Planet Debate 2011 September/October l-d release Animal Rights
Factory Farms Result of Speciesism
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- AT: “Confinement More Humane/Better for Animal Welfare”
- Abuse of Farm Animals Threatens Human Survival
Factory Farms Result of SpeciesismHUMAN SUPERIORITY IN THE LAW IS RESPONSIBLE FOR CAFOS Cassuto 2007 (David Cassuto, As. Prof of Law at Pace, “Bred Meat: the Cultural Foundation of the Factory Farm”, Law and Contemporary Problems, Winter 2007, Vol. 70:59, pg. 61-2) This article argues that the ability of large-scale industrial farms to commodify animals in the face of strong countervailing social forces stems in large part from the legal system’s embrace of a secularized but nonetheless deeply religious vision of human ascendancy. Within this belief system, animals comprise beings through whom we define ourselves by contrast and to whom we deny ingress to the legal system. The impulse to increase protections for nonhuman animals is offset by institutionally privileged categories of behavior that commidify nonhumans and strip them of legal defenses. The resulting lattice of laws purports to safeguard animals while instead sanctioning and enabling the practices from which they require protection. The human–animal dichotomy is no more a “fact” than any other religiously derived norm. Nevertheless, it enjoys a form of constitutional protection seemingly at odds with the Constitution’s Establishment Clause. It further leads to “speciesism,” a category of discrimination that makes membership in the privileged species a prerequisite for access to the moral community. Despite the dominance of the mythic divide between humans and animals and the economic and political ascendancy of factory farms, the discourse of species and its accompanying ethical issues continues to shift. Therein lies the increasing vulnerability of the idea of a singular, dominant species that alone possesses the characteristics necessary for entrance to the moral and legal community. This fragile notion of human ascendancy as well as the complex social trends undergirding it forms the foundation of this article.
There is a strong argument firmly based on extensive scientific evidence that cages are not appropriate environments for laying hens. The most recent comprehensive analysis of the welfare of laying hens in cages and alternative systems was the LayWel project, a collaborative effort among working groups in seven different European countries that examined data collected from 230 different hen flocks. After reviewing all of the current science, the report concluded: With the exception of conventional cages, we conclude that all systems have the potential to provide satisfactory welfare for laying hens….Conventional cages do not allow hens to fulfil behaviour priorities, preferences and needs for nesting, perching, foraging and dustbathing in particular. The severe spatial restriction also leads to disuse osteoporosis. We believe these disadvantages outweigh the advantages of reduced parasitism, good hygiene and simpler management. The advantages can be matched by other systems that also enable a much fuller expression of normal behaviour. A reason for this decision is the fact that every individual hen is affected for the duration of the laying period by behavioural restriction. Most other advantages and disadvantages are much less certain and seldom affect all individuals to a similar degree.8 Indeed, in addition to the findings of the LayWel project, many other experts agree that, in general, hen welfare is compromised more in cages than in properly managed alternative systems89,90 and that the differences between cage and cage-free systems are such that there is a clear welfare advantage for hens who are not confined in cages.77 According to Michael Appleby, former Senior Lecturer in Farm Animal Behavior at the University of Edinburgh: Battery cages present inherent animal welfare problems, most notably by their small size and barren conditions. Hens are unable to engage in many of their natural behaviors and endure high levels of stress and frustration. Cage-free egg production, while not perfect, does not entail such inherent animal welfare disadvantages and is a very good step in the right direction for the egg industry. CAFOs WORSE FOR ANIMAL WELFARE – VIEW ANIMALS AS PRODUCTION UNITS RATHER THAN SENTIENT BEINGS Humane Society of the US, 2008, Factory Farming in America: the true cost of animal agribusiness for rural communities, public health, families, the environment and animals, [http://www.hsus.org/web-files/PDF/farm/hsus-factory-farming-in-america-the-true-cost-of-animal-agribusiness.pdf], p. 10 As industrial animal production facilities displace the independent family farmers who once raised most of the nation’s farm animals, animal agribusiness has also lost the traditional U.S. farmer’s connection to—and compassion for—the animals. Rather than regarding animals as sentient individuals, today’s animal agribusiness industries treat them as “production units,” denying the billions of animals raised for food in the United States most of their natural behaviors and subjecting them to selective breeding for overproduction, overuse of antibiotics, overcrowding, intensive confinement, and physical mutilations including castration, dehorning, and beak-trimming—all performed without painkillers.* Abuse of Farm Animals Threatens Human SurvivalPROTECTION FOR ANIMAL WELFARE VITAL TO HUMAN SURVIVAL Roland Bonney & Marian Stamp Dawkins, Zoology Professor Oxford & Director Food Animal Initiative, 2008, The Future of Animal Farming: renewing the ancient contract, eds. M. Dawkins & R. Bonney, p. 2 As Bernie Rollin explains more fully in the next chapter, this interdependence between humans and animals can be seen as a kind of contract – a “deal” that goes back over thousands of years of human history. Traditionally, the deal was that farm animals provided us with food, clothing and much else while we provided them with food, protection from the elements from predators. Humans have most often cared for their animals not out of sentiment but because their animals were valuable to them. With the industrialization of agriculture, we have broken that contract. Many people are no longer in touch with how farm animals are raised and so the health and welfare of food animals no longer seems to affect their own survival so directly. But indirectly it still does. Disease in food animals has potentially catastrophic effects on human health and the ecological effects of poor farming practices threaten the very life of the planet. It is time to renew the ancient contract for the benefit of all us, not because it would be a pleasant extra if we could afford it but because it is a necessity we cannot afford to be without. The exact terms of the new contract have yet to be worked out in detail because there are no easy solutions to the problems that confront us. On our side, there will have to be many changes – in our mind sets, in our diets, in our business models, and in the ways we keep animals. Furthermore, the future itself is uncertain as far as the technology that might become available or the changes in climate that might occur are concerned. But the essential elements are already clear. As this book shows, there are successful ways of farming that give priority to animal welfare, deliver high quality food, protect the environment, and most importantly, make business sense. What people value in their food is changing and continues to change. As a result, there are some surprising changes in the way that global businesses set their priorities. There are commercial as well as social and ethical benefits to animal welfare. ACCOUNTING FOR THE NEEDS AND WELFARE OF FARM ANIMALS CAN LEAD THE WAY IN CHALLENGING INDUSTRIALIZATION TRENDS THAT THREATEN PLANETARY SURVIVAL Kate Rawles, Lancaster University Lecturer in Environmental Philosophy, 2008, The Future of Animal Farming: renewing the ancient contract, eds. M. Dawkins & R. Bonney, p. 59 To conclude, then, animal welfare and environmental problems have a shared root cause in the mindset that sees others in purely instrumental terms as a set of resources for humans; and that sees ourselves as detached and separate managers of these systems. This worldview, and the inadequate shallow environmental ethic that accompanies it, are amongst the most significant things that need to be tackled if we are to respond to the clear wake-up calls that are coming from many quarters – from climate change, from the desperately accelerated extinction of our fellow species, and from systematically poor levels of animal welfare. These issues are all connected and cannot be tackled separately. To take them together is to see that industrialized societies are heading in the wrong direction and that profound changes are needed.
To get there, we need to re-forge the ancient contract between humans, animals, and the land, and understand ourselves as members of a living ecological community in which others are treated with respect. This does not mean treating them as sacrosanct and unusable but it does mean treating animals as sentient beings with social, behavioral and other needs, and it does mean working with the grain of living systems rather than against, ensuring that farming is compatible with biodiversity and minimizing its climate change impact. Directory: file -> view view -> Western Europe after wwii view -> Author study: paul fleischman view -> Qpa1 7ela study Guide view -> Arctic Oil/Gas Neg view -> November 1970 Approximately 150,000-500,000 deaths Bhola Cyclone Bangladesh view -> Grade Level: 6 Unit of Study: Caribbean glce view -> Citation: Duffield, Katy view -> Table of Contents Lesson # view -> Chinese Wind Energy Disad Download 1.43 Mb. Share with your friends:
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