The Super Predator: How humans became the animal kingdom’s most feared hunters
The Super Predator: How humans became the animal kingdom’s most feared hunters
Human beings have been termed “super predators,” surpassing other famous predators in the number of prey they kill. This has led to animals fearing us. Consistent with humanity’s unique lethality, a growing number of experiments have demonstrated that fear of humans far exceeds that of the non-human apex predator in the system. In Africa, 95 percent of carnivore and ungulate species (e.g., giraffes, leopards, hyenas, zebras, rhinos, and elephants) in the Greater Kruger National Park ran more or faster on hearing humans compared with hearing lions. A primitive fear that afflicts all animals when they see a human. Humans might […]
‘Turn The Volume Up’: What Zohran Mamdani’s victory teaches us about animal liberation
‘Turn The Volume Up’: What Zohran Mamdani’s victory teaches us about animal liberation
We constantly hear that we need to water down the message of veganism to make it more palatable. Zohran Mamdani’s victory underscores one simple truth: people are hungering for radical change. At its core, the animal liberation message — like all liberation messages — has always been and will always be profoundly radical. For people to go vegan, stay vegan, and fight for actual animal liberation, we do not need to tone down our message. We need to turn the volume up. People do not want a new consumer choice, a quirky diet, or a slightly improved cruelty commodity. They […]
MORAL ORDER: The coming revolution of animal rights
MORAL ORDER: The coming revolution of animal rights
Peter Singer argues that moral systems that expand rights have a natural logic that causes them to win out over their exclusive alternatives. “Rights to me but not to thee” simply doesn’t have much rhetorical power. Could something be similarly unlocked if our moral circle expanded to other species? It could not come a moment too soon. An expanding circle, beyond the frontiers of intelligence or species, may be the only thing that saves us. The human condition has benefitted immensely from civilizations with diverse populations looking beyond religion, race, or creed. The condition of all sentient beings will be […]
