FIrst in a Series:
You're not going to give your five-year-old the car keys and ask him to pick up his younger sister from daycare. So why would you cozy up to animal rights groups which ultimately want you to let your five-year-old Lab out to pee, and then have him sashay off into a world where there is no animal ownership? Because maybe you're not aware that animal rights activists often pose as animal welfare advocates? But have a completely different agenda.
In a series of posts starting here, we'll take a look at the differences between animal rights and animal welfare. The philosophical postions are starkly distinct. Animal rights supporters, embodied by such organizations as People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) and the Humane Society of the United States (HSUS), maintain that humans and animals are virtually equal and should have the same rights. They renounce the use of animals for the benefit of humans whether it is for food, labor, sport, clothing, research and companionship.
Supporters of animal welfare, on the other hand, represented by groups like the American Veterinary Medical Association (AVMA) and the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (ASPCA) endorse the responsible used of animals to satisfy certain human needs. They work to ensure animals' basic needs are fulfilled in terms of food, shelter and health; and that animals experience no unnecessary suffering in their service to humans. Animal welfare champions further argue that giving equal rights to animals will not provide for their well being.
As interest in the humane treatment of animals grows, media coverage tends to lump animal lovers and animal rights activists together. "The popularity of the phrase animal rights activists rather than something like animal welfare activists reflects an increasing focus on animals as potential bearers of rights rather than on humans as bearers of responsibility for the welfare of animals they control," writes Richard L. Cupp, Jr., of the Pepperdine University School of Law. In the introduction to his paper Moving Beyond Animal Rights: A Legal Contractualist Critique published in May 2009, Cupp noted that legal reforms regarding animals are "better suited to social contract ideals than to the creation of new rights." He suggests a formal code of rights would be "harmful to both humans and, ultimately, to animals."
Over several installments, we'll examine the entire landscape of the animal rights/animal welfare discussion: the rapidly growing field of animal law how activists use ballot initiatives to move their not-so-transparent agendas forward, among other issues.
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