{"id":755700,"date":"2018-12-28T08:31:23","date_gmt":"2018-12-28T13:31:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/arkcenter.us\/?p=755700"},"modified":"2018-12-28T08:31:23","modified_gmt":"2018-12-28T13:31:23","slug":"new-zealand-legally-recognises-animals-as-sentient-beings","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/animalrightswatch.us\/?p=755700","title":{"rendered":"New Zealand Legally Recognises Animals as \u2018Sentient\u2019 Beings"},"content":{"rendered":"\t<blockquote  class=\"bs-quote bs-quote-1 bsq-t1 bsq-s1 bsq-left\">\n\t\t<div class=\"quote-content\">\n\t\t\t<p>To say animals are sentient is to state explicitly that they can experience both positive and negative emotions, including pain and distress. The explicitness marks another step along the animal welfare journey.<\/p>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t<\/blockquote>\n\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><strong>ANIMAL EQUALITY:<\/strong> <em>&#8216;An amendment to New Zealand law on behalf of the The Animal Welfare Amendment Bill, which was recently passed, states that animals, like humans, are \u201csentient\u201d beings. \u201cTo say that animals are sentient is to state explicitly that they can experience both positive and negative emotions, including pain and distress,\u201d said Dr Virginia Williams, chair of the National Animal Ethics Advisory Committee. \u201cThe explicitness is what is new and marks another step along the animal welfare journey.\u201d The recent bill has also included a ban on the use of animals for the testing of cosmetic products. Dr Williams said the legal recognition of animal sentience provided a stronger underpinning of the requirements of the Animal Welfare Act. Nelson SPCA manager Donna Walzl said the changes were \u201cwonderful\u201d and that \u201cit\u2019s great to finally see it brought into legislation. It\u2019s awesome.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><em>She went on to explain that \u201cyou can see that they do have separation anxiety and that\u2019s showing emotion. It\u2019s the same with the animals that we see that are neglected and have real, true animal welfare issues. They suffer for it. You can see it in their eyes.\u201d The SPCA Auckland said a declaration of sentience was required considering \u201cmost New Zealand law treats animals as \u2018things\u2019 and \u2018objects\u2019 rather than as living creatures\u201d. Walzl said she hoped that this new change in law by recognizing animals are the sentient beings that they are would add \u201cmore weight\u201d to abuse and neglect cases in court. \u201cHopefully there will be some sterner penalties out there and that obviously creates a bigger deterrent for people to do those things&#8221;.&#8217;<\/em>\u00a0 <a href=\"https:\/\/animalequality.org.uk\/blog\/2015\/05\/12\/new-zealand-legally-recognises-animals-as-sentient-beings\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><strong>SOURCE&#8230;<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n<p><strong>RELATED VIDEO:<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/kFiNWVRMtrA\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>ANIMAL EQUALITY: &#8216;An amendment to New Zealand law on behalf of the The Animal Welfare Amendment Bill, which was recently passed, states that animals, like humans, are \u201csentient\u201d beings. \u201cTo say that animals are sentient is to state explicitly that they can experience both positive and negative emotions, including pain and distress,\u201d said Dr Virginia [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":755701,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[16,20,23,25],"tags":[35,36],"class_list":["post-755700","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-culture","category-justice","category-rights","category-welfare","tag-protection","tag-sentience"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/animalrightswatch.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/755700","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/animalrightswatch.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/animalrightswatch.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/animalrightswatch.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/animalrightswatch.us\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=755700"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/animalrightswatch.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/755700\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":755702,"href":"http:\/\/animalrightswatch.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/755700\/revisions\/755702"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/animalrightswatch.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/755701"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/animalrightswatch.us\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=755700"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/animalrightswatch.us\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=755700"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/animalrightswatch.us\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=755700"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}