Why Do We Have Animal Rights

Kentarou Miura once stated, “Human beings are wretched things. They envy anyone who possesses even a little more than themselves. And year, they despise them if they have nothing.” This is not untrue when speaking about animals. Humans worry that animal rights will demand so much of humans that the capacity to help other humans, and live lives, will be diminished. Some humans view animals as inferior and fundamentally believe that animals are nothing more than property - tools - to assist in furthering the human race. Although some may argue animals are incomprehensible to humans and therefore do not deserve rights, society should grant animal rights because animals are more like humans than imagined and animals have an interest in being respected. Animal emotions and …show more content…
In the peer-review journal article written by Regents Professor of Law and Philosophy, William A. Edmundson asserts, “Because animals have interests that can be harmed, they can use, and do need, rights that serve yet another function: one that is straightforwardly a protective function” (Edmundson 349). Animals have interests in being respected, which is more specifically, their desire to prosper and survive without being subjected to unnatural treatment. These interests cannot be protected by current indirect duties alone because indirect duties are any duties society owes to non-human animals that are in fact owed to humans. The animal itself does not matter for its own sake in this argument. For example, if increasing animal abuse will lead to a decrease in human violence, then this would still be considered an indirect duty to animals. This is not how animals should be treated. Far from it. The concept of rights connotes “a kind of equality among rights holders, however unequal and diverse their rights holdings may be” (Edmundson 358). Rights endow their holders with a dignity that is appropriately more than the status