Mission: The mission of the Sentient Being Rights Project is to: (a) Formulate and disseminate sound arguments regarding sentient being rights, and provide a resource for such arguments and; (b) Oppose the injustice of speciesism by advocating for justice in the application of basic rights for all sentient beings as well as the nonviolent vegan worldview it implies and support furthering this agenda.
This web site reflects my ongoing journey to explore, define and refine my ethical arguments with regards to basic ethical theory and specifically how we relate to nonhuman sentient beings. It is an ongoing project. The orientation is rights and abolition of speciesism, not a regulation and welfare orientation. I hope that others may benefit from my journey. Although there may be some minor dissimilarities, my approach most closely aligns with Gary Francione's excellent set of arguments. I strongly recommend his books and his web site and hope someday to exhibit the clarity he demonstrates.
This web site is for substantive philosophical discussion, not slogans, gimmicks and theatrics.
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- The abolitionist approach to animal rights maintains that all sentient beings, humans or nonhumans, have one right: the basic right not to be treated as the property of others.
- Our recognition of the one basic right means that we must abolish, and not merely regulate, institutionalized animal exploitation—because it assumes that animals are the property of humans.
- Just as we reject racism, sexism, ageism, and heterosexism, we reject speciesism. The species of a sentient being is no more reason to deny the protection of this basic right than race, sex, age, or sexual orientation is a reason to deny membership in the human moral community to other humans.
- We recognize that we will not abolish overnight the property status of nonhumans, but we will support only those campaigns and positions that explicitly promote the abolitionist agenda. We will not support positions that call for supposedly “improved” regulation of animal exploitation. We reject any campaign that promotes sexism, racism, heterosexism or other forms of discrimination against humans.
- We recognize that the most important step that any of us can take toward abolition is to adopt the vegan lifestyle and to educate others about veganism. Veganism is the principle of abolition applied to one’s personal life and the consumption of any meat, fowl, fish, or dairy product, or the wearing or use of animal products, is inconsistent with the abolitionist perspective.
- We recognize the principle of nonviolence as the guiding principle of the animal rights movement. Violence is the problem; it is not any part of the solution.