We all know about animal cruelty. We have seen it on the news and even on sports
shows with Michael Vick's case of dog fighting. But were you aware of the relationship
between money and animal cruelty?
Much of the systematic animal cruelty is motivated by money, our physical
object money (POM).
Some people like to gamble on
animal sports like horse racing, dog racing, and cock or dog fighting. These
are industries, although those
last two are illegal. Quite a lot of money changes hands over these sports.
There is a large market for popular breeds of cats and dogs. The "puppy
farm" tries to make money from such demand. These breeding operations
often are conducted in pitiful circumstances and discomfort for the animals
involved and the over-breeding (in-breeding) produces animals which frequently
have genetic weaknesses. But these operations, too, make money.
In agriculture there are certain practices which raise animals in most unnatural
circumstances which are detrimental to the animals and the health of others
in the area. Factory farms for hogs and chickens and the producing of veal
come to mind but there are many others.
These agricultural practices not only mistreat thousands of animals, they
also produce inferior foods for our tables. Animals raised under stress or
with unnatural amounts of hormones or antibiotics do not provide the most nutritious
meat (or eggs in the case of chickens). These practices also help create "super
bacteria" which are immune to most antibiotics and place animal hormones
in our food and environment. All these practices have been found to be profitable
to many of the larger farming interests.
But the above has to do with our current POM economy and nations in the modern
world. What would be changed with a conversion to a non-POM money, a money
which had no physical object nature, a money which came into existence when
earned and ceased to exist when spent?
In a non-POM society, those who produce food are paid for the net benefit
that results from their actions. Thus, all those hormones and the antibiotics
would reduce the pay for such production. Those high-stress living environments
for the stock would produce less income. That, in and of itself, would cut
back on such practices. But also, the family farm as opposed to the large factory
farm would likely become the norm. Family farms are much more likely to avoid
the over crowding and highly polluting of the factory farms.
Gambling would still exist in a non-POM society, but it would be what one
might call "amateur
gambling." There would be no money for those who conducted illegal cock
fights or dog fights. Those who contributed to horse racing would lose money
whenever horses were injured or had to be destroyed. Horses which were not
good for the racetrack and were too "crazy" to be ridden would cost
the owners money. Since the gambling industry would not exist, and since there
would be no money for purses and such, the races that did exist would be more
localized and amateur for the most part; run for the love and enjoyment of
the animals and competition in general.
None of this should lead one to believe that animal cruelty would cease to
exist in a non-POM society. There will still be individual sadists who delight
in the pain of others, both human and animal. But these unhappy people would
not have the cooperation of others in producing pain. Also, as human activity
becomes more and more observed by technology, it would be more and more difficult
for a sadist to hide (and get away with) such activities.
Finally, for the inadvertent cruelty of pollution and
destruction of wilderness and other habitat areas, a non-POM economy will be
less destructive since pollution
and environmental destruction will reduce income for all who participate. That
reduction will not be a one-time event either. So long as the consequences
of that destruction exist, the effect on the actor's net benefit equation will
exist. Producers will be very slow to do anything that might cost them money
every payday for the rest of their lives.
If you like animals, if you hate to have animals suffer... you will notice
that the worst abuses, the abuses that are on the largest scale are being done
for
money,
not for the pleasure of making animals unhappy. Most of the suffering of animals
is preventable, unnecessary, and results from the nature of our money.
Previous: Non-POM: Utopia? Hardly.
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