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Observation 1: Inherency

A. The U.S. military is exploiting thousands of animals a year forcing them to work in

some of the most dangerous combat situations seen by the military.

Plourde '04, (Shawn is a writer and animal rights activist, What Did You Do in the War Fido?,

http://www.thenausea.com/elements/special%20topics/crimesagainstanimals/animals%20in

%20warfare/anim als%20in%20warfare.html)

The list of animals placed in harms way during combat is depressingly long. There

has also been an incredible variety of combat tasks where animals are being put to

use in ways that may result in their death. To lay copper telephone wire around no-

man's land for telephone service. Many were of course shot at. Military working dogs

are considered equipmen no different from a rifle. Unlike aircraft and ships, dogs are

not sold as surplus, nor are they retired. They are simply terminated. Dolphins, sea

lionseven whaleshave been and still are used to spot sea mines by the many

navies around the world Animals operating in harms way in combat mostly have

one thing in common: although some of them were chosen because of abilities

superior to humans, most were deployed because the duties that they carried out

were considered too dangerous for human combatants.

B. Animal soldiers are not a relic of the past. Troop surges in Afghanistan and de-

mining missions in Kuwait, Iraq, and South Korea have lead to a substantial increase

in the presence of military dogs.

LA Times 2010,(Along with troop surge in Afghanistan, a dog surge. Along with dog surge, a dog food dilemma, January

25th

)http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/unleashed/2010/01/along-with-troop-surge-in-afghanistan-a-dog-surge-along-with-dog-surge-a-dogfood-dilemma.html

The U.S. troop surge in Afghanistan has led to a dog surge the number of military

working dogs being brought into the country to search for mines, explosives and to

accompany soldiers on patrol is increasing substantially.

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Advantage 1: Animal Rights

A. Actions like the plan are vital to the success of the animal rights movement.

Enacting legislation attacking specific forms of animal exploitation like military use

strikes at the heart of institutionalized animal exploitation.

Francione '96,(Gary is a professor at The Rutgers University School of Law, Animal Rights: The Future,

World PratAssembly, DLD: June 24th 2010,http://www.worldproutassembly.org/archives/2005/04/animal_rights_t.html)

If the animal rights movement is to survive the backlash of animal exploiters, and if

the movement is going to harness both its own internal energy and the general level

of political dissatisfaction, the movement needs to re-strategize and re-organize.

Now is the time to develop a radical--nonviolent but radical--approach to animal

rights as part of an overall program of social justice . The solution will not be simple,

but we must make a start. Never underestimate the power of the individual and of

small groups: If we decide to pursue legislation, we should pursue legislation that

seeks to abolish particular forms of exploitation. For example, to end animal use for

military purposes.

B. Only the animal liberation movement is capable of overcoming the worst aspects

of the capitalist and ecological crisis.

Best, '06 [Steven, Chair Philosophy at UT-EP The International Journal of INCLUSIVE DEMOCRACY, vol.2, no.3, (June 2006)]

One could support animal liberation as a dynamic social movement that challenges

large sectors of the capitalist growth economy by attacking logic and economies,

drawing strong connections between the pursuit of profit and destruction of the

social and natural worlds. If the ALM could gain wider public support, it could

provoke a capitalist monetary crisis. The ALM has the potential to affect a cultural

paradigm shift, one that broadens ethical horizons to include nonhuman animalsand leads human species identity away from the dominator paradigm so directly

implicated in the ecological crisis.

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C. This makes animal liberation a moral imperative, because a free and peaceful world

will never be possible until we demand the end of human domination over animals.

Best, '06[Steven, Chair of Philosophy at UT-EP, http://www.animalliberationfront.com/Philosophy/ARNewEnlightenment.htm]

MLK formulated a vision of a "world house." In this cosmopolitan utopia, all peoples

around the globe would live in peace and harmony, But to whatever degree this

dream might be realized, King's world house is still a slaughterhouse. Humanismdoesn't challenge the needless confinement, torture, and killing of billions of

animals. The humanist non-violent utopia will always remain a hypocritical lie until

so-called "enlightened" human beings extend nonviolence, equality, and rights to

the animals with whom we share this planet. The next logical step in human moral

evolution is to embrace animal rights. Whether people realize it or not, this is not a

burden but a liberation. Our distorted conceptions of ourselves as demigods who

command the planet must be replaced with the far more humble and holistic notion

that we belong to and are dependent upon vast networks of living relationships. If

humanity and the living world as a whole is to have a future, human beings must

embrace a universal ethics that respects all life. We can change; we must. The

message of nature is evolve or die.

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Advantage 2: Ethics

A. Viewing animals as property is intrinsically wrong and must be rejected because

animals are not objects lacking dignity or feelings.

Bartlett '02, (Steven J. completed his undergraduate work at the University of Santa Clara, received his master's degree from theUniversityof California, Santa Barbara, and his doctorate from the Universit de Paris.,Roots of Human Resistance to Animal Rights: Psychological and Conceptual

Blocks http://www.animallaw.info/articles/arussbartlett2002.htm)

For many people in our society, the concept of legal rights for other animals is quite

"unthinkable." That is because our relationship with the majority of animals is one inwhich we exploit them. Animals are not "things." A legal system which treats them as

mere property is intrinsically flawed. " To label something property is to conclude thatthe entity so labeled possesses no interests that merit protection and that the entity is

solely a means to the end determined by the property owner." What is at stake is oneof the most urgent moral issues of our time. There are moral consequences that follow

from a view that judges nonhuman animals to be no more than inanimate, disposable

things. It is imperative that we understand what forces define the present state if weare to construct a bridge to the future.

B. You have an ethical obligation to vote for the plan. The logic reducing animals toobjects is the same logic that has justified the slaughter of millions of humans. Earth is

doomed until we stop viewing living beings as property. A rejection of the utilitarian

viewpoint towards animals is key to questioning utilitarianism worldwide -

Bartlett '02,(Steven J. completed his undergraduate work at the University of Santa Clara, received his master's

degree from theUniversity of California, Santa Barbara, and his doctorate from the Universit de Paris.,Roots of HumanResistance to Animal Rights: Psychological and Conceptual Blocks

http://www.animallaw.info/articles/arussbartlett2002.htm)

It is common to value the life of a nonhuman animal by means of a cost-benefit

analysis heavily weighted in favor of even the most frivolous human benefit. The

utilitarian evaluation of nonhuman animals, characteristically leads to moral

atrocities toward those animals to whom there is generally little to no empathetichuman response. There are parallels to this psychically numbed outlook in the

unaffected emotional response of bystanders to the Holocaust. Our treatment of

animals is, in disturbing ways, like the treatment of Jews in the Holocaust,

particularly with respect to the capacity of normal people to rationalize and deny

that suffering is taking place. In relation to them, all people are Nazis. There is an

unmistakable banality of human evil in the relationship of the human species toward

other species. The whole creation groans under the weight of the evil we humans

visit upon these mute, powerless creatures. It is our hearts, not just our heads, that

call for an end to it all, that demand of us that we overcome, for them, the habits

and forces behind their systematic oppression. The situation is entirely similar with

respect both to the ease with which ordinary human beings can be ordered tocommit acts of barbarity, or the absence of difficulty with which human executioners

can be found to do their socially appointed work in prisons. What needs to be called

into question are these very phenomena that involve ordinary humanity's

willingness to engage in acts of barbarism and cruelty, to which the majority has

become psychologically habituated and deadened.

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C. You are not voting for the plan, because it magically solves every instance of animal

exploitation. Instead, vote for our policy, because it is intrinsically good. Reject the

negatives future based disadvantages, because their utilitarian and consequential

rational will always recreate human domination over the non-human.

Katz, '97Eric, Director of Science, Technology, and Society Program at the New Jersey Institute of Technology,[Nature as Subjectp. 3-10]

At the end of his analysis of arguments for' the preservation of the irreplaceable,' John Martindiscovers that he is puzzled by the peculiar two-sided use of utilitarian reasoning in debatesover the environment. His conclusion is that 'the vast majority of preservationist cases can beexplained by a version of utilitarianism." Martin is thus proposing that with more carefulphilosophical groundwork, a complete utilitarian justification of the environmentalist-preservationist position can be formulated, routing once and for all the anti-environmentalistforces of development. utilitarianism in its most basic forms cannot explain or justify thepreservationist position the widespread use of utilitarian arguments to justify policy decisionsabout the protection of the environment is detrimental to preservation. The essential elementsof utilitarianism only provide a justification for the satisfaction of human need, for thissatisfaction is the standard by which utilitarianism measures goodness or moral worth. thepreservationist position? the major problem in the application of utilitarian ethical theory to

this preservationist position lies in the justification of the importance of genetic properties. Anyworthwhile argument for preservation would have to explain why a perfect reproduction of awork of art or an artificially produced Yosemite Valley is not as valuable as the original. Thereason-of course is that the historical genetic properties of the object-the process by which itwas created cannot be separated from the nongenetic properties in a determination of theworth of the object. Martin, however, claims that utilitarianism is unable to evaluate the geneticproperties of an object because of its "blindness to the past." When evaluating theconsequences of an action in order to determine its moral worth, the utilitarian has his "eyesdirected towards the future." The sole concern of the utilitarian is whether a world in which acertain entity is presented will be a better world than one in which the entity will not bepreserved. According to Martin, the utilitarian is not interested in the historical properties thatthe entity may possess, and thus how the entity came into being is a fact which is irrelevant tothe moral calculation. The utilitarian is forward-looking: the measurement of future utility is the

criterion of goodness or moral value. The utilitarian counts astroturf as the equal to grass;genetic considerations This indirect calculation of genetic properties yields a number ofproblems.first is the "contingency of a preservationist obligation" which is based on humanattitudes. Because the utilitarian bases his policy of preservation on the satisfaction of certainhuman attitudes, the policy will be justified only as long as these attitudes remain in effect. Astraditional arguments against utilitarianism have stressed, there are some valuessuch astruth and justice-which are important regardless of consequences. conclusion is that a morecareful use of utilitarian arguments can buttress the environmental cause. I believe that thecontrary conclusion is much more obvious: these problems reveal the complete failure ofutilitarian arguments to explain the subtlety and crucial importance of the environmentalistposition on preservation. What Martin fails to see, however, is that even his "safe," nongeneticcases of preservation-- those involve conservation, cost-benefit analyses, externalities, and

ecology"--arenot sufficiently

explained or justified by a direct utilitarian approach. A goodcounterexample is the preservation of endangered species which are of little or no importanceto humanity or the world ecological system. This point has been amply demonstrated byMartin. Krieger in an article entitled "What's Wrong with Plastic Trees?" described by MarkSagoff as "a reductia ad absurdum of contemporary 'utilitarian' arguments for preserving theenvironment."' Krieger states that "Artificial prairies andwildernesses have been created, andthere is no reason to believe that these artificial environments need be unsatisfactory for thosewho experience them?' "the way in which we experience nature is conditioned by our society,'Here then is the ultimate utilitarian position: environments artificially created to produce themost human satisfaction, and human minds conditioned to enjoy the artificial environments.Surely no greater amount of social utility could be imagined! Unfortunately, the effect of this

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theory on environmental policy would be disastrous. Any or all natural objects andenvironments could be destroyed to further the interests, to increase the satisfaction, of thehuman community. An artificial but satisfying utilitarian world clearly demonstrates the flaw inMartin's analysis and the danger that analysis holds for the policy of preservation. Humanitycould even create an artificial, plasticized world which produces more social utility than a worldfilled with natural objects and resources. humans can even survive in an artificialenvironment.interests of humans are not necessarily connected with the preservation of the

natural environment. Any ethical theory which places its emphasis on the satisfaction of humanneeds can support a policy of preservation only on a contingent basis. Obligations to preservenatural objects and resources are overridden whenever a greater amount of humansatisfaction be attained by nonpreservation. There is no danger then, as Martin believes, for

the foes of environmental preservation from who use utilitarian arguments. Basing

arguments for environmental preservation on the premise utilitarian moral theory will only

reveal the precarious relationship which exists between the satisfaction of human needs and

the preservation of natural objects. Utilitarianism might be salvaged for use in the

environmental debate if it is stripped of its bias towards the satisfaction of human needs and

preferences. Bentham, it should be remembered, considered the pains and pleasures of the

animal kingdom to be of important to a utilitarian calculation. According to this kind of

position, the wants and desires of the wildlife in a given area would have to be considered

prior to any development or destruction for the purpose of human betterment.Unfortunately, the problems with this kind of broad utilitarianism appear insurmountable,

How does the satisfaction of animal needs compare in utility with the satisfaction of human

needs? Can we bring plant life into the calculation? What about nonliving entities, such as

rock formations (e.g., the Grand Canyon) or entire ecological areas? Does a marsh have an

interest in not being drained and turned into a golf course, a need or desire to continue a

natural existence? It is clear that difficult-if not impossible-problems arise when we begin to

consider utility for nonhuman and nonsentient entities. A second alternative, highly

tentative, is a movement away from a "want-oriented perspective" in ethical theory. Rather

than evaluating the moral worth of an action by the consequences which satisfy needs and

desires in the human (or even nonhuman) world, we can look at the intrinsic qualities of

the action, and determine what kind of values this action manifests. The question whichthe debate over environmental presentation raises is not "Does preservation of thisparticular natural object lead to a better world?" but rather "Do we want a world in which

the preservation of natural objects is considered an important value?" The question is not

whether the preservation of a certain entity increases the amount of satisfaction andpleasure in the world, but rather, whether these pleasures, satisfactions, and needs ought

to be pursued. The question, in short, is about what kind of moral universe ought to be

created.2' Only when the preservation of natural objects is seen to be an intrinsically good

policy of action, rather than a means to some kind of satisfaction, will a policy of

environmental protection be explained and justified. The development of an ethical theory

which can accomplish this task will be a difficult undertaking, but it is the only choice open

to preservationists who wish to avoid the easy, self-defeating trap of utilitarianism.