Yeah, but you didnt top the concept of genetically engineered “monkubines” 
My point was to compare the law and the rationale behind the law to the law against beastiality. The point is that animals do not fully think the way humans do and cannot give meaningful consent regardless of their actions. If you wish to argue that society has been infantilizing our puppy dogs too much and as soon as we stop coddling them and understand that French Poodles know what they’re doing because in dog years they’re really 6 times older, well, I guess we’re just going to have to agree to disagree here. I’m quite fine with a bright line rule.
You’re absolutely right.
That’s why we don’t arrest the donkey.
Nice dodge. The point was that “the Rules” are made up as we go along and subject to change as societies change. Bright line rules aren’t holy writ, they are just what a group of people decided, and subject to change. Care to address that?
Rules can change, yes. Laws can change, yes. Society perspective can change, yes. I’m not arguing any of that because it’s beyond the scope of this debate. If you need me to concede an argument I never made, fine.
I’m arguing against bestiality because that is the scope of this debate. The question is “bestiality: always wrong?” and the answer is “yes.” This goes beyond the ick component and into the huge differences between the two actors in terms of intelligence and authority to name but just two factors.
If you’d like to argue your point in terms of bestiality (i.e. “society doesn’t understand, man, they were fucking donkeys back in Ancient Greece” or “we could create a test to prove that dolphin’s smart and totally loves me when he sticks his dick in me”), be my guest. I don’t think you’re going to be very convincing but I welcome the effort.
There’s no solid moral argument against it and it’s probably not the law’s concern, but I would be very suspicious of anyone who makes this their big issue. The people who do it are very fundamentally off and, like a lot of other behaviors that don’t hurt people (words chosen on purpose) and aren’t the state’s business, it’s still not something a healthy human being would ever choose to do.
I guess what I’m saying is that any time I have for political causes can be better spent on about six hundred things before I get to “free the dogfuckers” on my list.
As a slight clarification or elaboration to my point above, I’m not making the circular argument that bestiality is wrong because it’s against the law and it’s against the law because it’s wrong. I’m saying that it’s against the law and there are good, convincing reasons why it’s against the law and those reasons are highly unlikely to change with time or a shift in society’s perspective. I think the best you can hope for is a shift in what punishments are allowed or administered by law, but a live-and-let-live-barnyard-orgyfest? Not gonna happen. With good reason.
Sex toys similarly cannot give informed consent. If it’s blanket-unethical to have sex with something that can’t consent, then it is unethical to use sex toys, yes?
If not, what attribute about animals makes them different than sex toys?
:dubious:
IIRC there are examples of places were the beast is stoned to death or even tried and then killed.
Not trying to be snarky, but I’m genuinely curious – what evidence leads you to this conclusion?
For some context: I am a vegetarian (for moral reasons). I have objections to things like factory farms for the cruelty and negative environmental impact reasons. I also recognize that the life/death cycle is a part of nature, and am not about to lecture a lion not to hunt and eat antelope. I also have no objection to symbiotic relationships between species, as long as they are truly symbiotic; I have pets, I eat eggs and dairy but make sure they come from cruelty-free farms. I don’t see anything morally wrong with domestic oxen working on a farm in exchange for shelter, safety (protection from predators), and easy access to food. I think that domestic animals are less likely to demonstrate an objection to something because compliance has been intentionally bred into them by us; that’s an imbalance of power that we made, and thus the moral onus is on us not to abuse it.
And the reason I ask is that humans have a history of assuming that animals have a low/simple mental capacity – and then they actually do the research and discover that we’ve been wrong in that assumption. For a long time it was believed that only humans have sex with each other as an act of social or emotional bonding. Then we learned that dolphins and bonobos do that too.
Seriously? Seriously?
Holy cow that’s the most unbelievably god-awfully adverbly stupid question I think I’ve heard. Ever.
Seriously. Ever.
[sub]it’s the udders. sex toys don’t have udders[/sub]
I’d be flattered, but I’d have to turn him down.
But the question is, *why *is it wrong (and illegal)? It’s wrong when it’s statutory rape (and even more wrong and more harshly punished when it’s pedophilia as opposed to a 19 year old with her 16 year old boyfriend or two 14 year olds) because it carries a great potential for harming the nonconsenting partner. If it couldn’t cause harm it wouldn’t be illegal purely on “ick” factor. (How do I know this? Because before people were icked out by it, it wasn’t illegal.)
Again, where is the harm to the animal? Consent is required in human relations because to allow otherwise risks harm. Where is the similar harm in “raping” a cow?
And to whomever said upthread that a human has the upper hand in a domesticated animal relationship obviously hasn’t tried to back an unwilling horse into a trailer. She might not be hot for your bod, but if you haven’t hobbled her, she has a whole lotta power at her disposal to move away or make you stop. A full horsepower, in fact!
I claim there’s no harm and absent even that potential for harm, even without consent, there’s nothing to the law or the morality besides the ick factor.
(And, if it hasn’t been said enough, “ick”.)
Not sure if it would change your response, but Koko’s a female.
If her legs are hairier than mine, it’s a definite no-no.
ps. It’s the only standard I have, but I never deviate from it.
What if she signed that she would shave her legs before the date?
Signin’ ain’t doin’.
In the case of Gorilla v. Clarence Beeks in the movie Trading Places, it was implied that Gorilla sex with an unwilling man trapped in a Gorilla suit was entirely just.
(1) I am, as I mentioned, looking at Der Trihs’s proposition and seeing where it takes us. In the scenario he proposes, one side (humans or even just “persons”) has normally a component of the quality of sentience that makes it capable of moral agency and significant consent, although it may be impaired or disabled for certain individuals; while the other (‘animal’) simply lacks it to begin with.
(2)*** IF ***that is taken as a premise, then, “where it takes us”, is here: If it has been judged that the fundamental “wrong” in the various forms of human sexual assault is the “violation of the person” and the potential for harm beyond the immediate and physical, then an animal submitting to a sexual contact due to reacting to pleasant stimuli should not be in the same category of immorality as a human being lured under circumstances of impaired consent. Diddling livestock that can’t give you conscious consent [woud/should] not be the same kind of crime as doing it to a roofied-out sorority pledge. Creepy and unethical on its own terms, perhaps, but not in the same league. Can a cow “feel violated” upon the emergence 5 years later of a suppressed memory of Farmer Jed getting freaky?
(3) Now, HOWEVER, you do bring other possible arguments in favor of the sociocultural norm (“bestiality: wrong”) : (a) considerations of *stewardship *of a resource that is at the same time a living creature and whether sexual use is beneficial to said creature or a proper use of the resource [I respectfully decline to adhere to the imagery of the ox as working “in exchange” for food; it sounds too much like an implied contract.]; and (b) a cautionary approach as to how certain are we that this life form is NOT a moral agent whose dignity can be violated? Better arguments than just “ick”.
I wouldn’t define it as a contract as much as it is a relationship. Friends exchange favors all the time; the parent-child relationship is predicated on the parent providing food, care, and safety in exchange for the companionship/warm fuzzy feelings they derive from the child. Neither of these are “contracts”, they’re just the normal give-and-take of relationships between individuals. Not every interaction requires a signed piece of paper.
…and this is basically where I end up when considering the question. There’s a whole heck of a lot we don’t know about what, exactly, is going on in the mind of a non-human animal. We can assume, we can guess, but our track record on guessing correctly hasn’t been all that great. Humans tend to be egotistical and make assumptions that lead to the conclusion that our species is “more special,” which I think is both normal (“species solidarity” exists in other animals, too), and not currently backed by overwhelming evidence other than our desire to BE “special.” Lacking any better information, I’d err on the side of caution.
http://www.thesharkguys.com/2009/02/06/top-8-people-who-married-animals/
A rather unique list…people who married animals…