Nonviolent Animal Rights Organization example essay topic

Ever since the society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals in England in 1824 was formed, there have been long running debates on the topic of animal rights. The first societies were formed to protect and maintain humane treatment of work animals, such as horses, cattle, and house hold pets. Towards the end of the nineteenth century more organizations were formed, this time to protest the use of animals in scientific experimentation. Today groups such as People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) have continued these traditional fights as well as adding new agendas. "Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness; The Declaration of Independence holds these rights to be self evident and unalienable.

In the eighteenth century when these words were written they were called natural rights, today we call them human rights" (Mc Shea, 34). The issue of whether or not to grant animals rights such as those humans retain, is a greatly disputed issue. Animal right is an extremely intricate issue that involves the question of animal farming, animal experimentation, and animal activists. There is no happy little farmer milking his cow on a nice farm anymore; this is the food industry; it is dirty; it is unsafe, and it is a massacre of innocent animals. Cows, chickens, pigs, and other animals processed into food are not kept on a farm; they are crowded into pens and cages that are too small to even allow the animal to turn around (Krizmanic, 36). So if the animals are not growing up on farms, where are they?

Animals are raised at places called "factory farms" (Krizmanic, 36), which is also known as intensive animal agriculture (Kamrin NA). A factory farm is just that, a factory. Food is brought to the confined animal on conveyer belts, and eggs and other products are taken away on conveyer belts (Krizmanic, 36). "Crowding, rough handling, mutilation, force feeding, genetic manipulation, and loss of offspring are the normal and standard operating procedures" (Karmin, NA). 90% of all slaughtered animals are raised in confinement (Krizmanic, 37).

At these "farms", nine million chickens, turkeys, pig calves, and cows are slaughtered every day (Robins, NA), so that most of the United States' meat, milk, and eggs come from intensive confinement factory farms (Sequoia, 45). These animals are not just raised on animal feed alone. Animals are immobilized by machines and transported on assembly lines into darkened factories, to be injected with many toxic substances (Sequoia, 45), including antibiotics and hormones to make them grow faster and meatier (Krizmanic, 37). 40% to 50% of the antibiotics used in the United States are given to these animals without medical supervision (Sequoia, 46). In the actual feed there are fungicides, recycled wastes, and insecticides (Sequoia, 46), and even steroids have started becoming the norm (Fox, 25). Every year, 85% of four million acres of topsoil is lost because of raising livestock (Sequoia, 47).

So many animals are concentrated on the farms that animal wastes are a major source of ground water pollution, air pollution, and contribute to global warming (Sequoia, 47). The intensive farming also uses immense amounts of energy resources (Kamrin, NA). Intensive agriculture takes a big toll on the rainforest. A total of 260 million acres of oxygen producing tress have been cut down for a meat-centered diet (Sequoia, 47). Rainforests that can absorb global warming carbon dioxide are being cleared, and cattle are moving in (Karmin, NA), which is pushing many rainforest inhabitants toward extinction. There are a large number of people who are opposed to a major chance in their meat eating lifestyle for reason of tradition, health, and ridicule from other meat eaters.

Humans are made to be omnivores, as we have teeth to eat meat, grains, and vegetables. Though we do not deny that fact, people for animal rights have a problem with how the meat is raised and brutally slaughtered for our personal enjoyment. There are many victims of deception in the food industry. Factory farms are unsanitary and downright unsafe and they perform many violations of animal rights and USDA policies. This industry is extremely dirty. Research on animals is important in understanding diseases and developing ways to prevent them.

The polio vaccine, kidney transplants, and heart surgery techniques have all been developed with the help of animal research. Through increased efforts by the scientific community, effective treatments for diabetes, diphtheria, and other diseases have been developed with animal testing (Bioethics, 148). There are many reasons given for it to be necessary to work with animals in research. First scientists must be able to test medical treatments for effectiveness and drugs for their toxicity before being tested on humans. Also new surgical techniques before being used on humans must be tested on living things with circulatory and pulmonary systems like ours. "No computer models, cell cultures, nor artificial substances can simulate flesh, muscle blood, bones and organs" (Am pef, 2).

If considered carefully there is no alternative to animal research. It is impossible to explain or predict the course of many diseases without observing the effects of it on the entire living system. In the classroom, it is argued, dissections must go on in order to further our knowledge. But, what about computer programs like the virtual frog? The answer to this is simply that even with today's technologies these kind of computer programs are not sophisticated enough to reproduce a living organism. Although that should be seen as a great accomplishment, it has been found that each year in the United States an estimated 100 million animals are maimed, blinded, scalded, force-fed chemicals, genetically manipulated, and otherwise hurt or killed in the name of science.

Appalled yes, willing to stand up and voice their thoughts, not often. There is one significant reason for this unwillingness by some to stand up for the rights of our fellow inhabitants of this planet, personal convenience. On a daily basis most people do not see their own degree of unintentional support towards this global dilemma, but when compiled on paper one must question how mankind can, with conscience, commit these acts which shame us as human beings. Animals possess the same kinds of feelings and emotions as human beings, and without anesthesia, they are subjected to the pain as well. Mankind often fails to give animals the respect and rights they deserve, they are treated as lifeless, unfeeling scientific specimens and items that we may manipulate at our own convenience and for vanity's sake. Laboratory research involving animals is cruel and merciless treatment of helpless creatures.

No law requires that cosmetics and household products be tested on animals. Nevertheless, by six o'clock this evening, hundreds of animals will have had their eyes, skin or gastrointestinal systems unnecessarily burned or destroyed (Sequoia, 27). Two of the most famous animal tests are the Draize, or eye irratancy test and the LD 50, Lethal Dose 50. The Draize test is performed almost exclusively on albino rabbits, such as the Florida White, because they are cheap, docile, and are not "equipped" with tear ducts to wash away the chemicals. During the test the rabbits are immobilized in a stock with only their head protruding and a solid or liquid is placed in the lower lid of one eye of the rabbit; substances vary from mascara to aftershave and even oven cleaner. The rabbits eyes are clipped open and observed at intervals of 1, 24, 48, 72, and 168 hours.

It is important to note that, during this test, anesthesia is rarely used. Reactions include inflammation, ulceration, rupture of the eyeball, corrosion, and bleeding. Some of these studies continue for weeks, and all the while no measures are made to reduce suffering or treat the animals. Their survival will only lead to an entirely new set of tests, such as the LD 50. Lethal Dose 50 refers to the lethal dose that is required to kill 50% of all animals in a test group of 40-200. Animals are force fed substances through a stomach tube, forced to inhale a substance, or have the substance applied to their extremities.

These tests continue until half of the test animals die. Any animals who somehow manage to survive these particular tests are subsequently destroyed (Sequoia, 29). Not only are these tests cruel, but the results are unreliable and unnecessary as scientific evidence. Albert Schweitzer once said, "Until he extends the circle of compassion to all living things, man will not himself find peace". In essence, the means of living a healthy and fulfilled life is to embrace and respect all life present on this planet. People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, or PETA, is a nonviolent animal rights organization.

They enforce the ideals that any exploitation of animals by humans is wrong and should be abolished. PETA, formed by Alex Pacheco and Ingrid Newkirk in 1984, has grown from a handful of members to an organization with more than 35,000 members and a yearly income of over five million dollars (Dear 70). They quote Ingrid Newkirk as saying, "A rat is a pig is a dog is a boy" (Tapply 71). This quotation of Newkirk's states her purpose in organizing PETA and it provides a platform of ideals for PETA. They call another pro-animals group the Animal Liberation Front, or ALF. ALF commits violent and illegal acts to make sure that their point is apparent to all.

Like PETA, ALF also seeks to end all human exploitation of animals, but unlike PETA, ALF will use any means possible to achieve their goal. ALF originated in England in 1974 by a man named Ronnie Lee. An anonymous woman, who goes by the pseudonym "Valerie", organized the American branch of the ALF after training in terrorist techniques in England. The American ALF made their American debut on Christmas Eve in 1982.

She and two other members broke into a lab at Howard University in Washington, D.C. They liberated thirty cats used in research to study the effects of drugs on nerve transmissions (Reed 38). The activists found the cats in poor condition. Deep incisions scarred some cats' backs and they were dragging their hind legs (Reed 38). While in the lab, the ALF members photographed the cats and later turned the cats over to sympathetic veterinarians who treated and put the cats up for adoption. In June 1991, ALF claimed credit for $800,000 worth of damage caused by arson at the Northwest Farm Cooperative in Edmonds, Washington, a supplier of feed to mink ranches. Totally opposed to any kind of animal exploitation, ALF does not indulge in eating eggs, honey, or dairy products.

On the other side of the coin is Putting People First (PPF). A grass roots organization made up of men and women who advocate the eating of meat, the wearing of furs and using animals in biomedical research. PPF takes the human side if the animal rights issue. As PPF is the only pro-human group, it is also the only nationwide organization attempting to merge interests of hunters with all the other interest groups that stand to lose to the animal rights extremists groups (Tapply 98).

This human rights group promotes the age-old view that human rights are above animal rights. PPF began in 1990 with Kathleen Marquardt as the director and founder of the human rights organization. By tracking legislative proposals and lobbying against animal rights bills at state and local levels, PPF maintains a high public image. Marquardt's organization also files public interest lawsuits in courts and with the federal regulatory agencies to expose the radicalism of the animal rights message (Tapply 98).

The granting of rights to animals such as the abolition of medical research, the dissolution of commercial animal agriculture, sport hunting, and trapping would in effect have both positive and negative consequences. Positive consequences to the granting of animal rights would include lessened cruelty to animals, a greater appreciation of animals, and even a probable decline in the rate at which endangered species decline in number. These positive consequences would have an immense impact on the ecological system of the world and in the end, may even benefit society. The negative consequences would include not being able to test potential cures of life threatening diseases, not having pets in homes, and the entire population becoming vegetarians. Therefore granting animals their rights would stimulate a large amount of controversy.

The question of whether or not animals are intelligent and have the ability to feel pain becomes one essential argument for animal rights activists in their fight for animal liberation.