LysanderNemoinis said:
I'm surprised...well, actually I'm NOT surprised that 8-Bit Philosophy didn't mention some of Singer's other theories and beliefs -- like how parents should have the right to kill their handicapped children after they've been born or that it's okay for people to have sex with animals so long as they can somehow "prove" they're not hurting the animal by doing so. Peter Singer is a reprehensible human being, and no one should take this sick bastard seriously.
While I agree that he was far from a golden human being, we can't just say he said these things we didn't like, so nothing he says should count. A lot of people out there have habits or act in ways that I don't like or care for, but that does not mean they shouldn't have an opinion or that there opinion carries with it no merit.
OT: I think animals do have some level of inalienable rights. Rationally, that makes perfect sense to me. That said, hurting a human by accident can land you in jail. Should it be the same for an animal? I don't think it should. If a child runs out in the street and we hit that child with our car, we face potential serious consequences because as the driver it is our job to watch out for these things. But when a dog or a squirrel does the same, should we face the same consequences? I don't think we should. As it stands, some animals are protected and you face sometimes worse consequences for killing one. For example, in NJ we sometimes have a bear season to keep the population down. But if you kill a bear outside a hunt year you face $10k in fines and up to 10 years in prison. I think this is ridiculous and there is extenuating circumstances like if your family is playing outside and bear wanders into the yard, should you not be able to protect them? I would say yes, but there are animal rights groups that say no, we have no right to protect ourselves.
But if we treat them the same as people, we can say that they have the same inalienable rights as us (ie. life and the pursuit of happiness). And just like in the case of people, those rights are protected so long as they don't rob someone else of those same rights. Meaning that you have the right to defend your home if someone invades it, including animals.
But it gets tricky when you look at the situation of people existing in the wild along with an animal. They don't own anything. So it can't be OK if we are out hiking and get attacked by an animal.
The truth is it's real tricky. Rights as animals go is not the same as rights as people go, no matter how you try to reason it out. I am looking at this as rational as I can, but one thing certain: People are not rational, and animals are far far far less rational than we are.