This is a needlessly complex issue that has always proven to be a headache to attempt honest discussion with people about.
Perspective and constancy are absolute imperatives when discussing anything that could be considered moral or emotional whilst still expect a progressive out come. Obviously this is so because these subjective emotional and moral feelings have a blanket affect on every one of us in literal, non subjective ways. That is to say, influence on our legal system.
For example it would not be productive to make, say, blinking your eye(s) illegal. Regardless of one's zeal on the issue the lone point of fact that the over whelming majority of us blink renders the idea impotent and useless. You would then incriminate all of us who blink, of course. Some don't blink however most do and almost if not every one of the people behind such a law do it as well. So naturally passing such a law would not be productive or beneficial in anyway. The only way a society could function in such a law is mass delusion that not only should blinking be illegal but that they themselves would never commit such a crime, even though they do. Which once again makes the law superfluous. This might seem completely mundane but the common sense behind this fact is every bit as fundamental to the issue of "animal cruelty".
We as a society are carnivorous. That is to say we by and large depend on meat to live. It's an integral part of our society's diet. Now, many people will and correctly so draw a distinction between that concept of need and want when it comes to the taking of an animal's life. Perhaps in another time and/or culture it would be productive to incorporate such values and practices into law as it would be an important part of said population's own constitution through action and tradition. We would then have the rational marriage between emotional/moral and legal standard. Making such laws productive by default because such practices are intuitive to their lifestyle.
As it happens to be we are not only a carnivorous society but we are also implicitly indulgent. As said about the anti-blinking movement, a society can only conduct itself under such moral and legal statutes if heavy doses of delusion are applied. For example; many hunters feel that it is moral for them to hunt and kill animals in the wild only if they eat the meat of the game they kill. However if society recognizes the distinction between want and need on the issue and uses that as the litmus test to discern moral and legal correctness then the hunter is just as guilty as Vick here is. He did not *need* the meat to survive. He did not *need* to go into the home of an animal and kill it for food. He *chose* only to do it for indulgence. Therefore he has to delude himself to appear and feel moral. Vick killed animals for enjoyment. A hunter in modern society kills animals for enjoyment. Obviously some hermit living and operating outside of the comforts of modern society would be exempt from such guilt because of the of the necessity of the hunt to survive.
------Life------
need =\= want
moral =\= immoral
legal =\= illegal
We see, several times every day advertisements for fast food. It's completely normal and taken for granted. There are posts here whenever a new sandwich pops up on the menu of McDonalds or Burger King where people go in a drool over and such. I would bet any sum of money that most or all of the people posting in such threads are cheering and lauding this sentence for Vick. This is a moral impasse. This is yet another example of society being forced to delude itself in order to function. Not a single person *needs* to go to McDonalds and shove a 1/4 chunk of beef down their throat to survive. That cow has every single one of the tenants people use when advocating animal's rights. The have a working nervous system. Can feel attachment and rejection. They feel pain and know fear. But yet millions upon millions of people see to it that they are killed for their own indulgence. They taste good, they are yummy. So people are fine with said cows being slaughtered by the millions if only to satisfy their own impulsive indulgence for ten or so minutes only to be digested then shit out and forgotten about. Mothers, fathers, all dying for nothing. That is just one example.
Modern hunters kills animal for enjoyment.
Your average American kills animals for enjoyment.
Mike Vick kills animals for enjoyment.
Justice is blind. Every single one of McDonald's 40 trillion served are guilty of the same crime. Taking the lives of animals for no reason other than selfish indulgence. But yet only Mike Vick is on trial here. How is that justice?
Animals are bought and sold like every other manner of property
You can have your pet put to sleep
You tell the animal what to do and punish it when it doesn't comply
You tear children from their mothers, break families/litters apart
You expect them to work without compensation
And none of that with the consent of the animal!
It's does not matter how nice you think your brand of humanity is to them, how much you claim to love them, how much you think they appreciate being pet and loved on. Maybe they don't want to be there, never did, don't like you but are afraid to do anything about it because of your power. It's the same concept of a mildly compassionate slave owner treating a black slave to an extra bowl of soup and a spot by the fire place during a cold winter night. That means that the owner cares about the feelings of the slave then right? He should be greatful? No. He is bought and sold. Animals are bought and sold and no one in their right mind would say "black people had rights before the civil war". So how in the green HELL can people claim animals have rights? That's right, delusion. They where/are not different.
People try to take their own admiration for their favorite pet and us it in an attempt to color over these facts. However I can do the same with my Wii. I LOVE it. I think it's awesome and would NEVER want to hurt it. I don't want to throw it, break it and catch it on fire. But that does not give me the right to tell you how to treat yours. It's yours, you bought it, you dictate what goes on with it - you do what you want with your own property. So until the nation wide delusion that we are a country that gives a flying shit about animals in practice fades way and we as a society stop wasting food and getting fucking obese off the remains of live, breathing animals for mere enjoyment; having such laws that dictate the contrary are impotent and superfluous as are the ideals behind them.
Now if some one was to bring about a movement to stop the buying and selling of pets and casual consumption of meat and so forth that could possibly have merit and would stand the test of legislation. But until that law passes, it is not ME saying animals have no rights; it's the practices of nearly every single citizen that say it. With their actions. Words mean nothing, death still happens.
