Best 272 quotes in «animal rights quotes» category

I've broken an arm before, but no one wanted to shoot me!' Suzie says. 'I mean, when you go to the emergency room I hope to God the doctors don't decide it might cost too much to care for.' -Suzie Schwab co-owner of East Maui Animal Refuge

I've known humans, and I know beasts. The beast is better. It is unpretentious. It kills for food. Humans do 'cause they're just not any good.

I've seen cases on the Internet, of a dog being locked in a car for several hours and comments from people so enraged, that they threaten physical violence toward the perpetrator; some even crying out for the owners to be faced with the death penalty! These self same people will likely not think twice about the animals on their plates. In fact, they usually react more strongly toward such events (dogs locked in cars) than do most vegans. The often unconsidered, deep seated reasoning behind their indignation, is to draw away attention from their own wrong doings toward animals, and focus it elsewhere. If they shout loud enough, perhaps people won't notice that they themselves, are behind far worse animal treatment!

I waited for him to come out. He didn't. I considered going in after him, but knew the fact that I had readied myself to kill him did not mean that he had readied himself to die.

I was created, then the Society ordered the destruction of all mods. The day after I was born, the date of my death was set! So I sweated in that pill, just waiting to die. Day after day, my brothers and sisters were killed. Then I got lucky and got shipped out with a load of goods by mistake. Still, I always expected to be discovered and destroyed. I had a lot of time to think about things. I decided no one has the right to take a life. I exist! I should have the right to live and die freely!! Like humans, or even bugs. Even a mod should have that right. So I refuse to take a life. I won't kill ...not anything!

I was talking to a friend and they told me that they’d recently accidentally stepped on their dog’s tail, and how sorry they were, how crushed they felt at the look of fear and betrayal in their pet’s eyes. As she told me this story, she was biting into a chicken sandwich, and I thought about the fear in the eyes of that chicken every day of its life before it became her meal.” -Shenita Etwaroo

I wonder if every animal is a spirit... What if they are all spirits sent to you and how you treat them is what you are.

Just how common do such savageries have to be for a decent person to be unable to overlook them? If you knew that one in one thousand food animals suffered actions like those described above, would you continue to eat animals? One in one hundred? One in ten?

Meat may taste good, but the guilt of eating it tastes far worse.

Look into their eyes and tell them "I'm sorry, you have to die, but I need to eat." Look into their eyes, and tell them "I know there is an abundance of plant based foods I could eat, but I would still rather eat you." Look into their eyes and tell them "I know I don't NEED to eat you, but I am going to pay someone else to murder you anyway." Look into their eyes and tell them "I'm sorry you lived a short enslaved, abused and tortured life, but I don't care because I am selfish." Look into their eyes and tell them "I love my cat/dog, but your life doesn't matter as much." Go ahead, take a look into their eyes and tell them that!

Many years from now, our descendants will look back on the use of animals for food—particularly the intense animal suffering in factory farms—as a moral atrocity.

Mas como era extraordinária aquela sala cheia de gente — ou melhor, de animais -, a olhar na mesma direcção, para outros animais mascarados e treinados para representar num palco, para animais cobertos de tecido e bocados de peles, ornamentados com pedras e de rostos e garras pintados. Toda a gente acabara de comer um animal de qualquer espécie; as peles que se viam por toda a parte, apesar de a noite estar quente, provinham de animas que tinham vivido, brincado e fornicado em florestas e campos, e os pés de toda a gente estavam cobertos de pele de animais.

Look a pig in her eyes, and understand the truth behind bacon.

Meat is a 4-legged word.

Men are the devils of the earth, and the animals are the tormented souls. - On Religion

MILK IS COW RAPE

Most frequently asked question at my AI talks: Will robots be conscious? We slaughter 60 billion animals/year, but are concerned for robots?

Much of the vaunted material wealth that shields us from disease and famine was accumulated at the expense of laboratory monkeys, dairy cows and conveyor-belt chickens. Over the last two centuries tens of billions of them have been subjected to a regime of industrial exploitation whose cruelty has no precedent in the annals of planet earth. If we accept a mere tenth of what animal-rights activists are claiming, then modern industrial agriculture might well be the greatest crime in history.

Most people I've met who weren't kind to animal, weren't kind to people either. Kindness is kindness. Simple as that. Barbaric activities such as hunting should be consigned to the history books.

Never apologize for being over sensitive and emotional when defending the welfare of wildlife. Let this be a sign that you have a big heart and aren't afraid to show your true feelings. These emotions give you the strength to fight for what is right and to be the voice of those who cannot be heard.

My blood was boiling, which is not a good thing for a coldblood. Dracula was dead. Rex was dying or dead. Breakfast was dying. And I was caring about it all. Meanwhile, that blasted Gunnar did nothing but sit and stare at his teevee all day. He was the reason we were all here, the reason we were suffering and dying, and he barely noticed us. I hissed so hard it hurt.

My view [is] that what morality boils down to is, 'Don’t harm, and do help.' And now the question is, 'Can creatures like chickens and cows be harmed?' And the answer is, 'Of course they can.' Consequently, I think it’s immoral to harm them. And that seems to me to provide a very strong moral reason to be vegetarian, to not wear leather... it seems to me that our treatment of animals is morally appalling... and that we ought to radically revise the way we live, precisely because they feel pain, they can be hurt, and we’re constantly hurting these creatures!

Nobody can possibly be so hungry that they need to take a life in order to feel satisfied - they don't after all, take a human life, so why take the life of an animal?

No consciousness that we would recognize as consciousness. Not awareness, as far as we can make out, of a self with a history. What I mind is what tends to come next. They have no consciousness therefore. Therefore what? Therefore we are free to use them for our own ends Therefore we are free to kill them? Why? What is so special about the form of consciousness that we recognize that makes killing a bearer of it a crime while killing an animal goes unpunished?

One day, soon, the oddness of the seemingly universal belief of human in other animals’ slavery will be palpable. Then, we will be worthier of sharing this planet with them because we will have discovered our souls.” -Shenita Etwaroo

No one in the world needs a Rhino horn but a Rhino.

No one with an ounce of empathy could fail to be appalled by the distressing footage – taken on fur farms in Finland, Sweden, the US, and other so-called “high-welfare” countries – of foxes, rabbits, minks, and other animals who were left to suffer in filthy wire cages with untreated wounds, injuries, and even missing limbs, sometimes alongside the rotting corpses of other animals. These frightened, distressed animals often mutilate themselves and their cagemates before their short lives come to an end through painful anal electrocution, neck-breaking, drowning, gassing, or strangulation.

One of my beliefs when it comes to animals is that they should be adored and respected as citizens of this earth. They should have the right to their own families, their own life and their own freedom.” -Shenita Etwaroo

Opposition to animal research ranges considerably in degree. “Minimalists” tolerate animal research under certain conditions. They accept some kinds of research but wish to prohibit others depending on the probable value of the research, the amount of distress to the animal, and the type of animal. (Few people have serious qualms about hurting an insect, for example.) They favor firm regulations on research. The “abolitionists” take a more extreme position and see no room for compromise. Abolitionists maintain that all animals have the same rights as humans. They regard killing an animal as murder, whether the intention is to eat it, use its fur, or gain scientific knowledge. Keeping an animal (presumably even a pet) in a cage is, in their view, slavery. Because animals cannot give informed consent to research, abolitionists insist it is wrong to use them in any way, regardless of the circumstances. According to one opponent of animal research, “We have no moral option but to bring this research to a halt. Completely. . . . We will not be satisfied until every cage is empty” (Regan, 1986, pp. 39–40). Advocates of this position sometimes claim that most animal research is painful and that it never leads to important results. However, for a true abolitionist, neither of those points really matters. Their moral imperative is that people have no right to use animals, even if the research is useful and even if it is painless. The disagreement between abolitionists and animal researchers is a dispute between two ethical positions: “Never knowingly harm an innocent” and “Sometimes a little harm leads to a greater good.” On the one hand, permitting research has the undeniable consequence of inflicting pain or distress. On the other hand, banning the use of animals for human purposes means a great setback in medical research as well as the end of animal-to-human transplants (e.g., using pig heart valves to help people with heart diseases) (Figure 1.12).

One's interest or need does not annul other's right.

People always say they have a deer heads on their walls because it’s such a beautiful animal. There you go! I have photographs of my mother because I think she’s attractive.” -Shenita Etwaroo

Our treatment of animals and our attitude toward them are crucial not only to any pretensions we have to ethical behavior but the humankind's intellectual and moral evolution. Which is how the human animal is meant to evolve, isn't it?

Out there is South Dakota," Kitch had said, "Matt said they treated Fern like some kind of animal.

People care about animals. I believe that. They just don’t want to know or to pay. A fourth of all chickens have stress fractures. It’s wrong. They’re packed body to body, and can’t escape their waste, and never see the sun. Their nails grow around the bars of their cages. It’s wrong. They feel their slaughters. It’s wrong, and people know it’s wrong. They don’t have to be convinced. They just have to act differently. I’m not better than anyone, and I’m not trying to convince people to live by my standards of what’s right. I’m trying to convince them to live by their own.

Si chinò per accarezzarmi. Fece scorrere la mano lungo la schiena e poi sotto al mento. «Ogni cane dovrebbe iniziare la giornata con una bella grattatina sotto il mento» dichiarò. Spostò la mano sopra la testa. «Posso accarezzarti qui?» mi chiese. «Sulla testa? So che non piace a tutti i cani». Rimasi immobile, e chiusi gli occhi. «Socchiudi gli occhi!» esclamò Susan. «Ottimo segno».

People who do not love animals, I find, are more often than not, beasts of a special kind. At the very least, deep within, to their fellow human beings too they're equally unkind.

People will say we're being a little bit anthropomorphic?' I remembered Brendan's use of the word - 'human-like'. 'Anyone who doesn't believe that animals are aware that they have family and friends, and care about them, must also be a paid-up member of the Flat Earth Society, or still think the sun revolves around the earth,' replied Dylan disdainfully. 'I mean, how switched off can you be? How can anyone still believe animals don't have emotions? They're alive and emotions are a response to life. I've seen warthogs that are more intelligent and more responsible than some people I know. Not to say better parents.

Rabbits will always have a special place in my heart. They are often discredited as being good pets because they don’t ‘do anything’—ask any rabbit owner and watch how they laugh!” -Shenita Etwaroo

Remember at all time that just as your life is precious to you, so too is all life precious to those living one.

Roaches should never trust humans. We’re all doomed.

Sadly, we live in a world where if you do good things, there are no financial rewards. If you poison the earth, there is a fortune to be made.

Sie töten so gerne Tiere, weil es unter Strafe steht, Menschen umzubringen, und weil sie doch so gerne auslöschen, am liebsten sich. Wie die Augen blind werden, im Augenblick des Übergangs von einem beseelten Lebewesen zu einem Fleisch. Seele. Das Wort für den Herzschlag.

Peradventure a new group of beings landed on planet earth, and these beings believe they are superior over us, humans… just like most of you exercise superiority over other animals, would you ever allow such beings right over you just like you assume rights over other animals?” -Shenita Etwaroo

Places of confinement providing free food and medical care are called prisons.

Poor animals, how jealously they guard their bodies, for to us is merely an evening’s meal, but to them is life itself.

Riding an elephant isn't as exotic or special as it looks on websites about jungles.

She wasn't soft, but she never saw the sense of a living thing dying such a cruel death just for some woman's vanity. Still, she thought, a fur coat when the wind blew down off the Tenmile Range would feel mighty good. Maybe they made fur coats out of foxes that died of old age.

Societies that lack respect for animals eventually lose respect for human beings.

Some animal rights activists are demanding vegetarianism, even veganism now, or nothing. But since only 4 or 5 percent of Americans claim to be vegetarians, 'nothing' is the far more likely outcome. I ask these activists to weigh the horrors of Bladen County's industrial farms and the Tar Heel slaughterhouse against the consequences of doing nothing to alleviate the hour-to-hour sufferings of its victims. Is not a life lived off the factory farm and a death humanely inflicted superior to the terrible lives we know they lead and the horrible deaths we know they suffer in Bladen County today?

Some folks insist that believing in animal rights is like a religion. But religion asks followers to believe in things nobody can see, while animal rights advocates ask followers to see things nobody can believe.