Animal Rights: Right To Life, Liberty And Pursuit Of Happiness

Nicole Fontaine

Delgado

W131: Sec. 33399

September 18, 2015

Animal Rights

The right to life, liberty and freedom, the pursuit of happiness, and the right to be free from slavery are just some of the basic human rights. Although animals’ rights aren’t completely alike, they do exist and are similar to some human rights. Some common misconceptions are that if we don’t use animals, we would have to use humans to test drugs and that hunting is necessary for controlling animal populations. Animal rights are rights believed to belong to animals to live free from use in medical research, hunting, and other services to humans.

Animal rights organization PETA (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals) further explains animal rights as “recognizing

animals are not ours to use—for food, clothing, entertainment, or experimentation”. All animals have the capacity to feel pain, loneliness, love, fear, and frustration. An easier way to explain animal rights, though, is through a historical timeline of animal rights movements. One of the first major events occurred in 1966 when the Animal Welfare Act was signed (Favre). This law regulates the treatment of animals in research, exhibition, transport, and by dealers. In her article, “Historical Timeline of the Animal Rights Movement,” animal rights attorney Doris Lin states that in 1987 California high school student Jennifer Graham made national headlines when she refused to dissect a frog and a few years later, in 1989, Avon, an international manufacturer, stopped testing their products on animals. Following that, “in 1990, Revlon also stopped testing their products on animals” (Lin).
In the years following, acts and laws were passed in order to protect animals and their rights. Lin states that in 1992 the Animal Enterprise Protection Act was passed. Later, in 2001, Compassion Over Killing, a nonprofit animal advocacy organization, conducted an open rescue at a battery hen facility, documented abuses, and rescued eight hens. In 2004, popular clothing chain Forever 21 promised to stop selling fur. Also, in 2009, the European Union banned cosmetics testing and the sale or import of seal products. As you can see by the historical timeline of events, the animal rights movement has been taking place for a long time and will continue for years to come until animals are treated with the same respect as humans.
Some examples of animal rights are killing animals for fur or food, using animals for testing cosmetic products, hunting, and enclosing wild animals in a zoo or aquarium. A recent issue was brought up about the use of Ovis 21 lamb fur in Patagonia clothing products. When people found out that workers would pick up lambs while fully conscious, tie their legs together, and start skinning them for their fur, many complaints were filed against Patagonia’s use of their fur. On August 17, 2015, following PETA’s expose, Patagonia announced that it was dropping Ovis 21 as a supplier and would not buy wool from the company again until they insured “humane treatment of animals.” This is just one way people nowadays are still fighting for the humane treatment of animals and this type of pro-humane treatment of animals will likely continue throughout the years.