Moral status

Moral status is based on sentience, which refers to whether a being can neurologically and physiologically suffer or experience satisfaction. Most animals are sentient beings and, therefore, humans have direct moral obligations to them. We do not yet know if insects are sentient; however, we should first focus on the sentient animals that we exploit daily, which include cows, pigs, rodents, and chickens.

Not everything that is alive is sentient. For example, plants are alive but are not capable of feeling pain. Whereas in human and nonhuman sentient beings, pain serves as a signal that helps them to escape from the source of pain to avoid death, plants do not have such a signaling mechanism. Since plants cannot suffer or experience satisfaction, they do not deserve the same moral consideration as sentient beings such as cows or chickens.

We, as humans, have duties to all sentient beings and therefore, are morally required to end all unjust treatment of animals, which includes our use of them in scientific experiments and their lives on factory farms. By attributing moral status to all sentient animals, we are also recognizing their rights; all rights are more important than interests. When humans use animals for research and testing, they are pursuing their own interests and many sick and disabled people's interests. However, since animals have rights, their rights override our interests. Consequently, we are morally obliged to end vivisection and factory farming.

To many humans, the notion that unnecessary suffering should not be inflicted on animals is commonsensical. However, not all humans agree as to what constitutes unnecessary suffering. Undoubtedly, animals should not suffer for purposes of our amusement, pleasure, or convenience. Nonetheless, billions of animals are used for food merely because many humans derive pleasure from eating them.

Animal exploitation is common in agriculture, fashion, and science. Humans kill billions of animals each year, just in the United States. Sometimes these animals live in deplorable conditions before their intensely painful deaths. They usually die without ever fulfilling their most basic desires. By ignoring their desires and forcing them to live in dreadful conditions, we are disregarding these animals' rights. These acts are anthropocentric and immoral. In such an advanced society we should exhibit more concern for this issue and enlighten those who do not share such views to encourage global recognition and societal change.