An op ed today in the New York Times talks about America’s “inconsistent, hypocritical” attitude toward animal rights.

“We disagree about where to draw the line to protect animal rights, but almost everyone now agrees that there is a line to be drawn.”
— Nicholas Kristof

“In many cases, we simply cannot know what consciousness is like for, say, an orca or a pig. We can hazard guesses from comparing their brains with ours – but, in my view, the captivity and use of any intelligent animal for entertainment will one day be seen as barbaric. It is a violation of the animals’ dignity. While that may not ascend quite to the level of human dignity, it demands that we cease treating our fellow inhabitants of earth as captive slaves. With the dominion humans have over the natural world comes great responsibility. And right now, we humans are behaving with criminal recklessness toward the planet that gave us life.
–Andrew Sullivan