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I had some animal day inspiration today. This morning I saw a clip from a documentary and it raised questions about how I myself actually view animal rights and animal suffering. And also how my own worldview is related to that. For example, are we animals among animals? Is there a hierarchy among animals? And what does it mean to speak about animal rights from a naturalistic viewpoint (and which animals? Dog or mosquito, fish or bacteria). And from a purely evolutionary vision, can you speak about the protection of other animal species; after all, it's about the survival of one's own species (thus using other species as food). Or is there some moral consideration here that transcends natural selection (survival of the fittest)?
And for myself, what are the moral considerations for the benefit of the animal that humans have responsibility for? Should there be animal rights? If so; does this involve mistreatment, or killing and eating? And then which animals should receive this judicial protection? How to deal with abundance and the associated waste?
Giving an animal a good life and then slaughtering it and eating it seems better to me than giving the animal a bad life and eating it. But isn't not eating the animal even better? I think the animal thinks so. And why do we feel more strongly that we shouldn't eat a horse, dog or cat, and we should eat a pig, chicken or cow? Isn't that much more our taste and the humanizing of (domesticated) species than a moral consideration? Isn't it a crazy idea to kill a cow in order to be able to give the bone to the dog as a treat on Animal Day?
I should add that ik itself admittedly vegan foodBut not necessarily from the motivation against eating meat. But I am becoming more and more aware that there are many contradictions around animal husbandry and meat consumption. Maybe I'll elaborate, but for now I'll leave it at a few textual stimuli that came to mind today:
Also read the blog 'Vegetarians, vegans and me' of Erwin de Ruiter.
