Human rights to dolphins?
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This is not a good argument in favor of slaughtering dolphins. It is an argument for changes in how humans treat pigs. If your facts are correct, we must do something for pigs, too.
It is not about animals who cannot respect the rights of other animals. It's totally up to humans, who can. Remember, that no human deserves rights. We have given rights to ourselves and to each other. Why couldn't we give them to dolphins?
I understand that it is difficult to argue why we could treat dolphins differently than pigs or octopus. Yet, it is a common understanding, that destroying a person is much more than simply killing an organism. I think, for those of us who feel that killing dolphins is wrong, it is because everything what we know about them, makes us perceive them as persons more than pigs or octopus.
AfterDark
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Here the USA we believe that all people are born with inalienable rights, human rights. Not given by any man or government. I know outside the USA that is hard to grasp but that's what I'm talking about, animals have no such thing, they only have the "rights" we say they have. We are the masters. Just as in other countries where people believe their rights come from man or government the government is the master.
Greenjuice
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I share all of your concerns but perhaps less of the nihilism.
However, I do struggle to think of any good examples of where one group or society has been able to successfully *completely* change another group or society's values and behaviour.
Conquest certainly doesn't work as there will always remain pockets of resistance!
The only ones that come to mind are through natural selection and extinction, such as Betamax and VHS, and now the VCR!
My point was that as individuals each of us can choose to make a stand. As a society, we only really have legislation. Whilst we recognise the hazards of unintended consequences and incomplete successes, it does allow a society/group draw a line in the sand to say, that *this* society/group does not find *this* behaviour acceptable.
The larger the group, the stronger the voice. A statement from the UN would have greater impact than a group of activists.
Raising awareness alone can have a significant impact. The demand for shark fin has fallen dramatically in the last year initiated by activism and then followed by legislation in China. These articles show that cultures once prejudicially marked as 'foreign' and impenetrable, are actually sentient, showing they can and do change centuries old practices, and very quickly at that; putting some of our western democracies to shame:
http://www.independent.co.uk/voices...k-fin-soup-is-losing-its-fashion-8894495.html
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2014/jan/11/shark-finning-in-decline-in-far-east
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---------- Post added February 16th, 2014 at 03:39 PM ----------
I do commend the strength of your belief. It may be the construct of your society. But in reality all your human rights are maintained by your legislation. Your rights come from your democratically elected governors who use your votes to empower themselves to make that legislation. Birth rights is a man-made concept.
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If you ask me, my inalienable human rights as well as yours come from the fact that I as well as you are created by God in His image and likeness. Agnostic divers here on SB would not agree with that. Yet, this historical belief is the source of modern human rights in the Western civilisation. Any other notion of rights, that doesn't originate from a divine source, is bestowed upon you by men - as Greenjuice correctly pointed out. We can bestow these rights upon dolphins, too. And we should. We are the masters, arn't we? To be a master is a great responsibility and requires empathy and wisdom. BTW, I am not a vegan, but I see a rationale behind it as it would lower the food prices, help eliminate hunger, protect environment from greenhouse gases and lessen the suffering in this world. Thus I consider to become one. We all should try to act according to what we know and understand.
AfterDark
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I'll agree to disagree because to agree would start a trip down the road to serfdom and slavery which is what we get when we let men grant us our rights. It is why rights are fought for and won not granted. Is that chains I hear rattling? Yes I think it is. Animals are animals they kill and eat each other alive and any "rights" we bestow upon them need to be in that context. When a animal can call and hire a lawyer to sue for redress then we may have something.
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OK...let's say a well funded environmentalist group, teaches a half dozen dolphins how to attach mines to fishing boats involved in threatening the dolphins....and then GIVES the dolphins several caches of mines the dolphins can hide wherever they choose to....the dolphins do possess the required intellect to make use of this technology--and to effectively wage a battle against the japanese fisherman.....and there have certainly been countless instances where groups of humans-or where some countries, provided weapons and battle plans to a less military society, for the "good" this would represent.....This actually could work!!!!
AfterDark
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Until somebody dangled a fish in front of them.
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Just consider the implications..humor notwithstanding.....train and arm a population of dolphins, see them fight back and destroy fishing boats attempting genocide against the dolphins........and you have an entirely different paridigm -- pigs and chickens COULD NOT be armed and then develop their own strategies and attacks against those humans that would capture and kill them..dolphins WOULD be alone in the animal world in this, potentially CHANGING what it means to be human....
I would love to see the dolphins trained to destroy Japanese fisherman involved in dolphin genocide....Once trained, the dolphins would train their own ranks....again, this is something previously only possible for humans, but it could occur with dolphins. It SHOULD OCCUR WITH DOLPHINS!!!
I would love to see the dolphins trained to destroy Japanese fisherman involved in dolphin genocide....Once trained, the dolphins would train their own ranks....again, this is something previously only possible for humans, but it could occur with dolphins. It SHOULD OCCUR WITH DOLPHINS!!!
OP
gcarter
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Leaving aside for a moment your unhealthy tendency to propose killing people as the solution, the unhealthiness of which is evidenced by the fact you actually find such a proposition humorous...
"What it means to be human" can be defined in a number of different ways, no question. And there will be no right or wrong in many of the definitions - context will matter, among other things. It is not unusual for words or phrases to be "blessed" with multiple nuanced meanings.
Nonetheless.
Type "human definition" into Google and you will get the definition below. When used as a noun, dolphins are clearly NOT human. Yes, they may exhibit some human characteristics as supported by the definition of the word when used as an adjective. But they are not human. What do you see in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights that supports granting these rights to animals? References are to humans, people, men, women. There is no reference to, for example, inter-species discrimination.
What about responsibilities? It is pretty widely recognized by most that rights do carry concomitant responsibilities, although there is a resistance to codifying those responsibilities in the same way we codify rights (not surprising given the lack of personal accountability we see in todays society).
https://www.scu.edu/ethics/practici...lectures/balance-rights-responsibilities.html
"Human Rights and Human Responsibilities: A Necessary Balance?" by Mia Giacomazzi
Balancing Rights and Responsibilities - Just Conflict
How do you see dolphins fulfilling the responsibilities attendant to the rights you want to grant them? Are both dolphins and people to have the same rights but only people to have responsibilities?
Back to your propensity for advocating murder... does this not then make dolphins criminal? How could they present a defense? Even if they could, how could such premeditated acts be defended?
This line of reasoning that equates dolphins and humans devolves into nonsense very quickly.
If one wishes to protect dolphins for whatever reason, to limit the harm done to them or cruelty visited upon them, that is a laudable goal and a fairly uniquely human one.
Advocating that dolphins should be considered human under the law is both silly and impractical. They are not human and never will be.
Advocating murder to achieve these goals makes you a terrorist.
hu·man
ˈ(h)yo͞omən/
adjective
adjective: human
- 1.
of, relating to, or characteristic of people or human beings.
"the human body"
synonyms: anthropomorphic, anthropoid, humanoid, hominid More "in human form"
- of or characteristic of people as opposed to God or animals or machines, esp. in being susceptible to weaknesses.
"they are only human, and therefore mistakes do occur"
synonyms: mortal, flesh and blood; More fallible, weak, frail, imperfect, vulnerable, susceptible, erring, error-prone;
physical, bodily, fleshly
"they're only human"
- of or characteristic of people's better qualities, such as kindness or sensitivity.
"the human side of politics is getting stronger"
synonyms: compassionate, humane, kind, considerate, understanding, sympathetic, tolerant; More approachable, accessible
"the human side of politics"
- Zoology
of or belonging to the genus Homo.
- of or characteristic of people as opposed to God or animals or machines, esp. in being susceptible to weaknesses.
noun
noun: human; plural noun: humans
- 1.
a human being, esp. a person as distinguished from an animal or (in science fiction) an alien.
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