To ban or not to ban? More people believing declawing is animal abuse

[ZombieHorde]

83. "reduces the number of animals that MUST BE KILLED!"

Unless we lack all free will, we don't have to kill them. The only reason we do kill them is to alleviate our own suffering. We don't like seeing them starving in the streets, so we round them up and kill them. They don't want to be killed.

"Are you capable of understanding the value of reducing the number of animals that must be expunged?"

Are you capable of understanding the difference between subjectivity and objectivity? All value is subjective. The animals we are killing don't value the number reduction the way we do. They wouldn't sacrifice themselves for this goal, but we will sacrifice them for this goal.

"Secondly, there are hormonal urges that pets undergo that make being homebound much harder to take. There is a calming psychological effect when the pets don't undergo hormonal swings they can't possibly be made to understand."

They don't want to be homebound, but we want them to be homebound, so we operate on them to change them to conform to our will. This is obviously for our benefit. We don't have to have pets, we just want pets very badly. We could treat them like deer or squirrels, but that would make us sad, so we bring many into our homes, and we kill many others.

And, it strikes me that you have quite the hubris to assume that you're the only one who KNOWS that spaying and neutering is a bad idea when virtually every animal welfare group and vet organizations encourage the practice.

I'm the first to admit "bad" is a value call, and therefore completely subjective. However, since having pets is completely optional, and as you have pointed out, many pets don't want to be homebound, the operations and the killings are strictly for our benefit. We created the current situation for our benefit, and we perpetuate the current situation for our benefit.

When we feed starving people, there is mutual desire. We don't want to see people starve, and starving people want food. Both parties involved fully agree to the situation. This is not the case with castrating animals. They don't want to be castrated to prevent the abandonment of future generations, we want them to be castrated to prevent the abandonment of future generations.