All the arguments to prove man's superiority cannot shatter this hard fact: in suffering the animals are our equals.
If possessing a higher degree of intelligence does not entitle one human to use another for his or her own ends, how can it entitle humans to exploit non-humans?
The notion that human life is sacred just because it is human life is medieval.
What one generation finds ridiculous, the next accepts; and the third shudders when it looks back on what the first did.
If it is in our power to prevent something bad from happening, without thereby sacrificing anything of comparable moral importance, we ought, morally, to do it.
Hebrew word for "charity" tzedakah, simply means "justice" and as this suggests, for Jews, giving to the poor is no optional extra but an essential part of living a just life.
We are, quite literally, gambling with the future of our planet- for the sake of hamburgers
Extreme poverty is not only a condition of unsatisfied material needs. It is often accompanied by a degrading state of powerlessness.
To give preference to the life of a being simply because that being is a member of our species would put us in the same position as racists who give preference to those who are members of their race.
The prescription of the equality of human beings is not a description of an alleged actual equality among humans: it is a prescription of how we should treat human beings.
We have to speak up on behalf of those who cannot speak for themselves.
Personal purity isn’t really the issue. Not supporting animal abuse – and persuading others not to support it – is.
Faith cannot tell us who is right and who is wrong, because each will simply assert that his or her faith is the true one.
It takes twenty-one pounds of protein fed to a calf to produce a single pound of animal protein for humans. We get back less than 5 percent of what we put in.
Cheats prosper until there are enough who bear grudges against them to make sure they do not prosper.
If we are prepared to take the life of another being merely in order to satisfy our taste for a particular type of food, then that being is no more than a means to our end.
It is a mistake to assume that the law should always enforce morality.
The unchallenged assumption is that humans may use animals for their own purposes, and they may raise and kill them to satisfy their preference for a diet containing animal flesh.
...it is in the rightness of our cause, and not the fear of our bombs, that our prospects of victory lie.
If our life has no meaning other than our own happiness, we are likely to find that when we have obtained what we think we need to be happy, happiness itself still eludes us.
Why [..] should the boundary of sacrosanct life match the boundary of our species?
The world would be a much simpler place if one could bring about social change merely by making a logically consistent moral argument.
If you are paying for something to drink when safe drinking water comes out of the tap, you have money to spend on things you don’t really need.
But pain is pain, and the importance of preventing unnecessary pain and suffering does not diminish because the being
What we must do is bring nonhuman animals within our sphere of moral concern and cease to treat their lives as expendable for whatever trivial purposes we may have.
What she really wants is a place with more tolerance for differences, less emphasis on materialism, where people value creativity and are interested in working on issues relating to peace and justice.
We do not have to make self-sacrifice a necessary element of altruism. We can regard people as altruists because of the kind of interests they have rather than because they are sacrificing their interests.
Reason is inherently expansionist. It seeks universal application.
We think of lions and wolves as savage because they kill; but they must kill, or starve. Humans kill other animals for sport, to satisfy their curiosity, to beautify their bodies, and to please their palates.
If doing the most you can for others means that you are also flourishing, then that is the best possible outcome for everyone.
