1.
“This system dictates which animals are edible, and it
enables us to consume them by protecting us from feeling any emotional or
psychological discomfort when doing so.” (page 616)
This system definitely affects me every day. I feel nothing
when eating chicken, beef, pork, or fish, yet I get so disgusted when I learn
that there are places that have snails or scorpions or ants as appetizers. Even
when my girlfriend tells me that snails are quite good, my reaction is “Blech.”
Then again, I have some weird tastes too that Caucasian people would be weirded
out. I love frog legs, pig tongues, ox tail, chicken feet, etc. I think it
would be awesome if this system keeps growing so that there’s no limits, so
that there’s no missing link (that’s probably an awful thing to say but dammit
when they’re delicious, they’re DELICIOUS)
2.
“What urbanization has taken away –firsthand experience of
real animals— Disney has replaced” (page 861)
So I agree with the bullet point right above the one I
chose, how people today no longer have experience living with animals since 80%
of the population in the country lives in cities and suburbs now, as opposed to
a long time ago when we lived on farms. But I never thought of Disney as the
entity that replaced that missing piece for humans, and I guess that makes
sense and it works effectively. I have similar attachments to all the animal
characters in their movies the same way I get attached to my pets. In fact,
Disney might have helped more because they made it easier for us to associate with
the animals as if they are also human beings, because they are *characters* in
their stories.
3.
“As we have pointed out, there is a hazy frontier between
the concerns of animal welfare advocates and animal rights partisans.” (page
863)
I decided to settle the argument and went online to do a
little bit of research myself, especially on the difference between animal
welfare and animal rights. Apparently welfare is that animals have interests
but are allowed to be traded for something else if humans benefit and the
sacrifice is justified. Rights, on the other hand, just says that animals are
not automatically ours for food, clothing, etc. So basically, welfare is a
basic way to say “It’s okay to be anti-animal rights as long as the reason is
humane.” Huh, I don’t know what to think of that, since human judgment is often
bad.
4.
“Researchers are paid, but whether or not the knowledge is
worth paying for is another question entirely. Their animal study will have no
application to humans, but they did not say it would. They only said it would “advance
knowledge,” not the type of knowledge that will cure or curb disease.” (page
873)
Wait wait wait, so you mean to tell me that the real
objective of researching… is not researching? As hopeless as that sounds, I
have lived for too long in this makes-no-sense world that I actually believe that
quote. I’m sure the researching division or industry is not the only one out
there that’s doing this, where the funding and the paying is all part of the chief
goal of wanting to stay employed. I guess money can make anything happen…
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