The ‘Trilemma’: Should anti-speciesists condone animal agriculture for people living in extreme poverty?
Anti-speciesists tend to grant the moral permissibility of farming animals in extreme poverty circumstances. They argue that it can be justified because such a practice is necessary for meeting the basic needs of those who engage in it. This is problematic because it entails that farming and killing humans in certain circumstances would also be morally permissible. The anti-speciesist who defends this position cannot avoid this problem and are, thus, faced with a 'trilemma': They can accept the permissibility of farming animals in extreme poverty, while also conceding that it would be permissible to farm and kill humans in certain circumstances; reject the permissibility of farming animals in extreme poverty; or abandon the anti-speciesist position.
JOSHUA JARVIS-CAMPBELL: Like racism and sexism, some philosophers have argued that speciesism is a morally untenable position. We cannot, they argue, give preferential treatment to the interests of humans over nonhuman animals simply in virtue of being human. Yet most practices involving animals today do exactly that. We experiment on them to test cosmetic products, we hunt them for fur, and we keep them in barren enclosures for our entertainment. Furthermore, we subject billions of animals to confined, unsanitary living conditions in order to consume them later. The suffering inflicted on animals in industrial animal agriculture is enormous. Yet we continue to farm animals in this way, even though such a practice is not necessary for our health or gustatory pleasure.
“Anti-speciesists” hold that we cannot do this. Animals, they argue, deserve serious moral consideration in our moral decision making, and their interests cannot be discounted simply in virtue of their species membership. Such anti-speciesist sentiments can be found in a wide variety of normative positions, including utilitarianism, rights-based ethics, virtue ethics, contractarianism, and care ethics…
The problem stems… with the anti-speciesist’s response to the large number of people living in extreme poverty who engage in animal agriculture. Since, for these people, abstaining from animal agriculture may not be such an easy task,… anti-speciesists tend to grant the moral permissibility of farming animals in this circumstance. They argue that it can be justified because such a practice is necessary for meeting the basic needs of those who engage in it…
This is problematic for the anti-speciesist… because it entails that farming and killing humans in certain circumstances would also be morally permissible… The anti-speciesist who defends farming animals out of necessity cannot avoid this problem, and so they face a trilemma: they can either accept the permissibility of farming animals in extreme poverty while also conceding that it would be permissible to farm and kill humans in certain circumstances, reject the permissibility of farming animals in extreme poverty, or abandon the anti-speciesist position.
Hundreds of millions of people farm animals in order to meet their basic needs. Deciding what ought to be done about this requires a multifaceted approach which appropriately takes into consideration the well-being of both farm animals (presuming they deserve moral consideration) and humans who need to farm animals in order to meet their basic needs… It is estimated that 74% of all land ‘livestock’ (23 billion animals at any given time) are factory farmed. Given the sheer scale of the issue, and given the horrible living conditions these animals face, it is hard to deny that this is one of the most significant moral challenges of our time. SOURCE…
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