Monkeys should be considered persons in the eyes of the law

Amina Amjed The case of Animal Rights Round 4 1.The use of animals for science, for commercial purposes, for agriculture purposes and for the purposes of sport hunting and trapping should be abolished. 2.It is our duty to consider animals just as we consider those who are unable to protect and defend themselves such as the elderly, the disabled and children. 3.The unjust and immoral abuse of animals for science, sports, agriculture and for any other human entertainment or attainment of needs for said humans is fundamentally wrong. 4.We should not regard animals as resources. 5.Once we start viewing them as only sources, which is where we commit the fundamental wrong. 6.It is our direct duty to ensure safety of animals from brutality as we do to our children and to those humans around us who are incapable of helping themselves. 7.It is without a doubt that the process of change regarding animals and the rights of animals is complicated and required extensive amount of time and finance to bring about this change but even so it is much needed. 8.Using/abusing animals for scientific experiments and/or for sports" such as seal clubbing is brutal and against morality. 9.We should not overlook animal rights because they do not have the characteristics and inherent components of a human being. 10.Some would justify the use of animals by applying the theory of contractarianism. 11.Contractarianism is the belief, by some, that morality consists of a set a set of rules that individuals abide to voluntarily just as we do when we agree to a contract. 12.In this case, animals cannot volunteer or provide consent to be or not be part of a contract therefore they cannot be moral and not considered persons. 13.The same is true for children. Children are unable to consent to a contract without the proper consent and supervision of their parent(s) and/or guardian. Similarly, animals should be protected by their guardian(s), if one is present, with the same moral perspective as another human. 14. By applying inherent value, it is evident that each individual is as valuable as the next and not just what that individual can do for another but the value of the individual on its own; animal or human. 15.We should not use/abuse animals just because by doing so it provides for the good of others. By hurting or undermining one individual, human or animal, we condone acts of cruelty which are not morally justified acts. 16.The rights view of moral theory rationally explains the domain of human morality. 17.Furthermore, it is undisputable that animals lack many attributes as a human such as reading, writing, building book cases or baking a cake. 18.The fight for animal rights is analogous to that of equality for women and other minorities, 19.In regards to animals that are used in the field of science, there is proof of devaluing these animals by testing on them routinely as if their value is reducible by their usefulness to others. This view is a utilitarian view but not a morally just view pertaining to inherent values. 20.The aforementioned animals are treated without any respect and by doing so the rights of these animals are violated. 21.Killing a human being does not justify our moral values then why should that be true of killing or torturing animals. 22.A right, properly understood, is claim that one party may exercise against another. 23.But rights cannot simply depend on the presence of moral capacity. 24.If that were true then we would have to assent that humans who are mentally impaired or comatose lack the ability to respond to or exercise moral claims therefore they have no rights. 25.Rights can simply pertain to those that have a subject of life, like normal mammals and non-human mammals because they have inherent value. 26.We have to end the systematic oppression on these animals as our moral duty. 27.Non- human mammals have the same fundamental rights to not be harmed or killed as we do. 28.As you mentioned, that one always weighs the pros and cons of whatever decision they make in order to determine the morality of said decision, is not always accurate. 29.Some human individuals lack the ability to determine what is right and wrong which further enforces the point that they are not moral beings. 30.If it was necessary to only have morality as a component of being a person than some humans would cease to one. 31. The abusive act of a mother, towards their child then are not immoral, as far as the individual committing the act but is considered immoral to those who are in fact able to make moral and immoral distinctions. 32.Because we cannot properly infer and communicate with animals, as humans we cannot assume as you said that they lack the ability to actually communicate. 33.It is almost like one individual who speaks only one language, going to a different country with a completely different language. At this point this individual has to acquire the ability to learn or either try and find someone to be able to communicate with the people of this country. 34.I do not believe that by giving rights to animals we would inherently be degrading the meaning of "rights". 35.If anything we would be expanding upon those rights to make them more just towards every member of our community and the world which includes animals as well humans. 36.It is true that by regarding a domestic animal as part of the family we do not stop considering them as an animal and I do not argue that point. 37.If to a thief the act of robbery is moral than how can we not say the same in regards to animals? 38.If a thief can commit a crime and believe that he is doing so with moral justification than we cannot think that an animal does what it does without moral causation. 39.Once again, I state that rights cannot simply depend on the presence of moral capacity. 40.The abuse of animals, in any arena of life if wrong and should be abolished. 41.Monkeys, therefore, should be considered persons in the eyes of the law.