Humans’ Unjust Dominance Over Animals.

Human supremacy has discriminated against animals.  Exercising power over animals in order to favor human interests suggests that humanity does not believe that animals have rights. Animals should not be human property, or made to suffer, and inhumane and cruel treatment to animals should stop.  In most U.S. states, animals are regarded as property and are vastly unprotected by law. The latest 2019 federal law against torture to animals, The Preventing Animal Cruelty and Torture Act, or PACT Act, was signed into law during the Trump administration. Although it promises some legal progress for animal rights, this law still exempts scientific research, hunting, cruel slaughtering, amputation practices performed without anesthesia, neglect, and intensive overcrowding of farm animals. Moreover, it is very complicated to prosecute animal cruelty because state laws for the protection of animals are different from federal law. State laws are mostly inconsistent and ineffective because they fail to define cruelty acts. Some states deem the torture of animals to be just a misdemeanor; therefore, they need to update their current laws in accordance with federal law. Cattle and other farm animals that suffer confinement and amputations are not covered under this legislation. Instead, chickens, cows, and pigs are inhumanely kept in filthy, overcrowded conditions until cruel slaughter. This clearly shows that the human interests reign supreme over the rights of animals. In addition, the PACT Act does not go far enough to prohibit animals being inhumanely used for entertainment purposes. In the United States, people imprison wild animals in cages at zoos with the excuse that it is educational. People also hunt animals for mere entertainment which are poached for their body parts. Animals all over the world are threatened by humanity because they do not have equal consideration as humans. It is unethical to exploit animals to satisfy human needs or pleasure, and to take an animal for granted. There was a time when humanity needed to hunt animals in order to survive, but they did so at a sustainable level. Nowadays, not only do people have the technology and means to survive well beyond just basic needs, but progress could mean humanity is getting closer to being more enlightened.  If we know more, and we know better, should humanity not be more humane?  Regrettably, the ethical and legal rights of animals are unprotected in today’s society.  

It is human supremacy which makes it so complicated for some people to declare which animals should be given rights comparable to those of humans. Generally, animal rights activists contend that animals with higher cognitive function and highly-developed nervous systems should be completely protected by state and federal laws against animal cruelty in the areas of bio-medical experimentation and intensive farming. Authors Cass R. Sunstein and Martha C. Nussbaum discuss the legal and philosophical sides to animal rights and animal welfare in their book Animal Rights: Current Debates and New Directions. As editors of this compilation of essays, they introduce the ideas of animal welfare advocates, who argue for stricter animal cruelty prevention laws, and those of animal rights activists who object to any and all use of animals for purposes of scientific experimentation, agriculture, or for any type of entertainment, such as circuses, zoos and rodeos. One of the arguments put forth in Sunstein’s and Nussbaum’s book includes the article, “Animal Rights: One Step at a Time,” by Steven M. Wise, who argues that man is not superior to animals, and animals are not property of mankind, so they should not be used or exploited for the benefit of humans. The author draws a parallel with slavery when he explains that “We can still learn from history the invaluable lesson that an enormously and powerful evil can be overcome. The first, most crucial, step will occur when judges begin recognizing that at least some nonhuman animals are entitled to recognition as legal persons” (Wise 54). He also writes that mankind has always felt superior to animals, and he states, “The idea that everything existed for the sake of humans was a core belief of the highly influential ancient Stoics, first in Greece, then in Rome, and was found in the Old Testament, law codes and other ancient law,” and he continues, “non humans were literally made for us. Savage beasts fostered our courage and trained us for war. Singing birds existed to entertain us. Cows and sheep kept our meat fresh. Lobsters fed us and provided us with exercise by cracking shells that doubled as nifty models for body armor. Lice made us adopt clean habits” (Wise 20). This could explain the general attitude of some people, like bio-research scientists who believe that experimentation on animals with sophisticated cognitive abilities, such as chimpanzees is not a criminal act. Further illustration of this point is that the majority of ancient Stoics believed that animals had life, could physically feel, had impulses, but they did not believe that animals had emotions, could act out with intentionality, could reason, believe, or had any memory except from the present (Wise 21). 

However, there are people who do not agree with animal rights activists. As Richard A. Posner illustrates in his essay, “Animal Rights: Legal, Philosophical, and Pragmatic Perspectives,” the counter-argument that some people will have is that just because humans and some animals share DNA, does not mean that people are indebted to them. Furthermore, emotional attachment to animals, and sympathy towards their pain is mistakenly channeling animal happiness to human happiness. Moreover, he adds that principles and decency are in the forum of public opinion (Posner 53). Values and beliefs are individual to each and every person, culture, and community, but the fact remains that animals with high cognitive brain function feel pain, suffering and emotion. Any type of situation where animals are subject to cruelty and loss of freedom should be forbidden. Posner concludes his essay with a very positive suggestion: “If enough people come to feel the sufferings of these animals as their own, public opinion and consumer preference will induce the business firms and other organizations that inflict such suffering to change their methods” (Posner 57). And a basic duty of all humans should be to provide all animals with a life where their rights are fully protected. 

It is unethical and cruel to commit an animal to living in a cage, and to inflict pain and fear on it for the sake of research. The actions that people take are representative of their values, principles, and what they believe is their purpose in life. All of these factors influence a course of action. Animals suffer and have feelings because they experience mental suffering and physical pain, and although the law allows for certain animal experimentation, this does not mean that it is ethically correct, or as binding as a person’s conscience. Animal welfare should not be subverted because people believe they have the right to exploit animals. In his article “Betraying Animals,” author Steve Cooke maintains that experimental research scientists deceive animals in order to exploit them. Scientists intentionally promote an unsuspecting environment to facilitate the animals’ comfort, and this leads to their eventual exploitation. He contends that in laboratory and agricultural settings, humans show their lack of principles because animals’ rights are compromised. Cooke interviewed a research primatologist who he questioned about the procedure of undermining the animals in order to gain their cooperation; the scientist was unable to respond that he believed the animals had freely chosen to participate in his experiments. The author asserts that “ My contention is that additional wrongness at play in the dynamic between research animals, technicians, and research animals lies in the way that trust is fostered in order that it be betrayed, and is an area that has been neglected by those writing about animal ethics” 

( Cooke 185). Furthermore, he writes that the objective of using animals in laboratory experiments is to determine if animals may be less afraid and more unguarded with humans in order to be easier to hurt and exploit, and for humans to reap added pleasure from eating them ( Cooke 197). A research scientist who deceives an animal in order to obtain a result is violating the animal’s rights. The Humane Society says that animal tests are outdated. They state that there are more sophisticated and accurate ways of doing experiments, such as using human cells and tissues, human simulator robots, or computer modelling; therefore, it is scientifically possible to take the suffering out of using animals for scientific experimentation. 

In creation myths, animals were viewed as equal by humans, such as in the culture of the Iroquois Native Americans or the African Bushmen. Animal sentience is recognized by federal governments in Canada, New Zealand, Tanzania and the Netherlands. Buddhists avoid eating meat, and animals are considered to be a symbol of acceptance, energy, wisdom, mental strength and enlightenment. In the United States, one of the most advanced countries in the world, it is shocking that the use of sentient animals used in testing is still not prohibited by federal law. In their article, “Examining the Ethics of Research in Animal Experimentation,” authors Christopher O.Akpan, Samuel A. Bassey, and Joseph N. Oger write that the reason why animals are used in laboratory experiments is due to humans’ demand for animal products, medical needs, and food requirements, and they examine the effects of the experimentation on the animals. The authors’ findings lead them to conclude that while using animals in experiments are justifiable, it is not necessarily ethical. They believe that the alternative method known as the “Three Rs,” which stands for replacement, reduction, and refinement, should be implemented by researchers in order to decrease the intensity of procedures on animals, as well as to decrease the number of animals used in laboratory experiments. However, they also believe that research can be accomplished without causing harm to animals, and they make suggestions, such as enriching the environments of the animals, anesthetics, pain management, and better-trained technicians to reduce the suffering of the animals. The authors illustrate the sequels animals used in laboratory experiments acquire, and they state, “Usually, after experimentation, animals are often burned, cut, addicted to drugs and infectious diseases often with no anesthesia. In various experiments, primates are deprived of food and water for up to 23 hours a day, are bound at the waist and neck in restraint chairs for up to 104 hours in a row, are subjected to electric shocks, electrodes, and other devices surgically attached and implanted” (Akpan et al. 236). They ask humans to imagine how the animals are forced to live in confinement without any power over their life, nor having choices of any kind, including when their life will cease to exist (Akpan et al. 237). It is unconscionable that human consumption is the cause of animal suffering because animals are not just resources that humans can use and abuse. Animals should be just as revered and vital to the planet as humans are. An animal should not be used for any purpose, even if it is for the greater good of humans. Self-aware animals, such as chimpanzees, cows, pigs, dolphins, whales, and all apes should be living in their own habitats, and with members of their own family.  When will humans draw the line?  

 Farm animals endure a torturous life in order to meet human demand for meat and dairy consumption. Killing animals and eating them cannot be justified; it is possible to get protein from other sources, such as legumes and nuts. People would be healthier and have lower cholesterol if they became vegetarian, and the environment would be better off because farming puts a great burden on the planet’s environment in terms of greenhouse gas emissions. But first and foremost, animals should have equal rights to humans, and they should not be tortured in order to meet the needs of humans. In their article, “Animal Farm & Ethics: A View of Rights Theory, by Kemi Anthony and Gregory A. Onah, the authors assert that farm animals have a moral right not to be treated cruelly or used for their meat because the interests of the animals are violated. They believe that intensively farmed animals are subjected to animal practices which make them suffer, such as overcrowded, cramped conditions where animals never see the light of day. Authors Anthony and Ohah also suggest an alternative, more humane farming method which could be more widely supported. In reference to animal cruelty, they write about how pigs are similar to dogs on a social and intelligence level; however, pigs are farmed intensively to satisfy human meat consumption. They state the following: “One of the behavioral abnormalities is so-called stereotypes, which are repetitive invariant behaviours, apparently without function. Stereotypes are often thought to develop as strategies to cope with the limited stimuli available in captivity. In pigs, stereotypes consist of bar-biting, head weaving, vacuum chewing, tail biting, rooting bare floor, and maintaining dog sitting position in relation to apathy” (Anthony and Onah 368). The authors contend that there are free-range options for consumers, and that complying with one’s own conscience is what must be heeded even if it means paying a bit more to support animal rights (Anthony and Onah 369). Animals instinctively want to live, survive, be free from pain and fear, live with their fellow animals, eat a natural diet, and they should be free from experimental medical procedures. If people carefully considered all of these facts, it would become clear that eating meat is morally wrong and insignificant for human survival.  

The exploitation of chimpanzees for the sake of  human advancement should be a criminal offense. Mahatma Gadhi once said, “the greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated” (PETA 2018). That is a very fitting statement for a country where pragmatism is the essential philosophy, whereby people willingly act upon their beliefs. Unfortunately, in the United States, scientific experiments using chimpanzees are still carried out in biomedical research and testing. Researchers say they can more effectively come to scientific conclusions using chimpanzees since they share 98% DNA with humans. The animal right’s activist group PETA, or People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, states in their website the disturbing fact that these beautiful, sentient, resourceful animals are still used in scientific research in two countries: The United States and Gabon. In her book, Through a Window: My Thirty Years with the Chimpanzees of Gombe, author and primatologist, Dr. Jane Goodall, relates her interpretation of the behavior of human’s closest relative, the chimpanzee. She points out the similarities of their brains and nervous systems to those of humans, and the biological traits which make them intellectually and emotionally similar to humans. Goodall illustrates how her extensive research with chimpanzees of the Gombe National Park in Tanzania helped people understand the true nature of chimpanzees when she states, “The opening of this window onto the way of life of our closest living relatives gives us a better understanding not only of the chimpanzees’ place in nature, but also of man’s place in nature. Knowing that chimpanzees possess cognitive abilities once thought unique to humans, knowing that they (along with other “dumb” animals) can reason, feel emotions and pain and fear, we are humbled” (Goodall 260). She writes about how Flint, one of the chimpanzees she was studying, died at the tender age of eight because he could not emotionally survive the loss of his mother. Goodall’s expertise and discoveries of chimpanzee’s social behavior were pioneering. Goodall describes chimpanzees as devoted, caring animals, who establish lifelong relationships with family members, understand the value of learning, using tools, making tools, collaboration with members of their group when hunting, and their cultivated ways of manipulating each other (Goodall 258). 

At the petition of the Animal Legal Defense Fund, a nonprofit organization which advocates for the interests of animals through the legal system, the National Institute of Health (NIH) no longer supports the use of chimpanzees in biomedical research since 2015 because it deemed the experiments using this animal as unethical and unnecessary. However, in some capacity, chimpanzees are still used to meet needs for federally funded research projects in the U.S. Furthermore, in 2015, the NIH declared that the chimpanzees that were used in experiments were to be transferred to animal sanctuaries, but this still has not happened for many of the animals. According to PETA, many chimpanzees have died in laboratory cages waiting to be transferred. Medical research companies and scientists who use chimpanzees, humankind’s closest relatives, for experiments and impose intentional physical and mental pain are criminal and cruel. Moreover, the cruelty towards these animals does not end with experimentation, animals are  still used for entertainment purposes in the 21st century. In some zoos, chimpanzees are made to live on man-made islands where they are surrounded by a moat; however, chimpanzees cannot swim, so their lives are put in danger.  Some circuses in the United States still use chimpanzees and other wild animals in their performances because state and federal regulations fail to protect wild animals. The Jane Goodall Institute states that in order to control the chimpanzees during circus training practices, the chimps are separated from their mothers at a very young age, and as they get older, they are controlled with shock collars and their teeth are removed. The cruelty that is imposed on some animals for entertainment purposes for humans has no justification. Nowadays children can learn about animals on the Internet. There is no philosophical or scientific defense for denying animals moral consideration. People who want to distinguish human beings from non-humans are interested in justifying practises that cause pain, discomfort, suffering, and death in animals. 

The evidence presented clearly shows that some species of animals are sentient and self- aware, such as chimpanzees and pigs. These animals should have moral and legal rights because they suffer and are conscious of their emotions. The law is not necessarily ethical or moral, but it is a basic standard which would outlaw violence towards animals. Even though animal cruelty, poaching and illegal hunting are penalized by federal and state law in the United States, the government is yet to produce a strong piece of legislation which would forbid the use of animals in testing, and prohibit the intensive farming of animals. Furthermore, if all laws were federally mandated, it would be much more effective because that would make wildlife laws applicable to all the states. At the present time, states mostly enforce laws that only apply domestic animal laws. It is not enough to just support an animal advocacy organization by donation, as many animal advocacy organizations are not non-profit. A great deal of these organizations use emotional advertising ploys to make money, and they are taking big salaries for themselves. However, there are many organizations that do wonderful work, but a little research is required to find out which ones are really making a difference for the animals. Fundamentally, the most important resource for the betterment of society is education. Consequently, it is extremely important for people as individuals to make a difference, and for children to learn values, principles, and the purpose of animals, at home or at school. Children can be taught that animals are equal to humans. They should be taught that animals are sacred, should be honored, have special status, and symbolize compassion, like in India, where cows are sacred and their mythology is used to affirm their pro-animal values. In the United States, domestic pets are the same as family members, and some people even celebrate their pets’ birthdays, so why cannot wild animals reach the same level of love and protection? In order to advance society, the aim of all humanity should be to promote happiness and pleasure; not harm and suffering of animals. 

                                              Works Cited

Akpan, Christopher O., et al. “Examining the Ethics of Research in Animal Experimentation.” Bulletin of Pure & Applied Sciences-Zoology, vol. 39A, no.1, Jan-Jun 2020, pp.230-241.  Ebscohost.

Animal Legal Defense Fund. “Ending Research on Captive Chimpanzees,” December 18, 2018,   aldf.org/case/ending-research-on-captive-chimpanzees/. Accessed April 14, 2021.

Anthony, Kemi, and Onah, Gregory Ajima. “Animal Farm & Ethics: A View of Rights Theory.” Bulletin of Pure & Applied Sciences -Zoology, vol. 39A no. 2,  Jul.-Dec. 2020,  pp. 367-378. EBSCOhost. 

Cooke, Steve. “Betraying Animals.” Journal of Ethics, vol. 23 No. 2, June 2019, pp. 183-200. EBSCOhost.  

Goodall, Jane. The Jane Goodall Institute UK. “Chimpanzees in Entertainment,” 2021, janegoodall.org.uk/chimpanzees/chimpanzee-central/15-chimpanzees/chimpanzee-central/27-chimpanzees-in-entertainment. Accessed April 14, 2021. 

Goodall, Jane. Through a Window: My Thirty Years with the Chimpanzees of Gombe. Soko Publications Limited, 1990.

Lee, Courtney G. “The PACT Act: A Step in the Right Direction on the Path to Animal Welfare.” JURIST – Academic Commentary, Dec. 1, 2019, jurist.org/commentary/2019/12/courtney-lee–pact-act/. Accessed April 20, 2021.

People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals. “Chimpanzees in Laboratories,” 2021, peta.org/issues/animals-used-for-experimentation/chimpanzees-laboratories/. Accessed April 14, 2021. 

People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, India. “These Mahatma Gandhi Quotes Will Inspire You,” October 2, 2018, petaindia.com/blog/mahatma-gandhi-quotes-on-animals/. Accessed April 14, 2021. 

Posner, Richard A. “Animal Rights: Legal, Philosophical, and Pragmatic Perspectives.” Animal Rights: Current Debates and New Directions, edited by Cass R. Sunstein, and Martha C. Nussbaum, Oxford University Press, 2004, pp.51-78.

Nussbaum, Martha C., and Sunstein, Cass R. Animal Rights: Current Debates and New Directions, Oxford University Press, 2004.

The Humane Society. “All Our Fights:Taking Suffering Out of Science,” 2021, humanesociety.org/all-our-fights/taking-suffering-out-science. Accessed April 19, 2021. 

United States, Department of Agriculture, National Agricultural Library. “Animal Welfare Act.” USDA, 2008, nal.usda.gov/awic/animal-welfare-act. Accessed April 20, 2021. 

Wise, Steven M. “Animal Rights: One Step at a Time.” Animal Rights: Current Debates and New Directions, edited by Cass R. Sunstein, and Martha C. Nussbaum, Oxford University Press, 2004.