Animals, Men And Morals
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''Animals, Men and Morals: An Inquiry into the Maltreatment of Non-humans'' (1971) is a collection of essays on
animal rights Animal rights is the philosophy according to which many or all Animal consciousness, sentient animals have Moral patienthood, moral worth independent of their Utilitarianism, utility to humans, and that their most basic interests—such as ...
, edited by Oxford philosophers Stanley and Roslind Godlovitch, both from Canada, and John Harris from the UK. The editors were members of the
Oxford Group The Oxford Group was a Christian organization founded by American Lutheran minister Frank Buchman in 1921, originally under the name First Century Christian Fellowship. Buchman believed that fear and selfishness were the root of all problems. ...
, a group of postgraduate philosophy students and others based at the University of Oxford from 1968, who began raising the idea of animal rights in seminars and campaigning locally against
factory farming Intensive animal farming, industrial livestock production, and macro-farms, also known as factory farming, is a type of intensive agriculture, specifically an approach to mass animal husbandry designed to maximize production while minimizing co ...
and otter hunting. The book was ground-breaking in its time, because it was one of the early publications in the mid-20th century that argued clearly in favour of animal liberation/animal rights, rather than simply for compassion in the way animals are used. The editors wrote in the introduction: "Once the full force of moral assessment has been made explicit there can be no rational excuse left for killing animals, be they killed for food, science, or sheer personal indulgence."


Origins

Apart from the Godlovitches and Harris, the group also included David Wood and sociology student Mike Peters. The Godlovitches had recently become
vegan Veganism is the practice of abstaining from the use of animal products and the consumption of animal source foods, and an associated philosophy that rejects the commodity status of animals. A person who practices veganism is known as a ve ...
on moral grounds, and soon after Harris and Wood met them, the latter were also persuaded that the case against exploiting animals was unanswerable, and they also became vegan. The group then began to raise the issue in lectures and seminars in moral philosophy at Oxford, and also began local campaigning against factory farming, otter hunting, and other animal exploitation issues. The initial inspiration for the book was the discovery of an article called "The Rights of Animals" by the novelist
Brigid Brophy Brigid Antonia Brophy (married name Brigid Levey, later Lady Levey; 12 June 19297 August 1995), was an English author, literary critic and polemicist. She was an influential campaigner who agitated for many types of social reform, including ...
, which had been published in ''The Sunday Times'' in October 1965. Brophy's piece was devastating in its brief and unsentimental statement of the case for animal rights. It began:
Were it to be announced tomorrow that anyone who fancied it might, without risk of reprisals or recriminations, stand at a fourth story window, dangle out of it a length of string with a meal (labelled 'Free') on the end, wait until a chance passer-by took a bite and then, having entangled his cheek or gullet on a hook hidden in the food, haul him up to the fourth floor and there batter him to death with a knobkerrie, I do not think there would be many takers.
It concluded:
In point of fact, I am the very opposite of an anthromorphiser. I don't hold animals superior or even equal to humans. The whole case for behaving decently to animals rests on the fact that we are the superior species. We are the species uniquely capable of imagination, rationality and moral choice – and that is precisely why we are under the obligation to recognise and respect the rights of animals.Brophy, Brigid. "The Rights of Animals," ''The Sunday Times'', 10 October 1965.
Soon after the Godlovitches and Harris read the article, the idea of creating a book, or symposium of articles, began to emerge. Much of what was written at that time about animal welfare was anthropomorphic and sentimental in tone. There was plainly a need for something which offered an alternative, in the form of a clear and rigorous philosophical and moral perspective. The group began to draw up a list of possible contributors. Members of the group went to London and visited Brophy, who was enthusiastic and agreed to contribute. Brophy then introduced the group to Richard D. Ryder, a clinical psychologist based in Oxford, who later agreed to write a piece on animal experimentation. The group began to visit publishers, and when they met Giles Gordon of Victor Gollancz, he persuaded them that they should themselves write chapters for the book, as well as better known authors, as this would make the whole more interesting. Gollancz also agreed to publish it. The editors were uncompromising in their Introduction:
Once the full force of moral assessment has been made explicit there can be no rational excuse left for killing animals, be they killed for food, science, or sheer personal indulgence...should the reader himself find no fault in the positions he will find in these pages he is, as a rational being, committed to act in accordance with them. Should he fail to do so, he can only have been terribly misled since childhood about the nature of morality.


Contents

The book contains essays by Ruth Harrison on
factory farming Intensive animal farming, industrial livestock production, and macro-farms, also known as factory farming, is a type of intensive agriculture, specifically an approach to mass animal husbandry designed to maximize production while minimizing co ...
; Muriel Dowding, founder of Beauty without Cruelty, on furs and cosmetics; Richard D. Ryder on
animal testing Animal testing, also known as animal experimentation, animal research, and ''in vivo'' testing, is the use of animals, as model organisms, in experiments that seek answers to scientific and medical questions. This approach can be contrasted ...
; and Terence Hegarty from the Fund for the Replacement of Animals in Medical Experiments on alternatives. John Harris writes about killing for food,
Maureen Duffy Maureen Patricia Duffy (born 21 October 1933) is an English poet, playwright, novelist and non-fiction author. Long an activist covering such issues as gay rights and animal rights, she campaigns especially on behalf of authors. She has receive ...
about hunting,
Brigid Brophy Brigid Antonia Brophy (married name Brigid Levey, later Lady Levey; 12 June 19297 August 1995), was an English author, literary critic and polemicist. She was an influential campaigner who agitated for many types of social reform, including ...
about the need for animal rights, Roslind and Stanley Godlovitch about the ethics, and
Leonard Nelson Leonard Nelson (; ; 11 July 1882 – 29 October 1927), sometimes spelt Leonhard, was a German mathematician, critical philosopher, and socialist. He was part of the neo-Friesian school (named after post-Kantian philosopher Jakob Friedrich Frie ...
(the German philosopher who died in 1927) about duties to animals. There are essays from David Wood and Michael Peters on the sociological position, and a postscript from Patrick Corbett, Professor of Philosophy at the University of Sussex. Corbett concluded with: "Let animal slavery join human slavery in the graveyard of the past!" It was in Ryder's article that the word "
speciesism Speciesism () is a term used in philosophy regarding the treatment of individuals of different species. The term has several different definitions. Some specifically define speciesism as discrimination or unjustified treatment based on an indivi ...
" made its first appearance in an independent publication. Ryder had first used it in 1970 in a privately printed pamphlet, entitled "Speciesism," which he had distributed around Oxford and sent to the colleges. He argued in the book that speciesism is as illogical as racism, writing that "species" and "race" are both vague terms, and asked: "If, under special conditions, it were one day found possible to cross a professor of biology with an ape, would the offspring be kept in a cage or in a cradle?"Ryder, Richard D. (1971). "Experiments on Animals," in ''Animals, Men and Morals''.


Reception

The book got into trouble from the moment of publication, because two animal experimenters named by the editors in Ryder's piece objected to what had been written about them. The publisher Gollancz was forced by the threat of legal action to pay damages, and to put an errata slip in all copies. In terms of public reception, the unusual and radical approach taken by the book meant that it created a small stir in the United Kingdom. John Harris was interviewed on the PM programme, and appeared on local television. The book was also reviewed in several papers and journals. But the way forward for animal rights as an issue was eventually to occur by a different route. The Australian philosopher
Peter Singer Peter Albert David Singer (born 6 July 1946) is an Australian moral philosopher who is Emeritus Ira W. DeCamp Professor of Bioethics at Princeton University. Singer's work specialises in applied ethics, approaching the subject from a secu ...
had come to vegetarianism through meeting the Godlovitches when he was a postgraduate student in Oxford, and gave critical feedback on Roslind Godlovitch's contribution to the book. It was in his review of the book for ''
The New York Review of Books ''The New York Review of Books'' (or ''NYREV'' or ''NYRB'') is a semi-monthly magazine with articles on literature, culture, economics, science and current affairs. Published in New York City, it is inspired by the idea that the discussion of ...
'' in 1973 that Singer first used the term "animal liberation," writing that "''Animals, Men and Morals'' is a manifesto for an Animal Liberation movement." The article prompted the ''New York Review'' to commission a book on the subject from Singer, which was published as '' Animal Liberation'' (1975), and which became one of the animal rights movement's canonical texts.Singer, Peter
"Animal liberation"
''The New York Review of Books'', Volume 20, Number 5, 5 April 1973. *Singer, Peter. ''Animal Liberation''. New York Review/Random House, 1975.


See also

*For a recent and detailed account of the history of the Oxford Group and the publication of Animals, Men and Morals see The Oxford Group and the Emergence of the Animal Rights Movement, R. Garner and Y Okuleye, OUP December 2020. *
Henry Stephens Salt Henry Shakespear Stephens Salt (; 20 September 1851 – 19 April 1939) was a British writer and social reformer. He campaigned for social reform in the fields of prisons, schools, economic institutions, and the treatment of animals. He was a n ...
*
List of animal rights advocates Advocates of animal rights believe that many or all Animal consciousness, sentient animals have moral worth that is independent of their utility for humans, and that their most basic interests—such as in avoiding suffering—should be afforded ...


Notes

{{Portal bar, Books, Animals 1971 non-fiction books Books about animal rights Ethics books Contemporary philosophical literature