Groundbreaking news from Spain has brought groundbreaking discussion to international media this week. The Spanish Parliament's environment committee has passed a resolution granting limited rights to great apes. The Sunday, July 13 New York Times ran a lengthy and thoughtful article on the issue, written by Donald G. McNeil Jr. An edited version of that article also ran in the Monday, July 14, International Herald Tribune. On Tuesday, the most widely distributed newspaper in the US, USA Today, ran a piece headed, "Activists pursue basic legal rights for great apes; Spain first to vote on some freedoms." And on Monday, July 14, the New York Times ran a supportive editorial. That editorial appears in today's Thursday July 17, International Herald Tribune. Also the views of Peter Singer, who co-founded the Great Ape Project, were put forward in the July 17 edition of the Shanghai Daily.
The Sunday New York Times piece, by McNeil, is headed "When Human Rights Extend to Nonhumans." ("Week in Review" page 3.) In the Monday International Herald Tribune it is headed, "Which kinds of rights do nonhumans deserve?" It tells us:
"The committee would bind Spain to the principles of the Great Ape Project, which points to apes' human qualities, including the ability to feel fear and happiness, create tools, use languages, remember the past and plan the future. The project's directors, Peter Singer, the Princeton ethicist, and Paola Cavalieri, an Italian philosopher, regard apes as part of a 'community of equals' with humans.
"If the bill passes -- the news agency Reuters predicts it will -- it would become illegal in Spain to kill apes except in self-defense. Torture, including in medical experiments, and arbitrary imprisonment, including for circuses or films, would be forbidden.
"The 300 apes in Spanish zoos would not be freed, but better conditions would be mandated."
McNeil makes some pointed statements on the issue. He writes:
"We like to think of these as absolutes: That there are distinct lines between humans and animals, and that certain ''human'' rights are unalienable. But we are kidding ourselves."
And he notes:
"Meanwhile, even in democracies, the law accords diminished rights to many humans: children, prisoners, the insane, the senile. Teenagers may not vote; philosophers who slip into dementia may be lashed to their beds; courts can order surgery or force-feeding.
"Spain does not envision endowing apes with all rights: to drive, to bear arms and so on. Rather, their status would be akin to that of children."
And McNeil includes an interesting comment on the upside of the slippery slope, from PETA's Ingrid Newkirk, who calls the Spanish vote, ''a great start at breaking down the species barriers, under which humans are regarded as godlike and the rest of the animal kingdom, whether chimpanzees or clams, are treated like dirt.''
You'll find that article on line at http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/13/weekinreview/13mcneil.html and
http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/07/13/europe/rights.php
Adam Cohen's commentary on the issue is headed, in the Monday July 14 New York Times, "What's Next in the Law? The Unalienable Rights of Chimps." (Pg 14) It is headed simply "The rights of chimps" in the Thursday, July 16, International Herald Tribune (pg 11). The thoughtful piece criticizes some animal rights activism, but also challenges its opponents. Cohen writes:
"Much of the opposition to animal rights is really economic. The campaign against the anti-cruelty referendum that will be on the California ballot this November - to prohibit keeping calves, hens and pigs in inhumanely small cages - is being financed in large part by egg and meat producers."
[Note: I will write more about this extraordinary initiative to ban many forms of cruel caging throughout California in the coming weeks. For now, please go to www.YesOnProp2.com to start learning about the historic campaign, and to https://secure.hsus.org/01/chf_2020 to help combat the meat producer's financing.]
Cohen's piece is well worth reading, and as papers note how many people go to an article, please check it out at http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/07/16/opinion/edadam.php and/or
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/14/opinion/14mon4.html and check it out.
Tuesday's (July 15) USA Today article, by Jeffrey Stinson, is headed, "Activists pursue basic legal rights for great apes; Spain first to vote on some freedoms." (Pg 7a.) It includes a welcome idea from Frans de Waal, a professor at the Yerkes National Primate Research Center at Atlanta's Emory University. (Note -- In expressing appreciation for his comments, I do not mean to condone his keeping of chimpanzees in captivity for us to study.)
We read:
"He says comparing chimps to children or mentally handicapped people is a false argument. The psychology of an adult chimp is more akin to a human adult than a child, he says. But activists equate adult apes and children because they cannot function on their own in society, he says."
[Note: While noting the strength of the legal argument in comparing chimps to children, I discuss, in "Thanking the Monkey" (p253 ) the falsity of truly equating the abilities or sensitivity of an adult monkey, who could fend for a whole family in the forest, with that of a human child. I am pleased to see that issue at least touched upon in the USA Today article.]
You'll find the full USA Today article on line at
http://www.usatoday.com/news/offbeat/2008-07-15-chimp_N.htm
You can comment at the bottom of that page. Many of the current comments tend towards the inane, so I hope many animal advocates will go to that page to raise the level of discussion. And please keep the issue alive in the paper with a letter to the editor. USA Today takes letters at http://tinyurl.com/hvsuz
The article on the issue by Peter Singer, a force behind the campaign, is on The Shanghai Daily website at http://www.shanghaidaily.com/article/?id=367030&type=Opinion
Please check it out, and comment below it.
Some of the most thorough discussions I have come across on legal rights for great apes are in the works of Steven Wise. In his book "Rattling the Cage" Wise argues that great apes should be given the right to "bodily liberty and bodily integrity." He bases his argument on their similarity to our species. Yet he suggests in that book, and makes it clear in his next book, "Drawing the Line," that indeed we hope for a slippery slope. He suggests that granting rights to the great apes will help tear down an arbitrary wall between human and other animals and start to open the door to more possibilities. (Check out http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0738204374/dawnwatch) In the opening chapter of Thanking the Monkey I cite some of Wise's work, and that of others on the issue of rights. And I also discuss my own views -- that in human society we need not expect other animals to have exactly the same legal rights as humans, and, importantly, that the respect for their lives tha
t we offer need not be dependent on what we believe to be their level of humanness.
It is just wonderful to see this discussion in leading papers. Please keep it alive with letters to the editor.
The New York Times takes letters at letters@nytimes.com and the International Herald Tribune takes letters at letters@iht.com
Please be sure not to use any comments or phrases from me or from any other alerts in your letters. The Times and Tribune make clear that they are looking for original responses from their readers.
I have covered only a few places the story appeared. Why not keep an eye out for this issue or anything that could be linked to it in your local media, and send a letter to your editor? Always include your full name, address, and daytime phone number when sending a letter to the editor. Remember that shorter letters are more likely to be published
Yours and the animals',
Karen Dawn
(DawnWatch is an animal advocacy media watch that looks at animal issues in the media and facilitates one-click responses to the relevant media outlets. You can learn more about it, and sign up for alerts at http://www.DawnWatch.com. You may forward or reprint DawnWatch alerts if you do so unedited -- leave DawnWatch in the title and include this parenthesized tag line. If somebody forwards DawnWatch alerts to you, which you enjoy, please help the list grow by signing up. It is free.)
Please go to www.ThankingtheMonkey.com to read reviews of Karen Dawn's new book, "Thanking the Monkey: Rethinking the Way we Treat Animals” and watch the fun celebrity studded promo video.
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Date: Thu Jul 17 12:36:40 2008
