OT: For those who are opposed to hunting.

[Jerry Freeman]

Excellent comment, James.

Best wishes,
Jerry

[jim stone]

It's easy to try to make animal
rights people the issue--their priorities are
skewed, etc. This may or may not be true, but
at the end of the day it's worth returning to
the subject of our responsibilities
to animals.

The argument these folks are giving, which
surely comes from the philosopher Peter Singer,
goes something like this:

1. Animals have rights and interests that deserve
respect. Animal rights means that animals deserve certain kinds of consideration—consideration of what is in their own best interests regardless of whether they are cute, useful to humans, or an endangered species and regardless of whether any human cares about them at all (just as a mentally-challenged human has rights even if he or she is not cute or useful or even if everyone dislikes him or her). It means recognizing that animals are not ours to use—for food, clothing, entertainment, or experimentation.

2. There may be desperate circumstances where human
needs entitle us to exploit animals (e.g. nothing else
to eat, etc.); otherwise their rights
ought to be respected. Generally we are not in those
circumstances.

Therefore

3. For most of us, our treatment of animals is seriously
unjust (in something like the way that slavery
was unjust).

The Biblical response is weak, in my opinion, for several
reason. First, obviously, it won't persuade the non-religious.
second, the 'dominion' statement doesn't warrant exploiting
animals; it can just as well be read as maintaining that we are
responsible for protecting their interests. The rest of
the passage appears to tell us to eat vegies.

Genesis 9: 1-4 (after the flood) explicitly gives
permission to eat animals--but when? This is
addressed to people who are often without agriculture,
largely nomadic, who have little else to eat.
It needn't be read as license to eat animals
because we like the way they taste. There has
long been within Judaism a vegetarian
movement, plenty of vegetarian restaurants among
the orthodox. We are entitled, in light of evolving
moral sensibiliteis, to read the passage in a careful way;
certainly this does no violence to it. If so,
the Bible's view and PETA's are close.

The crucial premise in PETA's argument seems
to be the first. The idea is that refusing to
allow that animals have a moral right not
to be exploited, while
insisting that defective humans less clever
than many animals do have them, is akin to racism
and sexism. Best

[TelegramSam]

Furthermore, hunters are harming animals other than the ones they kill and take home. Those who don't die outright often suffer disabling injuries. Additionally, the stress that hunting inflicts on animals—the noise, the fear, and the constant chase—severely restricts their ability to eat adequately and store the fat and energy they need to survive the winter.

I could die laughing at this. Most prey animals have evolved over thousands of years with constant pressure from preditors. They are always on the alert wether it's people or lions they're running from. This is so silly one must wonder what this crackpots are smoking...

[kevin m.]

Degenerate offspring, all the same. Bolsheviks tried to eradicate them in 1917, but stopped short of London. We cornered one under a Paris bridge a few years ago, but one alone was petty of us: they knnnigggets reproduce faster.

Well we've got plenty of empty mineshafts here 'up North'.You French had the right idea in 1789,Zub
Then again,we could always put them up for auction on E-Bay

[Walden]

Degenerate offspring, all the same. Bolsheviks tried to eradicate them in 1917, but stopped short of London. We cornered one under a Paris bridge a few years ago, but one alone was petty of us: they knnnigggets reproduce faster.

Well we've got plenty of empty mineshafts here 'up North'.You French had the right idea in 1789,Zub

*shudder*

[Parcour25]

Just for context, not that it will change any opinions, but factually, whitetail and almost all mule deer were extinct in N.America by the 40's 50's.... same as buffalo. I understand that sportsmen supplied the funding for reintroduction, everyone who has enjoyed the sight of deer in the wild owes somebody a thought of appreciation. They didn't repopulate by themselves.

[sturob]

It's unfortunate that PETA had to come up, I think. I know why; the link in Sara's original post was to a PETA site. I would like to think that the problem people have with Prince William spearing an animal would be separate from PETA.

What right do groups of ecoterrorists like PETA have to draw the line at mammals/plants/fish, etc.? Do PETA members take antibiotics? Or if they do, do they take ANYTHING or buy ANYTHING that was tested on animals? That axes all of medicine and a lot of foods.

Sorry. PETA is a nerve for me. Their founder worked in a primate lab and his famous videotape of the animals being "tortured" in medical experiments was a total hoax. He himself put the animals into equipment incorrectly so that they'd look like they were being tortured. Then he "liberated" the lab.

If you have problems with hunting, that's one thing. If you want people to listen to your message, please don't invoke PETA.

Stuart

[jluckett]

The world is full of irony.

Deer, which we tend to think of as possessing good mothering skills and some sort of caring relationship with other deer, are actually quite ruthless toward each other. Rather than share food, a strong deer will starve a weak one every time.

Wolves, on the other hand, are a quite different story. They have excellent mothering skills, they hunt and share food as a pack, they pick primarily the old and sick from their prey to bring down for food, they care for each other, and they all grieve when a pack member dies.

Our place in nature is that of a predator: closer to the wolf's role than the deer--however, we often act more like the deer. While it's true that mankind's relationship to the natural world--at least that of Western civilization--hasn't been one to be very proud of, a far worse problem is man's inhumanity toward his own kind.

--James

Excellent point!

I'm a former member of PETA, but let my membership lapse about 15 years ago because I got tired of watching them give very one-sided versions of every story they told. They rarely, if ever, bother with all of the facts involved in a story. Case in point: The Prince William story that started all of this.

PETA sends horribly graphic photos out to those who are already members. This is like running around your living room and handing out flyers.

They've done some good things, such as getting several companies to stop testing products on animals. (Don't know how you folks feel about it, but my first thought is that I'm not that similar physiologically to a guinea pig, rat, rabbit, dog or cat! What works on them may not work on humans.) There are a lot better, more reliable methods of product testing available.

But they've also been responsible for a lot of stupid things, as well. For instance, does anyone here really believe that throwing a bucket of red paint on someone wearing a fur coat will make them change their mind about wearing fur?!

If PETA wants to be taken seriously by the masses, they have to start educating the public about what goes on and include all of the facts, not just those that make their story more horrific. They lose credibility by doing that... if they have any left at this point.

Okay. I'm done with the soapbox. Who wants it next?

[jim stone]

Here's PETA on animal experimentation.
Please remember that weirdos and hypocrits can
speak the truth.

Frequently Asked Questions


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

"Hasn’t every major medical advance been attributable to experiments on animals?"
Medical historians have shown that improved nutrition, sanitation, and other behavioral and environmental factors—not anything learned from animal experiments—are responsible for the decline in deaths since 1900 from the most common infectious diseases and that medicine has had little to do with increased life expectancy. Many of the most important advances in health are attributable to human studies, among them anesthesia; bacteriology; germ theory; the stethoscope; morphine; radium; penicillin; artificial respiration; antiseptics; the CAT, MRI, and PET scans; the discovery of the relationships between cholesterol and heart disease and between smoking and cancer; the development of x-rays; and the isolation of the virus that causes AIDS. Animal testing played no role in these and many other developments.

"But many treatments we have today were developed on animals—like polio vaccines, for instance."
In fact, two separate bodies of work were done on polio—the in vitro work, which was awarded the Nobel Prize and which did not involve animals, and the subsequent animal tests, in which close to 1 million animals were killed and which the Nobel committee refused to recognize as anything more than wasteful. Also, polio died out just as quickly in areas of the world that did not use the vaccine as in the United States.

However, certainly, some medical developments were discovered through cruel animal tests. But just because animals were used doesn't mean they had to be used or that primitive techniques that were used in the 1800s are valid today. It's impossible to say where we would be if we had declined to experiment on animals, because throughout medical history, very few resources have been devoted to non-animal research methods. In fact, because animal experiments frequently give misleading results with regard to human health, we'd probably be better off if we hadn't relied on them.

"Scientists have the responsibility to use animals to keep looking for cures for the diseases people suffer from."
More human lives could be saved and more suffering spared by educating people on the importance of avoiding fat and cholesterol, quitting smoking, reducing alcohol and other drug consumption, exercising regularly, and cleaning up the environment than by all the animal tests in the world. Animal tests are primitive, and besides, we have modern technology and human clinical tests.

Even if it could be proved that we have no alternative to using animals—which it can’t—as George Bernard Shaw once said, "You do not settle whether an experiment is justified or not by merely showing that it is of some use. The distinction is not between useful and useless experiments, but between barbarous and civilized behavior." After all, there are some medical problems that can probably only be cured by testing on unwilling people, but we don’t do it, because we recognize that it would be wrong.

"If we couldn’t use animals, wouldn’t we have to test new drugs on people?"
The choice isn’t between animals and people. There’s no guarantee that drugs are safe just because they’ve been tested on animals. Because of the physiological differences between humans and other animals, results from animal tests cannot be accurately extrapolated to humans, leaving us vulnerable to exposure to drugs that can cause serious side effects.

Ironically, unfavorable animal test results do not prevent a drug from being marketed for human use. So much evidence has accumulated about differences in the effects that chemicals have on animals and humans that government officials often do not act on findings from animal studies. In the last two decades, many drugs, including phenacitin, Eferol, Oraflex, Suprol, and Selacryn, were taken off the market after causing hundreds of deaths and/or injuries. In fact, more than half the drugs the Food and Drug Administration approved between 1976 and 1985 were either removed from the market or relabeled because of serious side effects. If the pharmaceutical industry switched from animal experiments to quantum pharmacology and in vitro tests, we would have greater protection, not less.

"If we didn’t test on animals, how would we conduct medical research?"
Human clinical and epidemiological studies, cadavers, and computer simulators are faster, more reliable, less expensive, and more humane than animal tests. Ingenious scientists have developed, from human brain cells, a model "microbrain" with which to study tumors, as well as artificial skin and bone marrow. We can now test irritancy on egg membranes, produce vaccines from cell cultures, and perform pregnancy tests using blood samples instead of killing rabbits. As Gordon Baxter, cofounder of Pharmagene Laboratories (a company that uses only human tissues and computers to develop and test drugs) says, "If you have information on human genes, what’s the point of going back to animals?"

"Animal experimentation helps animals, too, by advancing veterinary science."
This is like saying it’s acceptable to experiment on poor children to benefit rich ones. The point is not whether animal experimentation can be useful to animals or humans; the point is that we do not have the moral right to inflict unnecessary suffering on those who are at our mercy.

"Don’t medical students have to dissect animals?"
No, they don’t. In fact, more and more medical students are becoming conscientious objectors, and many students now graduate without having used animals; instead they learn by assisting experienced surgeons. In Great Britain, it is against the law for medical students to practice surgery on animals, and British physicians are as competent as those educated elsewhere. Many of the leading U.S. medical schools, including Harvard, Yale, and Stanford, now use innovative, clinical teaching methods instead of old-fashioned animal laboratories. Harvard, for instance, offers a Cardiac Anesthesia Practicum, where students observe human heart bypass operations, instead of dog labs; the Harvard staff who developed it have recommended that it be implemented elsewhere.

"Should we throw out all the drugs that were developed and tested on animals? Would you refuse to take them?"
Unfortunately, a number of things in our society came about through others’ exploitation. For instance, many of the roads we drive on were built by slaves. We can't change the past; those who have already suffered and died are lost. But what we can do is change the future by using non-animal research methods from now on.

"Aren’t the animals protected by the law from cruelty?"
There is no law in this country that prohibits any experiment, no matter how frivolous or painful. The Animal Welfare Act is very weak and poorly enforced. The Act does not include rats and mice, even though they are the most commonly used animals. Also, the law does not include cold-blooded animals, birds, or animals traditionally used for food. It is basically a housekeeping act; it doesn’t prohibit any type of experiment on animals in laboratories—they can be starved, electrically shocked, driven insane, or burned with a blowtorch—as long as it's done in a clean laboratory.

"Most scientists care about animals—they have to, because their research depends on the animals’ well-being."
Investigations at our most prestigious institutions show that this is simply not the case. At the City of Hope in California, one of the country’s most prominent research facilities, animals starved to death and drowned in their own feces "by accident." Many experimenters become calloused after years of research and don't see the animals’ suffering—they treat animals as disposable tools for research. Improvements in the animals’ care are fought as "too expensive."

"What about peer review and animal care committees at institutions?"
Many such committees are composed mainly or totally of people with vested interests in the continuation of animal experimentation. It has taken lawsuits to permit public access to committee meetings.

"Aren’t cats and dogs killed in pounds anyway? Why not let them be used in experiments to save lives?"
A painless death at an animal shelter is a far cry from a life of severe pain and deprivation in a laboratory before being killed by experimenters.

"Would you allow an experiment that would sacrifice 10 animals to save 10,000 people?"
Suppose the only way to save those 10,000 people was to experiment on one mentally-challenged orphan. If saving people is the goal, wouldn't that be worth it? Most people will agree that it is wrong to sacrifice one human for the "greater good" of others because it would violate that individual’s rights. But when it comes to sacrificing animals, the assumption is that human beings have rights while animals do not. Yet there is no logical reason to deny animals the same rights that protect individual humans from being sacrificed for the common good.

"What about experiments that don't harm animals but simply observe them?"
If there really is no harm, we don't object. But "no harm" means that the animals aren’t kept isolated in barren, cold steel cages, because the stress and fear of confinement are harmful, as shown by the differences in blood pressure between caged and free animals. Caged animals also suffer by being prevented from performing their normal behaviors and social interactions.

"If you were in a fire and could save only your child or your dog, whom would you choose?"
I would save my child, but that’s just instinct. A dog would save her pup. Regardless of whom I save, however, my choice proves nothing about the moral legitimacy of experimenting on animals. I might save my own child instead of my neighbor’s, but that hardly proves that experimentation on my neighbor’s child is acceptable.

[chas]

Stuart, you said, possibly a little more vehemently, just what I was gonna say. PETA is simply not a mainstream organization.

Jluckett, I can certainly apreciate what you say, but what ARE the better, more reliable ways of testing products? I certainly agree that spraying hairspray or masquera in an animals eyes is wrong. But what about testing the potential lethality of drugs to treat cancer? Should we just begin with people, all of whom may die due to the product? I've often heard the argument that it can all be predicted by computers, which is absolutely laughable. We literally don't understand the helium atom completely, nevermind how some huge, really nasty molecule will behave in a human body somprising some number of cells that's probably 10 orders of magnitude greater than the number of electrons in a helium atom.

Also, there are some effective treatments out there that have arisen from research done on mice that are genetically engineered to develop cancer. These have saved human lives and probably would have taken many years more if these GE mice hadn't been available, and possibly never would have been discovered had animal testing not been available at all.

[sturob]

Here's PETA on animal experimentation.
Please remember that weirdos and hypocrits can
speak the truth.

Frequently Asked Questions


"But many treatments we have today were developed on animals—like polio vaccines, for instance."
In fact, two separate bodies of work were done on polio—the in vitro work, which was awarded the Nobel Prize and which did not involve animals, and the subsequent animal tests, in which close to 1 million animals were killed and which the Nobel committee refused to recognize as anything more than wasteful. Also, polio died out just as quickly in areas of the world that did not use the vaccine as in the United States.

However, certainly, some medical developments were discovered through cruel animal tests. But just because animals were used doesn't mean they had to be used or that primitive techniques that were used in the 1800s are valid today. It's impossible to say where we would be if we had declined to experiment on animals, because throughout medical history, very few resources have been devoted to non-animal research methods. In fact, because animal experiments frequently give misleading results with regard to human health, we'd probably be better off if we hadn't relied on them.

First off, Jim, it's not helpful to copy en masse such a huge thing from a website. No matter what it's about. Just post a link.

Second, this stuff about polio is crap. Polio is still a problem in the underdeveloped, undervaccinated third world. Before my recent Africa trip I was required to get a polio booster.

I didn't quote the paragraph on medical advancements. That's full of lies too. No animal work went into artificial respiration? Do you realize the immense body of work, animal AND human, that went into developing ventilators?

Unfortunately the examples you chose to quote are not truth coming from the mouths of "weirdos and hypocrits," they're exactly the lies and half-truths that jluckett mentioned.

Stuart

[sturob]

And Chas! Thanks for bringing up the other point.

No, there aren't really viable alternatives to animal testing for a lot of research. And, that's unfortunate. But our (US) current administration and political climate seem to be so scared of stem cell research that it will probably take a regime change before we CAN develop good cell lines for testing . . .

Stuart

[TelegramSam]

The main theme of PETA is propaganda. It's no different from the junk the gov't put out during the Cold War. Duck and cover indeed.

PETA does not care about facts, they simply care about swaying the rest of humanity to their world view and if they have to lie to do it, they'll lie through their teeth with a smile. Frankly, I cannot take anyone who is a PETA member or sympathizer seriously, as anyone who swallows such lies has to be a total sap or a zealot.

Why you people are even copying text from them to use as evidence for anything is beyond me. A decades-old pinto is more reliable.

[jluckett]

Chas, try this link for more info on alternative testing methods:

http://www.allforanimals.com/alternatives1.htm (This link addresses product testing only.)

or just run a search for "alternatives to animal testing". You'll find lots of links.

If you'll notice, I specifically wrote about product testing rather than including medical testing. As much as I hate to see animals used in any kind of testing, you're right. A lot of cures and treatments have been developed for humans... and animals... as a result of medical tests involving animals. I don't like it, but until something that's proven to be just as reliable comes along I don't see how it can be stopped. The good news is that the medical community is working on developing alternatives, such as computer analysis, cell cultures, etc.

Oh, MAN! When they find a viable alternative we'll all have to go back to arguing about high-end vs. low-end whistles!

[jim stone]

First off, Jim, it's not helpful to copy en masse such a huge thing from a website. No matter what it's about. Just post a link.

Hi Stuart, Why isn't it helpful?

Second, this stuff about polio is crap. Polio is still a problem in the underdeveloped, undervaccinated third world. Before my recent Africa trip I was required to get a polio booster.

Probably you are right about that claim. What about the other things they
said about polio?

I didn't quote the paragraph on medical advancements. That's full of lies too. No animal work went into artificial respiration? Do you realize the immense body of work, animal AND human, that went into developing ventilators?

I don't think they're talking about ventilators but CPR. What are the lies?

Unfortunately the examples you chose to quote are not truth coming from the mouths of "weirdos and hypocrits," they're exactly the lies and half-truths that jluckett mentioned

I don't think you've shown that. Personally I expect
that animal experiments are more useful than they are
making out, though having been involved in animal
experiments myself (cats, I had to clean the festering
wounds that never healed, until we beheaded them),
I believe there is considerable truth in what they are saying.
I'm especially interested in what they say about the
moral issues.

If you look back at my initial post, I questioned
their fairness about Prince William. I don't
like these folks so well myself,
but I think in
these passages I've quoted
there is something rather better going on, somethng
more sincere, that deserves to
be engaged and not so quickly dismissed--which doesn't
mean that it's true or that none of it is badly flawed.
Worth reading with a certain charity and attention
to the forest, I believe, before one responds. Best, Jim