Customer Reviews

In Defense of Animals: The Second Wave

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Articles and essays from different people like philosophers, biologists, activists and lobbyists. Here you learn first hand accounts of the stories that have made headlines around the world...the plight of the Silver Spring laboratory monkeys, the freeing of the Island of the Dragon dolphins, the successful campaigns against the Draize and LD50 tests, extinctions of species, and confinement of animals in farm factories and zoos.

The most brilliant book I have ever read. If you love animals and want to develop arguments for animal rights, this is a must have book. It does not deal with all the issues, but it does give explicit info on lab testing, farming, some activist wins, but overall it sets the mindframe of what human animals can do to live a more ethical life vis a vis their non-human counterparts. Mr. Singer is a gifted author and illuminated thinker. I strongly recommend it

I have hesitated purchasing this book for years - I knew it was going to be pretty awful to read. It is! The horrifying truth behind organized animal farming is much worse than I feared. The correlation between concentration camps and present-day animal farming is absolutely correct. The level of compassion for animals in the world is almost zero, and it is heartbreaking - that needs to be changed, along with more stringent laws. READ THIS BOOK if you wish to live in a decent society. Raise your children as Vegans. This should be mandatory reading in Grade School - teach children early on to respect our animal companions on earth and a whole new culture will be cultivated - a culture which I would embrace.

I learned more than I wanted to know about the food we eat every day. It is very good to be aware of what we consume and wehre it comes from. I have changed my diet as a result of this book. I have become much more aware of what me and my family consume, especially where and how it is produced. Though it may cost a little more, we have all switched to primarily organic foods and cut most of the meat out of our diets. Definitely worth reading.

I think Peter Singer is right in the battle to protect the animals. He shows in the book why is necessary the men change his mind .

I have thought for several days about posting this review, but in the end I felt I could not remain silent. The ethical treatment of living beings is something my wife and I believe in very strongly. You do everything in your power to give those beings in your care a comfortable, fulfilling life be they animal or plant. Every day we grapple with the fact that for us to live we must destroy others, and we do not take this fact lightly. So when someone comes along with the powers of persuasion and the well constructed arguments Mr Singer has you tend to embrace the book, and say, "see this is what I meant."

The problem is that Mr Singer also justifies the killing of human infants if they have some kind of "grave physical abnormality" like hemophilia. Mr Singer does not consider these infants "persons" because they do not have a sense of their own future; but the same argument could be made about the animals he is supposedly trying to save. A calf has no sense of its future, and it knows nothing about running and gamboling outside if it has never done it, so by extending Mr Singers arguments even the cruelest forms of producing veal is justifiable.

The eugenics movement of the last century advocated the improvement of the human race by castrating or eliminating the physically and mentally imperfect. Mr Singer has taken the stand that it is justifiable to kill the imperfect to make room for the, supposed, perfect. A concept Adolf Hitler took to its terrible limits.

I just find it sad that a movement as important as animal rights should have as one of its major voices a man who would have no philosophical problem killing me sixty year ago, or my grandson two years ago. You can kill a bleeder because they aren't really a person, but don't you dare kill a chicken.

I whole heartily believe the only good thing Singer has done for animals is come up with the word Speciesism and define it. Other than that he is a Welfarest and I completely disagree with his approach to animal liberation.

I think if many of you who are considering reading this book you will have better spent your time gaining a clearer understanding of Animal Welfarism VS Animal Rights/ abolitionism. Look up Gary Francione and Bob/ Jenna Torres stance on this debate first before purchasing this book.