Michael Vick and Dog Fighting

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Michael Vick and Dog Fighting

I am watching the whole sorry spectacle of Michael Vick and dogfighting unfold and I have a host of different feelings. The unusual part for me is that none of them are positive emotions. This is extremely rare in my life on contemplating a current affair. Here are a few observations.

I don't like spilling blood for sport, so I don't like dog-fighting by default. However I do not find myself to be howling in moral outrage like the rest of the country seems to be doing. If some people need to get their jollies by watching blood spill, death and gore—the real thing, not what gets cooked up in Hollywood as make-believe (to scratch that itch)—I much prefer that they hunt, do these kinds of things, work at a slaughterhouse, etc., rather than construct a stadium and watch human gladiators go at it. Or worse, murder folks or make war.

However, I am in favor of laws that prohibit dog-fighting, cock-fighting, bear-baiting, etc. I don't want to live around people who use real death and maiming for entertainment and gambling, even if it only involves animals and not humans. I think the risk factor is too high for comfort that such a person will decide to resolve his problems with people violently if he gets too impatient (or drunk or whatever).

The connection between Michael Vick as a football player and Michael Vick as a dog fight enthusiast is nonexistent. People who do not want him to play football anymore—forever and ever amen—because of the dog fighting are letting their rage and hatred cloud their reason.

But, as a sports entertainer, I can understand him being removed from the major leagues. Both kids and adults get really attached to their dogs, so the idea of watching—as entertainment—the performance of a man who kills dogs for entertainment and gambles on their lives is a turn-off. And that is literally what would happen if Vick continued playing without any remedy. People would literally turn off the TV channel where he was being broadcast and watch something else.

The sight of liberal animal-rights promoting TV commentators looking at each other in perplexity while saying that there has been more outrage in the USA against Vick for dog fighting than against high profile celebrities for murder or rape against humans would be comical if it did not embody an unsettling truth. On one level, poeple have simply adopted what the media people have told them. People believed them. Emotionally, animals are now more important than humans (because they are helpless, I suppose... whatever). I am not at all comfortable with the implications of that, neither value-wise nor vulnerability to media-wise.

The issue is deeper, though. It goes beyond animal and human, and this side I find healthy. The wonderful part about dogs is that they express some of the best, most life-affirming, emotions human beings have: principally loyalty, joy and playfulness. The idea of transforming that into murderous rage for the hell of it—when it was not necessary for surviving—gives people the feeling that they are witnessing raw evil. Murderous rage is held up as a superior value over loyalty, joy and playfulness. That's one hell of a vision of what life is supposed to be like and, yes, that is evil. On this point, I am in agreement with them and I also feel great anger.

I am completely disgusted with people harping on and on about Vick's 130 million dollar contract and the sanctimonious self-righteousness with which they show satisfaction that he will not longer receive that. I am with Rand on this point. They are using an unpleasant event as an opportunity to let raw envy and hatred of the good for being good run rampant in their souls. Notice how they pompously set back on their haunches and proclaim that Michael Vick will not be allowed to do this or do that ... (you fill in the blank). Who in hell are they to say what Michael Vick should or should not do with his talent? He worked hard to develop his skill and I get literally nauseous at the thought of these petty little nobodies trying to strut around as superior to him because he made a piss-poor choice. I would like to see any one of them get on a football field with him and then start mouthing off.

I am also disgusted with Vick for his convenient religious conversion. I have no doubt about his sincerity, but I think he took that route because he is scared out of his mind, not because he suddenly became interested in spiritual enlightenment. Until he was busted, he sought his wisdom and spiritual guidance in dog fights. In a certain sense, even though it has no connection, my respect for him as a ball player has been reduced. It takes a lot of courage to do what he does on the playing field, but in another area of his life, one of the most important ones (his spiritual concerns), he is a total wimp and cop-out.

It's not the Christianity, either, that disgusts me. That's another discussion. It's Vick's embracing it immediately on being busted. With this gesture, he has cheapened his soul much more than he did by slaughtering dogs in public for fun and profit. He is using the sacred as a moral band-aid for getting caught dog fighting, for Christ sake, not as something vital to his existence as a human being.

What a mess. What a sorry, sorry-ass mess!

Michael

[Brant Gaede]

Vick got what he deserved. He's finished as a football player. Good riddance to him. A monument to hubris and stupidity. If he ever even looks cross-eyed at a dog again he should be thrown back in jail for a parole violation.

--Brant

[Chris Grieb]

I have no use for Michael Vick but there are questions about the law he was convicted with.

One lesson is when your friends tell you something is a sure thing get a second opinion.

I suspect he will have an easier time in prison but will have a lot of problems when he realizes that no one wants him for football.

One question for Brant: You believe in parole?

Edited August 28, 2007 by Chris Grieb

[Brant Gaede]

I have no use for Michael Vick but there are questions about the law he was convicted with.

One lesson is when your friends tell you something is a sure thing get a second opinion.

I suspect he will have an easier time in prison but will have a lot of problems when he realizes that no one wants him for football.

One question for Brant: You believe in parole?

It exists. Do you mean for Vick? I question jail, philosophically.

--Brant

Edited August 28, 2007 by Brant Gaede

[Chris Grieb]

Several states have abolished it including Virginia. I believe it is harder to get in federal system. Robert Bidinooto has written a book about the getting out of prison early system.

[Brant Gaede]

Several states have abolished it including Virginia. I believe it is harder to get in federal system. Robert Bidinooto has written a book about the getting out of prison early system.

I believe there is no federal parole. One gets a little time off for good behavior.

--Brant

[Chris Grieb]

Michael; I to found his finding Jesus laughable. I have seen reports that he blow off the NFL and the Falcons when the first raid occurred. Only later did he find his Bible. I guess it could have been worse he could have the "bitch set me up."

Edited August 29, 2007 by Chris Grieb

[Barbara Branden]

The indication that Vick's "apology" is worth approximately the value of a $2.00 bill is that he kept referring to the fact that he starved dogs to death and bashed their heads against concrete as "a mistake."

Michael, I too prefer that if people enjoy watching blood spill, they do it by hunting rather than by killing people. (I'm tempted to say I'd like it still better if half of them hunted down the other half.) But that preference does not stop me from feeling intense moral outrage at anyone who takes pleasure in inflicting agony on defenseless creatures. And, in fact, children who torture animals -- as psychologists who study serial killers attest - very often grow up to be killers of human beings. Ir's not an accident.

Barbara

[Chris Grieb]

Barbara;

Torturing animals and setting fires are things that psychologists always look for in child killers.

I hate to say but some people will buy his explanation.

[Barbara Branden]

Chris, some people will buy anything -- including the Brooklyn Bridge.

Barbara

[Chris Grieb]

Barbara; Don't you mean three dollar bill. There has sometimes been a two dollar bill.

[Jonathan]

Barbara; Don't you mean three dollar bill. There has sometimes been a two dollar bill.

Indeed there has. It's currently a denomination of American currency. It was reintroduced in 1976, and since then I've often received two dollar bills in birthday cards because relatives knew that I shared Jefferson's birthday.

The funny thing is that some stores don't take them, or at least their employees will have to ring for the manager to verify that there's really such a thing as a two dollar bill.

J

[Judith]

The connection between Michael Vick as a football player and Michael Vick as a dog fight enthusiast is nonexistent. People who do not want him to play football anymore—forever and ever amen—because of the dog fighting are letting their rage and hatred cloud their reason.

Suppose we change "dog fight enthusiast" to "child molester":

"The connection between Michael Vick as a football player and Michael Vick as a child molester is nonexistent. People who do not want him to play football anymore—forever and ever amen—because of the child molesting are letting their rage and hatred cloud their reason."

Most people are unreasonably sentimental about children, and would be outraged about the above statement. Personally, I tend to see reason in it. But I tend to be unreasonably sentimental about dogs, and am outraged about your original statement.

I don't like spilling blood for sport, so I don't like dog-fighting by default. However I do not find myself to be howling in moral outrage like the rest of the country seems to be doing. If some people need to get their jollies by watching blood spill, death and gore—the real thing, not what gets cooked up in Hollywood as make-believe (to scratch that itch)—I much prefer that they hunt, do these kinds of things, work at a slaughterhouse, etc., rather than construct a stadium and watch human gladiators go at it. Or worse, murder folks or make war.

I'm not happy about people who hunt for any reason other than eating the meat. I live with the fact that people do it, but I don't like it. It shows an appalling lack of empathy.

However, I am in favor of laws that prohibit dog-fighting, cock-fighting, bear-baiting, etc. I don't want to live around people who use real death and maiming for entertainment and gambling, even if it only involves animals and not humans. I think the risk factor is too high for comfort that such a person will decide to resolve his problems with people violently if he gets too impatient (or drunk or whatever).

Is that all that matters? The collateral risk to humans? What about the animals themselves? Are they simply trash to be discarded without a second thought?

Animals are like us in many ways. The entire basis for empathy and concern for anyone other than ourselves is the recognition that others are like us.

Emotionally, animals are now more important than humans (because they are helpless, I suppose... whatever).

There's far more to it than that. Animals are "innocent". Lacking the capacity to be rational, they also lack the capacity to be irrational. Lacking the capacity to be moral, they also lack the capacity to be immoral. Therefore, they are much easier to love than are humans. We expect far less of them, and they don't disappoint us. They aren't a "fallen race". And, as you pointed out, they also embody many of our deepest values.

I don't agonize, as do so many objectivists, over any supposed "contradiction" between my love of animals and the supposed "doctrine" that there's no such thing as animal rights. I've reproduced below, along with the hyperlink to the article where I originally found it, an article that makes excellent commentary on the subject.

Judith

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

A Libertarian Replies to Tibor Machan's 'Why Animal Rights Don't Exist'

by David Graham

I find it strange that so many of my fellow libertarians and anarchists oppose and ridicule animal rights with such passion. For one thing, an animal right is perfectly libertarian in that it is a negative right. Unlike incoherent positive rights, such as the "right" to education or health care, the animal right is, at bottom, a right to be left alone. It does not call for government to tax us in order to provide animals with food, shelter, and veterinary care. It only requires us to stop killing them and making them suffer. I can think of no other issue where the libertarian is arguing for a positive right — his right to make animals submit to any use he sees — and the other side is arguing for a negative right!

Nor is libertarianism inconsistent with animal rights, unless one is an exponent of contractarianism, an ethical theory riddled with problems. The nonaggression principle states that it is morally wrong to initiate force against others (or their property), except in self-defense. The question is whether this principle applies to animals. Are animals part of the "moral community" that is covered by the nonaggression principle? In his recent essay "Why Animal Rights Don't Exist," Tibor Machan argues that animals cannot have rights, which is to say that the nonaggression principle cannot apply to animals. Does his argument succeed?

The Argument from Marginal Cases

For the rest of this essay, I will use "animal rights" as a shorthand to denote the simple claim that animals have a single right: The right not to be made to die and suffer by humans except in self-defense. If you have problems with the concept of a "right," you can also think of this position as being equivalent to the following proposition: "It is morally wrong to kill animals and make them suffer except in self-defense." The most powerful argument for this conclusion is the Argument from Marginal Cases.

So-called "marginal cases" are humans who lack the ability to reason or be held accountable for their actions but who are still considered part of the moral community and have a right not to be killed or made to suffer except in self-defense. (Philosophers also call such people moral patients.) This argument is so crucial to the animal rights debate that one philosopher, Daniel A. Dombrowski, has written a whole book about it called Babies and Beasts: The Argument from Marginal Cases.

I have never heard a satisfactory response to this stunning argument. It has convinced me — on a rational level — that it's morally wrong to kill animals or make them suffer except in self-defense. Pure Aristotelian logic powers the Argument from Marginal Cases. It demands simply that we treat like cases alike — or else cite a relevant difference between the cases. Here's how the Argument might work out in the course of a casual debate.

Opponent of animal rights: How can you say that animals have rights? It's impossible.

Proponent of animal rights: Why?

Opponent: For one thing, animals can't reason. They can't be held responsible for their actions. To have rights, you must have these capacities.

Proponent: Wait a minute. Infants can't reason. Does that mean it's open season on babies?

Opponent: Of course not. Infants will be able to reason someday. We must treat them as prospective rights-holders.

Proponent: But what if the infant is terminally ill and has only six months to live? What about a person who was born with part of his brain missing and has the mental capacity of a pig? What about a senile person? Is it OK to kill, eat, and otherwise use these people for our own ends, just as we now use pigs?

Opponent: Well . . . let me think about that.

Welcome to the Argument from Marginal Cases.

Given the revolutionary importance of this argument, I am shocked by the number of libertarians who ignore it when ridiculing animal rights. Maybe I shouldn't be surprised. It's a tough argument to deal with. Many times I have read an essay ridiculing animal rights and e-mailed the author to ask what his response is to the argument. Some of them respond, lamely, that being human is sufficient to have rights, period. Some dodge the issue. One or two authors admitted that they could not answer the argument, but they would not go so far as to agree flat-out that animals have the same rights as marginal humans.

Objectivists get especially excited when faced with the Argument from Marginal Cases. One time I e-mailed Edwin Locke, an Objectivist writer, in response to an essay he wrote ridiculing the notion of animal rights. Naturally, his essay made no mention of the Argument. When I explained it to him, Locke assured me that he had totally demolished the argument — in a recorded speech he gave several years earlier. If I wanted to hear it, he said, I should go to a Web site that sells Objectivist merchandise (he generously provided the link) and buy an audio tape of one of his talks. When I demanded to know why he couldn't just e-mail me his answer, he declared that he had no desire to talk with me further, that I had "misrepresented" his views, and he was "ending communication." As you can see, the Argument from Marginal Cases has the power to really rattle people.

The Argument from Species Normality

That's why I respect Professor Machan. Not only does he bring up the Argument from Marginal Cases; he also tries to address it, however briefly. He even has the intellectual honesty to admit that it is "the most telling point against" him. Does his rebuttal succeed? Here is the passage:

The most telling point against me goes as follows: "But there are people like very young kids, those in a coma, those with minimal mental powers, who also cannot be blamed, held responsible, etc., yet they have rights. Doesn't that show that other than human beings can have rights?"

This response doesn't recognize that classifications and ascriptions of capacities rely on the good sense of making certain generalizations. One way to show this is to recall that broken chairs, while they aren't any good to sit on, are still chairs, not monkeys or palm trees. Classifications are not something rigid but something reasonable. While there are some people who either for a little or longer while — say when they're asleep or in a coma — lack moral agency, in general people possess that capacity, whereas non-people don't. So it makes sense to understand them having rights so their capacity is respected and may be protected. This just doesn't work for other animals.

Machan seems to equivocate here. He starts out with the objection that includes people with "minimal mental powers," which includes people who are permanently deprived. But in his answer, he seems to shift to people who only temporarily lose their moral agency ("say when they're asleep or in a coma") and argues that we should "understand them as having rights so their capacity is respected and may be protected." But people who are permanently without moral agency have no such "capacity." Think of the senile, the congenitally retarded, the brain-damaged. These are the ones to whom the Argument from Marginal Cases applies. It does not apply to people who are asleep or in a coma from which they might someday awaken. Let us be clear about that.

How should we read Machan's broken-chair analogy? There is only one coherent way to interpret it. He is arguing that, just as a broken chair still belongs in the category of chairs, a marginal human still belongs in the category of humans. And because marginal humans belong to a species whose normal members can reason, have guilt, be held responsible for their actions — which Machan previously argued is a necessary condition for having any rights — the marginal members, too, deserve the same moral protections as those normal members. Here an implied premise lurks: Any member of a species most of whose members are moral agents has the same rights and protections as the normal members of that species. To put it more concisely: The moral status of an individual depends on what is normal for that individual's species. I will call this the Argument from Species Normality.

Why the Argument from Species Normality Fails

Does the Argument from Species Normality hold water? Does it destroy the Argument from Marginal Cases? The philosopher James Rachels addressed this argument in his essay " Darwin, Species, and Morality":

This idea — that how individuals should be treated is determined by what is normal for their species — has a certain appeal, because it does seem to express our moral intuition about defective humans. "We should not treat a person worse merely because he has been so unfortunate," we might say about someone who has suffered brain damage. But the idea will not bear close inspection. Suppose (what is probably impossible) that a chimpanzee learned to read and speak English. And suppose he eventually was able to converse about science, literature, and morals. Finally he wants to attend university classes. Now there might be various arguments about whether to permit this, but suppose someone argued as follows: Only humans should be allowed to attend these classes. Humans can read, talk, and understand science. Chimps cannot." But this chimp can do those things. "Yes, but normal chimps cannot, and that is what matters." Is this a good argument? Regardless of what other arguments might be persuasive, this one is weak. It assumes that we should determine how an individual is to be treated, not on the basis of its qualities, but on the basis of other individuals' qualities. This chimp is not permitted to do something that requires reading, despite the fact that he can read, because other chimps cannot. That seems not only unfair, but irrational. (p. 100, Animal Rights and Human Obligations, Tom Regan and Peter Singer, eds.).

Rachels's choice of a positive right — the "right" to attend a university — is unfortunate, but his point applies to any kind of right. He gives us a straight reductio ad absurdum. The denial of rights for our super-smart chimp follows logically from Machan's implied premise that we should treat individuals according to what is normal for their species. If you think the outcome of Rachels's thought experiment is unacceptable or irrational, then you must also reject the claim that led you to it — that the moral status of a marginal human depends on what is normal for her species. Logically, you have no choice.

And why stop at rights? If an individual's moral status depends on what is normal for her species, why not impose the same moral duties on marginal cases? As Machan points out, an essential part of being a moral agent is that other people may hold you responsible for your actions. On the other hand, we do not hold those who lack moral agency responsible for their actions, for they do not know what they are doing. They are unable to have evil intent, or what lawyers call mens rea. But normal humans know what they are doing. Therefore, according to the Argument from Species Normality, we should punish even marginal humans for their bad actions. If, for example, a man suffering from the advanced stages of Alzheimer's escapes from a nursing home, steals a car, and runs over a child, we should convict him of manslaughter and throw him in the clink.

Are you willing to bite the bullet and accept these implications? Most people would say, "Of course you shouldn't punish an insane man for his actions. You have to take into account his individual shortcomings. You can't treat him like a normal human." Exactly. And that is why the Argument from Species Normality fails.

If you think about it, the Argument from Species Normality is very un-libertarian. It demands that we judge a being not as an individual, but as a member of a group, in this case her species. This is no different from the "identity politics" we hear from the left. If it's senseless to decide a person's value or moral status solely on the basis of his race, it's equally senseless to decide a person's value or moral status solely on the basis of his species. Species, by itself, is simply not morally relevant. What matters is the nature of the individual, viewed under the light of objective moral principles.

It's easy to grasp this fact if you do some introspection and ask yourself why it is morally wrong to inflict suffering on a human who can't reason. Why is it morally wrong to torture an infant? Is it because she has the "potential to become a moral agent"? Be honest about this. Isn't it really because the infant can suffer and has an interest in not suffering? Isn't it because forcing the infant to suffer against his will violates the nonaggression principle? Why is it immoral to use a victim of Alzheimer's for target practice? It is because he is "a member of a species whose normal members can think conceptually and can be held responsible for their actions"? Surely not. It's because he can suffer, he has an interest in not suffering, and to treat him this way against his will goes against the nonaggression principle.

But all of this also holds true for a monkey. Like a "marginal" human, the monkey can suffer. He has an interest in not suffering. To force him to die and suffer, except in self-defense, violates the nonaggression principle. It's a simple matter of treating like cases alike. Pure categorical logic.

Two Common Objections

Sometimes skeptics, including some libertarians, make the following objection to animal rights: "If animals have a right not to be made to suffer, doesn't it follow that we should police the wilderness and prevent predatory animals from attacking their prey?" No, this does not follow. Animals should be allowed to defend themselves, of course, but they do not have a "positive right" to protection any more than humans do. What the Argument from Marginal Cases proves, based on the logical requirement of treating like cases alike, is that it is immoral for moral agents to treat animals in ways we would not treat human marginal cases except in self-defense. Because animals are not moral agents, what they do is outside the purview of ethics. We might as well ask whether a zebra has a "right" not to be crushed by a falling rock. As moral agents, we can only concern ourselves with what we should do and not do. Animals in the wild are on their own. At least an animal who is preyed upon in the wild has a fighting chance. It is not locked in a cage.

Another popular objection goes like this: "But animals kill and eat each other in nature, so why shouldn't we be able to do the same thing?" In other words: "If animals do it, then we can do it." Surely it would be silly to base our moral principles on the actions of animals who can't even engage in moral reasoning! Some animals eat their offspring. Does that mean I am morally entitled to eat my offspring?

A valid question from an anarchist is, "How would an animal's right be protected in an anarcho-capitalist world? Unlike a person, an animal can't pay a protection agency to protect it from aggression." I plan to address this issue in a future essay. At any rate, before we worry about the practical matter of how to protect a right, we first have to settle the philosophical matter of whether that right exists in the first place.

Giving Animal Rights a Fair Shake

At the beginning of this essay I said I was surprised by the number of libertarians who ridicule animal rights while ignoring or evading the Argument from Marginal Cases. Not all libertarians fall into this category. At the FEE (Foundation for Economic Education) convention in 2002, I attended a talk by the great libertarian psychologist Nathaniel Branden. During the question and answer session, a young man told Branden that he maintained an Objectivist Web site. He had posted an essay ridiculing animal rights on the site. A woman had e-mailed him recently and challenged him with the Argument from Marginal Cases. He confessed that he could not think of a good retort.

Dr. Branden cut him off: "I'm afraid I won't be able to help you on this." Dr. Branden explained that he himself had "struggled" with the question of the moral status of animals. He said even Ayn Rand (a confirmed cat lover, by the way) had felt there must be something morally wrong with mistreating animals, but, unable to make it fit her Objectivist philosophy, she shelved the issue. As for him, he could not deny the pure Aristotelian logic of the Argument from Marginal Cases. He was stuck.

Other libertarians should follow Dr. Branden's example and face up to the merits of a reasoned animal rights position. Animal rights is not ridiculous. Animal rights is not inherently leftist. Just because the animal rights movement has been associated with the left does not make it inherently leftist like social security or socialized medicine. Leftists are also antiwar and against the Drug War. Does that mean we libertarians can't hold those positions without succumbing to leftist ideology? Of course not. Being for animal rights does not put you in the same category as a screaming animal rights protestor any more than being against the War in Iraq puts you in the same category as Michael Moore or the hyperemotional "peace protesters" of San Francisco.

Someone once asked the anarchist Dr. Mary Ruwart whether libertarianism would allow for natural rights for animals. She gave this answer:

"The libertarian philosophy addresses relationships between human beings, not humans and other species. Many people are looking for a coherent way to address this issue, so please give some thought to developing one."

We libertarians are supposed to be the party of principle, the sticklers for logical consistency. It's time to put aside ad hominems and straw men. Let's take up Dr. Ruwart's challenge to address this issue with coherence and honesty. As a starting point, I encourage you to read Introduction to Animal Rights: Your Child or the Dog by Gary Francione. He offers a philosophy of animal rights that any libertarian can coherently endorse.

http://www.animalliberationfront.com/Philo...0Exist'.htm

[Brant Gaede]

Re Marginal Cases

Rights do not exist inside a human being--any human being. What exists is the need for rights by rational, productive adults, so rights were invented. Rights are logically extended to marginal cases for there is no way to objectively determine a cut off point except for birth and death. (There is a grey area late in pregnancy.) The idea is rights are there to use if you can and need to, but no one has the right to stop you if you do. Above all, no one has a right to take your life, in whole or in part.

I suppose you can extend this to animals to some extent. I don't know. I do know that there are plenty of laws protecting animals and if an animal abuser wants to defend himself in court with philosophical arguments he is welcome to do so, but I will not supply those arguments.

--Brant

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Judith,

I knew you were a dog lover (and I even bought a book of stories for you about dogs), but I am a bit surprised at the way this led you to arrive at some of your conclusions. Here are a few that surprised me with my comments:

Suppose we change "dog fight enthusiast" to "child molester":

"The connection between Michael Vick as a football player and Michael Vick as a child molester is nonexistent. People who do not want him to play football anymore—forever and ever amen—because of the child molesting are letting their rage and hatred cloud their reason."

What does achievement in football have to do with child molesting? I suppose it is theoretically possible for a quarterback to molest a child during a football game, but for the life of me, I don't see how. (Maybe at halftime.) I certainly don't see how it is possible to do a dog fight and play football at the same time. So what is the connection you see between playing football and molesting children or staging dog fights? I don't see any.

Be outraged at my statement if you must, but that feels a lot to me like psychological transference. (And if you are outraged about the entertainment part, please reread my post. I covered that.)

Is that all that matters? The collateral risk to humans? What about the animals themselves? Are they simply trash to be discarded without a second thought?

Are you discussing my post or arguing against something in your head? Where did I say that this is all that matters or that animals are trash, etc.? The fact is I didn't. Your presumptions have nothing to do with what I believe or the points I was making.

Animals are "innocent". Lacking the capacity to be rational, they also lack the capacity to be irrational. Lacking the capacity to be moral, they also lack the capacity to be immoral. Therefore, they are much easier to love than are humans.

All I can say here is speak for yourself. I find humans just as easy to love as animals. (And I presume you are talking about domestic animals and not about sewer rats, poisonous snakes and so forth. I find it very difficult to love those kinds of animals.)

btw - I am all for humane laws for protecting animals, especially pets and livestock, against undue cruelty. Hell, I even believe wild animals shouldn't be tortured. I am probably much more in favor of animal protection laws than your typical Objectivist. But I eat meat and expect to continue this practice so I am in favor of slaughterhouses. I also exterminate vermin, so I am in favor of traps and poisons. And I consider domestic animals and livestock as property, so I take into account the property rights of the owners. I certainly have no restrictions against the concept of beast of burden.

As to the article you posted, I did not finish reading it. I stopped when I got to the part where Graham started analyzing animal rights in terms of NIOF. That's just plain silly.

Michael

[Barbara Branden]

Judith, thanks so much for posting this very fine article. I have one concern about it, however. Although the writer doesn't discuss it, it seems that it would follow from the fact that he makes an analogy between animals and the mentally retarded, that just as we should not perform medical experiments on the latter, so we should not perform experiments -- that may save thousands, even millions of human lives -- upon animals.

Barbara

[Judith]

What does achievement in football have to do with child molesting? I suppose it is theoretically possible for a quarterback to molest a child during a football game, but for the life of me, I don't see how. (Maybe at halftime.) I certainly don't see how it is possible to do a dog fight and play football at the same time. So what is the connection you see between playing football and molesting children or staging dog fights? I don't see any.

Are you saying, then, that someone could be convicted of any crime, or multiple crimes, and should still have an unhampered football career? If so, then I retract my outrage.

Many employers refuse to employ people with a criminal record. Football in particular is a very public career, and is held up as one in which the players are supposed to be exemplary to the young.

In addition, there are two kinds of crimes: malum prohibitum, acts that are criminal simply because the law defines them as such -- for example, driving a truck without the appropriate documents in one's possession for the cargo on board -- and malum in se -- acts that are inherently evil -- for example, murder, theft, stealing, etc. Had Vick done one of the former, no one would have been outraged. It is the severe moral turpitude of his crime that has people up in arms.

Is that all that matters? The collateral risk to humans? What about the animals themselves? Are they simply trash to be discarded without a second thought?

Are you discussing my post or arguing against something in your head? Where did I say that this is all that matters or that animals are trash, etc.? The fact is I didn't. Your presumptions have nothing to do with what I believe or the points I was making.

When you said, "even if it ONLY involves animals and not humans" (emphasis added), the implication is that animals are disposable. Seems pretty clear to me; your concern is not for the animals, but that those doing these things may eventually commit REAL crimes on humans. Go back and read it again; I don't think my interpretation was unreasonable.

But I eat meat and expect to continue this practice so I am in favor of slaughterhouses. I also exterminate vermin, so I am in favor of traps and poisons. And I consider domestic animals and livestock as property, so I take into account the property rights of the owners. I certainly have no restrictions against the concept of beast of burden.

I think we're essentially in agreement on the above, although current slaughterhouse practices are appallingly inhumane, to the point that I feel very uneasy about eating birds that weren't humanely raised and slaughtered. (I don't eat mammals anymore, but that's a personal prejudice, and not one I'd impose on anyone else.) Same with "beasts of burden"; I own horses -- you know that. I even insist that one of them take me on the occasional trail ride against his express wishes; I pay the bills, I get to have things my way once in awhile!

Don't read more rancor into my response than was there, Michael.

Judith

[Judith]

Judith, thanks so much for posting this very fine article. I have one concern about it, however. Although the writer doesn't discuss it, it seems that it would follow from the fact that he makes an analogy between animals and the mentally retarded, that just as we should not perform medical experiments on the latter, so we should not perform experiments -- that may save thousands, even millions of human lives -- upon animals.

I'm squeamish about research on animals. I suppose I want it both ways -- I want the benefits without the costs. I don't know how to resolve the issue.

There's so much UNNECESSARY animal experimentation going on that could be stopped. Testing personal care products that contain ingredients known to be safe, for example. There are web sites that list companies whose products are not tested on animals, and I like to use those products.

Veterinary schools have responded to the unhappiness of their students in wasting animals' lives for teaching purposes and have invested in very lifelike models that accomplish the same purpose without the need to destroy animals.

Let's hope that technology can solve the problem -- and soon. For example, perhaps testing can be performed on tissue samples or cloned organs instead of on living animals.

Judith

[Jon Letendre]

Barbara,

I don’t know anyone who hunts because they “enjoy watching blood spill.” That’s not fair. You are projecting the part that bothers you the most onto them, as though that’s what they’re motivated by. A pacifist could just as easily say that all soldiers are mentally twisted because they just want to kill people.

Judith,

You quote Graham at length while also making clear you don’t agree with him! He says animals have the right to be left alone, yet you keep horses and dogs, you eat birds, and you agree with Michael about eating meat from slaughterhouses and exterminating undesirables with traps and poisons and with keeping beasts of burden (slave animals.) About research, which can fairly be described as torture (even if torture with a purpose) you say you are “squeamish.”

“I'm not happy about people who hunt for any reason other than eating the meat. I live with the fact that people do it, but I don't like it. It shows an appalling lack of empathy.”

I find this very strange. Outside of poor rural folk, no one today in the USA hunts because they will starve otherwise. They’re hunting for other reasons, like myself, even if they happen to eat the animals, like I do. If Vick had eaten the dogs, would it all be OK? I’ve heard this before and I don’t get it. “It’s terrible…but as long as you eat them, well, OK.”

Hunting shows no more an appalling lack of empathy than your bird eating does. The birds I kill live a fine life in their natural habitat before my dog and I find them (and, in the case of quail, about 80% of the population will be dead before winter is out anyway, while hunting eliminates maybe 15%.) You on the other hand (even though it makes you “feel very uneasy,”) pay producers to raise birds in terrible confines where they live horrible lives and die no differently, nor any faster, than my shotgun provides. Who lacks empathy?!

[Brant Gaede]

I think we should differentiate between pets, other domesticated animals and the non-human rest.

I stopped hunting in 1964 when I had my first kill: a 22 LR through the neck of a beautiful woodpecker. That was it for me, until I joined the army and went to Vietnam. Now if the hunters want to hunt I have no objection, I just don't myself. If, that is, they use guns and get clean kills. Bow hunting sucks.

I think dogs basically chose to live with humans--the alpha male thing: those dogs when they were wolves knew a good thing when they saw it. As for cats, they are our masters, but are quite subtle about it if they can be. We know this is true when they want to eat and bend us to their will. Our reward is niggardly affection.

--Brant

[Barbara Branden]

Barbara,

I don’t know anyone who hunts because they “enjoy watching blood spill.” That’s not fair. You are projecting the part that bothers you the most onto them, as though that’s what they’re motivated by. A pacifist could just as easily say that all soldiers are mentally twisted because they just want to kill people.

Jon, did you ever see the movie "The Deer Hunter?" It's one of the finest and most gripping movies I've ever seen. It's the story of four friends who enlist in the Vietnam War, expecting glory but finding horror. Although in one sense it's a war story, it's much more and much rarer than that: it's the story of the love these men have for one another.

There's one riveting, superb scene in the film that is relevant to our discussion here. Robert de Niro has just come home from Vietnam on leave, and as he has always loved to do, he goes hunting. The next scene occurs in total silence, without a word of dialogue. He sees, in the distance, a sudden movememt in the bush, and he raises his gun to get it in his sights; after a few moments, a beautiful, graceful young deer leaps out of the bushes, almost kicking up its heels in its joypis energy. De Niro carefully moves his gun the required distance to keep the deer in his sights, and we wait for him to fire.....and then, very slowly, he lowers the weapon to his side; he puts it down, he packs up his gear, and leaves. And we know that he's seen too much killing of innocents and done too much killing, and he cannot bear to kill again. We know he'll never hunt again.

You're right, Jon, it would not be fair to suggest that the only people who hunt are those who enjoy seeing blood spill. I've known hunters who are far from bloodthirsty, and who seem to love animals. But I've never understood how one can kill for "sport." These creatures we kill are living beings, who feel pain and who seem able to feel joy. How can we, as a form of entertainment, however much skill it takes, simply snuff out those lives that are not ours? How can death and suffering be any part of entertainment? I don't want to be unfair, bit I don't understand it, despite the attempts of hunters to explain it. I know that I could never do it.

Let me ask you a question. If, in the precise moment before you fired at an animal, you were to make it fully real to yourself that you were about to kill a beautiful living being, a being who might well suffer agonies because of you, and that its potential for joy would be gone forever and by your hand -- could you then fire?

Barbara

[Judith]

You quote Graham at length while also making clear you don’t agree with him! He says animals have the right to be left alone, yet you keep horses and dogs, you eat birds, and you agree with Michael about eating meat from slaughterhouses and exterminating undesirables with traps and poisons and with keeping beasts of burden (slave animals.) About research, which can fairly be described as torture (even if torture with a purpose) you say you are “squeamish.”

In short, we are animals, and we do have to eat. We have the right to defend ourselves against intruders such as vermin, especially when those intruders carry diseases such as hanta virus. The concept of slave animals doesn't really make sense when the animals are loved and love in return and are well-treated; they don't constantly hanker after freedom and long to escape the way humans would in the same situation. One of my dogs can't bear to be separated from me by even a door.

Hunting shows no more an appalling lack of empathy than your bird eating does. The birds I kill live a fine life in their natural habitat before my dog and I find them (and, in the case of quail, about 80% of the population will be dead before winter is out anyway, while hunting eliminates maybe 15%.) You on the other hand (even though it makes you “feel very uneasy,”) pay producers to raise birds in terrible confines where they live horrible lives and die no differently, nor any faster, than my shotgun provides. Who lacks empathy?!

I agree with you completely. I'd much rather eat a bird that lived a happy life in the wild and died a quick, humane death at the hand of a hunter than eat a bird that led a miserable life on a factory farm and died a horrible death in a typical slaughterhouse. I've hunted and I plan to hunt again. Pheasants are delicious. Ducks are delicious. Nothing like it -- yum! But do it humanely, damn it! None of this factory farming crap.

Judith

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Judith,

I think we have a case of incorrect communication. Your interpretation of my words is not the meaning I was trying to convey, and I admit the possibility of my writing not being clear. So I will try to explain further.

The first thing I tried to convey is that there is practically nothing I approve of in this mess with Vick. I did not read much other than skim headlines, but I did see TV coverage, including talk shows, that discussed this as a theme. Even when people were right, they came off as bimbos to me.

One example is something I saw several times with different people. They harped on and on in an affected manner of innocent incredulity that a ball player could provoke so much outrage in the country over dog fighting, but celebrities who committed murder, sex offenses against children or rape stayed under the radar, so to speak, or at least did not prompt nearly as much outrage. They made a point of stating something like, "We are talking about people, folks, not animals!" as if this were the most absurd thing in the world. Yet some of these commentators had been constantly going along with PETA, etc. They are the very ones who had been feeding the public the idea that animals are more important than human beings. Now they have evidence in front of them that their message was heard and are they happy about it? No. They are incredulous. Maybe it's me, but I see bimbos.

This and things like gladiators were the context of my meaning for the following statement:

I don't want to live around people who use real death and maiming for entertainment and gambling, even if it only involves animals and not humans.

I did not mean that I approve of torturing animals for entertainment. I stated clearly that someone who engages in this has psychological problems and I don't want to be around him because he is dangerous. If I thought animals were trash to be discarded, why would there be a psychological problem at all? The premise is that torturing for sport is evil. That automatically means that I do not discard concern for tortured animals. Saying that one who enjoys it is not healthy does not mean that one has no concern for the tortured being. You stated:

When you said, "even if it ONLY involves animals and not humans" (emphasis added), the implication is that animals are disposable. Seems pretty clear to me; your concern is not for the animals, but that those doing these things may eventually commit REAL crimes on humans.

I do have the concern you mentioned and it is a real one, but it is IN ADDITION to not approving of torture (concern for the animal), not IN LIEU of it. This might have been clearer had I added a comment to such effect. Sorry for the lack of clarity.

I cannot resist a comment, though. I could use the same reasoning and say that your interpretation shows clearly that you have no concern for humans, only for animals—that humans are disposable. But I don't believe that.

I also should mention that, in general, I hold human life to be more valuable than animal life. This does not mean that I do not value animal life. And there are cases where I would unhesitatingly choose to save an animal (say a dog) over a human being (like Hitler).

Next point.

Are you saying, then, that someone could be convicted of any crime, or multiple crimes, and should still have an unhampered football career? If so, then I retract my outrage.

Now I am more confused than ever. If I were saying that a criminal should have an unhampered career, that is when you should feel outrage. Why would you retract it in that case? I don't understand. At any rate, I stated clearly the following:

But, as a sports entertainer, I can understand him being removed from the major leagues. Both kids and adults get really attached to their dogs, so the idea of watching—as entertainment—the performance of a man who kills dogs for entertainment and gambles on their lives is a turn-off.

I see nothing in that statement, when added to the previous one, that merited outrage. I think it is clear as daylight that I am not saying "that someone could be convicted of any crime, or multiple crimes, and should still have an unhampered football career." I am saying the contrary. Since my meaning was so easily turned around backward, there must be something in the expression that does not compute. So here are some more thoughts.

There is something I saw on TV that might make what I mean clearer. One issue that kept popping up in the discussions was what to do with Vick after he served time in jail and reformed himself through remorse and never doing dog fighting again—whether he should be readmitted to the NFL. I mean that literally: "what to do with Vick." Some people were talking about this as if it were their decision. And we are talking about a couple of years down the road, at the least.

I saw these people seething with hatred saying that he should not be allowed near a football ever again in his life. Not "not be allowed to reenter the NFL." They clearly stated "not be allowed near a football." I'm sorry if I sound arrogant, but these people come off as a total bimbos to me. What does playing football have to do with dog fighting and how would they enforce that anyway? I want to be clear that I am objecting to the power-lust I observed and not the anger over dog fighting. Vick was wrong. That doesn't make the envious people right to strut their envy.

And there is another consideration that I find even more troubling. What is the meaning of paying one's debt to society? Does that mean the debt is settled, or does that mean there is still a debt? I consider the debt to be settled. I do not believe in a person being branded on the forehead or having to wear a scarlet A for the rest of his life. I strongly believe in human redemption. (I have serious doubts and disapproval about Vick's religious conversion and remorse right now, as I have stated, but that is another issue. I am discussing a principle, not his dubious public performance.)

I see the decision about whether Vick is readmitted to the NFL after paying his debt to society as one to be made by the directors of the NFL and the market, i.e., whether his image can be repaired. I certainly do not see this decision being made by the people I saw on TV saying he should not be allowed to touch a football ever again. And I do not see preaching lifelong prohibition of employment as appropriate, anyway. If down the line Vick is sincere and it is evident he really did turn over a new leaf, the market will reflect that. If he is not, even after serving jail time, the market will reflect that, too. I see both reactions as appropriate, depending on what happens.

The connection I see with dog fighting is with his entertainment value, not his football playing per se. I find it easy to recognize outstanding performance in football without approving of dog fighting. And I find it really easy not to begrudge Vick of his talent even though he promoted dog fighting. He is still just as good a quarterback as he always was. Actually, he is one hell of a quarterback. Whether I want to watch him perform (and want kids to watch him) knowing he did what he did is another matter. But that has nothing to do with football and everything to do with dog fighting.

One thing is clear to me. If he were an unknown ball player, this would not be an issue. And if his crime were not so widely commented, this would not be an issue, either. The only real connection between football and dog fighting in Vick's case is the fame involved. So I see the connection as entertainment and nothing more. And, please, I hope this is not taken to imply that I approve of dog fighting. I don't.

Did this shed some light on my meaning?

Michael

[Jon Letendre]

Barbara,

“Let me ask you a question. If, in the precise moment before you fired at an animal, you were to make it fully real to yourself that you were about to kill a beautiful living being, a being who might well suffer agonies because of you, and that its potential for joy would be gone forever and by your hand -- could you then fire?”

It is every time fully real to me that they are beautiful living beings that might well suffer agonies, and yes, I still fire.

I can think of one time that I did not. Unlike Pheasants, which typically take to wing straight up like a helicopter then go away in a straight line, ruffed grouse will dart behind cover to keep trees between you and them. This one time, a grouse took off right from my buddy’s feet (they hunker, sometimes you don’t see them) and burst away, darting into and behind trees. My friend fired when it was in the open, again when it reemerged, and a third time upon its final reemergence. But this thing was incredible. It displayed the maneuverability of a dolphin. It turned again and passed over my head and I watched it fly away into open sky away from me.

My friend asked, “Why didn’t you shoot?”

“Holy shit.”

“Why didn’t you…”

“Did you see that?”

Why didn’t you shoot it?”

“Oh, um, I don’t know. I guess after seeing how beautifully it fucked you, I just couldn’t.”

Now I remember one more time. A friend and I were in Northern New Hampshire, maybe a mile from the Quebec border. We were walking a gravel timber company road. The grouse do the same because they swallow the gravel to turn in their craw and break up the shells of the seeds they eat, so it’s an easy method—you walk in the brush beside the road and put them up hoping they’ll fly into the open over the road instead of into the woods. (It’s a private road, not a public thoroughfare, so this is allowed (Live Free or Die).) So my friend puts one up right in front of him and it flies, like a dumb bird, straight away from us, in the open, straight down the road.

Now I have to explain an aspect of shot gunning. In order to absorb the recoil of the gun you lean forward upon firing. You don’t even realize you do it, but if you don’t, your barrel will rise too much for a good follow-up shot and you might even have to take a step back upon recoil.

My friend raises his gun for this easy shot, tracks for a moment, then lunges, stumbling and taking a step forward. My friend has learned the truth of what I wrote above. Having forgotten to take off his safety, no shot occurred when he expected it to. He looks disoriented and I’m laughing.

“Well, you could have shot it, too!” He yells.

“At the moment I can’t do anything but marvel at the safest gun in the world, you dip-shit.”

I did see The Deer Hunter. I am guessing I was twelve when I saw it. I recall that scene and have never forgotten it. I don’t recall any other scene, unless it was the same movie where the enemy forces some GIs to play Russian roulette in an elevated hut. If that’s the same movie, then that’s the only other scene I recall. I have all the respect in the world for anyone who’s “had enough” and doesn’t want to kill anything anymore. But I still object to describing hunters as motivated simply to reduce the count of we the living.

[Jonathan]

But I've never understood how one can kill for "sport." These creatures we kill are living beings, who feel pain and who seem able to feel joy. How can we, as a form of entertainment, however much skill it takes, simply snuff out those lives that are not ours? How can death and suffering be any part of entertainment? I don't want to be unfair, bit I don't understand it, despite the attempts of hunters to explain it. I know that I could never do it.

What's the difference between Jon enjoying the thrill of the hunt, and a non-hunter enjoying a rib eye or a new pair of leather shoes (especially in today's world where there are plenty of alternatives to animal products)? Is one type of pleasure at an animal's expense upsetting or perplexing but the other is perfectly natural and understandable? Is the actual killing itself something about which we should be somber, but after someone (not us!) carves up the dead animal, and does so with the proper degree of melancholy and regret that we demand of him, then let's have a happy old time chowing down while being fashionably accessorized and not giving it any more thought?

It seems that those who don't understand the enjoyment of the hunt selectively anthropomorphize the issue in favor of their own brand of pleasure: others' enjoyment of hunting animals -- which are living, breathing, feeling creatures just like us -- is disturbing because it too closely resembles the psychology of someone who might enjoy killing humans, but those who don't do the killing themselves, but enjoy eating animals or purchasing their parts as products, somehow do not too closely resemble those who might enjoy doing the same thing to humans. Is that the essence of the emotions driving the issue?

J

Edited August 31, 2007 by Jonathan