IS SPECIESISM OPPOSED TO LIBERATIONISM? - Ethics and the Beast - page 9

add that allowing survival to be a trumping interest does not imply that other highly
important human interests are also trumping. Liberationists could thus endorse species-
ism of the following kind:
Speciesism (4): It is justified to actively thwart the survival interests of a nonhu-
man being when they conflict with survival interests of a human animal, and it is
justified to do so because these are human interests.
When endorsing (4), liberationists will add that the numerous exploitative animal-re-
lated practices that they are criticizing do not resemble lifeboat situations in the least.
The varied forms of animal abuse (factory-farms, most animal-based research, zoos,
blood sports, fishing or hunt-ing) should be abolished, even if one admits that in sur-
vival scenarios one would be a fierce speciesist.
The only animal-related practice that does perhaps resemble the lifeboat scenario is
experimentation on animals as part of applied research in which life-saving drugs are
developed and tested. While liberationists argue against imaging research in terms of
a lifeboat situation (both in terms of the disanalogies that this picture obfuscates and
also in terms of the moral logic itself 10 ), there is one way in which digesting the
speciesist intuitions that emerge from imaginary lifeboats actually advances the libera-
tionist cause. As I argue further on in this topic in a detailed chapter devoted to ex-
perimentation (chapter 4), most research consists of product testing, classroom demon-
strations, and basic research (which is many times unconnected to any known human
illness). This means that if liberationists and scientists agree that animal-dependent re-
search ought to continue wherever human survival is at stake (while at the same time
relocating funds for the purpose of developing alternatives to such research models,
thereby eliminating the “lifeboat” nature of research, even if it is such 11 ), most
animal-related research will have to stop. This result is not ideal. Yet it serves the
liberationist agenda and will be an extremely important step forward for liberationism.
Promoting a tough and radical liberationist agenda is thus continuous with speciesism
as defined in this fourth definition when “trumping” is confined to survival conflicts.
Before moving on to a modified version of the fourth definition, which does finally
constitute an antiliberationist position, I need to respond to a liberationist worry about
slippery slopes having to do with the linkage between survival interests and other im-
portant interests. The liberationist counterargument to what I have just conceded on
behalf of liberationists is that if one allows survival interests to take precedence, one
appears to admit that important human interests justify actively annulling interests of
animals. But if liberationists concede this, they would be pressed to make further
concessions. After all, why limit importance to survival? What about great human
suffering induced by minor aesthetic flaws that can be eliminated through animal-
based devising of cosmetics? Basic research (the interest to know) or fine cuisine (the