Don't Void Your Pets

Good life is good, for animals too

Gary Francione & Anna Charlton argue that, no matter how well we treat companion animals, domestication violates their rights. Further, they assume that these rights-violations are so morally important that we should prefer that these animals never exist at all (no matter how good their lives might be):

We would be obliged to care for those domesticated animals who presently exist, but we would bring no more into existence… We love our dogs, but recognise that, if the world were more just and fair, there would be no pets at all, no fields full of sheep, and no barns full of pigs, cows and egg-laying hens. There would be no aquaria and no zoos.

This is an example of the nihilism-adjacent philosophical pathology that I warn against in ‘Don’t Valorize the Void’—emphasizing moral negatives while neglecting positive value—a pathology that sucks people into thinking that non-existence is some kind of moral ideal.

Farewell, Fluffy!

More recently, Richard Healey has argued that pets should not exist because we have “illegitimate power” over them:

Our ability to exercise power by imposing coercion, force, and threats must be justified if it is to be legitimate. And there is no reason to think that the same is not true of our power over non-human animals…

in keeping pets, we systematically set back their interests in having control over their own body, actions, and environment… Just think of the familiar sight of a dog being tied to a lamppost, pulled along by a lead, or confined in a kennel.

Does being tied to a lamppost for a few minutes suffice to establish that a dog’s life is so intolerable as to not be worth living? Hmm. I’d say that domesticated life seems both (i) clearly good overall, and (ii) the best form of life that’s realistically available for many non-human animals. (I know I’d much rather be reincarnated as a well-cared-for companion animal than as a starving, parasite-ridden stray. Yeah, even at the cost of a minute spent tied to a lamppost!) If these two conditions are satisfied, then the “power”—or guardianship—that we exercise over our pets is straightforwardly justified by those very facts.

Lessons for moral theory

I think it’s a strong count in favor of a broadly beneficentric approach to moral theory that it so straightforwardly verifies sensible views on this topic. Conversely, it’s a cost of deeply anti-consequentialist views (that grant immense non-instrumental significance to “rights”) that it can so easily careen off the rails, as seen above. Some more practical upshots I’d encourage folks to bear in mind:

• If you find yourself positing “rights” (e.g. against domestication) that are contrary to the interests of the putative rights-holder, then something has clearly gone wrong. (Though non-consequentialists may struggle to explain why this is so. Why don’t we have a “right” not to be exposed to oxygen without our express consent?)

• It’s not friendly to the interests of a (possible) happy individual to argue that they should not exist. In cases where there’s no trade-off with others’ interests, but you’re instead just prioritizing moral purity over good lives, then—again—something has gone badly wrong with your whole approach to ethics.

Next time you pet Fluffy, and she purrs appreciatively, take a moment to appreciate in turn how wonderful it is that she exists. Then consider sharing this post, or finding some other way to push back against the value-of-life denialists.