2006.pdf)

A booklet on the Genes 4 Genes websites confirms that they have
created a mouse model carrying a gene mutation that causes muscle
disease and that they use mice and chicks as models for human brain
development.

The Australian Association for Humane Research is NOT opposed to
medical research. We are only opposed to the use of animals in
research because it is not an ethical nor scientifically- valid
method to achieve real medical progress. If you do not support the
use of animals in research we urge you to donate only to those
health charities that are listed on the humane charities list:
www.humanecharities.org.au

Please contact AAHR if you would like a Humane Charities car sticker
to help raise awareness.
Regards,
Emma Burgess
Humane Charities Coordinator

http://www.aahr.org.au/

Animal welfare is the viewpoint that animals, especially those under human care, should not suffer unnecessarily including where the animal is used for food, work, companionship, or research. This position usually focuses on the morality of human action, or inaction, as opposed to making deeper political or philosophical claims about the status of animals, as is the case for an animal rights viewpoint.

The history of animal welfare has been attributed by some to the time when a systematic concern for the well-being of other animals arose in the Indus Valley Civilization as the religious belief that ancestors return in animal form, and that animals must therefore be treated with the respect due to a human. This belief is exemplified in the existing religion of Jainism and in varieties of other Dharmic religions. Other religions, especially those with roots in the Abrahamic religions, have tended to treat animals as the property of their owners, codifying rules for their care and slaughter intended to limit the distress, pain and fear animals experience under human control.

From the time when in 1822 Richard Martin, a British Member of Parliament, shepherded a bill through Parliament offering protection from cruelty to cattle, horses and sheep, animal welfare has had human morality, and human behaviour, as its central concern. Martin was, in 1824, among the founders of what might be considered the world's first official animal welfare organisation, the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, or SPCA. In 1840, Queen Victoria gave the society her blessing following which it became the existing Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, or RSPCA. When originally established, the society used members' donations to employ a growing network of inspectors, whose job was to identify those who abused animals, gather evidence, and report them to the authorities. Subsequently similar groups and societies sprang up elsewhere in Europe, North America and elsewhere in the world. The Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (SPCA) Fiji was established in 1953.

A number of religious denominations have added animal welfare to their list of concerns. Animal-related ethics courses, animal blessings, prayers for animals and animal ministries have increased in popularity. In 2007, the Interfaith Association of Animal Chaplains was formed to assist clergy members concerned about animals and their welfare to network and share information. A number of Animal Chaplains' books and websites reference scriptural passages from the world's sacred texts supporting animal welfare.

In 1965 the UK government commissioned an investigation into the welfare of intensively farmed animals, partly in response to concerns raised in Ruth Harrison's 1964 book, Animal Machines. On the basis of this report, the government set up the Farm Animal Welfare Advisory Committee, later to become the Animal Welfare Council. The first guidelines recommended that farm animals require freedom to turn around, to groom themselves, to get up, to lie down, and to stretch their limbs'. These have since been elaborated to become known as the Five Freedoms of Animal Welfare:

1. Freedom from thirst, hunger and malnutrition;

2. Freedom from discomfort due to environment;

3. Freedom from pain, injury and disease;

4. Freedom to express normal behaviour for the species; and

5. Freedom from fear and distress.

A distinction can be made between animal welfare and animal rights. The former believes humans have a moral responsibility not to cause cruelty or unnecessary suffering to animals, and advocates for the betterment of the condition of animals, but not the elimination of all animal use. However, animal rights advocates campaign for the total abolition of any use of animals and argue that the animal welfare position is logically inconsistent and ethically unacceptable. Nevertheless, there are some animal rights groups, such as People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), which support animal welfare measures in the short term to alleviate animal suffering until all animal use is ended.

Some critics argue that, in practice, supporters of animal welfare sometimes demonstrate a form of speciesism' by showing a disproportionate concern for some species of animals over others without providing a rational or scientific justification for such preferences. In this regard they point to the tendency to be more concerned over the welfare of pets or companion animals over that of commercial animals; certain wild animals over domestic animals; or mammals over birds, reptiles or fishes.

Needless to say there will also be those who question why we, the human species, should concern ourselves about animal welfare when there is so much that needs to be done in various aspects of human welfare. Fortunately, when Noah found himself at the door of The Ark, and with the tide rising, he made the wise decision that it did not have to be either humans, or animals, and that it was important, and indeed possible, to take care of the welfare of both.

This article was based extensively on material derived from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, whose website is http//:en.wikipedia.org.

The Ferrater Mora Oxford Animal Ethics Centre

Calls for animal sex referendum

http://www.news.com.au/dailytelegraph/story/0,22049,20852354-5001028,00.html

*Looks like singer has been around there *

10 Reasons for Animal Rights and Their Explanation

1. The philosophy of animal rights is rational
Explanation: It is not rational to discriminate arbitrarily. And discrimination against nonhuman animals is arbitrary. It is wrong to treat weaker human beings, especially those who are lacking in normal human intelligence, as "tools" or "renewable resources" or "models" or "commodities." It cannot be right, therefore, to treat other animals as if they were "tools," "models and the like, if their psychology is as rich as (or richer than) these humans. To think otherwise is irrational.

"To describe an animal as a physico-chemical system of extreme complexity is no doubt perfectly correct, except that it misses out on the 'animalness' of the animal."

-- E.F. Schumacher

2. The philosophy of animal rights is scientific
Explanation: The philosophy of animal rights is respectful of our best science in general and evolutionary biology in particular. The latter teaches that, in Darwin's words, humans differ from many other animals "in degree," not in kind." Questions of line drawing to one side, it is obvious that the animals used in laboratories, raised for food, and hunted for pleasure or trapped for profit, for example, are our psychological kin. This is no fantasy, this is fact, proven by our best science.

"There is no fundamental difference between humans and the higher mammals in their mental faculties"

-- Charles Darwin

3. The philosophy of animal rights is unprejudiced
Explanation: Racists are people who think that the members of their race are superior to the members of other races simply because the former belong to their (the "superior") race. Sexists believe that the members of their sex are superior to the members of the opposite sex simply because the former belong to their (the "superior") sex. Both racism and sexism are paradigms of unsupportable bigotry. There is no "superior" or "inferior" sex or race. Racial and sexual differences are biological, not moral, differences.
The same is true of speciesism -- the view that members of the species Homo sapiens are superior to members of every other species simply because human beings belong to one's own (the "superior") species. For there is no "superior" species. To think otherwise is to be no less predjudiced than racists or sexists.

"If you can justify killing to eat meat, you can justify the conditions of the ghetto. I cannot justify either one."

-- Dick Gregory

4. The philosophy of animal rights is just
Explanation: Justice is the highest principle of ethics. We are not to commit or permit injustice so that good may come, not to violate the rights of the few so that the many might benefit. Slavery allowed this. Child labor allowed this. Most examples of social injustice allow this. But not the philosophy of animal rights, whose highest principle is that of justice: No one has a right to benefit as a result of violating another's rights, whether that "other" is a human being or some other animal.

"The reasons for legal intervention in favor of children apply not less strongly to the case of those unfortunate slaves -- the (other) animals"

- John Stuart Mill

5. The philosophy of animal rights is compassionate
Explanation: A full human life demands feelings of empathy and sympathy -- in a word, compassion -- for the victims of injustice -- whether the victims are humans or other animals. The philosophy of animal rights calls for, and its acceptance fosters the growth of, the virtue of compassion. This philosophy is, in Lincoln's workds, "the way of a whole human being."

"Compassion in action may be the glorious possibility that could protect our crowded, polluted planet ..."

-- Victoria Moran

6. The philosophy of animal rights is unselfish
Explanation: The philosophy of animal rights demands a commitment to serve those who are weak and vulnerable -- those who, whether they are humans or other animals, lack the ability to speak for or defend themselves, and who are in need of protection against human greed and callousness. This philosophy requires this commitment, not because it is in our self-interest to give it, but because it is right to do so. This philosophy therefore calls for, and its acceptance fosters the growth of, unselfish service.

"We need a moral philosophy in which the concept of love, so rarely mentioned now by philosophers, can once again be made central."

-- Iris Murdoch

7. The philosophy of animal rights is individually fulfilling
Explanation: All the great traditions in ethics, both secular and religious, emphasize the importance of four things: knowledge, justice, compassion, and autonomy. The philosophy of animal rights is no exception. This philosophy teaches that our choices should be based on knowledge, should be expressive of compassion and justice, and should be freely made. It is not easy to achieve these virtues, or to control the human inclinations toward greed and indifference. But a whole human life is imposssible without them. The philosophy of animal rights both calls for, and its acceptance fosters the growth of, individual self-fulfillment.

"Humaneness is not a dead external precept, but a living impulse from within; not self-sacrifice, but self-fulfillment."

-- Henry Salt

8. The philosophy of animal rights is socially progressive.
Explanation: The greatest impediment to the flourishing of human society is the exploitation of other animals at human hands. This is true in the case of unhealthy diets, of the habitual reliance on the "whole animal model" in science, and of the many other forms animal exploitation takes. And it is no less true of education and advertising, for example, which help deaden the human psyche to the demands of reason, impartiality, compassion, and justice. In all these ways (and more), nations remain profoundly backward because they fail to serve the true interests of their citizens.

"The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be measured by the way its animals are treated."

-- Mahatma Gandhi

9. The philosophy of animal rights is environmentally wise.
Explanation: The major cause of environmental degradation, including the greenhouse effect, water pollution, and the loss both of arable land and top soil, for example, can be traced to the exploitation of animals. This same pattern exists throughout the broad range of environmental problems, from acid rain and ocean dumping of toxic wastes, to air pollution and the destruction of natural habitat. In all these cases, to act to protect the affected animals (who are, after all, the first to suffer and die from these environmental ills), is to act to protect the earth.

"Until we establish a felt sense of kinship between our own species and those fellow mortals who share with us the sun and shadow of life on this agonized planet, there is no hope for other species, there is no hope for the environment, and there is no hope for ourselves."

-- Jon Wynne-Tyson

10. The philosophy of animal rights is peace-loving.
Explanation: The fundamental demand of the philosophy of animal rights is to treat humans and other animals with respect. To do this requires that we not harm anyone just so that we ourselves or others might benefit. This philosophy therefore is totally opposed to military aggression. It is a philosophy of peace. But it is a philosophy that extends the demand for peace beyond the boundaries of our species. For there is a war being waged, every day, against countless millions of nonhuman animals. To stand truly for peace is to stand firmly against speciesism. It is wishful thinking to believe that there can be "peace in the world" if we fail to bring peace to our dealings with other animals.

"If by some miracle in all our struggle the earth is spared from nuclear holocaust, only justice to every living thing will save humankind."

-- Alice Walker

via: http://www.cultureandanimals.org