This is not a SFW instance. NSFW communities will be tagged, and efforts will be made to keep SFW communities clean, but proceed at your own comfort level.
Either all animals have souls or nobody does. Humans are JUST animals with a more complicated social life (in some cases anyways).
I HATE people who think humans are special. That’s how we end up with all sorts of evil shit in the world, including people who think they’re the most special and get to kill others because skydaddy said so.
That’s true but our sense of moral significance is just a part of that social life, and other animals are largely not capable of fully participating, which means that the idea of humans being special has a structural role in our society. If a human kills another human, it means our social structure has failed to protect us and needs to be improved, because if our humanity does not protect us from each other, then nothing plausibly can, it’s easy to tell that the other things purporting to offer such protection are flimsy lies. If a human kills a cricket, even if crickets feel pain, that doesn’t make waves the same way; other crickets are not going to remember or consider this event, other humans generally won’t have to fear the cricket killer may later come for them.
Basically I think it is just really important for our ability to function and succeed as a species that we regard human wellbeing as an exceptional high priority and overriding moral imperative.
Birds mourn the ones that die when killed by humans, yet no one cares. It’s not about social structure, it’s about considering that some immoral things are acceptable out of convenience.
There’s a big reason why genocides are often backed with a “they are animals” justification. It’s just an excuse to not care, because everyone knows that animals feel as much as humans but accepting it means changing things, and feeling guilty for even “just” killing a cricket. And humans are stupid egotistical shits that need to constantly feel that they are perfect, so they instead delude themselves into thinking that whatever they don’t want to feel empathy for, is just an inferior creature that isn’t worth much.
There’s a reason why kids killing pets or other animals is a big red flag. There’s a reason why it’s used so much in horror movies. Everyone knows that it’s fundamentally wrong and a sign of mental instability to kill sentient beings, and yet everyone pretends like it’s normal as soon as it involves changing their behaviour.
Why is it ok to eat birds that have very developed social intelligence, but not dogs and cats? Because dogs and cats are seen emotionally, birds aren’t.
And if you can switch your empathy on and off, you can do it for whatever, and whoever.
What you’re describing doesn’t allow humans to function, it allows Israel to commit genocide, it allows nazis to get control of the world little by little, and most of the shit of the modern world. Selective empathy is never a good thing, and even prehistoric men had more empathy than the current, “modern” human. That says a lot.
Either all animals have souls or nobody does. Humans are JUST animals with a more complicated social life (in some cases anyways).
I HATE people who think humans are special. That’s how we end up with all sorts of evil shit in the world, including people who think they’re the most special and get to kill others because skydaddy said so.
That’s true but our sense of moral significance is just a part of that social life, and other animals are largely not capable of fully participating, which means that the idea of humans being special has a structural role in our society. If a human kills another human, it means our social structure has failed to protect us and needs to be improved, because if our humanity does not protect us from each other, then nothing plausibly can, it’s easy to tell that the other things purporting to offer such protection are flimsy lies. If a human kills a cricket, even if crickets feel pain, that doesn’t make waves the same way; other crickets are not going to remember or consider this event, other humans generally won’t have to fear the cricket killer may later come for them.
Basically I think it is just really important for our ability to function and succeed as a species that we regard human wellbeing as an exceptional high priority and overriding moral imperative.
I’d argue “moral imperative” and “regarding human wellbeing” are FAR more similar than most people would ever care to admit…
Because admitting that ALL humans (let alone sentient animals) deserve well being is something FAR too many people fail to understand.
Birds mourn the ones that die when killed by humans, yet no one cares. It’s not about social structure, it’s about considering that some immoral things are acceptable out of convenience.
There’s a big reason why genocides are often backed with a “they are animals” justification. It’s just an excuse to not care, because everyone knows that animals feel as much as humans but accepting it means changing things, and feeling guilty for even “just” killing a cricket. And humans are stupid egotistical shits that need to constantly feel that they are perfect, so they instead delude themselves into thinking that whatever they don’t want to feel empathy for, is just an inferior creature that isn’t worth much.
There’s a reason why kids killing pets or other animals is a big red flag. There’s a reason why it’s used so much in horror movies. Everyone knows that it’s fundamentally wrong and a sign of mental instability to kill sentient beings, and yet everyone pretends like it’s normal as soon as it involves changing their behaviour.
Why is it ok to eat birds that have very developed social intelligence, but not dogs and cats? Because dogs and cats are seen emotionally, birds aren’t.
And if you can switch your empathy on and off, you can do it for whatever, and whoever.
What you’re describing doesn’t allow humans to function, it allows Israel to commit genocide, it allows nazis to get control of the world little by little, and most of the shit of the modern world. Selective empathy is never a good thing, and even prehistoric men had more empathy than the current, “modern” human. That says a lot.