The comment posted by Julie to the recent entry "low sun, stovewood, and the next generation" struck quite a chord with me, particularly the part about the soulless person who seemed to think that animals were either to be eaten or enslaved. I have always been highly uncomfortable with the kind of dogsled racer who refers to his dogs as "power units" and treats them as cannon fodder for "his athletic career."
Although the syndrome is showing signs of breaking up, in the postmodern era we still have a substantial body of people who seem to think of animals as sophisticated machines or biological automata, incapable of thought or feeling. To me, to hold the position that mammals other than mankind have no souls is proof positive that the person holding that position is himself without any such accessory. That opinion, for millennia part and parcel of the judaeo-christian ethico-religious tradition, was enthusiastically taken over and advanced by the modern "religion of science."
Animals cannot speak, therefore they cannot think, so goes the argument. Words are indispensable to thought, they claim. And if feelings cannot be verbally expressed, then those, too, are open to question. Therefore animals don't feel, either. Very poor logic, but popular among the scientific fraternity. These attitudes have justified the exploitation and torture of animals by science and industry.
I'm not enough of an idealist to be an animal-rights activist or an ethical vegetarian. The natural world is set up in such a way that everything preys upon and eats everything else. Maybe I find that aesthetically or even morally displeasing, but that's the way it is set up; I didn't create it, and I cannot change it. So I eat my beef and chicken, preferably home-grown or locally-produced in a reasonably humane fashion; I hunt occasionally. I also breed and drive sleddogs, which is arguably exploitative, although the dogs seem to enjoy their work tremendously. If they were wandering around in the wild, their lives would be nasty, brutish and short. Dogs have chosen to dine at the tables of mankind, which means they must put up with the strange relationship which their commensalism entails, including being bred, confined, worked, and sometimes terminated by their human owners. Their choice is an evolutionary success thus far -- the domestic dog population far exceeds that of the wild canids.
Last year I discovered a poem by the Scottish poet Edwin Muir that greatly impressed me with the beauty, economy and force of its language. I immediately got my hands on his collected poems via interlibrary loan, only to discover that this particular work was, for me at any rate, probably his best. It is a very powerful little work, yet completely wrong-headed in its view of the animal world -- in the traditional judaeo-christian way.
They do not live in the world,
Are not in time and space.
From birth to death hurled
No word do they have, not one
To plant a foot upon,
Were never in any place.
For with names the world was called
Out of the empty air,
With names was built and walled,
Line and circle and square,
Dust and emerald;
Snatched from deceiving death
By the articulate breath.
But these have never trod
Twice the familiar track,
Never never turned back
Into the memoried day.
All is new and near
In the unchanging Here
Of the fifth great day of God,
That shall remain the same,
Never shall pass away.
On the sixth day we came.
This wrong-headed counterintuitive view of things is rooted in the opening statement of the Gospel of St. John: "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made." The traditional religious/scientific view of the animal world holds that, having no spoken language understood by us, animals have therefore no thoughts, no concepts, no feelings, no memories, no sense of a future or past; that they live in an eternal present reality in which they are but passive participants. That surely doesn't sound like my sleddogs!
From time to time I have recited this poem to one or another of my lead dogs. Invariably their only (telepathic) response is, "Boss, if 'these have never trod twice the familiar track,' then when we go out on that long trail into the wilderness -- you in BIG TROUBLE!"
Posted by jjeffrey at October 27, 2003 01:07 PMJeffrey,
There is starting to be a change in the way some humans perceive animals, less as mechanisisms reflexively responding to the world and more as complex sophisticated beings in their own right. I heard Jane Goodall describe animals as non-human beings and said YES! that's it! and then chose to describe humans as human animals to further remind me that humans and non humans are all animals and beings.
Cougar or bear might cheerfully try to hunt and eat me, they can try but I'll put up a fight. I don't mind being considered food, I consider some animals food. And when I die, I'd rather be composted than cremated or pickled. To me, it's all part of the balance. There's nothing wrong with killing to eat. Putting chickens in battery cages or cattle/hogs in tiny pens is another issue. That's torture.
Sadly, while there is one belief system about animals changing for a more informed one, there is a phenomenon happening that has 2 sides. One is the fur baby, don't you dare hurt that poor animal's feelings even if you are training it not to investigate a bear and the animals are toys that come with software mentality. At least the furbaby mentality thinks about animals to some degree but the other group is so cut off from animals in their urban, assembly line copy life that they have no clue about animals at all. Only a short few generations ago, most people were living in a rural area, and if not working with animals, knew that milk came from a cow--not a carton, eggs came from a chicken's bum and meat used to be walking around with skin on. There was at least a passing knowledge that animals were individuals and could be dangerous. People were aquainted with different types of hunting dogs, herding dogs, varmint dogs, hog dogs and knew that cattle need different handling than a hog or a horse. People now are so ignorant they think horsies are nice kind creatures by nature, cows are cute and quiet and hogs are like the pigs in a few Disney movies. And all dogs are born knowing what Lassie etc. could do. And when the animals don't behave as expected, it is their fault! The human provided a leash, collar and food. The dog should walk on a loose leash, never counter cruise and only bark at those the owner doesn't like.
Educating humans in how to observe, interpret and influence dog behavior in a way that connects them and is enjoyable for both is one of our goals. Teaching a dog the life skills it needs to live in a family is generally easy for us. Teaching the owners to keep the dog easy to live with and how to have a good relationship is more difficult by far. But we're working on finding better ways to help the human animal understand their non-human being partner. There are wonderful humans who dearly want that heart connection and willing to open up. Those human beings help spread it to those unenlightened ones also.
And we know a trainer who is working on expanding communicating into 2 way 'talking' between humans and non humans. By training an animal to target say thumb, forefinger and pinky for different choices, she can play 20 questions. Example, offer the dog a choice of food, a walk or playing fetch. Or asking the food detection dog, do you smell meat, vegetable or grain.
This type of interaction allows us to find out just how many abstracts and generalizations animals have the ability for. And it's more than most beleived.
Us humans are finally growing a brain. Our animal partners are probably delighted that their patience is now paying dividends.
take care,
Julie