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Reciprocal Morality The view that you are obligated to respect the moral rights of others only if they respect your moral rights is called reciprocal morality. The failure of animals to reciprocate moral obligations is a reason why animals should not have rights, according to some philosophers. Rights must be reciprocal, they say, and because animals cannot honour our rights we should not grant them rights.
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Reciprocating spans in stone. Photo: Paolo da Reggio.
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However, you can argue that conferment of rights to animals is about how humans should behave towards animals and not about whether animals can grant us rights. Much the same argument is the following. We give rights to many people who cannot respect or reciprocate our rights, such as babies, young children and unborn future generations. When they are grown up they benefit us by giving rights to our future next of kin (see Altruism). We also give rights to severely mentally retarded people and we benefit by being grateful for rights ourselves if we become severely mentally disturbed. But as far as animals are concerned, some people claim, we are not related to animals and nor shall we turn into animals, so it is pointless giving rights to animals. However, this argument misses the point because conferring rights is about how we should behave, even when we gain nothing tangible from doing so.
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