Master_Shake

I don’t necessarily see anything wrong with this. Granted, it’s not how I like to spend my free time, but it seems that the reasons people object to the treatment of the fish are two-fold, neither of which is really a moral viewpoint.

First, humans view the fish anthropomorphically. It’s become common to impose our morality on unhuman things which have no morality, and to identify with these things. I think this is partially instinctual, but also the by-product of those terrible Disney movies with talking animals. If the animals can talk, then they must have feelings, thoughts, dimensions, and can even be equal to a human, right? I think that is incorrect. While intelligence and sentience may be more of a sliding scale than previously imagined (humans, dolphins all the way down to amoebas and algae) I don’t think anyone can realistically argue that the lives of goldfish are important in their own right. The previous posts bear this out.

We like them because of their relationship to us, not because we respect the fish.

But so are bugs, germs and possibly viruses. Being a living creature clearly is not the threshold upon which respect of rights must be based. We would do well to examine the goldfish qua goldfish instead of seeing it as a younger brother.

Again, see the application of human ideas of proper behaviour with those of fish. Should we really be concerned about giving a goldfish a “quick, humane process”?

Perhaps we should offer it a goldfish process? What is the goldfish process? Well, one need only watch the Discovery channel to see the ruthless and amoral world that is underwater life. It is doubtful that the goldfish would have passed more peacefully were it allowed to experience a proper goldfishian death.

Second, humans view the effect the killing has on the person, rather than on the fish.

(I don't think that's quite accurate. A better way to say it might have been that torturing animals as a child may be one of many indicators of sociopathic tendencies. Let's not throw some drunken frat boys under the bus so quickly.)

However, this illustrates my second point, that we respond not to the death of the goldfish itself, but rather to what we view as the immoral actions of the person involved. This is closely connected with the first point. We wouldn’t approve of a person cruelly flushing another person down the drain (well, probably not) so we shouldn’t approve of a person cruelly flushing a goldfish down the drain.

The insinuation being that anyone who would behave in such a manner with a goldfish would behave just as abominably with humans. It is the person's actions which are the concern, not the life of the goldfish.

Even assuming that one can assign a goldfish rights, does that mean we have to respect those rights? At what cost? Granted, the guy here was only killing out of enjoyment, but if you object to that then what would be a legitimate reasons for killing unhuman animals? If there are no such reasons, then are we under an affirmative duty to provide all animals with medical care? And what about animal on animal crime, are we under an obligation to end that as well?

By erasing the distinctions between humans and animals one can behave more humanely toward the animals, and they do receive the benefit of such actions. But the actions are not without an equal reaction, and the elevation of animalia proportionally reduces the value of humanity.

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You know something, I don't think the sun even... exists... in this place. 'Cause I've been up for hours, and hours, and hours, and the night never ends here.