Human Animal Relations Quotes

“If I know that a man is cruel to his Beast, I ask no more questions about him. He may be a noble man, or a rich man, or a polite man, or a sensible man, or a learned man, or an orthodox man, or a church man, or a puritan, or any thing else, it matters not; this I know, on the sacred word of a wise King, that, being cruel to his beast, he is a WICKED man.”
― Humphrey Primatt, The Duty of Mercy: A Dissertation on the Duty of Mercy and Sin of Cruelty to Brute Animals

“In 2004, the Animals in War monument outside Hyde Park in London was created by the English sculptor David Backhouse. The monument includes two life-sized bronze mules carrying supplies, as well as statues of a horse and a dog and bas-relief carvings of other animals such as camels, elephants and birds who have been used in warfare. The inscription reads: *Animals in War. This monument is dedicated to all the animals that served and died alongside British and allied forces in wars and campaigns throughout time. They had no choice.* ~ John Sorenson”
― Anthony J. Nocella II, Animals and War: Confronting the Military-Animal Industrial Complex

“The animals that one culture likes are often hated in the next, and it seems that the animals themselves know it well.”
― Brian Griffith, War and Peace with the Beasts: A History of Our Relationships with Animals

“In the Celtic Druidic tradition, whole clans and families are reputed to have descended from the union of humans and seals. They include: Clan MacCodrum ("of the Seals") from North Uist in the Outer Hebrides; the Coneelys, Cregans and Hennessys from Ireland; the O'Sullivans of County Kerry; and the MacNamaras, whose name means "Sons of the Sea-Hound (i.e. seal)".”
― Yowann Byghan, Sacred and Mythological Animals: A Worldwide Taxonomy

“Pet owners like to think of themselves as the parents of their animals, but they overlook the fact that the ‘children’ they claim are not their own. They are rather ‘children’ that were abducted from their natural communities.”
― Charles Danten, Un vétérinaire en colère - Essai sur la condition animale

“The perceived value of pets has been grossly exaggerated to stimulate demand and to create jobs and wealth. Although scarce for lack of public funding, the only decent research in the field has shown that the long-term benefits of pets are largely overrated, if not totally absent. The therapeutic value of zootherapy is of the same nature as that of gambling, binge-eating, and alcohol: it provides a transient, feel-good experience, but at a high cost to all involved.”
― Charles Danten, Un vétérinaire en colère - Essai sur la condition animale

“Animals are certainly attached to us, but they do not love us in the true sense of the word: their dependence is ensured when we take advantage of the imprint mechanism, the biological phenomenon that guarantees they will identify with us for life.”
― Charles Danten, Un vétérinaire en colère - Essai sur la condition animale

“We dwell in homes or work in sites that once displaced animals, we pay federal taxes that legalize the slaughter of animals for profit or pleasure, we travel in cars with leather seats over roads unfenced to prevent roadkill, we attend schools that allow animal experiments in biology classes, we take drugs once tested on animals, we buy newspapers that carry adds for the meat, egg, dairy and fur industries, we shop in stores that profit from the sale of animal products, we vote for politicians who pass laws favoring the meat, dairy, egg and hunting lobbies, we pay the salaries of federal and state judges who interpret a constitution that says nothing about the welfare or rights of animals and we embrace religions that give humans dominion over animals; and it’s a rare sermon where the sacredness of animals is sounded. ~ Colman McCarthy”
― Anthony J. Nocella II, Animals and War: Confronting the Military-Animal Industrial Complex

“I have met many circus people and some of them have impressed me by the concern they have shown for their animals. Not all of them are cruel, by any means. But in the end all of them are involved in presenting a spectacle that is completely outdated in its central concept. The idea that it is funny to see wild animals coerced into acting like clumsy humans, or thrilling to see powerful beasts reduced to cringing cowards by a whip-cracking trainer is primitive and medieval. It stems from the old idea that we are superior to other species and have the right to hold dominion over them. ~ DESMOND MORRIS”
― William Johnson, The Rose-Tinted Menagerie

“Yet not content with merely depicting itself as educational, the circus menagerie has also jumped on the conservation bandwagon, claiming that its efforts in captive breeding will ultimately help save endangered species from extinction. But like all circus illusions, this one too is both tenuous and contradictory and does not bear up to further scrutiny. Indeed, wary of potential public interest in the release of their animals into the wild, circus owners and their animal trainers are the first to admit to the impracticalities of re-introduction, partly on the grounds that their animals have lost their natural instincts — though they hasten to add that the creatures retain enough of their innate wildness to be “educational” in the ring.”
― William Johnson, The Rose-Tinted Menagerie

“It is often stated in defence of circuses that they are of educational benefit to children, who might otherwise never see these animals. But what exactly do we teach our children about animals through a visit to the circus? All a child can see is the size, shape and colour of the animals. Their behaviour patterns, social interaction, intelligence, hunting instinct, maternal instinct, sibling behaviour, food gathering patterns and all the facets of animal behaviour that makes a species so unique and interesting, are not apparent in circus, animals. ~ Animal Aid”
― William Johnson, The Rose-Tinted Menagerie

“Even if we accept their claims for the educational potential of zoos at face value, study after study has shown that zoos fail miserably at this task. As one author notes, 'A study of observation periods at Regent’s Park in 1985 revealed that spectators stood in front of the monkey enclosure for an average of 46 seconds, and spent 32 minutes in a pavilion containing a hundred cages. Rather than indicating thorough examination, this is reminiscent of the speed at which television programmes, and even works of art in museums, are consumed.' This 46 seconds includes time spent reading—or rather skimming—the information posted about the animals. Further, while 80 percent of zoo visitors claim to have learned something at the zoo, studies have shown that even after their visit patrons remain ‘less sensitive to the need to respect nature' than hikers. Further still, inquiry after inquiry has revealed that even while patrons are in the zoo, standing directly in front of the animals in question, they consistently fail even rudimentary nomenclature questions: they still call gibbons and orangutans monkeys; vultures buzzards; cassowaries peacocks; toucans fruitloop birds; tigers lions; otters beavers; and so on.”
― Derrick Jensen, Thought to Exist in the Wild: Awakening from the Nightmare of Zoos

“Peter Batten comments on the educational value of zoos: 'Whether anyone derives lasting benefit by seeing wild animals from other countries in enclosures which inhibit their natural behavior must be evaluated without bias. Should one learn that the chimpanzee, for example, is a neurotic humanoid that cadges food from humans, and throws tantrums and excreta should this not materialize? Or that the orangutan, which [who] by nature seldom descends to the soft forest floor, is a pathetic bundle of matted red fur in the corner of a tiled cell? Must the alert, gregarious California sea lion be represented by an animal, half blinded from filthy unsalted water, that [who] spends its life begging for rotten fish?'
All this said, I actually think zoos overwhelmingly succeed at teaching visitors about nonhumans. But the question remains: what are they teaching?”
― Derrick Jensen, Thought to Exist in the Wild: Awakening from the Nightmare of Zoos

“The modernization of zoo cages and their renaming as “habitat” fits perfectly into the story of our own confinement. Modern cages—the kind in zoos—use fewer bars, not because moats or electrified fences provide more freedom for those encaged, but because they provide the illusion of freedom to those who watch. The fantasy of the consumers of the spectacle, the fantasy of the consumers of the animals—the fantasy that the animals are eagerly awaiting us, awaiting our use—will be slightly less brittle. As the real world is increasingly consumed and turned into artificial habitat, or rather Habitat™, for humans and nonhumans alike, we increasingly attempt to blur the distinction between habitat and Habitat™ until multiple authors can state with a presumably straight face that the whole world is a zoo.”
― Derrick Jensen, Thought to Exist in the Wild: Awakening from the Nightmare of Zoos