LETTER: Animals' rights differ from ours

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by Mikael Thompson

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I am writing in response to the letter by Kanika Bahl and Mona Rashad propounding animal rights ( Thresher , April 7).

They state that "we can no more deny animals rights because they are not humans than we can deny blacks rights because they are not white or can deny women rights because they are not male." This is an obscene inversion of the very concept of rights.

Humans have rights precisely because we are not "animals" in the sense of the word meant by Bahl and Rashad.

Rights are necessary in human society because humans do not have an automatic standard of behavior like instinct.

Human beings are rational animals in the sense that we possess reason and must use it to survive.

Moreover, with irrelevant exceptions, all people live in societies in which we must live with other people, and we are not born with instincts to make this an automatic, unthinking process as is the case with termites.

We may institute a society in which the stronger force the weaker to support them, or we may choose to establish a society in which force is abolished as a proper means of dealing with others.

If we choose the latter, then we must establish a society in which no person may be forced to give up the product of his or her labor to others. This situation is the basis of rights.

From the purpose of rights, we see that rights pertain only to human beings.

This reason is why we extend rights to children; they are human beings, and although they do not yet fully recognize others' rights, they can be taught.

It is why in a proper society all people, black or white, male or female, have rights, and why slavery is evil.

This assumption is why the special circumstances ( not special needs or special interests, which are secondary) of women give them the right to abortion:

No person may be forced to be the property of others, whether for nine months or a lifetime, no matter what the interests of the putative owner might be.

And it is why we guard the rights of college professors and mentally disabled individuals alike while we restrict the freedom of criminals to roam society -- not because they have equal capacities to suffer or to be happy, but because most college professors and mentally disabled individuals can be expected to act without violating the rights of others, and criminals cannot.

Following this same line of thought, this reason is why animals do not have rights.

Animals cannot be expected to respect the rights of others, so any animals we allow to co-exist with us must be placed in the care of a legally responsible person.

Thus, we have leash laws for dogs, laws for the proper restraint of livestock and all else.

I am not saying I enjoy seeing animals suffer; I assuredly do not. I am saying that establishing the supposed rights of animals in law is destructive of human rights.

Bahl and Rashad wish the interests of animals to be put on an equal footing with the interests of humans in order to eliminate undue suffering of animals.

However, it is rights, not interests, with which we must concern ourselves.

In a free society, a person may pursue his or her interests only if doing so does not violate the rights of others; their rights are not determined by their interests.

Once we establish interests, however conceived, to be the basis of law instead of rights, then the government ceases to be the protector of rights.

What if a successor to Bahl and Rashad decides that humans may not kill animals as did King Asoka of India?

What if someone later still decides that humans who injure dogs must be put to death as did the Shogun Tsunayoshi in 1687, and that dogs must be housed at government expense as he did in 1695?

Animals would continue to devour each other no matter what laws we might put into place declaring their rights, and there is no police force we could institute that would secure these supposed rights from violation by other animals.

Nor is this the thrust of the animal rights movement, which is aimed solely at the human world.

It is fitting that Bahl and Rashad quote Jeremy Bentham approvingly, for Bentham concluded that the concept of rights is "nonsense," and individual rights are "nonsense on stilts."

Animal rights, if accepted, also lead to dismissing authentic rights as nonsense.

Mikael Thompson

Jones '96

This item appeared in the Opinion section of the April 21, 1995 issue.

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