The Singer Peter Singer Summary

In the reading, Singer talks about how animals should be treated equally as human beings when it comes to certain aspects, but that they should not be treated equally in every aspect of the word. in example, he states that human beings have the capability to understand about politics and about voting, but that animals do not know anything about voting and should not be counted as equal in that aspect, which would be called; equal rights. Animals should be counted as equal as human in terms that animals just like human beings feel pain and fear, and that it should not be taken for granted; which we would call, equal consideration. Singer also goes on to talk about speciesism; which “is the attitude of favoring the interests of members of one’s
Being that all human beings deserve to have equal consideration when you are to choose between who to either help and who not to help. That if we see two people are suffering equally, then we should give both of them the same thought of who to help more instead of favoring a certain individual more, because no matter the situation, both individuals should be treated equally. Singer is not totally wrong, but his argument has only minor problems. Singer states that animals should be given equal consideration and not equal rights, I agree to that point. But what I believe singer did not explain clearly is that if animals should be given equal consideration as human beings, what would happen if a dog is suffering alone or has a huge bump/lump on his leg that may be cancerous and will not be able to walk anymore, we do not know if the dog wants to continue living that way or would like to end the pain they are in; of course we may be able to figure out that the dog is in pain and is sad, but there is no form of communication from the dog as to whether the dog wants to be put to sleep(euthanize the dog) or would like to keep living and fighting another day, and we would have to make a decision for the dog, as to whether or not try and help/cure the dog from the problem or euthanize the dog so that its suffering can end. Now let us say a human being has the same problem as the dog, of course the human being can communicate with another human being and express how they feel about the situation/problem they are in. We can understand if they are sad, upset or happy about it. That human being can communicate in the same language as the other human being, so therefore it is easier to know what the person would like to do, and we would understand the decision they would like to make because they will also be able to explain it to us as well, and so therefore the human being can make a decision on their own