You might have to seek consent the next time you want to dip your skinny-dipping toe in the waters of the great Lake Erie. The lunatic denizens of Toledo, Ohio, have just voted to give the fluid that washes over the Mistake-on-the-Lake “the right to exist, flourish and naturally evolve.”
Natives of Michigan, the greatest state, will understand this bizarre happenstance, as they have always viewed their benighted residents to the south with some suspicion. Their qualms have once again been confirmed.
There are so many things off kilter with the eerie vote, starting with the vote, that it’s only natural to sputter and gasp. So calm yourself and carry on reading.
The central insanity of a democracy is that it can vote on anything. And what it votes on is constituted as good and true and eternal. At least until the next vote which says that the previous vote on an eternal matter was wrong. Letting people believe they have the right to give rights to lakes is the first sin. It is a big one.
The second sin is to suppose objects have “rights.” This mania for rights is another consequence of our democracy, as has been well documented. It’s not only objects, but even people now have “rights” to metaphysical impossibilities, such as two men “marrying.” Well, you marry voting and “rights” and the resulting issue is worse than that produced by third-generation inbreeding.
Since rights imply duties—you cannot have one isolated from the other—if Erie has rights, it must have certain duties. The next time some poor slob drowns in her waters (after securing the aforementioned consent), we can charge her with murder. Perhaps we could make ice of her waters and sell them to Chinese billionaries for use in outrageously priced cocktails as punishment.
The Toledoites are angry runoff from nearby farms is causing nastiness to grow in the lake where it shouldn’t. The solution, in saner times, would be to stop the runoff, or make those who did it responsible for the damage. But, no. Instead we have to take a pantheistic view and say the lake is alive and should be allowed to “naturally evolve.” Ten mere seconds spent pondering that requirement is sufficient to convince of its idiocy. These are the third sin.
Inanimate objects are new to the rights game. Not so much animals. Since folks have begun to lose the ability to distinguish man from animal, they think animals are us, or we are they, and so the argument has become less “Should animals have rights” to more “Why are people blocking animal rights?”
This is so not just for those who prefer fantasy to Reality, but it’s becoming a thing even on the right.
“Most normal, civilized people living today,” writes Anatoly Karlin in Unz, “would agree that reducing animal suffering is a worthy goal.”
Some us normal, civilized people alive today are not most. Because it is an absurd blanket goal to desire to reduce animal suffering.
Consider that the vast, vast, vast majority of causes of animal suffering is other animals. Did people not pay attention to Mutual of Omaha’s Wild Kingdom? Every damn thing is doing its level best to eat every other damn thing in the most savage, bloodiest, most ruthless, most pitiless way.
This includes Yours Truly and his dinner. As I’ve said before, I have killed, gutted, and eaten many animals, and will continue to do so, all in an effort to stave off becoming worm food myself for as long as possible. I do not feel bad about this. I feel good. I feel best when my victims are grilled and coated in freshly ground pepper. The creatures that eat me after I collapse one day alone in the darkest wood of Up North won’t apologize, and neither will I for stalking them now.
As “technological solutions”, as Karlin euphemistically calls fake meat, “are likely still decades away… most of us will still have to grapple with the consequences of destroying living, conscious entities for our own sustenance.”
Again, the crow is feeling nothing but glee as it pecks out the eye of the mouse. The only grappling is with the crow’s claws on the mouse’s throat. Or with me and my steak knife.
Note: There are a number of philosophical arguments put forth by Karlin for why humans should consider them both exceptional and simultaneously below animals, all of which fail on that impossibility, which we might explore next week.
This either proof that Darwin was wrong and “survival of the fittest” is utter nonsense or proof there is a God and that’s the only reason humans survive, maybe both.
I always think of Stephan King’s “The End of the Mess” (written before he went lunatic leftist all the time). I really do think “it’s in the water”.
(You can find the short story online. It first came out in Omni Magazine decades ago. Assuming the water hasn’t gotten you at this point…..)
The goal of the Left is always and forever the destruction of humanity, specifically Western Civilization, formerly known as Christendom.
The philosophy of the Left is anti-realism, the complete and utter dismissal of reality.
Once you understand these two things, everything they do can be explained. Summary: They are both insane and evil.
Well given that Lake Erie has 4 state and 1 international border, shouldn’t this be a Federal jurisdiction?
In any case unilateral action by Ohio would be subject to challenge under sections 8, 9 and 10 of the US constitution.
That’s *before* we get to it being stupid…..
It’s alarming how seemingly everyone is absorbing leftisim in some way. Karlin has written some good stuff in the past. But now hes attributing rights to animals! It makes me worry that somewhere I might believe in something leftist and not even realize it.
A lake voted in as having rights ? Aren’t people going to allow it to exist anyway? What’s the point? Makes me wonder if people just do this as a joke and just have too much time in their hands and want to get attention.
‘Insane and evil’ is not contained to the left of politics, evidently.
Christianity is not right wing politics, how funny.
Western culture is quite another story. A christian one.
Eastern culture has managed to absorb Christianity. All be it slowly and piecemeal.
Evolution is not discounted by the bible.
One read through of Genesis will reveal this. You knew this in baby biology classes at school, stop pretending. How is it that all these years, people have remained Christian and remained happy enough with evolution. Since the advent of the internet, in my view, it’s as if the theory was just published brand new.
Pro Intelligent design arguments are all around where or when such design happened.
The anti side is a reworking of the God debate.
Christians need to stop acting as if they’re being threatened all the live long day because someone doesn’t believe what they believe! Christians are threatened enough, for real. That’s what people should think about.
If they’re right, which I believe they are, they’ve got no worries on such matters.
The left spends all day looking for Hitler, or some or other ‘ist’,
The right??? the same, it seems.
Just fighting imaginary demons of their own creation. One definition of insanity.
Humans carry a bunch of bacteria in their gut. 10 for each body cell. Surely, these critters have a right to be fed too.
You might find this interesting.
http://www.pulpless.com/jneil/aniright.html
Legally speaking a right is an entitlement — an exclusive privilege to own or possess something or to undertake some action.
Jefferson wrote in the Declaration of Independence that our rights are given by God, but that is not factually correct. Our rights result from a contractual agreement written by men, i.e. the Constitution (although many other contracts establish or transfer rights as well, for instance a home sale contract). When actions or possession are adjudicated, judges refer to the written law. They do not appeal to or rely upon divine revelation.
Contractual agreements are exclusively a human thing to do. Animals, lakes, trees, rocks, etc. cannot make or agree to contracts. Only people can make contracts. Your dog may agreeably not bite you, but she cannot put it in writing. There may be a law against shooting your dog, but the dog had nothing to do with creating or enforcing that law. Thus only people can have rights.
What are the odds the hamburger someone gets at a restaurant includes the same cow from which their new car’s leather seats are made?
A Baptist friend of mine has pointed out that the Bible, in Genesis, says that even current predators were collegial co-inhabitants in the Garden of Eden. Until Eve tricked Adam and got them & all the other beasties kicked out, at which point they began picnicking on their former neighbors. If animals are unhappy now it’s our (us humans,) fault — Original Sin & all…
What are the odds the hamburger someone gets at a restaurant includes the same cow from which their new car’s leather seats are made?
A Baptist friend of mine has pointed out that the Bible, in Genesis, says that even current predators were collegial co-inhabitants in the Garden of Eden. Until Eve tricked Adam and got them & all the other beasties kicked out, at which point they began picnicking on their former neighbors. If animals are unhappy now it’s our (us humans,) fault — Original Sin & all…
The purpose of the odd law is disclosed in the third para of the article — the law allows any citizen to sue another over perceived lake pollution or other damages to the lake. The equality of rights extended to an inanimate part of nature is not the real motive (though particularly well-parodied in today’s post).
In our legal system a person must have standing allowing them to sue. For a common area such as a lake, an individual typically lacks standing unless directly impacted. That’s usually a very small set of prospects. This law gives everyone standing to sue when that would normally be reserved to a Govt entity charged with protecting the general welfare, and, hopefully/presumably, exercising that right to sue with suitable discretion in consideration of all truly affected (human) parties.
As the article notes, in other words, that indiscriminate extension of standing sets an ominous precedent. As if our society weren’t slready litigious enuf.
Ken’s baptist friend is a fundamentalist. AKA, he’s wrong, knows it, and is probably very angry about it, like the other fundamentalists.
I’m wondering if for the posterity of the cow, drivers should be more careful, drive slowly, leave the driving to someone who knows where they’re going and why.
Just a thought.