My Human Right to Doubt

The Great Ape Project has a good point. More humane treatment for our relatives.

But there is a humangous risk in it. The way I think about every new change is to think a way to abuse it. The way to begin to understand security is to awknowledge the risks. In order to be safe, you have to understand how your rights could be abused.

I do not know, whether they mean they should have the same rights to live freely as we do, or same kind of right to live freely as we do. Is it human rights, or 'human rights'?

If this indeed becomes a landmark legislation to enshrine human rights for chimpanzees, gorillas, orang-utans and bonobos, and we are still free to capture great apes and put them in the zoo, what stops me to capture you, dear reader, and put you in a zoo against your will? If they enjoy the same human rights as we do, I should be able to do the same to you as to our fellow human chimpanzees. Or are you more equal than a chimp in front of the law, if it is the same human rights law?

Don't get me wrong, I am not against animal rights. I am against demeaning our own rights.

There is a declaration that you can sign at the Great Ape Project webpages, but I will not sign that before I know for sure what kind of lawtwisters we are talking about. Same kind of rights, no problem. I am all for that. The same rights? No way. We can barely respect each other. I do not want to give anyone a chance to compare my rights to any non-Homo Sapiens Sapiens for as long as we treat any animal the way we do.

I want to know more about this, as this should be a step forward for animal rights, and not a step backwards for human rights. If you know better than I do, or do not care to read the fine print, feel free to sign the declaration here.