Quote:
Originally Posted by Chris
As a point of morality, slavery is different. Slaves are human, foxes are not. This is a fundamental difference. Regardless of ongoing agitation from the "animal rights" lobby, animals, as non-human, do not have rights. Certain species have certain protections for certain reasons.
And I think you are wilfully conflating the concepts of majority rule and minority oppression. There are plenty of things that a majority of people in this country object to, which nevertheless are tolerated and do not become criminalised, because for the most part our representatives recognise that the purpose of democracy is to safeguard freedom, not to restrict it.
Smoking remains legal, despite the extreme harm it can cause. Religious organisations continue to enjoy exemptions from aspects of our equality laws, when religious reasons are cited, despite these legal guarantees supposedly being the hallmarks of a modern, tolerant society.
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Slavery is different, but not that different. More people object to unnecessary cruelty against animals than a couple of years ago. This has resulted in legislation again cruelty to animals. The point of the analogy with slavery was that, at the time, to many people, slaves were just short of non-human.
Perceptions change, and your arguments against the fox hunting ban can easily be transposed to slavery. At the time, trading and keeping slaves, was a widely followed practice that suddenly became illegal, because some people didn't like what others were doing. In hindsight, there's little that's Draconian about that.
And I'm not conflating anything thank you. Any form of government is going to be a trade-off between what's considered acceptable and people's liberties. As it happens, animal rights have come to the fore in recent years, and this means that unnecessary cruelty against animals is frowned upon. Just like smoking in the Pub, where others are affected (unless it's the HoP Pub, but that's another matter).