A Sound Defense For Animal Rights Zealots

Most think of animals as objects whose mere purpose is to serve our desires and whims, whether for the taste of their flesh, the feel of their fur and skin, or the profit that can be made from either. Perhaps we, the people, should rethink the multitude of ways we use animals for our purposes and endeavor to minimize their pain, discomfort, and ultimate demise in performing such necessary functions as research and agriculture. If we are indeed all created equal, as Lincoln said, would that not hold true for animals as fellow inhabitants of Earth? From this line of thought, humans do not necessarily have the right to test animals to serve our own desires and whims.

In terms of sheer utilization, animals today are more valuable than ever before. We not only eat, ride, shoot, wear, trap, hunt, and farm animals, but the medical field experiments on over 17 million animals per year.

While animal testing is almost a necessary evil for the well-being of humankind, there are still steps that can be taken to ensure that animal welfare is first in the mind of researchers, such as boycotts and protests. The humane treatment of animals in all of our animal-related endeavors — carefully judging which are necessary and which are not — should be our ultimate goal. After all, if we as humans can’t be humane, who can?

Granted, most people recognize the fact that what we do to animals, one could never conscionably do to humans. As individuals, we each acknowledge certain rights that prevent us from being eaten, worn, or experimented on by other people. What we don't realize — until we really examine our beliefs about animals — is that rights cannot belong exclusively to human beings. A cow killed, skinned, dismembered, and ground up is instantly beef or leather. A laboratory rat, an individual being itself, is reduced to a "research tool" or "model". Though a hard — if not impossible — concept to grasp, like humans, animals are sentient, meaning they are able to experience pain and suffering and lead emotional lives. They are simply in laboratories because we as humans have the ability to put them there. Rhesus monkeys currently being experimented on at Cal are forced to undergo cataract surgery after being subjected to distorted vision incurred by a human-planted opaque contact lens. After a period of time, the primates are killed and then cranially dissected to measure brain adaptation that has taken place (Cowley 52). Such activity is merely the consummation of years of animal neglect by researchers, says naturalist Roger Caras. “They (animals) have the right not to hav

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