An inhumane practice - Essay Example

Animals are no different from us humans, because they have the same organs and systems that we have. This is most especially true with chimpanzees, which share 99% of their DNA with us humans (Goodall 173, par. 5). That means that they are also capable of interacting socially with their own kind, or of other species, as well as feeling pain. Because humans are seen as advanced creatures capable of empathizing with what happens to other people, it is important that we remain as such by extending our empathy with creatures that are lower than our status.

If we remain indifferent to the plight of animals even though we have awareness of the pain and sufferings that they endure, that itself rubs us off of the true meaning of humanity and being human. We become just like any other lower kinds of animals that only pursue their own interests and goals. While there are some people that believe in the upholding of the rights of animals, there are still a greater number of those that do not see how the use of animals in medical research can be likened to a dictatorship that steps on the rights of the weak, which is why I firmly believe that to restore our humanity, the use of animals in medical research must be stopped altogether. . They can also get sick and they are not immune to pain, even without the intervention of humans.

For example, chimpanzees are capable of cognitive abilities and socialization, but can also experience depression, sickness and hopelessness (Goodall 175, par. 20). Like chimpanzees, animals are also capable of feeling distressed at being separated from their family or social unit, or seeing the death of their own kin. Does this not make them like us, whenever we feel a sense of loss or homesickness from being away from the people we care about? This is why we must be liable in our actions towards animal use, and not justifying it by our greater power over animals.

By using them as sacrificial lambs in the pursuit of improving human health as whole, it is not any different from tyrants or dictators that show off their power by feeding from the weaknesses of their subjects (Cohen and Regan 21). It is therefore inhumane to allow the proliferation of pain and suffering, even among lower animals. We may frown at the human rights that are being trampled upon by such dictatorship, but what about the plight of animals being used as experiments and getting pain and torment from the human captors?

Letting animals experience pain is no different from other predatory animals that let instinct take over without considering what other animals might feel. Humanity loses its value because the one thing that separates us from animals, sympathy and kindness towards all other living things gets lost, making us no better than animals moving on instinct and self-preservation. In my opinion it is equally important we also exert the same sympathy towards animals because as Immanuel Kant has said, anyone who is cruel towards animals are also capable of being