Should Cockfighting Be Legal?

[guitarlifter]

Right. I am not saying that animals are necessarily rational. I illustrated that they employ some degree of what we may consider to be reason. At the same time, the fact that we are not omniscient means that we can never act in a fully rational manner. And if we are not able to be fully rational, then at a certain point we must wonder if there is a limit to the utility of reason.

I agree that God is one solution to this problem. At the same time, God has left a significant amount of space for us to respond to this problem. This is an excellent illustration of it- the only precedent God really gives us towards animals is somewhat vague- act as their stewards. At the same time, we know He does not simply ban us from hunting or using animals as necessary. Thus, a policymaker is still left with significant space to act.

So let us look at this. The deontological aspects of the question are vague- God has given us a vague directive, some animals illustrate some degree of reason, and humans demonstrate imperfect reason. We cannot craft some clear policy based upon a philosophical principle without leading to absurd conclusions that lessen the value of any of the above. At this point, we should be enacting a policy which provides the greatest utility for our goals- undermining the least amount of human autonomy while also respecting the life of animals as well is what I prefer in this situation, although there is room for flexibility here.

My goal is to please God because of the justification that He gives me. In order to please God, I must be faithful. In order to be faithful, I must enact my faith through works. In order to properly enact my faith through works, I must follow God's law. God's law is an interesting beast. There's the moral dilemma of having Siamese twins, who are attached to one another. One is healthy, but is losing that health because of a sickly twin that is killing the other. According to sheer utility, one should cut off the twin that is killing the other. The ends would seem to justify the means However, God's law does not allow killing of innocent people. The deaths of the two children is tragic, but one murder of one of the children is sinful, so we justify the two children's death by the fact that, in order to be faithful, we must follow God's law, for following it is the highest moral ground, even above unfavorable ends to the most extreme extent.

The same applies to animals. God would not want us to abuse animals. However, it would be sinful to force another person to stop since animals have no rights. It would be even more sinful to vote that the government steal money from others through taxation in order to fund the intervention of animal abuse. Ergo, animal abuse is tragic, but coercion and theft of money in order to fund such coercion is sinful. My means of being faithful to God justify the ends of this earth. Luckily for us, we know that, as long as we are faithful, God will count us as righteous. We don't have to be perfect so long as we follow Christ.

 

[pcosmar]

Very true; nature is violent. But humans don't have to be, and if violence is necessary for human food, then it should and can be done as painless as possible without suffering by the animal.

Perhaps. I am not really interested in Cock Fights.
But in the several thousand years of human history, Blood sports have existed. They are cultural traditions and have a basis in breeding and harvesting animals.

I don't see it going away because of some (johnny come lately) laws. It will just go underground and become profitable to the criminal classes.

Prohibition is good for organized crime.

 

[YumYum]

I am a boxer. I am in the hurt game. That is my choice. I can choose to fight or not to fight. A cock has no choice in a cockfight.

 

[Sentient Void]

Just to play devil's advocate - I'm pretty sure people used to say the same thing about slaves.

The difference is:

1) Slaves were human beings and not animals. All men have unalienable rights - these are natural rights, and rights even recognized by the constitution. The constitution was clearly inconsistent in keeping slavery legal ('ALL men are created equal... inalienable rights")

2) Human slaves have sapience, animals do not.

Animal cruelty should and would be handled through appropriate social and commercial ostracism.

 

[charrob]

The difference is:

1) Slaves were human beings and not animals. All men have unalienable rights - these are natural rights, and rights even recognized by the constitution. The constitution was clearly inconsistent in keeping slavery legal ('ALL men are created equal... inalienable rights")

2) Human slaves have sapience, animals do not.

Animal cruelty should and would be handled through appropriate social and commercial ostracism.

Why such a distinction between human beings and animals? Do animals not feel the same pain as a human if tortured?

Animal cruelty is obviously not being handled through appropriate social and commercial ostracism, so there needs to be laws to protect them.

 

[BamaAla]

Animal cruelty is obviously not being handled through appropriate social and commercial ostracism, so there needs to be laws to protect them.

What? So if any given market doesn't respond the way charrob sees fit, laws are required to gain a favorable outcome?

I don't want to ruin your Christmas, but laws against cockfighting are already in place in all 50 states. I can only speak for areas that I have been to cockfights and my home, but, in those instances, the laws are wholly ignored by everyone involved. What works best for you and your community isn't necessarily right for me and mine; furthermore, I don't appreciate you suggesting that the majority of my state and community be classified as outlaws because we hunt, fight chickens, and use livestock to work.

 

[Icymudpuppy]

From a moral standpoint, torture is torture. Roman gladiators vs cockfighting are similar in that the subjects are facing mortal peril at the whim of their owners.

In the case of predator prey relationships, every great hunter I know strives to provide his quarry as quick and painless a death as possible. A clean kill. Clean kills provide health benefits as well as toxins from undesirable body parts, adrenalin, cortizone, bile, fecal matter, etc is not spread throughout the animal's system. The whole concept of Kosher butchering is based on efficient clean killing.

In nature, most predators don't have the ability to make the kind of instant kills that modern humans with firearms can provide. A heart/lung or brain shutdown is often not possible. However, instinctively most predators do try for the kind of injuries that will result in relatively quick death via throat attacks to bleed their victim out, or snapping the neck.

There are not many animals that play with prey. Domestic cats are rare in that regard. I have seen some scavengers eat the innards of a weak animal while it was still alive, but they are not predators and they acted as if the still living animal was already a carcass. Indeed, it was in a way, as if it could have lived, it wouldn't have been in any danger from the scavengers. I have also seen normally solitary scavengers like raccoons start acting like predators when they become semi domesticated and social and will attack small dogs and cats and wound them enough to start eating them like a carcass. Raccoons I don't think have the instincts to make a quick kill. As soon as their victim is weak enough that they can't run away, raccoons start eating their guts out. Pretty gruesome, really. Coyotes on the other hand usually will rip out the throat of a victim ensuring a quick kill as soon as they can, and before they start glutting themselves.

Is the Raccoon less moral than the Coyote?

Is a Housecat less moral than a Bobcat?

Is a Coyote that doesn't kill its victim before eating less moral than one that does?

Is a pack of raccoons that actively hunts weak or pregnant housecats and eats them alive less moral than the solitary raccoon that only eats already dead carcasses?

I don't have the answer to those questions. I personally think that animal cruelty is immoral, but I don't believe any government should legislate morality, and I don't believe that natural rights are interspecieal, only intraspecieal. If a mouse has a natural right to life against a hawk, then the entire food chain breaks down. But a mouse I think probably does have certain right to life against other mice, and they have their own little battles of resource use, sexual dominance etc, but that is up to mice to sort out amongst themselves. As humans, we have a right to life protected from other humans, but I don't think that Sheer Khan the Bengal Tiger is a murderer if he preys on little Mowgli the manchild, but Sheer Khan has no right to preside over our human-human disputes. Likewise, we have no right to preside over Chicken-Chicken disputes, nor to incite or force Chickens to fight or make peace amongst each other.

 

[Austrian Econ Disciple]

Why such a distinction between human beings and animals? Do animals not feel the same pain as a human if tortured?

Animal cruelty is obviously not being handled through appropriate social and commercial ostracism, so there needs to be laws to protect them.

There is a pre-requisite for rights. Sentience. Animals neither have reason, logic, or sentience. I didn't know rights were impinged upon having certain receptors. Of course, personally, I would never do such an intentional provocation, but it isn't like lions and zebra's take each other to court, or are aware of or capable of discourse. Can a Lion represent themselves or have the capacity to appoint anyone? What about squirrels? Where is your distinction? Rights imply the ability to be responsible for ones actions. Rights are intrinsically a human construct, therefore it is silly to assign animals something to which they cannot even understand nor have the capability to possess.

How do you know trees do not feel pain? What about plants? Are we going to institute courts for arbitration between predators and prey? How far are you going to take this?

 

[charrob]

What works best for you and your community isn't necessarily right for me and mine;

so if in your neck of the woods people murder and torture humans for fun and entertainment, are you asking me to ignore it because it's "in your neck of the woods"?

 

[BamaAla]

so if in your neck of the woods people murder and torture humans for fun and entertainment, are you asking me to ignore it because it's "in your neck of the woods"?

Reductio ad absurdum is not a flattering debate technique. I think nearly everyone on earth can draw the distinction between the two examples. Poster after poster has outlined the problems with your line of reasoning, yet you ignore them and call for more laws. Why don't you come here and educate everyone instead?

 

[charrob]

There is a pre-requisite for rights. Sentience. Animals neither have reason, logic, or sentience.

says who? I'd argue they have all three.

I didn't know rights were impinged upon having certain receptors.

What do you mean?

Rights imply the ability to be responsible for ones actions.

why?

I just don't understand your argument. Let's use an example; this is Fluffy:

Fluffy has reason, logic, and sentience. She knows what pain feels like and she has a right as a sentient life-form not to be harmed unnecessarily. She is a member of our family and should anyone harm her, this person should be given the same penalty as if they harmed a human in our family. We love her as an equal member of our family, and we would mourn her loss just as we would mourn the loss of any other member of the family who would be harmed. So what is your argument? In our eyes she is an equal.

 

[farrar]

I argue that a right is moral capacity. The ability to act and be moral in doing so. In order to understand a right, we must understand what morality is.

Morality is staying within the bounds of a mutual contract between [men], the contract defined by our empathy for one another who live on this earth with the capacity to ask "who am I? why am I here?" and then to answer those questions. We tend to empathize with one another, who bare this burden of existence, and we tend to respect one anothers existence and property to the extent that it does not conflict with our own. The mutual contract is a result of our empathy for one another, and our recognition that just as I may wish to live my life unmolesteed so would others, and that the best way to achieve this goal in my life is to refuse to molest others intentionally. When we obey this mutual contract and respect one anothers life and property we have acted in a moral fashion.

This is why attackers, who have lost the empathy of the victim can be killed without acting immorally.

This is the same with many others such a murders and such.

Therefore I would argue that animals have as much rights as they are capable of, through tapping into man's empathy. My dog has alot of rights compared to the racoon that tips over my garbage can. the Racoon does not have enough empathy from others who are willing to protect its "right" to live. Where as my family and I are willing to protect my dogs right to live and will to do so.

In a sense morals are just general rules that humans concieve for themselves based on their empathy for one another, and whatever else they are willing to invite into the group. If racoons were capable of this higher level of thinking there might be general rules for racoons, and how humans fit into it would depend on their level of empathy for us.

 

[dannno]

I just don't understand your argument. Let's use an example; this is Fluffy:

Fluffy has reason, logic, and sentience. She knows what pain feels like and she has a right as a sentient life-form not to be harmed unnecessarily. She is a member of our family and should anyone harm her, this person should be given the same penalty as if they harmed a human in our family. We love her as an equal member of our family, and we would mourn her loss just as we would mourn the loss of any other member of the family who would be harmed. So what is your argument? In our eyes she is an equal.

Fluffy is also your property, which you have the right to protect with your life.

 

[farrar]

Do plants have rights? They are living things. Does matter have rights? What has the nail or the hammer done to me? lol

 

[Dr.3D]

says who? I'd argue they have all three.




What do you mean?


why?

I just don't understand your argument. Let's use an example; this is Fluffy:

Fluffy has reason, logic, and sentience. She knows what pain feels like and she has a right as a sentient life-form not to be harmed unnecessarily. She is a member of our family and should anyone harm her, this person should be given the same penalty as if they harmed a human in our family. We love her as an equal member of our family, and we would mourn her loss just as we would mourn the loss of any other member of the family who would be harmed. So what is your argument? In our eyes she is an equal.

I'm with you on that. Both of my dogs know they are alive, are sentient and they know they don't like pain. As far as someone causing them harm or unnecessary pain, I would do anything in my power to keep that from happening. I know for a fact, if someone were to cause me harm or even attempt to while they were watching, they would do the same for me.

 

[libertybrewcity]

I think most local communities would ban cockfighting. The ones that didn't would probably be pressured to.

 

[libertybrewcity]

Fluffy is also your property, which you have the right to protect with your life.

bingo.

 

[charrob]

Fluffy is also your property, which you have the right to protect with your life.

The "property" business raises several issues. I don't think many people realize our pets are not even OUR property, but under the control of the Dept. of Agriculture. They are in our "care, custody and control" with limits.

Furthermore, why not try and enact legislation to end the outdated concept that pets are merely property? If such a law were passed, and I realize that has its own bumps and hurdles, at the very least, it would clear the way for civil action against animal abusers and killers.

In every way i see hurting/torturing an animal as the same as hurting a human being: it's force against a life-form, it's immoral, and it's wrong.

 

[libertybrewcity]

The "property" business raises several issues. I don't think many people realize our pets are not even OUR property, but under the control of the Dept. of Agriculture. They are in our "care, custody and control" with limits.

Furthermore, why not try and enact legislation to end the outdated concept that pets are merely property? If such a law were passed, and I realize that has its own bumps and hurdles, at the very least, it would clear the way for civil action against animal abusers and killers.

In every way i see hurting/torturing an animal as the same as hurting a human being: it's force against a life-form, it's immoral, and it's wrong.

if animals are not property anymore, we would then be forced to be vegetarians because animals have rights and those rights can not be taken away.

 

[jack555]

I could just as easily say that mosquitoes are mosquitoes, so they get all the same rights, and my argument would be just as valid as yours, which is of no validity at all. And, although the argument that rights are a grey scale in regard to animals being nothing new is true, the age of the argument does not make it correct. To say that something is common sense is also fallacious. You can't say that something is right just because it is. You have still yet to provide an argument that is without fallacy.

What you are missing is that a mosquito feels far less pain then a dog.

He originally stated that it had to do with animal size. I think what he meant was

insect>non mammal animal (possible exceptions)>mammal>primates

This is general would have to do with intelligence and ability to feel pain.

I agree in this sense. This is why there are stricter rules at say a College University when putting down a dog verses a fish.

I do think animals have some natural rights. Its just a concept anyways right? Humans having natural rights is just a concept. A concept that can quickly be taken away when a big bully steps up and imprisons you or kills you. I would argue that in the case of torturing a dog you are the one acting like the bully in my example. Now is dog fighting torturing? It would seem like the dog is doing it of it's own free will to some degree. Thats tough.

I think a mammal and many other animals should have the right to not be tortured for human pleasure.

An exception might be an ant who does not feel pain like a mammal and in addition if an ant is in your home whether intentional or not it is invading your property especially if it is crawling on you. I would squash a bug in my home but not if I was on a walk. However I think making it illegal to squash a bug outside your home (with no real purpose) is a little far fetched but I'm not sure I would have a problem with it.


Is it wrong to imagine creatures as having a right to their life as long as it doesn't need to be taken for a valid human purpose (like food or the animal is causing a problem)?