The Bestiality Perplex
Posted Monday, April 2, 2001, at 5:23 PM ETChatterbox has been brooding all weekend about what his policy should be regarding bestiality. It hasn't come up before, partly because Chatterbox doesn't own any pets, and partly because he wasn't aware that bestiality had become a political issue until he read an outraged March 30 editorial on the subject in the Wall Street Journal. As a matter of personal preference, Chatterbox would characterize himself as a heterosexual speciesist (and happily married man). But what are Chatterbox's views concerning interspecies congress among others?
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StumbleUponPerhaps we should back up a bit. The Journal's ire was directed at an essay titled "Heavy Petting" by Peter Singer on the highbrow porn Webzine Nerve. Singer is, of course, the notorious bioethicist whose Princeton appointment three years ago caused a mild ruckus because of his hard-line views about animal rights. (It was Singer who coined the term "speciesist.") In the Nerve essay, which is actually a review of a new book about bestiality called Dearest Pet, Singer argues that the taboo against bestiality should be dispensed with. The foundation for Singer's argument is the Aristotelian view that man is part of nature, as opposed to the Platonic view that man exists apart from nature. (A chunk of Al Gore's sophomoric eco-tome, Earth in the Balance, is dedicated to criticizing the Platonic worldview and embracing the Aristotelian one, a stance that Lynne Cheney attacked rather unfairly in her plodding anti-political-correctness jeremiad, Telling the Truth. Had Singer's Nerve essay surfaced before the November election, Gore's Aristotelianism might have tempted the Journal's high-spirited partisans to declare Gore the animal fanciers' fellow traveler. Though, as Chatterbox has written before, Gore toward the end of the campaign attempted a bold raid on the Platonist camp.)
In Singer's philosophical construct, zoophilia is just another, slightly less conventional way for humans to assert fellowship with the rest of God's creatures:
There are many ways in which we cannot help behaving just as animals do--or mammals, anyway--and sex is one of the most obvious ones. We copulate, as they do. They have penises and vaginas, as we do, and the fact that the vagina of a calf can be sexually satisfying to a man shows how similar these organs are. The taboo on sex with animals may, as I have already suggested, have originated as part of a broader rejection of non-reproductive sex. But the vehemence with which this prohibition continues to be held, its persistence while other non-reproductive sexual acts have become acceptable, suggests that there is another powerful force at work: our desire to differentiate ourselves, erotically and in every other way, from animals.
To Singer, then, you're a bigot if you'll accept a Great Dane into your home but draw the line at letting your sister marry one. As with other sexual taboos, Singer argues, the one against bestiality has been violated regularly down through the ages:
Oh, never mind about the octopus. Singer concedes that few of these art works likely depict events that actually occurred, but he adds that in the 1940s, 8 percent of males and 3.5 percent of females reported at least one interspecies tryst to Dr. Alfred Kinsey, and that among men living in rural areas, it was more like 50 percent. In fact, subsequent surveys have found much lower percentages, leading one to suspect that Kinsey was demonstrating a bias having something to do with his training as a zoologist. (Click here to read a debunking of various bestiality urban legends.) Singer is clearly right that any sexual taboo based on the idea that sex exists solely for reproduction doesn't make much practical sense, even for the boring heterosexual mainstream, in this age of contraception. But Chatterbox can't join Singer in concluding that the sexual revolution should give bestiality a free pass. Singer is so focused on trying to persuade his readers that people are no better than animals that he forgets to take into account the welfare of the animal. The Journal editorial describes Singer's essay as arguing that "the only real issues are whether you get the animal's consent--and you don't kill it as part of your pleasure." In fact, though Singer does denounce sexual practices that involve outright cruelty, he doesn't really explain how an animal can go about giving consent because, well, you know, animals can't talk. Sure, a dog humping your leg may be conveying a certain message, but without the kind of verbal confirmation required these days by every college freshman manual ("no means no"), how can you be certain? Moreover, it isn't immediately obvious that even if an animal could tell you its intimate desires that this would constitute informed consent, any more than would a "yes" from a homo sapiens under the age of 18. But wait, you say. Who cares whether an animal gives its consent or is the moral equivalent of jailbait? It's not a person; it's just a dumb animal. Who cares what an animal thinks? But this, of course, is not only an invitation to all kinds of animal cruelty, but also a contradiction to Singer's core belief that animals and humans should be valued the same. Singer's tolerance for bestiality is therefore not only repulsive and weird. It's also ... speciesist! |
E-mail Timothy Noah at .
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Reader Comments From The Fray:
[Notes from the Fray Editor: We weren't looking forward to this one. We have had some interesting experiences with veggie Frays (see Fray Notes on this article and this one) so maybe this is similar. But Marylb (and we feel we should stress that she was imagining someone else's thoughts here) cheered us up with this nice line: "The fish is looking pretty good swimming around in those revealing golden scales. Damn whore! I need a cigarette." Brings poetry to the topic. Another poster makes this point: "The Wall Street Journal objects to Singer because he wants to introduce ethical considerations in the treatment of animals that make research more expensive. In other words, the WSJ remains true to its belief that the only thing that counts in life is profit. That is as it should be."
And Ron Ribaudo says "Singer's position is the reductio ad absurdum of modern philosophy, defending the indefensible for no reason whatsoever. Assume, horibile dictu, that bestiality is OK. Why do we need a defense of it? No one goes to jail, that I am aware of, for violating it. No one really thinks it ought to be condoned. What is the damned point of defending it?" Other than that...well we don't know whether to bring you the jokes or the serious posts (nor, indeed, do we know into which category Helena's falls). So far, we're surprised to find, no dogs have posted. Why can't we hear the chocolate lab's view on this if he loves it so much?]
"Who cares what animals think?" indeed. Animals are not moral actors, so they have no rights. The objection to bestiality is the same as any objection to cruelty to animals. The issue is not what it means to the animal; it is that it is inhuman to behave with wanton viciousness. The Left has no problem invoking this principle in the case of greed; one might say that the modern sentimental Left is founded on objections to imputed greed, which it finds repugnant even when there is plenty to go around for all. Yet it rejects the idea that humans have purpose when it is inconvenient.
Chatterbox doesn't really rebut Singer's claim that humans and animals are the same; he just responds with rude derision, after granting Singer most of his argument. Almost 40 years ago Pope Paul VI in Humanae Vitae predicted this state, should human sex be severed from reproduction. The smart commentary then was rude derision. Now Chatterbox, having severed sex and all of human nature from any purpose, is left with no firm ground from which to reject bestiality
--Sean Fitzpatrick
(To reply, click here.)
It's occurred to me that everyone attacking Peter Singer misses his point, which is not a defense of bestiality, but an implicit questioning of what distinguishes the human use of animals for sexual purposes with the human use of animals for culinary or labor purposes. Academics throughout history, from Plato on down, pose rhetorical questions in order to explore ethical standards, not because they support sex with dogs (Singer) or selling babies (Jeffrey-Rosen-favorite Judge Richard Posner).
--NBW
(To reply, click here.)
Here's an option for Noah to consider on this subject that has caused him such perplexity: don't spend any more time on it. Resolve to execrate Singer and anyone who shares his beliefs; rejoice when anyone acting on those beliefs is found in any violation of law for which the punishment is imprisonment. As opportunity permits, heap on the relatives and friends of such people ridicule and abuse. Direct the same and more toward Princeton University, for bringing the principle of free intellectual inquiry into disrepute through its association with this person.
--Joseph Britt
(To reply, click here.)
Overlooked by both Singer and Chatterbox is the wonderful advantage that canine lovers offer women: they can be trained to fetch; they are not fussy eaters and certainly don't strew clothes over the floor; and, best of all, they do not leave the toilet seat up.
I thank the Lord every day for my chocolate lab.
Our intimacy is unsurpassed.
--Helena
(To reply, click here.)
Most ancient religions and more recent European Pagan religions have mythologies where their Gods appear as animals and cohabitate with mortals frequently. Zeus was notorious for appearing as a bull and mounting many a fair virgin and so did his wife Hera appear as a number of animals and interact with mortal men in retribution for Zeus' behavior.
--Chris
(To reply, click here.)