I just thought....it's fine to have a pack of huskies to pull your sledge, or a mule to haul your crap around, or even a horse to keep locked up and jabbed in the side when you want to go faster.

A slave is someone who is owned by someone else, and has to work for them. This term doesn't apply to animals, only to humans.

These animals are essentially born into slavery and spend their life being made to do things without their consent.

So, in light of that, why can't we force humans to do our bidding for nothing?

we can also spay and neuter dogs and cats without any thought as to whether or not they want a family.
Is that barbaric?

Well, in the US male infants get their cocks sliced up without their consent.

That didn't answer my question.

This discussion isn't about whether something is barbaric or not. That's completely subjective.

The thread is entitled 'animal slavery'
Are animals we perform surgery on (spay/neutering) considered slaves as well?

But domesticated animals did consent. There is some indication that domestication wasn't simply humans exploiting animals, but animals exploiting humans for their protection from predators, food and accurate predictions of where food is located, and medical care.

SPidergoat that was WAAYYY back in the day! It's time to EMANCIPATE THE ANIMALS.

Animals lack rational capabilities. Why should they be afforded rights? They're just animals.


Also, sled dogs love to pull sleds. Not letting them hang out with people and run around and be useful is more cruel than having them pull stuff. It's also more environmentally friendly. Lower CO2 emissions. Or would you rather us drive snow machines?

But domesticated animals did consent. There is some indication that domestication wasn't simply humans exploiting animals, but animals exploiting humans for their protection from predators, food and accurate predictions of where food is located, and medical care.

Sounds like black people. :rolleyes:

we can also spay and neuter dogs and cats without any thought as to whether or not they want a family.
Is that barbaric?

All of the "animal rights" groups want to force us to do that.

spidergoat:

But domesticated animals did consent.


I trust you have the signed contract to prove consent?

spidergoat:


I trust you have the signed contract to prove consent?

the goat ate the paperwork. You know how they are.

Animals lack rational capabilities. Why should they be afforded rights? They're just animals.

A fair amount of people, as well, lack rational capabilities and are subdued - this is fine. The paradigm of humanity on the elementary level indulges humans and animals as resources.

It should not be about rights rather than about fairness.
You don't have to be a goddamn asshole.


You don't go to a wine tasting with a six-pack of beer.


The differentials in intellectual and behavioural inclinations pretty much prohibit the rights of men, and the rights of animals to amalgamate.

At least from a moral standpoint...

Right, so it's fine to enslave animals then. That seems to be the general consensus here.

What about humans?

Right, so it's fine to enslave animals then. That seems to be the general consensus here.



Animal enslavement is the wrong term - that I find somewhat distastefull.

I'm in a terrible hurry I'll reply depper, If I ever feel like it..

What about humans?

The axiom of humanity is to manipulate ones surroundings.

So.. it's fine to use humans as slaves, as long as you've created a stance where you have this sort of "aristocratic value" which distinguishes you. Or then enslave black people (and vice versa), for it's only natural (natural in true humans, not pussywhipped fuckbags with over altruistic goals).

Animals are not playing in the same playground with us.

"Animals are not playing in the same playground with us."

With this I mean; we should respect that fact and not pretend that there are fucked up ethic values which uphold some mutual agreements..

Example: a dog bites your child, it should NOT be put to sleep.. for it functions as it knows best, in your nuttyy enviornment.

What would happen if a man bit your child?

Humans are animals.. if it's ok to enslave animals it's also right to enslave humans :shrug:

It used to be ok to enslave humans, it is not anymore(because it's usually not necessary to be honest).

So...in time we will also not use animals to do work(because we don't need them), hopefully we still keep them around though.

It used to be ok to enslave humans, it is not anymore(because it's usually not necessary to be honest).

So...in time we will also not use animals to do work(because we don't need them), hopefully we still keep them around though.

We don't need them now, it's just cheaper to use animals. As soon as other methods are cheaper the animals will be dumped.
I don't see a great future for animals in general, sadly..

All of the "animal rights" groups want to force us to do that.

Only domestic cats and dogs that would otherwise breed uncontrollably and lead to strays becoming a problem for both humans and animals. We can't expect people to stop having pets, but we can try to reduce the number of homeless animals waiting to be put out of their misery.

So, in light of that, why can't we force humans to do our bidding for nothing?

Ever heard of sweat shops?

What about horses? Lots of people keep them just to ride them around. Is that enslavement? Putting a saddle and bridle on them?
I still want to know if its wrong to spay and neuter a pet.

Only domestic cats and dogs that would otherwise breed uncontrollably and lead to strays becoming a problem for both humans and animals. We can't expect people to stop having pets, but we can try to reduce the number of homeless animals waiting to be put out of their misery.

So if an animal isn't a tool or a plaything for a human it's just waiting to die?

So if an animal isn't a tool or a plaything for a human it's just waiting to die?

Unfortunately that is sometimes the case. I know in Rome there is a large feral cat population that is under protection by law. However most people would not tolerate cats and dogs roaming the streets by the hundreds, which would happen if left to breed at their own leisure. Humans have created this problem, not animals.

Well, you referred to an animal not under the care of a human as "homeless". Do you still stand by that?

Animals lack rational capabilities. Why should they be afforded rights? They're just animals.



Actually animals do have rational capabilities, they just dont use formal systems like we do, although even if they didnt you dont put morality on hold because something cant 'rationalise'.
We empathise with other entities not on the basis of their mental prowess - if that was true we'd reserve our compassion for the most intelligent/able members of the speicies, in reality of course we tend to compassionate towards the least mentally able.
In actuality the capacity to experience pain is the only prerequisite of moral treatment

If you dont believe me conduct the follow thought experiment - you lose your mental facilities, you lose your capacity to reason, to rationalise, but you can still experience pain as well as you ever did.
Should we still treat you with compassion or are we permitted to do with you as you like since you can no longer 'rationalise'?

why can't we force humans to do our bidding for nothing?


There are laws that prevent that in most countries today. Sometimes

though people get away with enslaving others either by low pay or other

means .

Thank you Captain Obvious.

The thread is entitled 'animal slavery'
Are animals we perform surgery on (spay/neutering) considered slaves as well?

well, are they?

well, are they?

I'd be inclined to say no. When people were subjected to forced sterlization (Eugenics), they weren't considered slaves, just not useful contributors to the gene pool.

I just thought....it's fine to have a pack of huskies to pull your sledge, or a mule to haul your crap around, or even a horse to keep locked up and jabbed in the side when you want to go faster. A slave is someone who is owned by someone else, and has to work for them. This term doesn't apply to animals, only to humans. These animals are essentially born into slavery and spend their life being made to do things without their consent. So, in light of that, why can't we force humans to do our bidding for nothing?It's a dishonest argument to ignore the fact that animals don't have the same cognitive abilities as humans and it shows how badly we've been brainwashed by the ARF movement that no one has called you on it yet!

We put people whose mental capacities are diminished by birth defect, injury, senility, or simply being at the very bottom of the bell curve, in institutions for a combination of our own convenience and their protection. My wife was a social worker on a psych ward for a few years and you'd better believe that many of those people complain about "slavery."

Is that "wrong"? That's not the right question! The right question is, "OK buster, if you think it's wrong then come up with a better idea instead of bitching about it." Do you want these people wandering around the streets or the wilderness, not being able to take care of themselves and possibly harming themselves or us, or--*gasp*--simply being in the way and causing civilization to break down locally while somebody perpetually has to figure out what to do with them that is not "slavery"?

Whether you like it or not, the reality is that we've spent ten thousand years remaking this planet's ecosystem to suit ourselves and to support six billion of us, and there's no room in the remaining wilderness for all of those animals. The domesticated species only have such huge populations because we have integrated them into civilization on our own terms, which of course means that we are in charge, due to their aforementioned inferior cognitive abilities.

The choices are: kill the excess numbers until the ones who are left could survive in the wild. Or alternately stop them from reproducing until the population shrinks to that level. This could work with a few species such as cats, who have not yet differentiated very much from their wild cousins. It would not work with dogs, who despite being the same species as wolves have differentiated into a separate subspecies Canis lupus familiaris, with a scavenger's digestion, the smaller brain that a scavenger's low-protein diet can support, a scavenger's dentition that is not ideal for hunting, and most importantly a modified pack-social instinct that favors humans as pack leaders and regards many prey animals as pack mates. Dogs are part of civilization (arguably its first and key component, as I have pointed out in many other discussions) and cannot be separated from it any more than humans can.

It's impractical for horses; there's not enough range land left. It would be deadly for many species of parrots because their habitat is vanishing: there are more hyacinthine macaws in North American commercial aviaries than there are in the rain forest, which makes them a rather ironic poster-child for the "endangered species" movement since it is precisely domestication that keeps them from the verge of extinction.

So for many of these animals there is no alternative to living among us, with us in charge.

The issue becomes one of humane treatment, not "freedom from slavery." Of course "factory farming" is an ugly business and should be stopped. Even most of us hard-core carnivores would cut back on our meat consumption if we had to work in the meat production industry. Perhaps not raising animals for food at all is the way of the future--which means that the population of pigs, chickens and many other species will shrink by many orders of magnitude since there's no place for them to run free and although they both make decent companion animals pets there's only so much room for them even in the increasingly urban ecosystem.

As for "working animals," well again to call them "slaves" is a dishonest argument. What do you call our treatment of rats, cockroaches, ants and still-lower lifeforms? Are you a Jain, wearing a mask so you don't accidentally swallow a gnat and sweeping the ground in front of you so you don't accidentally squash a myriapede--and maintaining a studious ignorance of microbiology so you don't have to wrestle with the issue of the bacteria and amoebas that are actively trying to kill you?

Everybody on this planet has a job, now that we've rebuilt it. That's neither "right" nor "wrong," it just IS. That includes the animals whose populations are part of the ecosystem of civilization. Some of those animals are well adapted to those jobs after all these millennia, like dogs and cats. Others seem to take to them well enough, like horses. Your comments about poking show that you're a little distant from your subject. Not all animals have as many nerve endings as we do and their skin can be much thicker. Just as your dog regards having his neck bitten as a social custom (mine beg for it and show me how hard to bite by biting mine) your horse regards those pokes (obviously if not overdone cruelly) as communication.we can also spay and neuter dogs and cats without any thought as to whether or not they want a family. Is that barbaric?It's one of those things that comes with civilization and is not a matter of right or wrong. In very rural locales cats might be allowed to breed freely because the forest will absorb the excess population--and we don't have to watch nature at work as only the fittest survive.

But the main difference between the dog and the wolf is arguably the self-selection their distant ancestors made, of who wanted a soft life among us and who wanted the harder but freer life of a hunter. Excess dogs will not politely disappear into the forest and be eaten by the cougars. They will clog our streets, dig through our garbage, beg at our doors, and give us sad-puppy looks everywhere we go--and that's exactly what they do in the Third World. Dogs are denizens of civilization and we have to deal with it. The only way is to limit their reproduction. You can do it by locking the females up when they're in estrus. But you're talking to a dog breeder here who has a few intact females, and I promise you two things: 1. You won't want to put up with the noise and behavior and 2. Dogs are incredibly clever and tireless and they'll occasionally mate anyway. Every breeder has a few "mis-matings" and we all have our share of "rescue puppies" that resulted from them. One of ours looks like his momma slept with a giraffe.But domesticated animals did consent. There is some indication that domestication wasn't simply humans exploiting animals, but animals exploiting humans for their protection from predators, food and accurate predictions of where food is located, and medical care.Humans didn't master the technology of animal husbandry until the past few thousand years. Even at the dawn of civilization, many species arrived as the result of self-domestication. Many people suggest that dogs joined our hunting packs because it was obvious that their superior speed, hearing and smell were perfect compliments to our superior planning ability and those wonderful pointy sticks that could bring down a frelling mammoth; others say they came for the garbage and the fires. Goats and pigs definitely wandered into our camps to eat the garbage. Cats are shamelessly opportunistic latecomers, following the rodents into our granaries and still marvel at our "paying" them for doing something they like to do anyway.Well, you referred to an animal not under the care of a human as "homeless". Do you still stand by that?In the context of civilization, absolutely. The modern ecosystem has room for a much greater number of dogs, cats, parrots, and other species--but only in our homes. Obviously many species choose to live on the fringe of civilization, scavenging from it outside of our "homes," and their numbers are held in check by the food supply. Cats and (especially) dogs without human homes are vastly outnumbered by the ones with human homes because there aren't many places for them in that fringe of the ecosystem.