Murder is worse than abuse.
These videos in essence are propaganda tools and I see little value in the so called animal rights movement that promotes clean killing as an ethical good.
But at the end of the day there should be free speech no matter whether it's right or wrong or for good or evil.
Correct? Well you can but you'd be a bigot thinking you're beliefs are better than someone else's.
>Extrapolate it further, we shouldn't, then, be more appalled by a gruesome murder (of a human) than a gunshot to the back of the head.
Correct. Again a no brainer. There is however evidence that a person who commits a gruesome crime might be more likely to re-offend. This should be taken into account for sentencing/rehabilitation. But no, you should not be more 'appalled'
> Since that is untrue for virtually everyone, you either have to claim that nearly every human on earth is a logically inconsistent dunce, or perhaps there is, in fact, a violence gradient of some sort.
??? Do I even need to answer that? 80% of India is Hindu. 80% of America is Christian. You think people aren't logically inconsistent?
People are not shocked by horrible crimes because of the likelihood of re-offense. They are shocked by horrible crimes because there are things worse than simple murder, at least to most people. The idea that every murder is completely equal in every way is just plain silly.
Torturing someone to death is worse than shooting them in the back of the head. Rape-and-murder is worse than murder. These are things that most people can see pretty clearly. Here's why: just ask yourself which you would prefer to have happen to you (assume that you won't be able to escape your fate no matter what happens). I'd take the bullet every single time, and there's a reason for that.
Lets take the "bacon fad" for a ride down fallacy lane. So everyone loves their dog, right? Nobody in the US would ever dream of eating dog, its even used as a racial stigma against other cultures that have a history for eating them. However, "lesser animals" something that you would think isn't as intelligent as a dog it's ok to slaughter mercilessly for the sole purpose of mass consumption. But the fact of the matter is a pig is smarter than your pet dog. So think if it was your dog going through this, being born, raised in horrible conditions and then slaughtered. It bothers most people to think about that, so why does killing a pig not?
Dont even get me started on the environmental issues that we all pretend to care about. Given that factory farming is a main source of pollution.....
I also agree that eating meat and claiming to be in favor of animal rights involves a certain amount of hypocrisy. I accept that, and I am still coming to terms with it personally (I have noted to friends, only half-jokingly, that I'm only about one PETA video away from becoming a vegetarian, and so I try to avoid them).
That being said, and given that there is a continuum of mistreatment, I still think it is acceptable to eat meat and attempt to encourage more humane treatment of the animals. The hypocrisy is still there, but surely less cruelty is an improvement even if the treatment is still cruel. Of course at some point you will reach a minimum viable level of cruelty, at which point people will have some uncomfortable choices to make, but that's a good thing in my mind.
You can grow fond of plenty of the animals that we eat on a normal basis, pigs in particular. We also have a tendency to anthropomorphize animals which can lead to attachment.
Factory farming is indeed a huge problem, because it requires so much fossil fuel, grain, and antibiotics, and destroys the land and causes global warming. But the fix is not to stop eating animals, the answer is to go back to the roots of the ecosystem and actually raise more animals. Ever heard of Alan Savory? Check it out.
Regarding your second point, the issue we have with the slaughter of dogs is cultural, and has to do with how dogs are integrated into our society. It's not how intelligent we think they are, it's how we percieve them as members of the family. If pigs were the household pets of our time, they'd be perceived the same way, and the same applies to less intelligent creatures. It's a simple fact that we care for things which are close to us more than others, be this humans or other animals.
Movements are inevitably made up of many different kinds of people with varying motives. There are always going to be radicals (like many with PETA), but the majority often have reasonable arguments and concerns.