(July 29, 2019 at 12:37 pm)Anomalocaris Wrote:(July 29, 2019 at 11:34 am)Shell B Wrote: Ah, but I think you're looking at it wrong. Correcting the hypocrisy is better than just becoming an asshole to animals. I can't really suss out your argument. Is it that there was a time when we didn't have a moral position on animal cruelty (I think that's incorrect) or that we have and we're hypocrites for it? I feel like a goalpost shifted here.
If that's what you think my position is, you've got me all wrong. I specifically mentioned survival of the cutest and how that needs to be corrected. I also think that if these other people are going to adopt the same animals as pets, they shouldn't be dicks about it. Don't invite an animal into your home if your only reason is to have something to cuddle that is never more than a minor inconvenience.
We had no general fundamental moral position on animal cruelty. If anything we thought it was morally good to modify animals to better suit our needs. What many people had were not a moral position but laundry lists of ad hoc "thou shall not"s with respect to particular coddled animals, which they then frequently sought to impose on others.
Isn't that what all of "morality" is? As for the particular coddled animals part, I've already established that my argument is the hypocrisy is what needs to be corrected, not the fact that we're making it a criminal act to harm animals.
