Specie-cism and veganism - Page 7

On February 10 2011 05:31 Tony Campolo wrote:
So the last thread got closed 'cos I didn't put enough effort into the OP. Yet I didn't have the chance to respond to the replies because it was like 12am in NZ.

Like racism or sexism, specie-cism is one dominant species disregarding the rights of other species. It is compassion and the capacity for empathy that differentiates human beings from being good and bad. Without compassion for our fellow man, there is only the law of the jungle - survival of the fittest.

Why can't the same compassion be shown towards animals? The worst argument I heard was that children are dying around the world, therefore animal rights don't matter and somehow because I support animal rights I am against human rights.

First of all, I do support human rights and am actively involved with charities that help the poor (e.g. sponsoring children, volunteering my time for community groups that help the homeless). Coming from an ex-Christian background, I've dedicated more of my time to helping human rights than animal rights. Chances are those that attack vegans for not supporting human rights are less likely to be involved in any active charitable work themselves, as most people that give their time to various causes know how disrespective it is to have someone attack your cause as being less worthy than another's.

Secondly, supporting animal rights takes nothing away from human rights. All veganism requires is a change in diet - it does not require going out and trampling on human rights.

Thirdly, what it comes down to is what is ethical. Animals may not be as intelligent as us - but that doesn't mean they feel less pain. This is evidenced both physically and mentally.

An extract from my personal blog:

In addition to having distinct personalities, cows are very intelligent animals who can remember things for a long time. Animal behaviorists have found that cows interact in complex ways, developing friendships over time, sometimes holding grudges against cows who treat them badly and choosing leaders based upon intelligence. They have complex emotions as well and even have the ability to worry about the future.

Researchers have found that cows can not only figure out problems, they also enjoy the challenge and get excited when they find a solution. In one study, researchers challenged the animals with a task where they had to find how to open a door to get some food. The researchers then measured their brainwaves. Professor Broom said that ‘The brainwaves showed the cows excitement; their heartbeat went up and some even jumped into the air. We called it their Eureka moment,’ Cows can also learn how to push a lever to operate a drinking fountain when they’re thirty or press a button with their head to release food when they’re hungry. Like humans they quickly learn to avoid things that cause pain like electric fences. In fact if just one cow in the herd is shocked by an electric fence, the rest of the herd will learn from that and will avoid the fence in the future.

Grandmother cows often help their daughters with mothering duties, but one cow named Olivia wanted no part of that. She never left her calf’s side, and she ignored her mother’s offers to help groom him. Offended, her mother finally marched off to another field to graze with her friends and never communicated to her daughter again. Cows can also remember and hold grudges against people who have hurt them or their family members.

Dairy cows are continually kept pregnant and lactating and their babies are sold off to the meat industry when they are only two days old. The life of a dairy cow is not as natural as you might think, especially considering that 80 percent of dairy cows are made pregnant through artificial insemination.

The only way for a cow, like any other mammal, to produce milk is for the cow to have a baby. The milk produced by cows is naturally meant for baby calves; however, because people want to drink this milk, the baby calves are taken away from their mothers when they are only a few days old. Cows are extremely maternal animals and both the mother cow and the baby calf suffer terribly from being separated at such a young age. In fact, one cow missed her baby so much that she broke out of her paddock and trekked through 8 kilometers of paddocks and rivers to find her baby. On dairy farms, mother cows can be heard bellowing out wildly trying to find their babies as well as running after the cattle trucks that take their babies to separate farms.

The baby calves life is then decided by their gender. That’s right, not only is the dairy industry hell for the animals, the environment and your health, it is also an industry that decides an animal’s entire life based on whether they are male or female. If the calve is male then he is taken away to be raised and slaughtered for meat. Because of this the NZ dairy industry contributes to the death of more than 1 million male dairy cows every year. That’s one death every 20 seconds. In fact, 55 percent of all beef in New Zealand supermarkets comes directly from the dairy industry. These male calves are transported to separate meat farms where they will never see their mothers again. They suffer terribly on their journey to the meat farm. Transported as young as 4 days of age, they endure cold and hunger, without food for up to 30 hours, while struggling to maintain their footing in the cattle truck.

However if the calf is female she is raised as a dairy cow, living in the same conditions as her mothers. She too will live in a cycle of pregnancy and lactation, being forced to give birth to a baby calf each year, only to have that baby torn away from her within a few days. In the wild cows can live to be up to 25 years old. But on dairy farms they are slaughtered when they are only 8-10 years old meaning that most dairy cows live less than half their natural life span.

Because dairy cows are milked so excessively, NZ dairy cows have increased risks of teat diseases like mastitis. When a cow has mastitis her udder may become so inflamed that it is as hard as a stone, and blood bubbles into her milk, which becomes clotted and watery. Severe cases of mastitis can kill a cow in less than a day.