If Our Justifications for Human Equality are True, then so Must Be Arguments for Animal Liberation

Singer argues that animals, being sentient beings, should be liberated from oppression in much the same way that ethnic minorities and women were once liberated. I support his argument, which is both complete and well-articulated. (I say that his argument is complete because he offers several views of why humans all deserve equality but would contradict why he believes animals also deserve it. He dismantles each of these views.)

Singer says that as a society, we have become speciesists - in the tradition of racists who favored their own skin color over any others, we favor our own species over any other. We are unknowingly participating in the oppression of animals who have the capacity to feel both pleasure and pain. He cites our meat production and consumption as the most aggregious example of speciesism. We destroy the most fundamental interest of other species, i.e. their lives, for our own pleasure, since we do not require meat to survive.

Because we have decided collectively as a society that equality should be shared amongst all members of our own species, regardless of age, gender, race, or mental capacity, we must use the least common denominator as a basis for the right to equality. (Singer does not mean equality in the most clear sense, but only equality of consideration: that we should consider the potential pain or pleasure that could result from our interactions with others. The well-being of any organism must not be given any more consideration than the well-being of any other organism.) Singer clarifies the concept of the least common denominator through examples. Some individuals are more intelligent than others, but still deserve equality. Even if some races showed an average proficiency in a certain trait, that race should be treated the same as another. Because one more intelligent person is not given more equality than another,one less intelligent species should not receive less equality than a more intelligent species. Where philosophers have fallen short is in that they have failed to realize this least common denominator may not be exclusive to humans.