So far I don't think anyone among us has come out and claimed that animals should have the same rights as people . . .
Steve, I don't see anyone strongly arguing here that animals have the same rights as people.
Just to review: it may be true that none of us Ranters is arguing that animals should have the same rights as people. However:
21. THE “RIGHTS” OF ANIMALS
IT HAS LATELY BECOME a growing fashion to extend the concept of rights from human beings to animals, and to assert that since animals have the full rights of humans, it is therefore impermissible—i.e., that no man has the right—to kill or eat them.
That was the opening thesis. On the second page of the thread, issodhos reminds us of the subject at hand:
Special note should be made of Murray Rothbard's first sentence in this chapter. He is specifically speaking of the idea of extending to animals the full Rights of humans.
I'm with you, Mellow Julia, I don't think that's what the rest of us were intent upon discussing. I replied to iss:
I don't see where anyone is arguing that animals should have the same rights as humans.
A page of humorous digressions, and issodhos came back with a slight equivocation:
Do you think animals have the same or similar rights?
In response to my assertion that his "lion" example was not germane to the opening theme, issodhos once again reminds us:
It seems to me the only one attempting to change the debate is you, Stereoman. It is about whether animals have the same Rights as Man -- not "whether humans should respect their rights".
And reaffirmed the serious intent of posing the question:
You can return all you want, Stereoman, there is no straw man.
No doubt your confusion as to the question at hand is fed at least in part by the thread starter's uncertainty. We have the title question:
The first question in the thread was “do animals have rights?”
But then we have the more specific question reiterated:
The first paragraph was:
IT HAS LATELY BECOME a growing fashion to extend the concept of rights from human beings to animals, and to assert that since animals have the full rights of humans, it is therefore impermissible—i.e., that no man has the right—to kill or eat them.
And underscored:
He was referring to the full natural rights of Man, and His conclusion was, no, they don’t.
I had earlier pointed out that none of us, not one, had asserted that animals' rights should be
equal to those of humans, and it doesn't seem that anyone, including issodhos, had or has any interest in that point.
In fact, after these several reminders that the question was whether animals have
the same rights as humans, our intrepid guide now offers us a completely different idea:
. . . perhaps what we need to do is develop a political philosophy concerning the relationship between Man and animal.
I think that's what we've all been discussing, all along. Off topic though it may have been.
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