Zooless Society??

view at kawa-kawa

        God created us fairly, although we human's gained his highest form of creation. We are assigned to be it's caretaker, from the highest mountain to the valleys and plains. To the shallow seas down to the deep seas. But what have we done? We become savage and abused this given task.  

      I think Equality doesn't extent to what form of organism you are, but to life-if life will the primary basis of fairness.........we are all fair in a way that we breath the same air, we step on the same ground, we drink the same water and we all die. What I am trying to figure out is the animals beyond the snug cages of the commercial zoos and theme  and amusement parks.

                                                                                                        

 

        Amusement was certainly an important reason   for the establishment of the early zoos, and it remains an important function of contemporary zoos as well. Most people visit zoos in order to be entertained, and any zoo that wishes to remain financially sound must cater to this desire. Even highly regarded zoos have their share of dancing bears, dolphins, penguins, seals, sealions and trained birds of prey. But although providing amusement for people is viewed by the general public as a very important function of zoos, it is hard to see how providing such amusement could possibly justify keeping wild animals in captivity.

         Before we consider the reasons that are usually given for the survival of zoos, we should see that there is a moral presumption against keeping wild animals in captivity. What this involves, after all, is taking animals out of their native habitats, transporting them great distances and keeping them in alien environments in which their liberty is severely restricted. It is surely true that in being taken from the wild and confined in zoos, animals are deprived of a great many goods. For the most part they are prevented from gathering their own food, developing their own social orders and generally behaving in ways that are natural to them. These activities all require significantly more liberty than most animals are permitted in zoos. If we are justified in keeping animals in zoos, it must be because there are some important benefits that can be obtained only by doing so.

 

        This conclusion is not the property of some particular moral theory; it follows from most reasonable moral theories. Either we have duties to animals or we do not. If we do have duties to animals, surely they include respecting those interests which are most important to them, so long as this does not conflict with other, more stringent duties that we may have. Since an interest in not being taken from the wild and kept confined is very important for most animals, it follows that if everything else is equal, we should respect this interest. Suppose, on the other hand, that we do not have duties to animals. There are two further possibilities: either we have duties to people that sometimes concern animals, or what we do to animals is utterly without moral import. The latter view is quite implausible, and I shall not consider it further. People who have held the former view, that we have duties to people that concern animals, have sometimes thought that such duties arise because we can 'judge the heart of a man by his treatment of animals.

 

"for amusement, education, opportunities for scientific research, and help in preserving species"

 think of this....what if we reverse the tradition...Humans for amusement, education, opportunities for scientific research, and help in preserving species.......

Source: http://www.animal-rights-library.com/texts-m/jamieson01.htm