Meat consumption and other forms of animal exploitation have led to many ethical concerns in the US and other parts of the world. As human beings have human rights, animals deserve to be respected and protected in society. Actions such as exploiting animals for meat, fur, foie gras, and veal are unethical practices against animals. This study will analyze the potential arguments and counter-arguments for why animal rights should be upheld.
Crush believes that it is important to advocate for animal rights so that they may also live in a free world from use and abuse. The author suggests that people should adopt a vegan universe whereby there is no mistreatment of animals for their by-products. One of the main arguments by the author is that adopting animal rights would challenge the general worldview of animals being mindless creatures. The author argues that animals have feelings and that the use of animals for food, research, and pets is cruel and unjust to them. The other argument is that stopping the act of animal exploitation would solve the myriad environmental problems, such as the emission of greenhouse gases, water pollution, deforestation, and air pollution. As humans have rights against suffering, animals should also have rights against exploitation and cruelty to save the environment. The third argument is that eating substitute protein sources such as lab-grown meat and pineapple leather would eliminate the toxic industries allowing a clean environment. Finally, the author argues that animal species also require moral respect. The animals suffer when they are slaughtered, confined, or tormented because they are alive, only that they are a different species from humans.
One of the main counterarguments against animal rights is that some predators eat other animals. Therefore, humans also rely on meat and should not be denied the right to hunt for their meat like other predators. Predators like lions need an essential component called Amino acid which can only be obtained from eating meat from other animals (Stucki, 2020). Additionally, lions use cruel methods for killing their prey and even play with their food without eating it. No research has shown that predators feel sorry for their prey. Therefore, human beings should not feel sorry for exploiting animals for their use because this seems like the natural order.
Another counter-argument is that pets will become extinct if animal rights are upheld. Animal rights advocate for the freedom of every animal, including cows, cats, dogs, and horses, and this means that they have to be released to the wild to live on their own. There is already a powerful bond between people and pets, such as cats and dogs. Some people even communicate with their animals, enjoying each other’s company. Therefore sending these animals back to the wild would be mistreatment because they are not even used to hunting on their own (Stucki, 2020). This implies that they cannot survive independently, and they would starve and face the risk of other predators in the wild. For instance, broiler chickens grow so big that they develop joint problems, making it difficult to survive independently (Stucki, 2020). Therefore sending these animals to the wild would be killing them instead of saving them. This shows that animal rights would lead to the extinction and death of pets worldwide.
Despite vegans fighting for human rights and justice, they also cause harm to animals. It is impossible to live on the planet without causing harm to an animal or living creature (Stucki, 2020). Vegans need plenty of space and land to grow their crops, which can only be found by clearing more bush and transforming it into farmland. This action displaces animals from their original habitat, against animal rights. According to the animals’ rights, animals should be allowed to live freely in their natural habitat without any interference (Stucki, 2020). Additionally, vegans also exploit animals by using products that come from animals, such as car-tires come from animals, and the pollution they cause while driving affects the animals’ environment. Although vegans are working on a plan to ensure that they leave as small a carbon print as possible, living in the current world is impossible without interfering with animals. Therefore, vegans should seek a comprehensive solution to the problem of animal rights and ensure that they also focus on the indirect ways of harming animals.
The strongest objection is that predators eat animals for survival, so humans also need to depend on animals too. Predators are living creatures, so their dependence on animals’ meat cannot be stopped. Therefore, if it is impossible to stop predators from eating meat, it would be unjust to stop human beings from feeding on animal meat. Additionally, this shows that life is a food chain process; therefore, interdependence is essential for existence.
Although activists advocating for animal rights have their arguments, relying entirely on a world without animals seems impossible. Some of the reasons that show it is difficult to stop animal exploitation are; that predators feed on other animals, pets would become extinct, and vegans cause harm to animals. This shows that it is difficult and almost impossible for humans to live without depending on animals for their survival.
References
Stucki, S. (2020). Towards a Theory of Legal Animal Rights: Simple and Fundamental Rights. Oxford Journal of Legal Studies, 40(3). Web.