On Friday, we brought up the new topic of zoos, and discussed how zoos serve a pedagogical function. Sarah mentioned, that we don't really need to learn about wild animals and that we should just leave them alone. Do we need to learn from animals? Do we have the right to take them out of the wild?
Having a pet teaches you how to care for another being, and it also teaches responsibilities. We use various animals for researching which is a necessary tool for new treatments and medications. Zoos give a real life look at, for what a lot of people, will be the closest they ever come to seeing a real-life exotic animal. Animals are a huge part of our world and teach us so much, we do need to learn about them. In some aspects, humans think they own every animal (and thing). I do not think that this is intentional, but our thirst for knowledge blinds us.
Question: Yet, do we have the right to cage animals for our viewing? Where is the line between curiosity and taking away rights?
Saturday, November 6, 2010
Animal pedagody
Monday, November 1, 2010
Re: Becca Lindamood's Hunting v. Stop and Shop
At the end of Becca's latest post she asked what the world would be like if everyone was required to kill their own meat?
Well, first my response was that the rate would go down dramatically. Yet, then I thought, let's think realistically here. In order to answer this correctly I first have to imply that this is regulated by law -- purchasing meat from industries or small farms is illegal. In that case, I think it would not change at all. People would buy meat from the black market or from small farms anyways.
If, just for hypothetical reasons, we didn't live in a society where people do things even though they are illegal, the rate of meat consumption would go down. This is due to the fact that some people cannot afford weapons and also due to the fact that some people would feel wrong killing an animal. Although, I do think the crime rate may increase because more people would own weapons and would have to know how to use them. When asked a "what if " question it is difficult to say what would truly happen or how the population will react. And as we know from the Prohibition act in the 1920's if people want something that is illegal they will find a way to get it. In the case of hunting, people will get what they want even if that requires someone else to do their dirty work for them.
From an environmental standpoint, there would be an abundance of extra farm animals. I would say that farmers would have to keep their animals and not breed them. If they let them out into the wilderness it would throw off the entire food chain. The amount of foxes, coyotes, wolfs and other natural predators would increase. This would make other things go off course. A realistic chain reaction.
Question: what do you think the effects of a vegetarian world would be if we gradually worked towards it? Is it possible?
Saturday, October 30, 2010
re: Isa 10/29/10
This is a response to Isa's question," Do you think that our nature as humans has grown into something that may be uncontrollable if not regulated?"
In Isa's post and comment in class yesterday, she talked about the status of owning diamonds and pearls is like the status of owning a buck head on your wall. The words "power, money, and status" all come to mind when talking about trophy hunting (a whole new meaning to 'PMS'). When it comes to killing animals and mounting them on the wall or making rugs out of them that is power. I killed this animal and I am going to show it off. I wouldn't call this status, because the person is showing pride in the fact that they dominate the animal they killed. Wearing a fur coat, or a mink boa is a symbol of having money just like owning diamonds and pearls. Your status is determined by how much money and power you have. I think that it is in our nature to want to obtain the highest status possible.
It's not our nature as individual humans but our nature as a society that has made us believe in this appeal to vanity. Since owning a fur coat and the like are not things that everyone can afford, the amount you own does not need to be regulated. The amount of deers that are hunted, or any other animal that is, needs to be regulated because the population will be at risk for the hunted species.
There is an up side to a small amount of hunting though. When deers are over populated there are a lot of car accidents where they die and cars get completely totaled. I've heard several first hand account stories from friends and relatives. When a deer dies from a car accident, I'm pretty sure that in this country, it doesn't get eaten. I'm not saying that we might as well hunt them because they a going to die anyways from cars, I'm just pointing out that there are less car accidents when the population is under control.
Questions: What are other countries traditions for road kill? How does this compare with America's? What should change about our system or other countries?
Wednesday, October 27, 2010
Vegatarian V. Ego Defense Mechanism
On Friday Alex spoke about a billboard supporting meat eating and then asked why people were so threatened by vegetarianism. I replied by saying, "People come up with those ignorant sayings because they feel the need to rudely over justify their meat eating so that they can protect their egos." In further inspection of the topic, I found that this situation, does in fact, resembles a certain type of ego defense mechanism. In psychology courses they only teach you the ten Freudian ego defense mechanisms, yet there are others. I won't go into detail about all of the others but I will mention that they are typically divided into three categories: primitive; less primitive, more mature; and mature defense mechanisms.
Among the primitive defense mechanisms is "acting out." The man and the billboard would fall underneath this category. Acting out is preforming an action (puting up a meat eating billboard) instead of feeling the related emotion. People who are defensive have a hard time facing their shortcomings. Instead of excepting other's opinions they fight fire with fire.
Some individuals, feel threatened by vegetarianism because they are at risk for feeling guilty for something that they have been taught is okay their whole lives. An individual does not want to admit that they are a bad person for advocating the death and torture of another being for their own earthly use. In order to refrain from such feelings, they go to the extreme with excuses such as: "That's why God put them here," "PETA is just exaggerating, the animals don't really go through all that suffering," and, "Everybody else eats meat, so it's okay." By instantly dismissing the ethical aspects of meat-eating with excuses, the feelings of guilt are not felt.
Question: Is there a psychological aspect to eating meat and testing on animals? Perhaps cynical?
Thursday, October 21, 2010
Re: Emily's Food and Morality
Emily made a really good point about society labeling people and people labeling themselves based on what they eat. In a part of her blog she mentioned how people will say, "I had chocolate last night, I was so bad." This really hits the nail on the head because it's so true; I never thought of it that way before. She ends her post by asking, "Why are people 'good' or 'bad' based on what they eat?"
Now I'm going to use a little bit of logic by saying the word "bad" is ambiguous, in this dispute "bad" means unhealthy or morally wrong.
The saying goes, "you are what you eat." To some extent I think this is true, the foods we eat determine how healthy we are. The foods we eat even effect our mental functioning to some extent. When people say that they were bad for eating chocolate they mean it in a health sense-- they ate something "bad" for them. So in this context they are not assigning morality to the food. The people who eat the chocolate do not feel morally bad, they feel unhealthy.
When it comes down to the moral implications of eating meat that's a bit more tricky. Are we (morally) bad for eating meat? Well, this depends on what your morals are. If your morals tell you that you should not eat meat, then it is morally wrong to eat meat. If your morals justify consuming animals, then it is not morally wrong to eat meat. We cannot control our morals nor can we force morals upon someone. Laws and society shape our morals, we are taught that stealing is wrong and killing another person is wrong. Since consuming flesh is well accepted in our culture, our moral responsibility is up to us when it comes to the consumtion of animals.
We cannot control how these animals are being treated, and we certainly do not advocate their suffering, but is it our responsibility to feel morally wrong? The blame really should be on these industries and supermarkets. I have tried to find free-range poultry in grocery stores, but the selection is simply not there. So purchasing Purdue and other factory farm suppliers is the only option. It is different if there is a free-range option, but there isn't. Society has nothing to do with how those animals are treated, it is the corporations decision to do these things so that they will make more money.
Animal experimentation is a different story however. Yes, it is the corporations fault for testing on animals, but there are plenty of other options. These alternate options are easy to access and do the same thing, they are just a different brand. These products cost just as much as the products that are tested on animals. We should feel more morally obligated to not use animal tested products for these reasons. To me, it is worse to use products that were tested on animals than to consume animals, because it's so easy and people have no excuse. Yet, like I said before, we cannot control our morals, nor force morals upon someone else.
My questions: Should we spend our time and energy trying to reinstate animal cruelty laws against the politics of factory farms and animal testing, rather than promoting vegetarianism? Do they both have their place?
Wednesday, October 20, 2010
Animal Testing
Below (in two separate blog posts) I have listed companies that do and do not test on animals. These are PETA's complete lists of companies that are not required by law to test. These include companies that produce cosmetics, personal care products and domestic cleaning products.
Going over the ethics of whether testing is ethical or not for pharmaceutical and new treatment reasons is a tiresome task. This has value behind it and it is done with intention of helping others. In some light I can understand why they would test personal care and cosmetics on animals before putting it on the market (I will later elaborate). Make-up and soaps could cause people to break out, or give them hives. But household cleaning products?
Test Pinesol on floors? Test Lysol on counters? Test Febreze in the air? No, let's test them on animals. The defense may be that the fumes are at risk to poison you when you are cleaning, but why not use the knowledge of chemistry to our advantage? We know we do not need to put arson in our cleaning products -- a hopefully well established fact.
Arm and Hammer is listed on products that test on animals. Arm and Hammer is mainly known for baking powder/soda. Baking powder is quite a versatile substance. You can eat it, you can brush your teeth with it, you can clean with it, you can freshen your fridge with it, as well as other things I'm sure. It's versatility is due to it's low, basic pH. This is a scientific fact-- we know that it is safe to use. Yet, if we know it's safe why do we still test it on animals? Why fix something that obviously is not broken. You can do practically anything with baking powder, it does not need improvements. Testing it is a waste of time, energy, and animals.
New cosmetic products come out every once in a while. When they do, advertisements for new mascara's that make your eye lashes 'even longer' parade television commercials. Concealers and foundations that match to your exact skin tone take up several magazine pages. Shampoos that are created just for long hair, or short hair, or curly hair, or fizzy hair have just started coming out (in stores, not necessarily salons) over the past few years, making it seem like they all do not do the same thing -- clean your hair. Like it really makes a difference. All of this just for, what seems to me, some marketing ploy? I can understand companies testing on animals in the beginning, but once you have an effective product that makes you money why do you need to continue testing? Because other companies are doing it and if they do not keep up with them, then they won't make as much money.
As I mentioned before drug testing and new medical treatments are required by law and they have good intention behind their actions. Yet, cosmetics, personal-care products, and house-hold cleaning products do not need to be tested on animals. Newly created make-up and other personal care products are tested every day. Drugs are for our health, yet, cosmetics and some personal care products are for our appearance. Animal testing in these areas are driven by the consumer's need to be beautiful. Is this the price we must pay to be beautiful?
My question is: Why do you think that companies (that are not required by law to test) test their products on animals?
Companies that Do test on Animals
This is peta's list of companies that test on animals. Yet, just because a company is not listed here does not mean that they do not test on animals.
Arm & Hammer (Church & Dwight),
609-683-5900; 800-524-1328; www.armhammer.com
tBic Corporation,
Chesebrough-Ponds (Fabergé, Ponds, Vaseline),
Church & Dwight (Aim, Arm & Hammer, Arrid, Brillo, Close-up, Lady’s
Choice, Mentadent, Nair, Orange Glo International, Pearl Drops),
Clairol (Aussie, Daily Defense, Infusium 23, Procter & Gamble),
Clorox (ArmorAll, Formula 409, Fresh Step, Glad, Liquid Plumber, Pine-Sol, Soft Scrub, S.O.S., Tilex), 1221 Broadway,
800-227-1860; www.clorox.com
Colgate-Palmolive Co. (Hills Pet Nutrition, Mennen, Palmolive, SoftSoap, Speed Stick),
Cover Girl (Procter & Gamble), One Procter & Gamble Plz.,
Dial Corporation (Dry Idea, Purex, Renuzit, Right Guard, Soft & Dri),
Johnson & Johnson (Aveeno, Clean & Clear, Listerine, Lubriderm, Neutrogena, Rembrandt, ROC), 1 Johnson & Johnson Plz., New Brunswick, NJ 08933; 732-524-0400; 800-526-3967; www.jnj.com
Lever Bros. (Unilever),
L’Oréal
Rubinstein, Lancôme, Matrix Essentials, Maybelline, Ralph Lauren
Fragrances, Redken, Soft Sheen,
212-818-1500; www.loreal.com
Max Factor (Procter & Gamble), One Procter & Gamble Plz.,
Mead, 10 W. Second St., #1,
Melaleuca,
Mennen Co. (Colgate-Palmolive),
New Dana Perfumes,
PA 18707; 800-822-8547
Noxell (Procter & Gamble),
410-785-7300; 800-572-3232; www.pg.com
Olay Co./Oil of Olay (Procter & Gamble),
800-543-1745; www.oilofolay.com
Oral-B (Procter & Gamble),
415-598-5000; www.oralb.com
Pantene (Procter & Gamble), One Procter & Gamble Plz.,
800-945-7768; www.pantene.com
Physique (Procter & Gamble), One Procter & Gamble Plz., Cincinnati, OH 45202; 800-214-8957; www.physique.com
Playtex Products (Banana Boat), 300 Nyala Farms Rd.,
Procter & Gamble Co. (Clairol, Cover Girl, Crest, Gillette, Giorgio, Iams, Max Factor, Physique, Tide), One Procter & Gamble Plz., Cincinnati, OH 45202; 513-983-1100; 800-543-1745; www.pg.com
Reckitt Benckiser (Easy Off, Lysol, Mop & Glo, Old English, Resolve, Spray ’N
Richardson-Vicks (Procter & Gamble), One Procter & Gamble Plz.,
Schering-Plough (Bain de Soleil, Coppertone, Dr. Scholl’s),
S.C. Johnson (Drano, Edge, Fantastik, Glade, OFF!, Oust, Pledge, Scrubbing Bubbles, Shout, Skintimate, Windex, Ziploc),
800-494-4855; www.scjohnson.com
SoftSoap Enterprises (Colgate-Palmolive),
Suave (Unilever), 800
800-782-8301; www.suave.com
Unilever (Axe, Dove, Lever Bros., Suave, Sunsilk),
Legend
t The company is currently observing a moratorium on animal testing.
Note: Clariol's product, Herbal Essences does not test on animals.
