Talk:Animal welfare

Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment
This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 14 January 2019 and 10 March 2019. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Jeanne1525.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 14:18, 16 January 2022 (UTC)

too many subsections of definitions
I point out this issue in the past multiple times, I think it is still an issue. 124.170.213.246 (talk) 20:56, 6 January 2014 (UTC) The purpose of heading/subsections is to sumarize. Giving each definition/paragraph a section is redundant/unlogical.124.170.223.210 (talk) 01:59, 25 January 2014 (UTC)
 * I agree, and will replace the subheadings with bold text highlighting the distinctive text in each paragraph, unless someone objects, or someone else does it first. Also these subtle distinctions overload the beginning of the article, and I propose to move them farther down the article.
 * Within the main section of "Animal welfare issues" there was only one subsection, on Farm animals, and there need to be subsections on a variety of issues. I've added a subsection on cetaceans (captive and wild). I hope others add other subsections. Kim9988 (talk) 23:37, 5 September 2017 (UTC)

Feeling subection
DrChrissy added Marian Dawkins' link back into the article again. She also move Yew-Kwang Ng's approach into the same category (feeling). I opposed to this kinds of editing.Reasons can be found here, here and here 124.170.213.246 (talk) 21:17, 6 January 2014 (UTC)

Semi-protection
I have semi-protected the article for a month and rev/del'd 2 edit summaries. If there's more IP disruption here (the personal attacks) let me know please. Dougweller (talk) 09:51, 25 January 2014 (UTC)

Richard Martin
'Since 1822, when British MP Richard Martin brought the "Cruel Treatment of Cattle Act 1822" through Parliament'. Martin was not British: he was Irish. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 109.79.185.58 (talk) 12:44, 26 April 2014 (UTC) Good Point! Richard Martin (MP) 124.170.196.77 (talk) 23:13, 27 May 2014 (UTC)
 * Seems odd that Richard Martin who introduced an act into parliament in 1822 is a member of the wikipedia community today - however - make the edit and give it robust sources.__DrChrissy (talk) 23:30, 27 May 2014 (UTC)
 * here is the source https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Martin_(Irish_politician) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 117.202.11.93 (talk) 10:48, 2 October 2021 (UTC)

External links modified
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External links modified
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I have just modified 10 one external links on Animal welfare. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20120227004725/http://media.animalsmatter.org/media/resources/en/en_draft.pdf to http://media.animalsmatter.org/media/resources/en/en_draft.pdf
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20131005022426/http://www.fawc.org.uk/freedoms.htm to http://www.fawc.org.uk/freedoms.htm
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20140328203053/http://ciwf.org.uk/animal_sentience/universal_declaration_on_animal_welfare/default.aspx to http://www.ciwf.org.uk/animal_sentience/universal_declaration_on_animal_welfare/default.aspx
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20110708233259/http://uscode.house.gov/download/pls/07C48.txt to http://uscode.house.gov/download/pls/07C48.txt
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20060314005853/http://www.porknet.com/archive/110702.html to http://www.porknet.com/archive/110702.html#96977
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20121017062147/http://awic.nal.usda.gov/research-animals to http://awic.nal.usda.gov/research-animals
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20121212013248/http://www.fass.org/docs/agguide3rd/Ag_Guide_3rd_ed.pdf to http://www.fass.org/docs/agguide3rd/Ag_Guide_3rd_ed.pdf
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 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20160304000320/http://www.kittyvillage.com/morton_v_irvin.pdf to http://www.kittyvillage.com/morton_v_irvin.pdf
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 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20121110083040/http://www.animallawcoalition.com/gas-chambers/law/289 to http://www.animallawcoalition.com/gas-chambers/law/289
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20130301102117/http://www.aphis.usda.gov/animal_welfare/downloads/awreports/awreport2005.pdf to http://www.aphis.usda.gov/animal_welfare/downloads/awreports/awreport2005.pdf
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20101114111046/http://www.hsus.org/press_and_publications/humane_bookshelf/the_state_of_the_animals_ii_2003.html to http://www.hsus.org/press_and_publications/humane_bookshelf/the_state_of_the_animals_ii_2003.html

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 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20111001083518/http://www.animalrightshistory.org/animal-rights-law/renaissance-legislation/1635-ireland-act-horses-sheep.htm to http://animalrightshistory.org/animal-rights-law/renaissance-legislation/1635-ireland-act-horses-sheep.htm
 * Added tag to http://eurogroupforanimals.org/what-we-do/category/eu-animal-welfare/list-of-eu-laws-on-animal-welfare
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20130521023231/http://acissearch.aphis.usda.gov/LPASearch/faces/CustomerSearch.jspx to http://acissearch.aphis.usda.gov/LPASearch/faces/CustomerSearch.jspx

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Edits warranted
All the edits that were made were, I feel, warranted. I will deal will each in turn:

1. "Respect" rather than "concern": Obviously, violence towards animals can itself show "concern" for their welfare". Ernest Hemingway in Death in the Afternoon says that the death of a horse in a bullfight is not moving because it is comic. He is blind to his own self-contradiction in this regard! How can it be "not moving" if it is "comic"? What Hemingway (and all other animal abusers) really have against their opponents is not that they love animals too much but that they refuse to hate them.

2. "The most widely held position in the Western World is a mid-way utilitarian point-of-view; the position that it is morally acceptable for humans to use non-human animals, provided that adverse effects on animal welfare are minimized as much as possible" (deleted): This is not really the case, rightly or wrongly. Slaughtering animals for meat (like the killing of the fatted calf in the Bible story) often does not involve any higher good than mere convenience. Moreover, practices like whipping horses during a race involve pain for entertainment (though not, I would contend, pain AS entertainment, as in bullfighting, itself defended by many in Spain and France and others elsewhere in the Western world). Ultimately, this issue comes down to specific views on specific issues, though it certainly helps to have the right principles.

3. "Animal welfare was a concern of some ancient civilizations but began to take a larger place in Western public policy in 19th-century Great Britain. In the 21st century, it is a significant focus of interest in science, ethics, and animal welfare organizations." (deleted by me): Again, this is not really the case, rightly or wrongly. Christian societies in the past did not really distinguish themselves in cruelty to animals from Hindu and Buddhist societies. Westerns had bullfighting and bear-baiting; even today there is cockfighting to the death in Hindu Bali and Buddhist Vietnam. Moreover, in terms of suffering, there is MORE, not LESS, cruelty to animals in the Western world today. There were no factory farms in medieval Europe. I have heard it argued that medievals would torture animals thus if they knew it were economically viable. This is impossible to prove or disprove, but it is irrelevant. The facts remain as they are; modern Westerns perpetrate more animal abuse than their more religious ancestors. Finally, I may note what I have said above, animal abuse itself shows concern for the welfare of animals. People who support factory farming and vivisection DO care about animals, they care about them as mere commodities (mere sources of food or mere tools) instead of as living creatures with intrinsic value and thus hate them no less than bullfighting enthusiasts.

4. "the welfare approach has had human morality and humane behaviour as its central concerns" (replaced by me): This is a distinction without a difference. Everyone, however he believes humans should treat animals, has "human morality and humane behaviour" as his central concern by definition. PETA does not spend much time preventing lions from eating deer! Perhaps the indirect duty theory of Aquinas and Kant has practical applications, but that is here irrelevant.

5. (replaced Descartes with Augustine of Hippo as an opponent): Here is Descartes on this issue: "[My] view is not so much cruel to beasts but respectful to human beings". https://philosophynow.org/issues/108/Descartes_versus_Cudworth_On_The_Moral_Worth_of_Animals Thus he recognized duties to animals in principle!

Augustine of Hippo did not.

In conclusion, my edits were not vandalism, and in my opinion were appropriate.

I welcome any response from anyone on this matter.

-70.190.102.49 (talk) 18:47, 16 November 2017 (UTC)

This is why I am reverting the edits of User:Epipelagic(all of which are unsourced):

I know that some of what I say here may sound POV, but that may be inevitable given the subject matter.

On the issue of the ethical treatment of animals, we must distinguish between reason and rationalization, if we seek to understand ourselves and others, among other things.

He writes: "One view, dating back centuries, asserts that animals are not consciously aware and hence are unable to experience poor (or good) welfare. This once-dominant argument is at odds..."

What evidence is there for the claim that this view was "once-dominant", in the West or anywhere else? In medieval animal trials animals often suffered painful deaths after being convicted of crimes, can anyone believe that this was because the societies believed animals could not suffer pain and did not experience life? Did they give them trials (however unjust in practice) because they believed humans had no duties to them? Could their behavior be explained thus?

The citations provided do not support this claim, and in fact the latter citation supports the opposite claim, that people have always known instinctively that animals could feel pain and suffer.

Why not just acknowledge that some thinkers (like Augustine of Hippo) rejected duties to animals in principle, without necessarily denying that they could suffer? This is sourced later in the article.

He writes: "Laws punishing cruelty to animals tend to not just be based on welfare concerns but the belief that such behavior has repercussions toward the treatment of other humans by the animal abusers. Another argument against animal cruelty is based on aesthetics."

There is no citation for either claim, and no evidence provided for the former in any legislative history. I must say that the former claim, if made, strikes me as a rationalization rather than a reason. Of course no one would advocate punishing people for eating Waffle Crisp if it could be proved by studies that people who ate Waffle Crisp were more likely to be murderers! The real reason they want animal abuse as they define it punished is because of the animals-no other reason.

He finally writes: "Interest in animal welfare continues to grow, with increasing attention being paid to it by the media, governmental and non-governmental organizations."

As I have said before, it is obviously idle to speak of compassion for animals as "interest in animal welfare". Obviously, violence towards animals can show concern for their welfare. If I may given an example, let me quote Hemingway from Death in the Afternoon:

"The question of why the death of the horse in the bull ring is not moving...is complicated; but the fundamental reason may be that the death of the horse tends to be comic while that of the bull is tragic."

https://books.google.com/books?id=AdFQAQAAQBAJ&pg=PT10&dq=hemingway+death+horse+not+moving+comic&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwich7vVlcbXAhUHilQKHeBGAbUQ6AEIPTAE#v=onepage&q=hemingway%20death%20horse%20not%20moving%20comic&f=false

Does it seem to anyone else that Hemingway is sanctimonious and self-contradictory? How can the death of the horse be "not moving" if it is also "comic"?

Does he not show an "interest in animal welfare" here?

He writes on the same page: "The almost professional lovers of dogs, and other beasts, are capable of greater cruelty to human beings than those who do not identify themselves readily with animals."

Isn't his real beef with bullfighting opponents not that they "love" bulls and horses in an "almost professional" manner but rather that they refuse to join him in hating them?

-70.190.102.49 (talk) 20:21, 18 November 2017 (UTC)

Animal welfare certifications and products
I believe this article would benefit from a section about the various types of consumer products (dairy, eggs, meat...) that are produced under animal welfare standards, and the certifications that exist to distinguish them in the markets. --Savig (talk) 22:10, 21 May 2019 (UTC)
 * If you can find notable and verifiable information about these certifications (what they say they guarantee, what they've been shown to guarantee, who funds them, etc), feel free to add a section on them. I think that would be really interesting. RockingGeo (talk) 20:41, 24 October 2019 (UTC)

Targeted adoptions
Some adopters want (a) targeted adoptions (type of animals, species of animal, characteristics of animal, need of animal (e.g. rescue), etc. and (b) well-developed decisionmaking tools about (consumer, marketplace) decisions (they have pending, or which they are considering).

For instance, November is "National Adopt A Senior Pet Month!" (for which there is no article, nor a mention in the November article, nor even an article about senior pets, as there are not articles about short-haired hypoallergenic animals (often dogs, as Bo Obama, adopted by the First Family in 2010?). Can a brief section be developed for 'targeted adoptions' (whatever editors decide that section and topic should be labeled)?? For instance, when one chooses a cat over a dog because they don't need to be walked during the day, or a dog over a cat because they show more affection, or a caged bird over a free-roaming animal because they are more management, many issues emerge (and more are hidden): what about the 'rights' of the caged animal or the housed animal (and are those 'inherent rights' acknowledged and served (e.g. dog walking, letting out the dogs for a run and a poop, etc.) - or why any kind of animal (for 'company'?). Perhaps the WikiProject Pets should be better developed. MaynardClark (talk) 19:49, 9 November 2021 (UTC)

Wiki Education assignment: Advanced Writing Science
— Assignment last updated by Blainethesquirrel (talk) 03:27, 19 October 2022 (UTC)

Buddhism
Why no mention of Buddhism or Ashoka in the section on history? 98.36.53.71 (talk) 23:57, 24 January 2023 (UTC)
 * ✅. Thanks. Rasnaboy (talk) 13:42, 25 January 2023 (UTC)
 * Seems like more early welfare-related events happened in that period. Trying to find reliable sources. Thanks. Rasnaboy (talk) 13:50, 25 January 2023 (UTC)

Animal ethics
Disus on animal welfare violation and ethical consediretion regarding animal expermention principle 196.190.61.229 (talk) 20:25, 27 December 2023 (UTC)

Wild and Farmed Animal Welfare
The areas of wild as well as animals used for human consumption or as livestock seems to be a bit lacking. I will work on finding additional resources for these areas and edit accordingly. KJSMSU07 (talk) 14:28, 23 January 2024 (UTC)

Wiki Education assignment: Senior Seminar
— Assignment last updated by KJSMSU07 (talk) 18:41, 7 February 2024 (UTC)