Creatures Great and Small
Ghandi said “the greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated.” Immanuel Kant voiced the similar sentiment that “we can judge the heart of a man by his treatment of animals.” So what can be said about the morality of ancient Israel and the heart of its God?
This God seemed quite devoid of empathy for the suffering of animals. He sent swirling holy water to swallow the flailing and terrified. He followed this slaughter of all slaughters with massive fish and frog kills and visited suffering and deadly diseases upon horses, camels, sheep and the like. He has animals cower and die under holy hail and heaven sent fire and brimstone.
He also commands man to kill in his name—to stone animals, break the necks of calves and donkeys and to twist the heads off of doves. He likes his bull’s throats slit, their blood drained and thrown against his red stained altar, their skin peeled off, their body cut into pieces, their organs washed, their heads burned. And since this God’s taste for barbeque was not easily satisfied, he ordered such brutality to continue forever.
Kant made the connection that those who are cruel to animals are likewise hard in their dealings with men. In his book, In Defense of Animals, Peter Singer writes, “In an earlier stage of our development most human groups held to a tribal ethic. Members of the tribe were protected, but people of other tribes could be robbed or killed as one pleased. Gradually the circle of protection expanded, but as recently as 150 years ago we did not include blacks. So African human beings could be captured, shipped to America and sold. In Australia white settlers regarded Aborigines as a pest and hunted them down, much as kangaroos are hunted down today. Just as we have progressed beyond the blatantly racist ethic of the era of slavery and colonialism, so we must now progress beyond the speciesist ethic of the era of factory farming, of the use of animals as mere research tools, of whaling, seal hunting, kangaroo slaughter and the destruction of wilderness. We must take the final step in expanding the circle of ethics.”
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This was very well said. I was just talking about this last night with a friend; about how you can measure a person by how he or she treats animals and children. I would like to add that not so long ago, women were outside the "circle of ethics". Women could be bought and sold; did not have individual human rights (such as the right to sign a contract); could not vote; and rape was a crime against the woman's husband or father. You may also be aware of the famous "persons case" in Canada, where our supreme court had to make the agonizing decision as to whether or not women were "persons" under the Canadian constitution. And this was less than a century ago! Our supreme court said "no", women were not persons. The case was appealed to the British Privy Council, then the highest court in the land. Finally, women were acknowledged to be persons under the law. This was in 1929. This was such a short time ago! Enlightenment can happen quickly, and I hope I live to see the end of animal abuse.
(As a side note, to me it is proof that there is no "loving god" because of the food chain. A truly loving god would not have created nature to be so cruel; to have to kill to survive. If god were all-powerful, he could have easily made it so that all living beings were vegetarians. This never made sense to me as a christian, by the way).
I would add, in reference to the idea of personhood the next step is to recognize apes as persons ( they have the same inherent right as human persons to not be subjected to inhumane experiments) and and then the granting of personhood to all animals.
And agree that no good god could intentionally make a world where life must destroy life to live. An all powerful god could have simply made all life live through some kind of photosynthesis.
I like the photosynthesis idea for fuel, but please don't change the current system for procreation. I would hate a world where the stork brought babies.
ha! right! Gotta give “God” credit for getting the sex part right! Too bad his spokesmen have always tried to control and sully such a beautiful thing.
Amen brother Evans!
So because a wild animal such as a lion attacks a antelope in africa, there is no god? what? i don't get the logic here...and even further, if a wild lion in africa attacks an antelope and brutally rips the flesh out in a wink, this life of the lion or the antelope (or the knat) has as much value as the black child left for dead from famine with a bloated stomach and flies covering his head? this is the same mantra spewed from the right that a petrie dish of human stem CELLS is as valuable as a live two year old child. the nazi's are coming....i can take the petrie dish of hubby and me cells to make future baby up the shooter, or my two year old...i take the two year old and run like hell from the nazi's and throw them the dish of cells...nazi's are coming...i take the hamster or my two year old...i take my two year old and throw the nazi's the hampster. i am sorry, but i really do not see the logic in most of these posts...is the lion a bad dude because he's a flesh eating mammal? we live with beasts. they eat one another for survival. this is nature. evolution. survival of the fittest. i'm beginning to think no one here likes even the natural world. sounds like your blaming the god you don't believe in for animals eating one another. i am trying not to laugh here seriously... you know, i loved my cat madonna who died after 20 loving years. i cry to this day when i think of her. but the pain in no way compares with the pain i felt when my daddy died. please forgive me for what i don't understand...but when i look in my child's eyes, i could never tell them my dog or cat means more than they do. the dog eats the cat's poop for god's sake.
Barb, Who said anything about valuing a child the same as a cat. I am afraid you misunderstood the thrust of the conversation. By granting apes personhood we would recognize their ability to suffer greatly as they are self aware and social creatures. This does not devalue other life at all.
Of course we make distinctions about the value of life. A cat is not a child. Though a cat experiences suffering like a child. An ant less so and so we can make choices based on capacity to suffer.
Your right that a world designed to be like ours, where every mouth is a slaughterhouse and every stomach is a tomb, doesn’t rule out a god altogether, but it does rule out a benevolent one.
And I love the world! I see it as a place of incredible beauty, mystery, joy but also see the incredible suffering.
I agree with both John and Barb that human life is very, very precious. And we all instinctively know that it is in a sense of higher value than an animal such as a cat (hard for me to say this - I have 2 cats that I love very dearly). But I also have a son - and there is no comparison in my view between the two. But I also agree with John that animals have a tremendous capacity to suffer and to love. When I look into the eyes of my cats I SEE the love there. One of my cats will curl up in my arms, and when I say his name ("Thnowball" - Snowball with a lisp) he looks at me with adoration and touches my face! It is so beautiful and moving. However, if it has to be a decision between the life of a person and the life of an animal, I would choose human life.
However, I am in agreement with John that capacity to suffer, and by extension level of consciousness, should be a basis of any moral system. To me, this means that cells in a petri dish are simply not worth as much as a person or animal. There is no consciousness yet and no suffering. As the cells grow into a human being or other entity, at some point there is consciousness. To me that is a gradiant scale.
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