Animal Rights

"Animal rights - moral or legal entitlements attributed to nonhuman animals, usually because of the complexity of their cognitive, emotional, and social lives or their capacity to experience physical or emotional pain or pleasure." (Britannia encyclopedia online, n.d.). The definition of animal rights is so clear to us. Human rights need to be protected, so do animal rights. In 1976, in New York City, thousands of cat lovers were beaten when they heard a painful test to be taken for pets’ sexual behavior. Henry Spira, the leader of animal rights movement, helped to mobilize a protest and marked the beginning of the contemporary animal rights movement. The group took dramatic and public action to express their concerns and anger. They were eager in their language, tactics, and methods of appealing new recruits to the cause of animal rights approach (Jasper & Nelkin, 1992, p. 26). This essay will discuss how people deal with animals and what animal rights people should respect and protect.

What have people done to animals?

Humans hunt animals and use animals as the subject of experiments.

Firstly, it would be unreasonable to choose to deprive an animal life to serve a non-vital human interest. For example, hunting. The course of hunting involves killing animals, and killing will inevitably lead to defeat of all the important interest of animals (Rowlands, 2002, p. 160). According to WAF fact sheets, more than 200 million animals are killed each year in the U.S.. Hunters are permitted killing animals on 60% of U.S. Land, such as wildlife refuges, national forest, and state parks. Even, 80 percent of them do killing on public land. Most hurters do not meet or promote basic human interests (Hunting fact sheet, n.d.). Therefore,...

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Cohen, C. & Regan, T. (2001). The animal rights debate. The U.S.A.: Rowman &

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Dolan, K. (1999). Ethics, animals and science. Great Britain: MPG Books Ltd, Bodmin,

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Hunting fact sheet. (n.d.). World animal foundation. Retrieved November 30, 2009. From

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Jasper, J, M. & Nelkin, D. (1992). The Animal rights crusade: the growth of a moral

protest. The U.S.A.: The Free Press.

Monamy, V. (2000). Animal experimentation: a guide to the issues. Cambridge: The

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Rowlands, M. (2002). Animals like us. The UK and the U.S.A.: Verso.

Shapiro, L, S. (2000). Applied animal ethics. The U.S.A.: Cengage Learning.