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Sex With Animals; Legality Of.

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neverborn

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My personal comment on this topic is: yuck.

The way to answer this question is:

Why is it illegal to have sex with another human being without their consent? Because humans have rights, and those rights include the right to dispose of your body as you please. Animals don't have rights. Thus the issue of consent is a null one.

Legally, you may do with an animal whatever you like; they don't have rights, they are property.

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I'm still uncomfortable with saying that animals do not have rights. I'll grant that humans certainly have more rights, but it seems that, as a consequence of their ability to feel physical pain, animals have a right to not be senselessly tortured. This would include bestiality, in my opinion.

Now, if inflicting pain on animals can help mankind, that's different, because human rights trump animal rights. But I don't see how it can be anything other than immoral to stick fire crackers up a cat's butt, just so you can watch it explode.

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I'm still uncomfortable with saying that animals do not have rights.
Get over your discomfort, you overgrown deer, or I'll bite you on the fetlock. You're misconstruing the basis of rights, and the relationship between basic civilized decency vs. law. Rights don't have anything at all to do with the ability to feel pain, and everything to do with the specifics of consciousness. I agree that sticking dynamite up a cat's butt is usually both pointless and messy (not to mention difficult to do -- nab a cat and give it a try, if you have any doubts), but that's irrelevant to the question of whether filthy stinking cats (sorry for the racial slur) have rights that should be protected by law. It is also pointless to destroy beautiful works of art, but that does not mean that it should be against the law. The concept of property makes all of the distinctions that need to be made under the law.
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I'm still uncomfortable with saying that animals do not have rights. I'll grant that humans certainly have more rights, but it seems that, as a consequence of their ability to feel physical pain, animals have a right to not be senselessly tortured. This would include bestiality, in my opinion.

Now, if inflicting pain on animals can help mankind, that's different, because human rights trump animal rights. But I don't see how it can be anything other than immoral to stick fire crackers up a cat's butt, just so you can watch it explode.

Shooting an animal with an arrow is very painful for an animal, especially if you miss a kill spot. If I'm not hunting for food, but just for fun, would you consider that "senselessly torturing" it? I'm not causing the animal pain and killing it for my own survival, just for my entertainment.

If you aren't against hunting, then where exactly would you draw the line? btw, I'm not against hunting, I'm just wondering what the line is between killing an animal for fun and torturing it, since both cause the animal pain and neither one are required for my survival.

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Hunting is not torture, because that is not the intention. The intention is for sport. If you can make a sport out of sticking fire crackers up cat's butts (I know people who have actually done this), then so be it, but you're gonna have a hard time finding competitors. I believe it is morally wrong to harm an animal just for the sake of causing it pain.

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The topic was about the legality rather than the morality. I don't think anyone has argued that torturing an animal for the sake of torturing it (i.e., not as part of some other reason) is moral.

Absolutely correct. It is not moral to hire a prostitute or to do cocaine, but I fully believe those two things should be legal. Sex with animals is probably not moral - however, should it be legal in a free society?

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In an Objectivist society, would bestiality be illegal? I argued yes, as having sex with anything that can not consent is wrong and illegal. A friend argued that animals have no rights, just as they do not choose to be slaughtered, they do not have the option of consent.

:lol: You and your friends sound like my friends :D

My personal comment on this topic is: yuck.

Second'd :worry:

But I don't see how it can be anything other than immoral to stick fire crackers up a cat's butt, just so you can watch it explode.

:P

I agree that sticking dynamite up a cat's butt is usually both pointless and messy... but that's irrelevant to the question of whether... cats ... have rights that should be protected by law.

Ah, this gets interesting. You didn't say whether it was immoral. And does this mean that animals shouldn't be protected from at least some actions by law?

The topic was about the legality rather than the morality. I don't think anyone has argued that torturing an animal for the sake of torturing it (i.e., not as part of some other reason) is moral.

True, but, legality is derived from morality; is it immoral, or arbitrary in terms of morality?

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Get over your discomfort, you overgrown deer, or I'll bite you on the fetlock. You're misconstruing the basis of rights, and the relationship between basic civilized decency vs. law. Rights don't have anything at all to do with the ability to feel pain, and everything to do with the specifics of consciousness. I agree that sticking dynamite up a cat's butt is usually both pointless and messy (not to mention difficult to do -- nab a cat and give it a try, if you have any doubts), but that's irrelevant to the question of whether filthy stinking cats (sorry for the racial slur) have rights that should be protected by law. It is also pointless to destroy beautiful works of art, but that does not mean that it should be against the law. The concept of property makes all of the distinctions that need to be made under the law.

:P:D

lol, You've been really funny lately. Or maybe you've always been a lollster and I never noticed before.

92.4% lollium

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I can't believe this is still a source of doubt for you, Moose. Have you been watching so much Fox that you haven't read and understood the essay "Man's Rights" in Capitalism: The Unkown Ideal? C'mon, take those antlers off, stop watching so much O'Reilly and Hannity, and start reading.

Moose, you know I like pulling your chain, but back to business. To remove your hesitation with regard to whether doing an animal should be legal, you must know what metaphysical condition gives rise to the need for the principle of rights, and whether animals satisfy this condition. On the moral side of the matter, just ask whether any context would result in such an act being beneficial to a man. Finally, you should clarify the nature of the relationship between morality and legality, if any.

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...however, should it be legal in a free society?
I didn't address that because others have already done so.

Let's consider the way you are trying to derive that it could be illegal:

I argued [it ought to be illegal], as having sex with anything that can not consent is wrong and illegal.
Let's assume that having sex without that other entity's consent is wrong and illegal. Why only sex? How about making that entity pull a plough without its consent? Would it be illegal to kill and eat an animal without its consent?

Sex with an animal does fall in a different moral category (as compared to eating an animal or making it work a field), not because of the animal and its consent but because of you as a human being and because of your own rational values.

Legality and rights are all about human beings creating a society and ensuring that society is subject to moral laws. We do not form a society with animals. Legally, they should have the same status as stones.

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True, but, legality is derived from morality; is it immoral, or arbitrary in terms of morality?

Legality is derived from morality but not all immoralities are illegal. For example, it is immoral to sacrifice yourself for the sake of others but that doesn't mean we make laws against anyone who does so. On the other hand, sacrficing others for yourself (murder, theft etc.) is immoral and illegal.

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And this gets interesting. You didn't say whether it was immoral. And does this mean that animals shouldn't be protected from at least some actions by law?
As to the first, it depends on the cat. As to the second, the protection is indirect: harm or steal my dogs, and you harm or steal me (no, wait, steal from me). "Canine rights" derive entirely from the rights of their owners.
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The topic was about the legality rather than the morality. I don't think anyone has argued that torturing an animal for the sake of torturing it (i.e., not as part of some other reason) is moral.

Indeed, it is grotesquely immoral to senselessly cause pain to a living creature for no other purpose than to see it suffer. To do so is profoundly nihilistic in the very worst sort of way - and the torture of animals is very often one of the advance warning signs that someone might end up doing the same or worse to human beings.

But, of course, there are a lot of profoundly immoral things which are not and should not be illegal.

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Hunting is not torture, because that is not the intention. The intention is for sport. If you can make a sport out of sticking fire crackers up cat's butts (I know people who have actually done this), then so be it, but you're gonna have a hard time finding competitors. I believe it is morally wrong to harm an animal just for the sake of causing it pain.

And it is. Somebody who would do what you describe is certainly a monster who should be shunned by any decent person. I recall reading that many wanton murderers had a long history of torturing animals, so such actions are consistent with a very pathological mentality that enjoys inflicting suffering.

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Did you guys see the now-removed Drudge link about live dogs being used as shark bait in France? They had a picture on there with a dog that survived that madness and swam to shore, still with huge fishing hooks protruding from its snout.

Is that a common practice over there or something? Or was it just a bunch of sick-o jerks? (Or course, since we are dealing with France........)

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Warning: Graphic content! And excuse me, but it occurs in a French-controlled terrority, not France.

Here

I have a pet dog. This is sick. One more reason to hate the French. :(

I wonder what David Odden has to say to this. :D

Here's something I have found:

post-1866-1128598769_thumb.jpg

Edited by Felix
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Are you violating someone's rights when you're doing an animal? Note that animals don't have rights, as DavidOdden neatly put it, so this is not a valid argument at all.

However, if an animal is someone else's property, this would be illegal (without the consent of the owner) and would be an issue of property violation.

Not to mention how depraved of dignity (or perhaps I should say sex, but then if you are not esteemed much by anyone I doubt you can get any) you would have to be to engage in such an action.

By the way, how did you come to think about this issue at all? What made you ask this question, neverborn?

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I'm curious as to what the consequences would be for 'interfering' with another person's animal in a society based on Objectivism, and also what the consequences actually are nowadays.

And while we're on the subject of weird sexual practises, what about necrophiliacs? Would they be permitted to do what they do as long as they have the property rights to the graves of their uh... partners?

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