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Minh A. Luong & Company Tutorial PlanetDebate.com 1

September-October 2011 National Forensic League Lincoln-Douglas topicResolved: Justice requires the recognition of animal rights.

2011 Minh A. Luong and Harvard Debate, Inc., All Rights Reserved

N.B.: The views expressed in this essay and other open-source work are those of theauthor/editor and his research staff and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or

position of Yale University, Brown University, the U.S. Government, nor the United Nations(with which the author maintains advisory relationships in the case of the latter two).

PlanetDebate.com/Lincoln-Douglas.com

Minh A. Luong & Company Tutorial:

September-October 2011 National Forensic League Lincoln-Douglas topic

Resolved:Justicerequirestherecognitionofanimalrights.

Dr. Minh A. Luong

Author/Editor

International Security Studies

and

The Brady-Johnson Program in Grand Strategyand

Ivy Scholars ProgramYale University

New Haven, Connecticut USA

Department of Political Science

and

Taubman Center for Public Policy andAmerican Institutions

andWatson Institute for International Affairs

Brown UniversityProvidence, Rhode Island
mailto:[email protected]?subject=PlanetDebate%20LD%20topic%20tutorial%20-%20Sept/Oct%202005mailto:[email protected]?subject=PlanetDebate%20LD%20topic%20tutorial%20-%20Sept/Oct%202005mailto:[email protected]?subject=PlanetDebate%20LD%20topic%20tutorial%20-%20Sept/Oct%202005mailto:[email protected]?subject=PlanetDebate%20LD%20topic%20tutorial%20-%20Sept/Oct%202005%20-%20Immigrationmailto:[email protected]?subject=PlanetDebate%20LD%20topic%20tutorial%20-%20Sept/Oct%202005%20-%20Immigrationmailto:[email protected]?subject=PlanetDebate%20LD%20topic%20tutorial%20-%20Sept/Oct%202005%20-%20Immigrationmailto:[email protected]?subject=PlanetDebate%20LD%20topic%20tutorial%20-%20Sept/Oct%202005%20-%20Immigrationmailto:[email protected]?subject=PlanetDebate%20LD%20topic%20tutorial%20-%20Sept/Oct%202005


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SelectedQuotations

As long as people will shed the blood of innocent creatures there can be no peace, no liberty, no harmony between

people. Slaughter and justice cannot dwell together.--Isaac Bashevis Singer

There are many ways human beings can be guilty of mistreating animals. Perhaps even the law should make someprovisions to ensure that wanton torture and mistreatment of animals are minimized. But this is not because animals

have rights, which they cannot have given their nature as instinctually driven beasts instead of moral agents.

Talking, therefore, about animal rights is a confusion and misguides our thinking about our proper relationship with

the rest of the animal world.-- Tibor Machan,

Research Fellow at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University

The question is not, "Can they reason?" nor, "Can they talk?" but rather, "Can they suffer?"--Jeremy Bentham

English jurist, philosopher, and legal and social reformer

I've always felt that animals are the purest spirits in the world. They don't fake or hide their feelings, and they arethe most loyal creatures on Earth. And somehow we humans think we're smarterwhat a joke.

- P!nk

Contemporary singer and entertainer

The life of an ant and that of my child should be granted equal consideration.--Michael W. Fox,

Scientific Director and former Vice President, The Humane Society of the United States, The Inhumane Society,

New York, 1990

The basis of all animal rights should be the Golden Rule: we should treat them as we would wish them to treat us,

were any other species in our dominant position.--Christine Stevens

Together, eco-terrorists and animal rights extremists are one of the most serious domestic terrorism threats in theU.S. today.

--Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI),

Putting Intel to Work Against ELF and ALF Terrorists, 30 June 2008

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.

--Peter Singer,Ira W. DeCamp Professor of Bioethics, Princeton University

If the apes survive, it will be because we decide (spurred on by Jane Goodall) to save their habitats. And the same

will be true, in time, of virtually all the larger animals. And if domestic animals are bred and cared for, it is becausewe have an interest in their products. In all our dealings with the animals, the inherent mastership of the human

race displays itself. And this only goes to show that we alone have the duty to look after the animals, because we

alone have duties. The corollary is inescapable: we alone have rights.-- Roger Scrunton,

Scholar, Institute for the Psychological Sciences (VA), Oxford University (UK) and University of St. Andrews (UK)


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InThisTopicBriefingCover page 1

Selected quotations 2

In This Topic Briefing (aka the Table of Contents) 3

A Note from the Editor 4

Topic in Context 5

Strategy Notes

Affirmative 15

Negative

Definitional Concepts and Definitions 29

Positions and Argument Starters

Affirmative 34

Negative

Sources 38

Selected Evidence on the Topic 43 75

About the Author/Editor and Analytic Research Team Leaders 76


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ANotefromtheEditor

The Lincoln-Douglas debate topic for September-October 2011 isResolved: Justice requires the recognition of

animal rights.

This topic evokes strong emotions and passions on both sides of the topic and through our extensive research, wehave found very few academics and public intellectuals outside those who are self-identified advocates for their

respective side of the issue who have taken a moderate middle ground position on this topic.

Every PlanetDebate Lincoln-Douglas debate topic briefing is the collective product of a number of scholars, topic-

engaged professionals, researchers, and individuals from typical judge demographic pools who evaluate potential

arguments and their effectiveness. Even though my name appears at the top of each briefing packet, it takes the

combined contributions of between 15 to 20 people to produce each topic tutorial; hence the & Company part of

the series name. In fact, one of the most difficult tasks in producing each topic briefing packet is to edit the material

down to our target of 40 pages!

Due to the difficulty in finding high quality open-source research material on the internet pertaining to this topic, my

colleagues and I have focused on presenting material that is generally not available to high school debaters. We have

focused on the bioethics, legal, philosophy, political science and other academic and public policy sources as well as

focusing on author qualifications which we believe will be especially important when debating this topic. We have

also chosen to continue to integrate extensive quotations from the leading scholars themselves directly into the topic

analysis with the intent of providing direct illustrations with the least amount of interpretation to promote clearer and

deeper understanding of the topic. You may notice that the quotation section for this tutorial is particularly robust

and each quotation is longer than usual. This is due to our desire to adequately capture the context and nuance of

each authors argument. As a result, this topic tutorial is nearly twice as long as our target length of 40 pages due to

the complexity of the topic and our desire to best prepare you for this topic.

I am particularly indebted to my longtime friend and colleague, Nick Coburn-Palo, doctoral candidate in the

political science department at Brown University for his significant contributions to this tutorial. As a former

national champion debater and coach and now emerging scholar on American political development and political

theory, his knowledge on this topic along with cutting-edge insights has added a unique dimension that we hope will

give you and your squad a significant competitive advantage when debating this topic. Rick Brundage, nationally

recognized coach and Yale Ivy Scholars Program senior instructor, continues to play a key role on our research andanalytic team here at PlanetDebate.com.

This topic briefing would not be possible were it not for the many conversations with and contributions from a wide

range of scholars and advocates on both sides of this question. My professorial colleagues at both Yale and Brown

universities provided important insights and contributions. I am also indebted to three subject matter experts

veteran advocates in the animal rights debate and a critic of the animal rights movement at a leading think tank for

their invaluable feedback, insights, and suggestions. And finally, many thanks to our focus group panelists for their

feedback and suggestions on prospective argument strategies.

My colleagues and I thank you for being a PlanetDebate.com/Lincoln-Douglas.com subscriber and we hope that our

unique blend of academic and policy practitioner approaches will give you a distinct advantage in your debate

rounds. As always, I invite your comments and feedback, and greatly value your confidence in our project by using

our materials to help your program prepare for each National Forensic League Lincoln-Douglas debate topic. If youhave any suggestions, questions or concerns, please feel free to contact me. My email address [email protected].

With best wishes for success as we start the 2011-12 debate season,

Minh A. LuongAuthor/Editor
mailto:[email protected]:[email protected]:[email protected]


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TOPICINCONTEXT

In selecting the topicResolved: Justice requires the recognition of animal rights to begin the

2011-2012 Lincoln-Douglas debate season, the coaches of the National Forensic League have

chosen a resolution with an exceptionally strong literature base and a robust core of topicspecific arguments and connections to broader philosophical and public policy debates. While

the academic debate is complex, more so than with most issues, my colleagues and I believe the

size of the necessary intellectual chessboard is well suited to Lincoln Douglas debate.

The relevance of debating environmental issues would be difficult to question. The salience of

the animal rights question, however, might not be as obvious at first glance. Duquesne

University Professor Stephen Newmyer1

explains its significance as follows:

It will be obvious to anyone who pays attention to the media that issues relating to the

treatment of animals by human beings constituted the subject of one of the central

intellectual debates of the closing years of the twentieth century that shows no sign of

abating in the twenty-first. One does not need to consult the sophisticated and abstractly

argued treatises of ethical philosophers and ethologists, those scientists whose work

entails the systematic study of animal behavioral patterns, to be aware that the questions

of whether animals possess rights, what those rights might be, and what impact such

rights possession might have upon human behavior, have far-reaching implications for

the lives of all persons, and that those questions are currently the topic of lively debate.

[Newmyer, Stephen. 2006. Animals, Rights and Reason in Plutarch and Modern Ethics.

New York: Routledge. p. 4]

This debate touches on a fundamental question(s) in philosophy: What is it to be human and

what significance ought one attach to such a designation? In the context of animal rights, this

maps well onto the issue of biocentrism, as Professor James B. Reichmann, S.J. of the

Philosophy Department at Seattle University explained:

Until recently, in the Western world, rights were traditionally and all but universally

recognized as attributable to humans alone. Today, new winds are blowing, and we

increasingly are hearing a call to extend rights to the nonhuman animal and even, on

occasion, to the environment as well. Though still perhaps a minority position,increasingly contemporary life scientists and philosophers argue that the planet upon

which we live belongs no more properly to us humans than it does to the animals. As a

consequence, it is alleged, we humans ought to extend to them also at least some of the

rights we extend to ourselves; others there are who are very vocal in contending that the

1 For a list of Professor Newmyers (and yes, there is no e between the m and the y) publications, visit URL:

http://www.duq.edu/classics/dr-stephen-newmyer.cfm
http://www.duq.edu/classics/dr-stephen-newmyer.cfmhttp://www.duq.edu/classics/dr-stephen-newmyer.cfmhttp://www.duq.edu/classics/dr-stephen-newmyer.cfm


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environment itself is to be viewed as a subject of rights. There is, in short, a rising

antipathy to a view, often characterized as elitist, which accords a privileged status to

humans, often at great cost both to the nonhuman animal and to the environment. This

view is often stigmatized as anthropocentric. As a corrective measure, many

environmentalist ethicists opt for a position they denominate as biocentrist. According tothis view, humans are to accept their place as merely one among many other life forms

inhabiting planet earth, all of which compete for their share in this planets coveted by

increasingly limited resources.

[Reichmann, James. 2000. Evolution, Animal Rights, & the Environment. Washington

D.C.: Catholic University Press. p. 2]

Because so many of the best resources on this topic are available only to university students and

professors, and understanding that most high school students lack access to these resources, this

briefing will endeavor to expose students to sections of text from the top books and articles in the

area of animal rights. In order to focus most effectively, this section will focus on the three most

influential contemporary authors on the topic: Peter Singer, R.G. Frey, and Tom Regan. Their

importance is explained by George Washington University Professor of Philosophy David

DeGrazia:2

Singer, Frey, and Regan have made important contributions. Much of the animal ethics

literature comes close to suggesting that they have mapped out the major views in this

debate; it is not unusual for an article or anthology to represent the utilitarian view, the

rights view, and no otherOne of the most remarkable facts about the first generation is

that they all agree upon the basic idea of extending equal consideration to animals. Forthe utilitarians, animals interests count equally in maximizing the good. For Regan,

animals interests are somewhat more rigorously protected by rights.

[DeGrazia, David. 1996. Taking Animals Seriously: Mental Life and Moral Status.

Cambridge (U.K.): Cambridge University Press. p. 6-7]

However, this is not to imply that these three authors constitute the entirely of the debate.

Classical thought will be explored in the context of Frey. Second generation Animal Rights

thought will be explored in the Argument Starter sections, as well as within the evidence set.

However, it would be an injustice to overlook the importance of the British animal rights

campaigners of over 100 years ago, among the most significant of whom was Henry StephensSalt.

3

He has been recognized by both Singer and Regan as making many of the same arguments

they did, far ahead of their times. Consider what Salt wrote back in 1912:

2 For a list of Professor DeGrazias work and his CV, see URL:

http://departments.columbian.gwu.edu/philosophy/people/1303 For a brief biography of Henry Stephens Salt, see URL:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Stephens_Salt
http://departments.columbian.gwu.edu/philosophy/people/130http://departments.columbian.gwu.edu/philosophy/people/130http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Stephens_Salthttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Stephens_Salthttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Stephens_Salthttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Stephens_Salthttp://departments.columbian.gwu.edu/philosophy/people/130


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Have lower animals rights? Undoubtedly if men haveIf men have not rights

well they have an unmistakable intimation of something very similar; a sense of justice

which marks the boundary-line where acquiescence ceases and resistance begins; a

demand for freedom to live their own lives, subject to the necessity of respecting the

equal freedom of other people.[From Henry Salts Animals Rights, written in 1912, republished in the following

anthology: Regan, Tom and Peter Singer (ed.). 1976.Animal Rights and Human

Obligations. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall Inc. p. 173]

The nuance in Salts argument is useful to consider even now, as he clarifies his demand

It is an entire mistake to suppose that the rights of animals are in any way antagonistic to

the rights of men. Let us not be betrayed for a moment into the specious fallacy that we

must study human rights first, and leave the animal question to solve itself hereafterit

is too late in the day to suggest the indefinite postponement of a consideration of animals

rights, for from a moral point of view, and even from a legislative point of view, we are

daily confronted with the problemanimals have rights, and these rights consist in the

restricted freedom to live a natural life a life, that is, which permits of the individual

development subject to the limitations imposed by the permanent needs and interests of

the community. There is nothing quixotic or visionary in this assertionif we must kill,

whether it be man or animal, let us kill and have done with it; if we must inflict pain, let

us do what is inevitable, without hypocrisy, or evasion, or cant. But (here is the cardinal

point) let us first be assured that it is necessary; let us not wantonly trade on the needless

miseries of other beings, and then attempt to lull our consciences by a series of shufflingexcuses which cannot endure a moments candid investigation.

[From Henry Salts Animals Rights, written in 1912, republished in the following

anthology: Regan, Tom and Peter Singer (ed.). 1976.Animal Rights and Human

Obligations. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall Inc. p. 177-78]

Having briefly considered the British influence on the contemporary animal rights movement,

we will now consider three leading authors who exemplify the most prominent intellectual

positions in the animal rights debate.

Peter Albert David Singer

Australian ethicist Peter Singer,4

4 Professor Singers website at Princeton University is at URL:

the Ira W. DeCamp Professor of Bioethics at Princeton

University, has gained prominence in the world of philosophy in a variety of sub-fields

including, in recent years, the emerging inquiry into cosmopolitan ethics. However, he first

gained international prominence from his full-throated defense of the welfare of animals.

http://www.princeton.edu/~psinger/
http://www.princeton.edu/~psinger/http://www.princeton.edu/~psinger/http://www.princeton.edu/~psinger/http://www.princeton.edu/~psinger/


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Considered the progenitor of the speciesism argument, as well an innovator on suffering-based

arguments, Singer offers a non-rights based defense of animals. George Washington University

Professor David DeGrazia explains the primary argument of Peter Singers iconic work on

animal ethics as follows

More than any other work, Peter SingersAnimal Liberation brought questions about the

moral status of animals into intellectual respectability. In this work, Singer argues on the

basis of behavioral, physiological, and evolutionary evidence that many animals (at least

vertebrates) have interests at the very least an interest in not suffering. Indeed, he

identifiessentience, the capacity to suffer, as the admission ticket to the moral arena.

Nonsentient beings have no interests, and where there are no interests, there is nothing

morally to protect. On the other hand, all sentient beings have interests and therefore

moral status. Noting that leading ethical theories assume some principle ofequal

consideration of interests, Singer argues that there is no coherent reason to exclude

(sentient) animals interests from the scope of equal consideration. Including animals

does not entail precisely equal treatment. Dogs have no interest in learning to read and

write, so equal consideration does not require providing them an education even if we

hold that humans are entitled to an education. However, it does mean that if a human and

a rat suffer equally in duration and intensity, their suffering has the same moral weight or

importance. Singer employs this simple thesis in a scathing critique of common uses of

animals for human purposes. He gives particularly detailed attention to factory farming

and the use of animals in biomedical research, calling for the abolition of the former and

the near-abolition of the latter.

[DeGrazia, David. 1996. Taking Animals Seriously: Mental Life and Moral Status.Cambridge (U.K.): Cambridge University Press. p. 2-3]

It is his emphasis on suffering which sets Singers work apart, as Professor Stephen T. Newmyer,

Professor of Classics at Duquesne University, explains that

While humans may have superior memories and more detailed knowledge of what is

happening to them, Singer feels that there is no reason to conclude that animals

experience pain to a lesser degree than do humans. Indeed, he maintains that their

suffering may be the more intense because they understand it less. The suffering of

animals has for Singer the same moral weight as does that of humans.[Newmyer, Stephen. 2006. Animals, Rights and Reason in Plutarch and Modern Ethics.

New York: Routledge. p. 49]

Singers theories have drawn both great praise and criticism. Among the most strident lines of

criticism have been related to his comparison of speciesism to racism, sexism, and the

Holocaust, which many have argued is inappropriate, inaccurate, and offensive. However,


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supporters of Singer have offered a robust defense of the comparisons, as Dr. David Sztybel,5

research fellow at the University of Vienna and former fellow at the Oxford Centre for Animal

Ethics, demonstrates:

The comparison in general, to the extent that it can be illuminated, cannot successfullybe impugned by alleging that it glosses over particular differences, is insulting,

trivializing, or put forward by those who are Nazi-like. Certainly, it would be viciously

circular to assume that animal liberation is mistaken from the start, which makes the

comparison offensive, and which in turn is supposed to prove that animal liberation is

wrong. I conclude that if all other objections against animal liberation fail, objecting to

the Holocaust comparison by itself will not vindicate the case for anti-animal-liberation. I

submit the possibility that some people are deeply offended by the comparison because

they are profoundly prejudiced against animals and in favor of human beings, and

intolerant of those who hold opinions that are reflective of animal liberationist

tendencies. If there were no such thing as discriminatory oppression, there never would

have been a Holocaust, but neither could there be what animal liberationists refer to as

speciesism. Far from the comparison being intrinsically objectionable, it is potentially

useful and illuminating, and may help to underline the gravity of our oppression of

nonhuman animals.

[Sztybel, David. 2006. Can the Treatment of Animals be Compared to the Holocaust?

Ethics and the Environment. 11:1. p. 130]

Singers importance to modern animal rights movement cannot be overestimated. However, in

terms of the current LD debate topic, he is less important than one might at first expect. Thereason for his diminished importance is that he is considered to couch his arguments in terms of

Darwinism and Utility, rather than the language of rights embraced by the resolution. This opens

his arguments to lines of criticism which might not necessarily apply to rights-based defenses of

animal welfare. Some of the potential pitfalls are explained by Professor Emeritus of English at

Brandeis University Eugene Goodheart:6

Singer presents himself as a Darwinian. Darwinism has historically been an unreliable

guide in ethical matters. Consider its pernicious consequences in Social Darwinism, in

which the Struggle for Existence and the Survival of the Fittest become models for

economic life. Darwin and his advocate Thomas Huxley cautioned against conflatingevolution and ethicsIn any case, Singer is undaunted in his attempt to extrapolate a

benign morality from evolutionary theory. Has he succeeded? Only if he is allowed to

pick and choose arbitrarily from its full panoply. Once invested in the theory, we cant

5 For an expanded summary of Professor Sztybels position, see URL:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Sztybel6 Professor Goodhearts bio page at Brandeis University is at URL:

http://www.brandeis.edu/facguide/person.html?emplid=8f9c3f620d81033c17c39c83e01330a940738a55
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Sztybelhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Sztybelhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Sztybelhttp://www.brandeis.edu/facguide/person.html?emplid=8f9c3f620d81033c17c39c83e01330a940738a55http://www.brandeis.edu/facguide/person.html?emplid=8f9c3f620d81033c17c39c83e01330a940738a55http://www.brandeis.edu/facguide/person.html?emplid=8f9c3f620d81033c17c39c83e01330a940738a55http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Sztybel


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simply ignore what works against our personal desires. If Darwinism is the basis for

rethinking ethics, then we will need to incorporate Natural Selection and The Survival of

the Fittest in conceiving or re-conceiving an ethical system. The very fact that human

beings are essentially animals (and not angels) means that they too struggle for existence.

They kill animals for food, resist or trim predatory herds to protect their domesticanimals, experiment in the laboratory with animals so that cures can be found for human

diseases. The discrimination on the basis of species is natural according to the Darwinian

dispensation.

[Goodheart, Eugene. 2006. Peter Singers Challenge.Philosophy and Literature.

30:1. p. 242-43]

R.G. Frey

University of Liverpool Professor R.G. Frey is considered a strong advocate of the classical

arguments in favor of the existence of obligations, rights even, regarding humans which are not

present among (other) animals. In order to understand his argument, it is best to consider the

tradition upon which it is constructed. The long-standing position of many classic scholars is

explained by the Professor of Philosophy and Biomedical Sciences at Colorado State University,

Bernard E. Rollin,7

as follows:

At least since Plato and Aristotle, and even in the Catholic tradition, the notion of the

soul providing the basis for excluding animals from moral concern has been given

philosophical content by equating the soul with the rational faculty or the ability toreason. Humans are rational, or at least have the capacity for rational thought, while

animals do not, and for this reason, the scope of morality does not extend beyond

humans. This claim that only humans are rational has traditionally been linked to another

criterion used to distinguish people from animals, the claim that only humans possess

language or the ability to use what are called conventional signs.The position linking

rationality, language, and moral status may very briefly be schematized as follows: 1)

Only humans are rational. 2) Only humans possess language. 3) Only humans are

objects of moral concern.

[Rollin, Bernard. 1992. Animal Rights & Human Morality. Buffalo, NY: Prometheus

Books. p. 33]

7 Professor Rollins webpage at Colorado State University is at URL:

http://www.colostate.edu/dept/Philosophy/RollinB.html
http://www.colostate.edu/dept/Philosophy/RollinB.htmlhttp://www.colostate.edu/dept/Philosophy/RollinB.htmlhttp://www.colostate.edu/dept/Philosophy/RollinB.html


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For Aristotle, what one might call normative or abstract judgment is a trait which sets

humans apart from animals. University of Kent scholar and critic of animal rights arguements

Michael Leahy8

explained Aristotles argument as follows

The implications of Aristotles account of animal experience is best brought out bycontrast with that of human beings. We bring rationality, in the form of thinking and

understanding, to bear upon the psychic faculties we share with plants and the lower

animalsBut rationality brings with it language and the possibility of being correct and

incorrectIt is purposive choice (prohairesis) of which animals are capable. As Aristotle

puts it, An object of choice is something within our power at which we aim after

deliberation. Deliberation is not within the power of animalsthere can be no

friendship or justice towards inanimate things, and not even towards a horse or an

oxPlants exist to give subsistence to animals, and animals to give it to men.

[Leahy, Michael. 1991. Against Liberation: Putting Animals in Perspective. London:

Routledge. P. 78-80]

Building upon the concept earlier articulated by Aristotle, Kant honed his notion ofa priori

thought around a human/animal binary. Again, Professor of Philosophy and Biomedical

Sciences at Colorado State University, Bernard Rollin, explains:

Kant proceeds by stressing the human ability to arrive at what philosophers call a priori

knowledge, that is, knowledge that cannot be shown to be false by experience and can be

known to be true simply by thoughtThe important point for our purposes is Kants

claim that only human beings can possess a priori knowledge, and only the possession ofa priori knowledge can allow a being to go beyond the particular circumstances one finds

in sense experience of the world and assert judgments that claim universality, not tied to

specific times and places. This for Kant is the essential meaning of rationality. Since

only humans can entertain, understand, apprehend, and formulate statements that are

universal in scope, only humans are rational. This is because, according to Kant, animals

are tied to stimulus and response reactions.


Books. p. 39-40]

8 Michael Paul Tutton Leahy was a conservative British philosopher who, in his bookAgainst Liberation (1991),

argued that the notion of animal rights was absurd which triggered threats against him from animal rights activists.

His obituaries from 2007 highlight his life and arguments against animal rights. These include The Telegraph (UK)

at URL:http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/1553905/Michael-Leahy.html,The Sunday Times (UK) at

URL:http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/obituaries/article1890104.ece , and The Independent(UK) at URL:

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/obituaries/michael-leahy-450821.html
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/1553905/Michael-Leahy.htmlhttp://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/1553905/Michael-Leahy.htmlhttp://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/1553905/Michael-Leahy.htmlhttp://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/obituaries/article1890104.ecehttp://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/obituaries/article1890104.ecehttp://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/obituaries/article1890104.ecehttp://www.independent.co.uk/news/obituaries/michael-leahy-450821.htmlhttp://www.independent.co.uk/news/obituaries/michael-leahy-450821.htmlhttp://www.independent.co.uk/news/obituaries/michael-leahy-450821.htmlhttp://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/obituaries/article1890104.ecehttp://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/1553905/Michael-Leahy.html


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Frey makes his contribution to the argument by articulating these classic arguments within a

utilitarian context, one which calculates utility in a substantially different way than does Singer.

Professor David DeGrazia explains as follows

Like Singer, R.G. Frey embraces utilitarianism, the ethical theory that states that theright action is that which maximizes good consequences. HisInterest and Rights is

philosophically more in-depth than most works in animal ethics. Unlike Singer, Frey

argues in this early work that animals have no interests (and therefore cannot be harmed).

To reach this conclusion, he begins by contending that all morally relevant interests are

based on desires. Then he argues that one cannot have a desire (say, to own a book)

without a corresponding beliefBecause animals lack language, they lack the beliefs

requisite for desires and therefore lack desires. Thus, animals have no interests. Lacking

interests, animals have no significant moral status.

[DeGrazia, David. 1996. Taking Animals Seriously: Mental Life and Moral Status.

Cambridge (U.K.): Cambridge University Press. p. 3-4]

Since animals lack significant moral status, they also lack a utilitarian based claim to rights.

Professor Louis Pojman9

clarifies Freys position:

Frey argues that rights are predicated upon beliefs and interests, and since animals fail

to have these, they fail to possess rights. In order to have a belief one must be able to

conceptualize and entertain a proposition or sentence, but there is no evidence that

animals can do this. In order to have interests, according to Frey, one must be able to

have desires, but desires also involve propositional content, beliefs, and this is somethingthat animals don't possess. Since only beings with interests can have rights, it follows that

animals don't have rights.

[Pojman, Louis. 1993. Do Animal Rights Entail Moral Nihilism? Public Affairs

Quarterly. 7:2. p. 168]

Tom Regan

For North Carolina State University Philosophy Professor Tom Regan,10

something called

subject-of-life status is of great importance in evaluation moral obligations and resulting rights

claims. He explains the concept as follows:

Individuals are subjects-of-life if they have beliefs and desires; perception, memory, and

a sense of the future, including their own future; an emotional life together with feelings

9 Dr. Louis Pojmans website is at URL:http://www.louispojman.com/index.htm10 For more information on Professor Regan, visit these two websites:http://www.lib.ncsu.edu/exhibits/regan/and

his website devoted to resources on animal rights at URL:http://www.lib.ncsu.edu/animalrights/
http://www.louispojman.com/index.htmhttp://www.louispojman.com/index.htmhttp://www.louispojman.com/index.htmhttp://www.lib.ncsu.edu/exhibits/regan/http://www.lib.ncsu.edu/exhibits/regan/http://www.lib.ncsu.edu/exhibits/regan/http://www.lib.ncsu.edu/animalrights/http://www.lib.ncsu.edu/animalrights/http://www.lib.ncsu.edu/animalrights/http://www.lib.ncsu.edu/animalrights/http://www.lib.ncsu.edu/exhibits/regan/http://www.louispojman.com/index.htm


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13

of pleasure and pain; preference and welfare-interests; the ability to initiate action in

pursuit of their desires and goals; a psychophysical identity over time; and an individual

welfare in the sense that their experiential life fares well or ill for them, logically

independently of their being the object of anyone elses interests.

[Regan, Tom. 1988. The Case for Animal Rights. London: Routledge Publishing. p.243.]

The claim of subject-of-life status carries with it, according to Regan, a right to not be harmed by

others. University of Miami Professor of Philosophy Mark Rowlands11

clarifies:

That is, being the subject-of-a-life bestows on an individual the distinctive sort of value

which consists in having an experiential welfare. Therefore, at least prima facie, we fail

to treat individuals in ways that respect their value when we treat them in ways that

detract from their welfare. And we detract from the welfare of this type individual when

we harm themAccording to Regan, therefore, we have a prima facie duty not to harm

those individuals who are subjects-of-a-life. The qualification prima facie signifies that

the duty can, in certain circumstances, be overridden.

[Rowlands, Mark. 2009. Animal Rights: Moral Theory and Practice. London: Palgrave

MacMillan. p. 68]

In addition to a duty to not harm animals, in Regans account, humans also face a limited

positive obligation to come to the defense of animals. The limits of that obligation are explained

by Professor Clare Palmer of the Philosophy Department at Texas A&M University:12

Two principles follow from Regans argument that allsubjects-of-a-life have inherent

value: aprinciple of respectand a harm principle. The unacquired right to respectful

treatment and the right not to be harmed can be claimed by or on behalf of all subjects-of-

a-life. Regan is not completely clear about what claims animals have on the basis of

these rights, but moral agents certainly have negative duties not to harm or kill animals.

Regan also claims that there is a duty to assist when others treat animals in ways that

violate their rights. But this duty can only arise when the threat to an animal is from a

moral agent, for only moral agents can threaten livesOnly (some) humans are moral

agents. Consequently, there are no duties to intervene when animals are threatened by

beings and things that are not moral agents. This means, for example, that there is noresponsibility to intervene in predation (since predators are not moral agents and so

cannot threaten anyones rights nor commit any injustice).

11 Professor Rolands maintains a blog at URL:http://rowlands.philospot.com/and a personal website at URL:

http://www.markrowlandsauthor.com/12 Professor Palmers website is at URL:http://philosophy.tamu.edu/People/Faculty/Palmer/index.html
http://rowlands.philospot.com/http://rowlands.philospot.com/http://rowlands.philospot.com/http://www.markrowlandsauthor.com/http://www.markrowlandsauthor.com/http://philosophy.tamu.edu/People/Faculty/Palmer/index.htmlhttp://philosophy.tamu.edu/People/Faculty/Palmer/index.htmlhttp://philosophy.tamu.edu/People/Faculty/Palmer/index.htmlhttp://philosophy.tamu.edu/People/Faculty/Palmer/index.htmlhttp://www.markrowlandsauthor.com/http://rowlands.philospot.com/


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[Palmer, Clare. 2010. Animal Ethics in Context. New York: Columbia University Press.

p. 35] (N.B.: italics added by PD editor)

Regan does allow for animals to be harmed, albeit in very limited situations. The narrow

contours of those limits are clarified in the following statement from Regan:

the onus of justification lies, not on the shoulders of those who are vegetarians, but on

the shoulders of those who are notit is the nonvegetarian who must show us how he

can be justified in eating meat, when he knows that, in order to do so, an animal had to be

killedThat is not to say that practices that involve taking the lives of animals cannot

possible be justified. In some cases, perhaps, the can be, and the grounds on which we

might rest such a justification would[be] (1) that such a practice would prevent, reduce,

or eliminate a much greater amount of evil, including the evil that attaches to the taking

of the life of a being who has as much claim as any other to an equal natural right to life;

(2) that, realistically speaking, there is no other way to bring about these consequences;

and (3) that we have very good reason to believe that these consequences will, in fact,

obtain. Now, perhaps, there are some cases in which these conditions are satisfied. For

example, perhaps they are satisfied in the case of the Eskimos killing of animals and the

case of having a restricted hunting season for such animals as deer. But to say that this is

(or may be) true of some cases is not to say that it is true of all, and it will remain the task

of the nonvegetarian to show that what is true in these cases, assuming that it is true, is

also true of any practice that involves killing animals which, by his action, he supports.

[Regan, Tom. 1976.Animal Rights and Human Obligations. Englewood Cliffs, NJ:

Prentice-Hall Inc. p. 203-04]

The critics of animal rights, fewer in number but no less shrill in their advocacy, have focused

their responses along several lines of reasoning which have been briefly discussed above and will

be further amplified in the Strategy Notes section for the negative side of the resolution.

One of the most prominent critics of the animal rights movement is the conservative British

scholar Roger Scrunton13

who has written extensively against animal rights and the arguments

advanced by pro-animal rights advocates such as Peter Singer. He has argued that humans alone

have the ability and capability to take on duties and responsibilities and along with that, humans

alone have rights.14

13 Professor Scruntons personal website is at URL:http://www.roger-scruton.com/14 Roger Scruton, Animal Rights, City Jourrnal, Summer 2000.

At URL:http://www.city-journal.org/html/10_3_urbanities-animal.html
http://www.roger-scruton.com/http://www.roger-scruton.com/http://www.roger-scruton.com/http://www.city-journal.org/html/10_3_urbanities-animal.htmlhttp://www.city-journal.org/html/10_3_urbanities-animal.htmlhttp://www.city-journal.org/html/10_3_urbanities-animal.htmlhttp://www.city-journal.org/html/10_3_urbanities-animal.htmlhttp://www.roger-scruton.com/


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TOPICBRIEFINGANDSTRATEGYNOTES

Affirmative Strategy Notes

1. Moral Revulsion: The Suffering is Fundamentally Intolerable

It is safe to say that the strongest argument in favor of granting greater protection to animals is

the jaw-dropping scale of damage inflicted by humans upon animals in the name of human

survival and prosperity. Professor Gary Francione,15

Distinguished Professor of Law and

Nicholas deB. Katzenbach Scholar of Law & Philosophy at Rutgers School of Law-Newark, puts

it in perspective:

We subject billions of animals annually to enormous amounts of pain, suffering, and

distress. According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, we kill more billion animals a

year for food, including approximately 17 million cows and calves, 102 million hogs,

almost 4 million sheep and lambs, 7.9 billion chickens, 290 million turkeys, and 22

million ducks. We slaughter more than 100,000 horses per year. Every day, we

slaughter approximately 23 million animals, or over 950,000 per hour, or almost 16,000

per minute, or over 260 every second. This is to say nothing of the billions more killed

worldwide. These animals are raised under horrendous conditions, mutilated in various

ways without pain relief, transported long distances in cramped, filthy containers, and

finally slaughtered amid the stench, noise, and squalor of the abattoir. We kill billions of

fish and other sea animals annually. We catch them with hooks and allow them to

surface in nets. We buy lobsters at the supermarket, where they are kept for weeks in

crowded tanks with their claws closed by rubber bands and without receiving any food,

and we cook them alive in boiling waterIn the United States alone, we use millions of

animals annually for biodmedical experiments, product testing, and educationAnimals

are burned, poisoned, irradiated, blinded, starved, given electric shocks and diseases

(such as cancer) and infections (such as pneumonia), deprived of sleep, kept in solitary

confinement, subjected to removal of limbs and eyes, addicted to drugs, forced to

withdraw from drug addiction, and caged for the duration of their livesAnd we kill

millions of animals annually simply for fashion. Approximately 40 million animals

worldwide are trapped, snared, or raised in intense confinement on fur farms, where they

are electrocuted or gassed or have their necks brokenIn short, we may be said to sufferfrom a sort of moral schizophrenia when it comes to our thinking about animals. We

claim to regard animals as having morally significant interests, but we treat them in ways

that belie our claims.

15 Professor Franciones website is at URL:

http://law.newark.rutgers.edu/our-faculty/faculty-profiles/gary-l-francione
http://law.newark.rutgers.edu/our-faculty/faculty-profiles/gary-l-francionehttp://law.newark.rutgers.edu/our-faculty/faculty-profiles/gary-l-francionehttp://law.newark.rutgers.edu/our-faculty/faculty-profiles/gary-l-francione


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[Francione, Gary. 2000. Introduction to Animal Rights: Your Child or the Dog?

Philadelphia, PA: Temple University Press. p. xx-xxi]

Tolerance and celebration of such often unnecessary suffering is reflective and constitutive of

multiple levels of human cruelty, as the late Professor Mary Anne Warren of San Francisco StateUniversity explains:

Torturing human beings, for example, is not wrong merely because it is illegal (where it

is illegal), or merely because it violates some implicit agreement amongst human beings

(though it may). Such legalistic or contractualistic reasons leave us in the dark as to why

we oughtto have, and enforce, laws and agreements against torture. The essential reason

for regarding torture as wrong is that it hurts, and that people greatly prefer to avoid pain

as do animals. I am not arguing, as does Kant, that cruelty to animals is wrong because

it causes cruelty to human beings, a position which consequentialists often endorse. The

point, rather, is that unless we view the deliberate infliction of needless pain as inherently

wrong we will not be able to understand the moral objection to cruelty ofeitherkind.

[Warren, Mary Anne. 1992. The Rights of the Nonhuman World. From anthology by

Hargrove, Eugene (ed.). The Animal Rights/Environmental Ethics Debate: The

Environmental Perspective. Albany, NY: State University of New York Press. p. 190]

Arguments of academics from Aristotle to Frey are unpersuasive to this perspective.

Fundamentally, advocates of animal rights tend to believe that reason (as opposed tosentience or

suffering) is a poor standard for assessing moral worth. Italian Law and Sociology Professor

Valerio Pocar explains:

Like many other theorists, I feel that the emphasis placed upon 'reason' as a uniquely

human attribute is actually not very plausible, for at least two reasons. First, this

emphasis attributes 'reason' to human beings as a species, whereas it is empirically

evident that many individuals who are certainly human from a genetic point of view are

partly or totally lacking in it. (Without meaning to be simply ironic, I am not thinking

only of people with brain damage. What passes for 'reason' often turns out, on closer

examination, to be nothing more than the habits of thought favoured by culturally

dominant groups; as witness the ease with which is proved possible to deny any 'reason'

to women and to Africans sold as slaves. The obsessive enthusiasm shown by dominantgroups for measuring the intellectual capabilities of those whom they control ought to

stand as a warning against the uncritical acceptance of 'reason' as either a meaningful

concept or as a marker for making discriminatory evaluations between animals and

humans.) Secondly, the work of anthropologists and zoologists in recent years has

demonstrated that it is no longer possible to deny the existence of forms of thought, and

even the capacity for cultural transmission, in many other living species. After first


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having denied, without any proof, that other living species may possess some ability to

reason, the proponents of 'reason' have had to fall back on distinctions of a qualitative and

quantitative nature without knowing exactly (and maybe not even vaguely) what reason is

among human beings.

[Pocar, Valerio. 1992. Animal Rights: A Socio-Legal Perspective. Journal of Lawand Society. 19:2. p. 220]

2. Moral Optimism: Rights Cement an Important, Yet Tenuous, Obligation

By tapping into compassion, rights uniquely access an internal link into justice. This makes

them an appropriate mechanism for emancipation, as Paul Brett explained

To have compassion is to recognize a continuity of existence with the other. It is to

suffer, to feel with not just for other creatures. It is to recognize with the heart and

with the head that human and animal are made of the same stuff and that moral obligation

arise for thisBut there is a point beyond compassion to which the argument seems

irresistibly to lead. To recognize the otherness of animals, and their place alongside

human beings, is to recognize that they belong here as of right, no less than we do. It is

to begin to see our relationship with animals as a question of justice. It is only with the

attribution of rights to animals that a secure basis can be found on which to work out our

detailed ethical obligation.

[Brett, Paul. 1998. Compassion or Justice: What is Our Minimum Ethical Obligation to

Animals? in Linzey, Andrew and Dorothy Yamamoto (ed.). Animals on the Agenda:Questions about Animals for Theology and Ethics. Urbana (IL): University of Illinois

Press. p. 235]

Rights can be a tool for progressive change. Indeed, they are necessary until people develop the

desire to act on their moral impulses, as Professor Sztybel explains:

However, rights need not be egoistic. They can be used to protect needs, and to

guarantee that those who have the ability to see to others' needs will do so, in keeping

with the famous principle of communism. The day may come when people will

spontaneously respect others' needs as opportunity allows, and not need to be made toconfront others' rights to have their needs met. But that day has not yet come. So rights

remain a useful tool for the promotion of justice

[Sztybel, David. 1997. Marxism and Animal Rights. Ethics and the Environment.

2:2. p. 183]


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The alternative to rights protection is no panacea. It means moral concern will go unacted upon;

animals will continue to be treated merely as economic commodities, as Professor Francione

laments:

If we can use animals for all sorts of purposes for which we would never use any humanbeings, then a prohibition on imposing unnecessary suffering on those beings will be

meaningless. If the life of a sentient being has value only as a means to human ends, then

the interests of that being will, as a practical matter, have only instrumental value as well.

The alternative to the rights view is to lapse back into the pre-nineteenth-century view

that animals have no morally significant interests and that humans have no direct

obligations to them. We could, of course, maintain that we ought to be kind to animals,

or treat them better than we currently do, because that will make us kinder people or

more caring people, but not because we have any direct obligations to animals. There is,

however, little realistic hope that such moral concerns alone will result in any significant

improvement in animal care and treatment as long as animals remain economic

commodities.

[Francione, Gary. 2000. Introduction to Animal Rights: Your Child or the Dog?

Philadelphia, PA: Temple University Press. p. 163]

The language of rights has a particular power in the public imagination which makes it important

to utilize as a platform in any effective campaign for animal welfare, as Professor Marc Fellenz16

of Suffolk Community College notes:

As a purely practical matter, to conceive of animals as the bearers of rights is toinstitutionalize their claim to moral concern, to recognize this status in a way that is writ

large. Given the political power rights claims can wield, couching ones moral position

in the language of rights can often be the most effective means of advocating it,

especially to a social context where moral discourse is usually ideologically and

politically combativeNonetheless, even those who are otherwise unsympathetic to

deontology may feel compelled to employ terms like rights because they are so

expedient. For example, Peter Singer concedes on behalf of utilitarians: The language of

rights is a convenient political shorthand. It is even more valuable in the era of thirty-

second TV news clips than it was in Benthams day.

[Fellenz, Marc. 2007. The Moral Menagerie: Philosophy and Animal Rights. Urbana,IL: University of Illinois Press. p. 76]

16 The link to Professor Fellenzs book, The Moral Menagerie, is at URL:

http://www.press.uillinois.edu/books/catalog/39fpd3fw9780252031182.html
http://www.press.uillinois.edu/books/catalog/39fpd3fw9780252031182.htmlhttp://www.press.uillinois.edu/books/catalog/39fpd3fw9780252031182.htmlhttp://www.press.uillinois.edu/books/catalog/39fpd3fw9780252031182.html


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3. Smart Definitions: Thin Conceptions of Rights

As mentioned earlier in this brief, how the Affirmative frames what it will defend as animal

rights will have a huge strategic effect on the debate. One perspective would argue that the

Affirmative should defend the narrowest/thinnest conception of animal rights possible, in orderto evade the most damaging Negative arguments. An example of such a framing is offered from

an article by Professor Pocar.

The case need not be argued differently when applied to the rights of animals (and,

potentially, also of other living beings, if they can feel). While it appears to be inevitable,

because of the conflict of interests, that human beings should inflict suffering on other

living beings, including depriving them of their lives, this suffering must be the least

possible, and must in any case be supported by a proportional justification.' Similarly

also, once the rights that set a limit to the suffering that can justifiably be inflicted have

been fixed, the onus of proof is reversed. In the system of agreed values, the right of

animals to the minimum of suffering may represent the minimum status of animal rights,

without affecting the fact that the concept of suffering should be understood to have as

extensive a meaning as possible and must therefore include all suffering that can be

hypothesized (or, as I would prefer to say, suspected) in the light of available

knowledge.

[Pocar, Valerio. 1992. Animal Rights: A Socio-Legal Perspective. Journal of Law

and Society. 19:2. p. 228]

Such a narrow defense can take the form of a baseline; for example, Negative Rights. Just suchan argument is explained by Duquesne University Professor Stephen Newmyer:

Stephen R.L. Clark, for example, suggests that even if animals cannot lay claim to

rights because of any intellectual endowments, they may still have at least the negative

right not to be harmed. He rejects reason out of hand as a criterion for according justice

to animals, remarking I have attempted to put, and rebut, the thesis that only those

creatures with whom we share a community of reason should be counted as worthy of

our concern. He rejects likewise the Stoic demand for a human-animal contract as a

prerequisite for according justice to animals, preferring to see life as a household of

differing species. Similarly, Clark discounts the long-standing emphasis on language as aprerequisite for moral considerability, arguing, Common sympathies and purposes,

mutual attractions and puzzlements are quite enough to provide a mutual sense of fair

dealings at least with our most immediate, mammalian kin.

[Newmyer, Stephen. 2006. Animals, Rights and Reason in Plutarch and Modern Ethics.

New York: Routledge. p. 50-51]


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Sometimes a narrow defense can take the form of a mechanism for protection of animal rights.

One interesting example is offered from the realm of law, by Professor Christopher Stone, might

well tap into current frustration with corporate America, as Professor Rollin explains:

A brilliant and accessible analysis of the logic of rights extension has been presented byProfessor Christopher Stone in his book, Should Trees Have Standing? Although Stones

argument does not directly deal with animals, the points he makes are directly relevant to

our problemStone argued that natural objects streams, wilderness areas, forests, etc.

should be granted legal standing, with guardians like the Sierra Club able to press claims

on their behalf. As Stone points out, the argument that only human persons can have

such rights is easily trumped by the fact that corporations have enjoyed such legal

standing since early in the nineteenth century, as have ships, trusts, cities, and nation-

statesIt is, as we have seen, essentially impossible to rationally deny that animals are

direct objects of moral concern, so it is quite easy in this light to demand legal standing

for them.


Books. p. 126-27]

4. Big Paradigms: Win a Framework and Use it Against Negative Arguments

The strategic approach identified immediately prior to this was to take a narrow approach to

ground (when on the Affirmative). This represents the opposite approach; making deductive,

paradigmatic arguments (aka framework) in relation to the topic. Such paradigmatic questions

are at the core of the animal rights literature base, as Professor Emily Gaarder

17

of the Universityof Minnesota Duluth explained in her recent book:

I have argued that two competing frameworks exist within the animal rights movement.

The first names the oppression of animals as the most crucial social justice issue of our

times. This framework focuses on animal liberation as its central, indeed its only, goal.

Coalitions or support of those involved in other causes are welcomed if they contribute to

the overall goal of animal rights. Expressing human concerns about gender, race, or

class is considered divisive to the movement, and even selfish. Focusing on ones own

concern for liberation, voice, or equality is unacceptable when animals suffer the greatest

oppression of all. The second framework names the oppression of animals as part of abroad, intersecting web of inequality that encompasses gender, race, class, and

environmental concerns. It suggests, for instance, that patriarchal and racist though five

rise to the same ideas that justify the devaluing of animals and the use of their bodies for

instrumental means. This framework considers the participation of diverse groups of

people within animal rights as an important aspect of the relational web. It also

17 Professor Gaarders academic website is at URL:http://www.d.umn.edu/~egaarder/Index.html
http://www.d.umn.edu/~egaarder/Index.htmlhttp://www.d.umn.edu/~egaarder/Index.htmlhttp://www.d.umn.edu/~egaarder/Index.htmlhttp://www.d.umn.edu/~egaarder/Index.html


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prioritizes campaigns and coalition building that reflects the common goals of other

movements for social change. The direction of the animal liberation movement hinges,

to a large extent, on which of these frameworks the movement culture adopts.

[Gaarder, Emily. 2011. Women and the Animal Rights Movement. New Brunswick, NJ:

Rutgers University Press. p. 153-54]

An example of a framework that the Affirmative might utilize on this topic, although the

Negative might be able to deploy it as well, is Eco-Feminism. Professor Gaarder offers an initial

definition of the concept as follows:

Ecofeminism argues that feminism must engage with the ethics of animals status and

treatment, because all oppressions are interconnectedWhile there is no unified body of

work or perspective that could be called ecofeminism, ecofeminists generally believe

there are important connections between the oppression of women and that of nonhuman

life forms, such as animals and the environment. Ecofeminist thought outlines the

conceptual links in patriarchal thought that identity women as closer to nature and men as

closer to culture. Societies that see nature as inferior to culture (most Western societies)

devalue and oppress persons and groups identified with nature. These dualisms serve to

justify the domination of women, animals, and the earth.


Rutgers University Press. p. 5]

The importance of gender in the oppression of animals to the point of constituting a synergistic

relationship is underscored by Kelly Oliver.

As many feminists have argued, however, there is more than an analogy among sexism,

racism, and speciesism. Even today, the patriarchal association between women and

animals is evidenced by the various names used to degrade women, includingpussy,

kitten, bunny, beaver, bitch, chick, fox, vixen , and cow. The connection between the

degradation of women and traditional views of animals existing for mans use

complicates any easy analogy between womens liberation and animal liberation. If

womens subordination is in part justified by comparing them to animals, thenperhaps

one reason why womens liberation has continued to meet with resistanceand continued

to bump up against the glass ceiling is because of our attitudestoward animals and thedeep patriarchal associations between women and animals.In other words, the relation

between the exploitation of animals and the exploitationof women and other oppressed

groups is not just a matter of analogy. Rather,the conceptual opposition between man, on

the one sidethe civilized sideandanimal, on the otherthe natural or barbaric side

plays a central role in the oppositions between man and woman, white and black,

civilized and barbaric, and so on. Until we address the denigration of animals in Western


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thought, on the conceptual level, if not also on the material economic level, we continue

merely to scratch the surface of the denigration and exploitation of various groups of

people, from playboy bunnies to prisoners at Abu Ghraib who were treated like dogs as a

matter of explicit military policy.

[Oliver, Kelly. 2008. What is Wrong with (Animal) Rights? The Journal ofSpeculative Philosophy. 22:3. p. 215]

However, as Professor Gaarder points out, Affirmatives should be careful in deploying

deductive/framework cases, as it is easy to run afoul of the internal standards of the school of

thought in question.

Gender is far more than a demographic characteristic of social movement activists. Just

as social movements can influence ideas about gender in society, so too can societal ideas

about gender shape social movements. Although this movement is focused on animals,

its activists are influenced by gendered expectations and experiences. Activists operate

within a sexist society, and their tactical choices and goals either accept or contest those

constraintsOpponents of animal rights who respond to women with sexist rhetoric

should be challenged on these grounds, instead of capitulated to by downplaying empathy

or the role of women altogether in recognition of the realities of sexism. Sexualized

campaigns that use stereotypical images of women have been similarly defended, on the

grounds that sex sells in a patriarchal society. Yet this same patriarchal society is

implicated in the values and practices of animal exploitationThe gender inequalities

described in this book cannot be resolved unless the animal rights movement challenges

the sexist devaluation of emotion and the sexual objectification of women that saturatesour culture.


Rutgers University Press. p. 152-53]


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Negative Strategy Notes

1. Weak Foundation: Animals Dont Deserve Rights

James Reichmann lays out the fundamental claim, as well as explaining why such a positionagainst rights extension is not incompatible with protecting animals from maltreatment:

As stated earlier, the notion of rights makes sense only within a context of free agents

who are responsible for their actions, and hence it must be limited to moral agents alone,

i.e. to humans. Trading on the sympathy most humans display for various species of

domesticated animals, and the pervasive conviction that it is wrong to mistreat them,

Regan has sought to revamp the definition of right. He extends this revised definition

to animals in an effort to provide reasoned, stable support for the above-mentioned near

universal sentiment. But, as we have indicated, one does not need to attribute rights to

animals directly in order to provide the latter with a shield that will morally safeguard

them from maltreatment.



Of course, Singer and his allies would accuse Reichmann of Speciesism. However,

Reichmann is ready to answer such a charge, claiming that the argument suffers from an obvious

fallacy:

The underlying fallacy is not hard to uncover. Racism and sexism deny equality of

nature where equality of nature actually exists, and are hence based on an untruth. But

what is considered speciesism affirms inequality where equality does not exist. The

fallacy feeds on the false supposition that what race and gender are to the human, species

is also. Yet race and gender are accidental or incidental characteristics that modify ones

humanity; they do not constitute one a human. On the other hand, species is not an

accidental characteristic, but a substantial determinant of the kind of the kind of being

one is. Hence, if there are many kinds of beings, then they must differ in an essential

way. Some beings must simply be ontologically more than others in order to be different

from them. There are no other possibilities. And if one existent differs in being from

another, it profits one nothing to deny this difference in kind. It is not arrogant to bearwitness to the truth, provided ones motive in doing so is to allow the truth to appear. For

humans to regards themselves as superior to the nonhuman animal for reasons already

alluded to, is no more worthy of condemnation than is the individual who thinks that he

or she plays the piano better than someone who does not play the piano at all. Those

bringing a charge of speciesism, then, against those who regard humans as ontologically

superior clearly argue fallaciously.


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Reichmann also points out that rights advocates, such as Regan, seemingly stipulate to the

meaningful difference in status between humans and animals by virtue of the asymmetry ofrights and obligations within their frameworks.

Such ethicians are, he states, much more comfortable with the ideal of natural rights

than with natural obligations. In fact, Johnson characterizes the impasse at which

modernist moral theory has arrived as precisely consisting in its failure to justify the

imposition of obligations. This critique scores heavily against Tom Regans theory of

rights, which, while granting rights to animals, imposes upon them no obligations.

Regans theory also struggles, unsuccessfully, to justify the imposition of obligation on

the human to respect the alleged rights of animals.



2. Unacceptable Costs: The Obligations Created by Rights for Animals Would Result

in a Disastrous Transition and Quality of Life Reduction

Imagine a world in which animals had functional rights claims against humans. Even if we

could somehow go back in time and start anew with such an assumption, it is far from clear that

the project of human civilization would have succeeded with such constraints. After all,according to Darwin, over 99% of all species die off. Humans likely needed every edge they

could get in the battle for survival. However, imagine the even greater difficulty in trying to

transition to such a framework in the here-and-now. Professor Michael Leahy takes an initial

shot at imagining such a circumstance, as follows:

But let us, for arguments sake, concede the nutritional point. Whatever weight this

would add to the utilitarian scales, would need to be colossal to offset the social and

economic ills which might well follow. Frey inRights, Killing and Suffering(1983)

paints a detailed picture of the possible downfall of whole economies the minutiae of

which, although hinting strongly at overkill, are nonetheless plausible enough to bedisturbingIn the first place, a huge number of industries would be undermined,

bringing the misery of unemployment to employees and their families where alternative

jobs are not availableSecondly, our social lives would need readjustment. If it is

difficult to change habits like smoking or drinking, despite the best of intentions, then to

switch to nut steaks and vegetable lasagna might be just as painful, and for those forced

to it because of the unavailability of meat it would also be deeply resented. Most


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traditional French, Italian, British, American, and even Oriental restaurants would cease

to exist in their present formsIn the wider context, Regan contends that, though the

(economic) heavens fall there is no case for protecting society if the protection in

question involves violating the rights of others.

[Leahy, Michael. 1991. Against Liberation: Putting Animals in Perspective. London:Routledge. p. 214-15]

Without an accurate mechanism by which to assess animal preferences, it seems fundamentally

wrong to expose so many to such incredible risks based upon what is ultimately mere

supposition. Professor Pojman explains as follows:

The Achilles Heel in his argument is the idea of preference. How does Singer know that

the abolition of factory farms will result in a net gain of preference satisfaction? Imagine

the suffering that would be incurred by such abolition. Besides losing the delicious taste

of meat in our diet (which by itself might not outweigh the animal's plight) hundreds of

thousands of factory farm workers, transporters, business owners, and butchers would be

unemployed. Their families would suffer. Social chaos might ensue. How do we weigh

the preferences of chicken, pigs, and cows? Perhaps, as R. G. Frey has argued, the

utilitarian thing to do would be to work for reforms in the factory farm, permitting

animals more space, exercise and pleasure.

[Pojman, Louis. 1993. Do Animal Rights Entail Moral Nihilism? Public Affairs

Quarterly. 7:2. p. 171]

For example, the Affirmative should make the Negative defend the loss of items and servicesproduced by dint of animal testing, such as cancer treatment. Dr. David Scott, Director of

Science Funding for Cancer Research UK, wrote this year that

More people are surviving cancer than ever before. Thanks to decades of research,

survival from cancer has doubled in the last 40 years, giving thousands of people more

time with their loved ones. But this progress simply wouldnt have been possible without

animal researchAnimal studies showed the benefits of radiotherapy in the early days of

cancer research, and surgical techniques such as keyhole surgery were first tested in

animals. Even prevention strategies such as the cervical cancer vaccine have relied on

animal research, and studies in animals continue to be vital in bringing benefits to cancerpatients and saving lives around the room. To give just one demonstration of the

importance of animal research, survival from childhood cancer has rocketed from just a

quarter of children surviving the disease in the late 1960s to more than three quarters

surviving today. That amazing progress is a direct result of treatments developed through

studies in animals.


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[http://scienceblog.cancerresearchuk.org/2011/06/21/animal-research-is-helping-us-beat-

cancer/]

3. Rights Fail: They are a Poor Mechanism to Protect the Environment and SuchAttempts Will Sap Rights of Their Power to Liberate

The inability to participate in the Rights Claims process ultimately render animal rights

inoperable; any oppression would likely merely be replicated and more deeply inscribed, as

Professor Fellenz explains:

Consequently, the difficulty in applying the standard deontological theory to rights to

other animals is evident: since nonhumans are not generally understood to be responsible

agents, they cannot meaningfully participate in political or moral space as either the

bearers or recipients of moral rights claims. If responsible agency is a necessary

condition for holding unacquired moral rights, then animal rights is a misnomer. In

turn, any legal or political rights a society extends to animals will amount to human

largesse, and are only meaningful to the extent that they are executed through human

proxy; as such, they are more likely to serve human interests and desires than animal

nature.

[Fellenz, Marc. 2007. The Moral Menagerie: Philosophy and Animal Rights. Urbana,

IL: University of Illinois Press. p. 79]

Even if moderate advances appeared to be made on behalf of animals, it would be a pale freedom not even worth the name. Rights claims would likely simply ensnare animals in further layer

of bio-power driven domination, as Kelly Oliver explains

Rights defined as protections still do not address the myriad causes of oppression and

denigration. They address neither material nor conceptual inequities that are part of a

history of exploitative practices. Equal protections do nothing to redress the material or

cultural inequities in the distribution of resources. In terms of animals, the struggle

continues between environmental and business interests as to the allocation of resources

for wildlife. Of course, the terms of these negotiations are always set by humans and

ultimately in terms of human interests, including human interests in animals. Equalprotection for oppressed people or animals does not go far enough in redistributing

resources. In addition, these protective rights bring with them regulation and surveillance

if not disciplinary institutions. For example, legislation protecting endangered species

requires counting animals, capturing and tagging them, following them, tracking them,

breeding them, and so on. Thus, even as such legislation goes some distance in

liberating animals, it continues structures of power that both enable and require putting


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up fences and manhandling them for their own protection. Given our attitudes toward

animals, and the ways in which we count them, it is obvious how equal protection means

increased surveillance and regulation. Even though people may not be captured, tagged,

and bred in captivity, they are measured, counted, and regulated in less conspicuous

ways, particularly now with the heightened security regulations in place for the sake ofour protection. The ways in which the liberty and freedom afforded by protective rights

also bring increased regulations are more apparent when we consider animal rights but

should also give us pause in terms of human rights.

[Oliver, Kelly. 2008. What is Wrong with (Animal) Rights? The Journal of

Speculative Philosophy. 22:3. p. 218]

Making matters worse, such a failed attempt to extend rights to animals would also render rights

an ineffective tool for dealing with other forms of human oppression. James Reichmann points

out the danger as follows:

The foregoing should make clear why, with regard to the issue of rights, the notion of

personhood and its presuppositions are very much in need of a closer analysis. If

personhood can be extended to some species of nonhuman animals, the pandoras box

seems to have been opened, and it becomes difficult to imagine circumstances which

would prevent its being extended not only to primates, but to many or all species of

quadrupeds and mammals, and even beyond. In the end, the term person would come

to lose its meaning, the distinction between species becomes impossible to retain, and the

entire ethical project of rights be devastatingly undermined.

[Reichmann, James. 2000. Evolution, Animal Rights, & the Environment. WashingtonD.C.: Catholic University Press. p. 245]

4. Undermines Movement: Relying on the Individualistic Tool of Rights to Assist

Animals Undercuts the Momentum Toward A Meaningful Environmental Ethic

Byron Norton makes the argument that the individualism inherent within rights claims is

incompatible with the biocentric stance required for a necessary environmental ethic:

It is worthwhile to examine, in conclusion, the deeper explanation for the failure ofindividualistic appeals to rights and interests as a basis for an environmental ethic.

Human demands on the environment are individual demands. As the population

increases, these demands are increased and a principle of adjudication is required. The

animal liberation movement is based upon an analogy between human and animal

suffering and its main thrust is not to provide a means to adjudicate between conflicting

demands that human individuals make on the environment, but rather it introduces a


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whole new category of demands the demand of animals. Recognition of such demands

has the overall effect of exacerbating the problem. It also has the contingent effect of

calling attention to destruction of habitat as one source of animal suffering, and many

have seen this as a plausible route to an environmental ethic. But as the class of rights

holders is expanded further and further in order to insure that environmentally damagingresults affect some rights holder, more and more demands are made. Expanding the

number and types of rights holders does not address the problem of deciding which

individual claims have priority over others it only increases these demands and makes it

more and more difficult to satisfy them. The basic problem, then, lies precisely in the

emphasis on individual claims and interests. An environmental ethic must support the

holistic functioning of an ongoing system. One cannot generate a holistic ethic from an

individualistic basis, regard

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