At Fri, 22 Jan 1999 22:16:47 EST, you wrote:
>
>As the word "person" derives from a word meaning "mask" or "face", and since
>cows do indeed have faces, it is not absurd to extend the word "person"
>towards them. In fact, using criteria of face -- as in looking in the face,
>looking in the eyes -- is a pretty good one. Can you look a person in the face
>while you kill them / keep them locked in totally unnatural conditions for
>ridiculous periods / genetically alter them / mutilate them?
We do indeed have different criteria for personhood; I do not consider nonhumans (with
the possible exceptions of the higher apes and some cetacean species) to be persons,
for my criterion for personhood is explicit self-consciousness (that which makes
multiple languages, technologies and individuality possible). I can indeed kill an
animal I plan to eat, but do not equate this with cannibalism. We have genetically
altered species by means of selective breeding for millennia; I have raised some of
these for my own food, kept them well-fed in clean and spacious pastures, and killed
them in as painless a manner as possible (a bullet in the brain). I then cleaned the
carcasses for consumption, and do not see this as mutilation so much as preparation.
You may choose all the loaded condemnatory terms you wish, but that does not mean that
they apply.
>And again, regarding "self-righteousness", no one has answered the question
>of whether they condemn murder, torture, or enslavement in the human realm.
Trust me on this one; none of us do. We simply do not agree with your extension of
these terms to apply to all nonhuman species, and all the snide and sneering
commentary of which you have proven yourself amply capable will not change this one
whit.
I
>am simply extending this to other persons mammalian or avarian. If you think
>that those who have a problem with these in the human realm are "self-
>righteous", then I guess by extension I am as well ; however, obviously we
>don't share the same criteria.
My criterion is above. Just because we abhor what humans do to each other does not
mandate vegetarianism; nor does meat consumption entail that we are torturers,
murderers, sadists, Nazis, slavemasters or any of the other epithets you so blithely
toss around. Get used to it; it's a fact.
>
>I don't get any sense of "self-righteousness" or "superiority". I simply have
>stopped participating in ethically appalling acts. I have the blood of 20
>years on me that keeps me from feeling superior to anyone. It's simply a
>matter of facing facts, and deciding how one is going to position oneself
>accordingly.
Which is exactly what we've done. No god has decreed that, given the world as it is,
that only your position is in proper accord with it.
>
>
Joe E. Dees
Poet, Pagan, Philosopher
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