10 ms·
Luxembourg's leaders have proposed a far-reaching animal rights bill
- kilovoltaire 10y ago> The legislation wouldn't apply to most farm animals, a common provision in animal rights laws. I expect that farm animals are the most numerous and most abused large animals in most countries, oh well…
- Pxtl 10y agoYeah, it seems like any animal rights legislation that ignores the meat industry is solving the wrong problem.
- ars 10y agoIf you make legislation on the farm industry too onerous then all that happens is that it shuts down and people buy animal products from countries with weaker legislation than you started with. It's like that with every industry. Can't burn coal in California? No problem we'll burn it for you in Washington and sell you the "cleansed" electricity. Require solar power in Germany? No problem, we'll make the solar cells in China using coal for energy. and sell you the "clean" solar panels. There are some things you just can't legislate.
- omginternets 10y agoHow many farm animals are there in Luxembourg?
- stereo 10y agoHi from Luxembourg. Cows everywhere, chicken, pork, and a few sheep and horses. http://www.statistiques.public.lu/catalogue-publications/luxembourg/2012/PDF-10-12.pdf http://www.statistiques.public.lu/catalogue-publications/lux...
- GraffitiTim 10y agoVery much agreed, but still happy to see people trying to take a step in the right direction. They do mention ending the practice of killing male chicks, which is currently universal among egg-producing farms.
- ars 10y ago> They do mention ending the practice of killing male chicks Why? I mean if you want to make sure animals are not in pain, and treated well, no problem. But what's the reason for not killing the male chicks? What do they plan to do with them? Release them back into the wild?
- Sophistifunk 10y agoIt's either an outlandish demand they can let go of during negotiation in order to appear reasonable, Trump-style, or a genuine demand in order to make the price of eggs increase 10x, because they honestly believe the state should eventually be enforcing veganism.
- manmal 10y agoIDK if that price is well calculated, but here in Austria we can buy 6 organic eggs for which no male chicks died vs 10 organic eggs where they do die. Same price. Doesn't look like x10.
- B1FF_PSUVM 10y agoThere was a nice SF novel by Clifford D. Simak where all the humans eventually migrated to Jupiter, to cavort pleasantly amongst the clouds, and the world was literally left to the dogs. All we need is the migration to Jupiter.
- venomsnake 10y ago"City" it is called to whomever is concerned. Pretty good stuff.
- atomical 10y agoWhat about rights for ladybugs?
- yeukhon 10y agoWhat about it? Is there anything specific you want to raise up as an issue?
- atomical 10y agoMy point was obvious. Why are animals valued more than other living organisms?
- humbledrone 10y agoLadybugs are animals. Note the "Kingdom: Animalia" here [1]. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coccinellidae https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coccinellidae
- rogual 10y agoIt wasn't obvious. There are a few things you could have meant. People often guess wrong if you aren't explicit, or will just be confused and not reply.
- vermooten 10y agoIt's a good start.
- metaphor 10y ago...to what end, from your perspective?
- dave2000 10y agoCan't speak for the OP but for many people the billions of animals killed every year for food, clothing and fun is a major moral crime which will be looked back on in the future - both the activities and the almost total lack of consideration given that it's even a problem - as completely unbelievable, just like women being unable to vote, black slavery and so on.
- oblio 10y agoThink about it this way: the Prohibition backfired badly. And alcohol is not as entrenched in modern society as meat consumption. Those billions of animals will keep dying until we can manufacture synthetic meat that is exactly as safe and tasty as natural meat.
- PhasmaFelis 10y agoI'm morally fine with meat-eating as a concept, but we need to treat those animals a lot better than we do, while they're alive.
- StavrosK 10y agoI am also for meat-eating, but I am against animal killing. The two positions are very hard to reconcile, let me tell you that.
- 1123581321 10y agoThe future you imagine will have very few animals in it. I love animals, so I am glad they serve so many useful purposes, since otherwise the cost of feeding, sheltering and caring for them would be enormous. Raising a token number in preserves is not an equitable substitute.
- daodedickinson 10y agoIt says legislation wouldn't apply to most farm animals, but it bans the poultry industry (unless they have some billionaire ready to adopt a bunch of roosters?). One can easily see that the call to "limit the sales of dogs and cats to reputable breeders" is gonna make some of these bill authors unjustifiably rich at a higher likelihood than it protects a cat or dog.
- tomjen3 10y agoThe poultry industry won't be hurt too much, since there is no good reason you can't sell rooster meat (actually they will typically be a little bit larger than the females) but I don't know if they do already sell them. The egg industry will be hit somewhat, since it will essentially double the price of eggs. Probably it will also hurt the pre-made goods industry (cookies, etc) and they will likely be forced out of Luxemberg. (Essentially nobody, other than people who raise chicks in their backyard, use the same chickens for eggs and meat, since different chickens species are optimized for either so this probably won't impact those who raise meat chickens much).
- chongli 10y agoYou can't sell the rooster meat. The breed used for laying eggs doesn't produce nearly as much meat as actual meat breeds. The best you could manage is to turn them into stock for soup, something they already do with the laying hens when they get too old.
- tomjen3 10y agoI must have been unclear, I meant that you could presumably sell the rooster meat from the meat chickens (at least my family eats rooster meat and it tastes great) but those who produce eggs would be foobar.
- chongli 10y agoThe vast majority of male chicks which are destroyed are of the egg-laying variety.
- KaiserPro 10y agoit almost makes up for the systematic tax dodging and money laundering that the country relies on to keep a float. almost
- gggggggg 10y agohonest question here. What is a animal vs a rodent vs a insect vs a pest? I am all for this, but what are the edge cases? I couldn't find it anywhere in that article.
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- marcoperaza 10y agoIsn't it interesting that calls for animal rights are strongest among those who don't interact with any animals except pets? We've become too far removed from the realities of nature. It leads to pointless feel-good laws like this, which "prohibit[s] the poultry industry practice of killing male chicks because they don't lay eggs" among other things. In general, I think it is totally inappropriate for governments to put human beings in prison for crimes against the well being of an animal. The coercive authority of the government must only be used to protect human interests. That doesn't mean that we shouldn't have environmental law; that's about protecting a shared resource, not about protecting the well being of any animal as an end in itself.
- adrusi 10y agoI don't know if I agree with you but I see your point, and it's not the sort of thing that people should be downvoting, I don't think. I usually think that the law shouldn't exist to enforce morality, but I'm not sure if that principle should be applied in the absolute sense or not. Anyway, its not clear that it's immoral under any secular ethics to "mistreat" animals in the first place, especially if there's a clear benefit to humans. Even if it is immoral, its not clear which animals should be valued. Most people seem to agree that chimpanzees should be treated with more consideration than jellyfish. My personal utility function values warm blooded animals higher than all others and below humans, but that's just an intuitive preference, not based on any rigorous analysis. I have hope that the next few decades of AI research might shed some light on this issue by giving us an idea of what "sentience" really means, but this is far from guaranteed. I suppose I'd like to see efforts focused on restructuring meat subsidies to make meat more expensive (and better reflective of the costs of production). I'm sure doing this would be a political nightmare, and I don't have the necessary understanding of agricultural economics to give any suggestions for exactly how to do this, but it seems doable. Higher meat prices will also hopefully make synthetic meat research more attractive. Synthetic meat would conveniently bypass this whole debate. Other measures that should probably be attempted before we turn to fining and jailing people for mistreating or disrespecting animals should probably address the pet breeding industry, people who aren't looking for a dog to aid with hunting or foraging or some other specialized purpose should have more incentives to prefer a shelter over a breeder than currently exist. And maybe make it a crime to intentionally kill or hurt certain animals for no reason.
- morgante 10y agoThe article says the bill will "ban people from giving animals as gifts or prizes." Can someone explain why giving animals as gifts is inhumane or something we should ban? Giving a relative a dog to raise seems altogether kind (especially a rescue dog) and beneficial for both (assuming you know the character of the person who will raise the dog and that they are ready/willing).
- unvs 10y agoyou'd be amazed at the number of dogs in animal shelters who are there cause the kid who got it for Christmas suddenly got tired of it. banning it might be extreme, but I wish more people would think of the consequences of gifting someone an animal.
- latch 10y agoPets require a long term commitment. If you're buying one for yourself, you've [hopefully] put some thought into the implications. It's a lot harder to be thoughtful on behalf of someone else over that time period.
- pcardh0 10y agoSymptoms of a dying society (fertility rate of 1.57). Can't wait to see what they think of next.
- jpatokal 10y ago> "In North America, the fur trade is an example of the sustainable use of renewable natural resources," Herscovici told VICE News. "This is the key concern of modern environmental thinking." The chutzpah is strong in this one.
- Wissmania 10y agoWhile it gives me hope that legislation is at least acknowledging that the suffering of animals is something we might care about, it still is sad to see the same arbitrary pet/livestock divide. Of course extending such legislation to farm animals would be politically impossible, but it still hurts to read > the animal's dignity must prevail over the profitability of the industrial activity when we all know it's not true.
- jensen123 10y ago> Isn't it interesting that calls for animal rights are strongest among those who don't interact with any animals except pets? That's an interesting observation. My impression is that the most intelligent humans typically move to large cities, whereas the dumbest ones remain in the rural areas. Most farmers don't seem terribly bright (there are of course exceptions). Could this have something to do with it?
- morgante 10y ago> Most farmers don't seem terribly bright (there are of course exceptions). Way to stereotype vast groups of people. Also, it's more or less totally inaccurate. Modern farms (even small ones) are multimillion dollar businesses and definitely require savvy. All the farmers I knew in rural Vermont had been to university (often for agriculture studies) and definitely weren't dumb. They also all universally recognized that death is part of nature. They treated their animals well (these were predominantly small family farms) but also had no qualms about killing them. My philosophy is that everyone who eats another animal should have to kill an animal once. If you're willing to do it, fine. (I am.) If you're not, then you're living your life by an inconsistent moral principal, where death is fine as long as you don't cause it—even if it's for your benefit. (Similarly, I think every politician voting for a war should be required to serve a tour of duty.)
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- dang 10y agoYou can't slur entire populations of people like that here. That's a bannable offense on Hacker News, so please don't do it again. We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11702913 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11702913 and marked it off-topic.
- jensen123 10y agoFreedom is very important to me. Keeping animals locked up makes me uncomfortable. Of course, the fact that I enjoy being free, does not necessarily mean that freedom is important to animals as well. Perhaps animals are too dumb to appreciate freedom. I have tried eating a vegan diet a couple times. I was surprised by how much delicious vegan food there is. I actually didn't miss the eating of meat much. However, my energy levels were really low, so I went back to eating meat.