On bestiality and ethics thereof · 10:36pm Apr 19th, 2014
For the purposes of this blog post, I shall define "bestiality" as "sex between a sapient being and a non-sapient being," rather than the more conventional "sex between a human and an animal." In my opinion, my definition is a better generalization of the concept to a world containing sapient non-humans, and since I'm going to be referring to my concept repeatedly, it will be good to have a single word that means what I want to say.
Oh, and be warned that there is going to be some analysis of a comparison of bestiality and rape, so if that's going to disturb you, don't read on.
As I mentioned in my previous blog post, I watched the original G1 TV special last night. And as is my wont, I pondered it in an undirected manner. And the brief appearance of TJ, Megan's (so far as I can tell) non-sapient pony, ultimately led to a thought that I felt merited further consideration. Specifically, it led me to wonder if my ethical views on bestiality are entirely consistent (by way of considering potential interactions between sapient and non-sapient ponies).
Before entering this liminal state of considering and possibly changing my opinion, I categorically classified bestiality as having negative ethical value. (I'd say I categorically classified it as bad, but for any action there exist circumstances that justify it, though they may be very contrived.) It seems all sorts of wrong, and I thought I could justify that feeling. It's pretty easy to make a comparison to rape, for one thing. But now I'm not so sure I can just apply that comparison in all cases. So let us consider a few different cases that one might compare to bestiality (in order of moral repugnance), and think about how close they actually are: forceful rape, statutory rape, and sci-fi sex-bots (I cannot seem to word that so it doesn't sound utterly out-of-place, but bear with me).
I think we can all agree that forceful rape is bad. I'm glad I can say that I have neither first- nor secondhand knowledge about it (unless you count fictional rape victims as counting for secondhand knowledge), but I think I'm safe in saying that it tends to cause lasting emotional damage, physical harm, and in some cases unwanted and unsupportabe children. And all of those are of course bad. But I don't think we can simply apply what we know here to bestiality. For one thing, I doubt we can assume that bestiality is necessarily forcible, especially when the whole train of thought was sparked by a world containing both magical talking pastel ponies and regular dumb ponies. I don't pretend to know what a given species can and cannot want to mate with (I heard once that it's possible to have a long-term sexual relationship with a dolphin, though I've no memory of the source and so I cannot vouch for the accuracy of this information). And if it's not forcible, there shouldn't be too much chance of significant physical harm (I hope). We can pretty much throw out the part about unwanted children as well; in general it should be quite biologically impossible for the union to produce children. If there are children . . . let's just mark that case as "complicated" and move on; questions about the heritability of sapience in interspecies breeding leave a lot of room for analyzing ever-more-restricted possibilities. And then we come to emotional damage. Noting that the comparison under consideration casts the non-sapient being specifically as the victim, we have to ask whether said being is capable of suffering lasting emotional damage, and further could suffer such emotional damage from sex, which is as a rule rather unclear. Yes, animals can form associations of unpleasant experiences with places or objects, but I wouldn't say that all traumatic memories are created equal, and it's hard to get data beyond observing an avoidance of certain places when your test subjects cannot talk because they're mice. Furthermore, the trauma is normally pain, and I don't know of any studies of whether unwanted sex can be traumatic in various species. I have a feeling that anybody looking to conduct such a study would have a hard time getting it past an ethics review.
So that doesn't seem to be such an apt comparison.
Next under the microscope is statutory rape: sex with somebody who is too young or intoxicated to legally choose. And we can look at the assumption that the perpetrator is taking advantage of the victim, and that this is bad, and confirm that there is a clear and simple analogy to bestiality. But is that really the reason we condemn statutory rape? Or is "taking advantage of" merely a heuristic that suggests when there are likely to be deeper issues? Perhaps the problem is that there is a high probability that the victim will strongly regret it later. In that case, we have to ask whether sapience is a necessary prerequisite for feeling regret, a question to which I would tentatively guess "yes." Then, if regret were the reason, a comparison to bestiality would fall apart.
Still, neither of these explanations feel right to me. And that's usually a good heuristic for when there's something I haven't thought of. If you've got ideas on this subject, please share them.
Finally, we jump abruptly to the concept of futuristic sex-bots. These I have no ethical problem with as long as they're not too smart; I'm not necessarily saying the other case is wrong, but sufficiently intelligent robots so often bring up tricky questions about slavery and the like. But then we have to ask how similar the sex-bots would be to not-sapient beings in the "okay" case. To my knowledge, as a rule, animals that reproduce through sexual intercourse (having sex with, say, a jellyfish would definitely not involve the jellyfish's consent, not to mention how it seems like a really bad idea) can be said to feel at least pain and fear by any sense of the word "feel." Would sex-bots be able to feel by any sense of the word? What, fundamentally, does that even mean? I don't know. So once again, I have to admit uncertainty as to whether a comparison makes sense. But if it does, then I've got a contradiction.
And that seems to be what I think. I'd like to know your stance on these thoughts. I've got some uncertainty that I'd like help resolving.
The "conventional" definition of bestiality crosses species boundaries. I imagine it's possible to contrive circumstances where the definition you're using doesn't. (Those wander into other ethical territories, but again, contrived.) So that's something to think about.
I'll let this rattle around in the back of my head for a while.
I would say, that the ethics forbidding bestiality are rather non sensible, from a purely logical point of view. The core of it is that the animal cannot consent, which is immediately discardable. We don't *care* if animals consent or not, that's simply not the standard that is appropriate to use. the appropriate standard is "unnecessary harm." which may or may not occur much the same way that any arbitrary group might include a wrongdoer. There is little evidence that there is ipso facto harm to the animal, nevermind it being unnecessary or excessive. the problem, then, is to demonstrate this in at least some cases as lack of evidence is not evidence of lack. We do have a method of discerning unnecessary harm to animals in our animal abuse laws, and one that seems at least nominally sound. Therefore, we can discriminate between "sex with harm" and "sex without harm" in those jurisdictions that have strong animal abuse laws but no specific prohibition of bestiality. When prosecution is not possible, or requires some creative approach (such as trying statutory rape for having sex with an animal under 18 years of age) then we can say there is evidence of lack.
Which brings the second point, that the assertion that an animal cannot consent seems absurd and little based in reality with the evidence available. While it is true that animals don't speak English, communication certainly exists and is in many cases clearer than the spoken word. Anyone who has ever had a dog that wanted to go out or hump their leg has observed this. Animals, notably dolphins, have been observed committing bestiality with other animals not in their own species. Now, I've had this strangely argued as no sign of consent, but if the thing itself is not consent then the term is meaningless.
Now, there are real complications to these sorts of matings (zoonotic disease and physical compatibilities in addition to normal animal handling) that should be addressed. The solutions are to provide your animal with regular veterinary care, be aware of how an animal may hurt you including unintentionally, both of which you should do anyway, and of course to use a condom if two or more persons are mating with the same animal.
As to the statutory rape case, it is a heuristic concerning violition. Certainly, in most cases we can be certain at a certain level of inebriation we would regret a sexual act. It is well known that we do things we regret when drunk, and there is little ability to discern a regrettable choice without consent aforehand and a good probability that even if they would do the same sober, they would regret doing so drunk. This is much less clear with animals and post pubescent children. Masturbation at some degree is universal barring some abnormality. You rarely see adults with great angst that they masturbated at age 17, and should have waited until age 18 yet still we prosecute children of these ages for crimes they have committed against themselves. Separate from culture, there is no reason to expect a volition issue were an animal to become sapient or vice verse, at least not in terms of sex.
The cultural issue is still relevant though. People get squicked by bestiality, and respect for our neighbors is important. That doesn't make bestiality wrong, though, any more than racist neighbors makes miscegenation evil. At most it makes it wrong for them.
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Is there some non-theocratic place I don't know about where it is illegal for a minor to masturbate? Or are you referring to other crimes committed against themselves?
I'm not so sure about your point about volition. Think about the first thing you can remember doing, back when you were a small child. Or think about things you've heard you did before you were old enough to remember at all. I doubt you had any worries about choice, identity, free will, and such at the time, but it's likely that now, looking back, you don't really feel that you chose to do whatever you did. Maybe you don't feel you were really you yet, maybe you don't feel you were truly making choices yet, maybe both. The point is that you don't feel you had volition at that time. And I don't see any better time than now to measure your volition back then; to base it off your self-perception then would be like asking somebody who is very drunk whether they are acting of their own free will. They'll say "yes" now, but in the morning they're going to tell a different story, and at that point you'll agree that they didn't have volition.
Now consider an animal achieving human-like sentience (through some means irrelevant to the discussion). For almost all animals, that's going to be a larger change than how different you were as of your first memory versus now. We consider a species to be pretty smart if members can do things like recognize themselves in mirrors and use tools, but humans start doing both of those by the time they're a year and a half old. So, were an animal elevated to that level of intelligence, it would surely say that it lacked volition beforehand, and we would have to agree. On those grounds, it would seem that the only two reasonable answers to "Does an animal have volition?" are "No" and "The question doesn't make sense." Either way, it doesn't seem like you can so casually dismiss volition as not an issue without any real inspection.
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In this case I'm referring to Florida and Virginia, where teenagers have been prosecuted for crimes committed against themselves. Now logically a plain reading of the law under those successful theories absolutely prohibits a 17 yr old from masturbating himself, which is a sex act committed against a minor. There are logistic issues with prosecuting that, as any prosecutable evidence would ipso facto be child porn and/or statutory rape. So they prosecute under the easier method.
My first memory was a gutter ball in candle-pin bowling, at maybe 3 or 4 years old. My second memory (we'll say hypothetically for legal reasons) was getting caught masturbating sometime between then and first grade. I still have the hypothetical psych reports from that time.
The problem is, that I do. I didn't have correct information. In fact, due to how I was raised I had deliberately incorrect information. . . which modified my still extant sexual behavior in a frankly more dangerous (in terms of STI) direction. This is strong evidence of a decision making process, but it wars with the rose colored glasses of childhood. Ive spent a lot of time reflecting on that. I've also been very drunk, to the point that looking back I know I had no volition. They are definitely different. It is also important to point out we're coming from opposite ends here- you the earliest memory, me the eldest illegality. If you properly surveyed the population and asked about their volition when they were 17, I have little doubt that everyone not suffering from some retardation ( I apologize I havent a PC term here) would clearly have volition and some healthy (or unhealthy as the case may be) form of sexuality and sexual experiences. Certainly that proportion will decrease with decreasing age, and discernibly so, but we have have no data on if or where the "0" point is- which we should remember is what the age of consent is supposed to represent.
now, it is possible I'm an aberration in this regard. But we don't know if I am unusual in my capacity for sexuality, my memory of the events, or both. What evidence I have suggests my memory is at least somewhat accurate. What we do know is that the legal and social standard we use is wrong in at least some cases. I would postulate that we have the moral responsibility to find out, else there is no way to minimize harm here.
I would also suggest that by removing sex from the equation may make it easier to process. Sex, less externalities such as disease and pregnancy, is not a bad thing in and of itself. So, if we consider an non sexual analogue we can make comparisons. As an arbitrary act, sex (again less externalities) is perhaps as complicated as cooking or bathing. We can certainly study if a child can choose to take a bath, and it seems that at some age under 18 they can, we know that a child probably should chose to take a bath sometimes, and that most likely they wont choose to bathe until they're older, and even then perhaps not often enough. That is a human activity though, so I guess forget that right now.
Lets instead imagine that a human being, through some means irrelevant to the discussion, became an animal. We can imagine what life would be like. We would have our bed on the floor, a bowl for food and water. If we were lucky our master might buy us a cool toy. Some people have pointed out that it might not be such a bad life. But lets say that your douchebag engineer owner doesn't play fetch with you ever because he has a machine to do that for him. Well, that sucks for you but it's not really animal abuse to most people. lets go a step further, and say he's using you as a test subject for his line of dog toys regardless of if you want to or not. Well, sucks to be you but it's his right as master. He can reward, punish, and otherwise train you to use his machine all he likes. He has to do something pretty horrible to you beyond all that to get you taken away. We don't *care* if animals consent or not, that's simply not the standard that is appropriate to use. The appropriate standard is "unnecessary harm," which you totally sidestepped.
Now think back to that youtube video. You probably saw that and thought that was a lucky dog. The dog certainly wanted to play with the toy. No one was forcing him, you could see that he was happy. He clearly communicated he was having fun vocally and through physical cues. As far as the toy is concerned, there seems to be evidence of volition. The mere addition of sex should not cause a problem theoretically, although we do lack the data for definitive proof either way.
I'm not trying to dismiss volition arbitrarily. I'm simply coming to a probable answer, based on limited data.
2372040 First, something entirely irrelevant: the age of consent is definitely not supposed to represent the point where volition rises above zero. You'd have to have brain damage to think a 17-year-old has zero volition. It's unclear if it ought to represent the point where volition reaches 100%, or 50%, or some other, less-round number, since it's seldom considered in those terms. But it's clearly not zero.
Anyway, a more relevant point is that if you devote a paragraph to analyzing when people do and don't have volition, then conclude with a brief assertion that volition should not be a problem in animals, you are asserting that animals have volition so clearly that you don't even need to present evidence. And you shouldn't do this if that's not actually the point you're trying to make.
And most important of all: it is, for all intents and purposes, quite impossible for me to sidestep issues of harm. Why would trauma, regret, fear, and pain even matter if not for their being harmful? You know I couldn't have written this blog from a deontological perspective, since the question doesn't even make sense from such a viewpoint, and you'd have to search quite widely indeed to find a teleologist who can simply ignore questions of harm. Far further than a staunch vanilla utilitarian such as myself, I assure you.
No, the issue here is that my gut says there's harm here that I'm not seeing. And it makes me wary when my gut disagrees with my logic and I can't explain why either of them is wrong. It means I'm missing something, and I don't like that. Ethics is far too important to invite mistakes by simply picking your favorite side in such conflicts and applying no further thought.
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Which was my point about the law being brain damaged. If age of consent is 18 in your state, then legally a 17 year old has zero volition in terms of sex, no exceptions. A day later, when he's 18, he has 100% by law. Compared to, say, operating a motor vehicle where there are tons of exceptions for emergency, rural youth/farm work, and activities done on private property, probationary periods, and a more or less normal distribution to that activity.
You are correct that I did dilute my point, which I apologize for. I felt that it was important to present both theories. I did present evidence for the can consent theory, that the dog apparently of his own volition was playing with a ball, anecdotal evidence of bestiality (or at least interspecies mating) in the animal kingdom. Is it strong evidence? Of course not. You can't have strong evidence either way when you have a chilling effect on science when it comes to sex- see Rind et al.
Nor do I suggest that we do so:
We are agreed on this point. I had a bit about sorting "with harm" from "without harm" and concluded it seems to be possible. You are free to dispute that bit.
And this is the crux of the problem. Ultimately, you'll need to decide yourself if this is worth fighting in your own heart. The strongest evidence against bestiality I have seen is this. My personal heuristic has always to come down on the side of logic. That's not what convinced me though. What convinced me was my grandfather.
My grandfather is a racist. He believes strongly in miscegenation among other things. He warned me away from the "jungle fever" which I never had. I learned he was wrong about these things later in life. Still, I'm not much attracted to african americans. I get how it's squicky to him. I had a gay friend who had the same gut feeling of wrongness at gay weddings.
I still can't fully explain the psycology of these sorts of gut feelings. They're certainly mnemetic, subconscious. They tend to be strongest around sex, but are by no means exclusive to that realm. I think they're a remnant of when societies were much less socially advanced. It's some social instinct to avoid (then lethal) ostracization back before we could or would reason through problems. The point is, it seems to have no correlation to the morality of a thing.
That is why, given two weak and opposing evidences, I have discarded one and favored the other. I could be wrong, but I think the odds are in my favor. I've put a lot of thought in these issues since before I was technically of age. I still could be convinced elsewise with strong enough evidence.
Also, It's nice to see another utilitarian. Feel free to PM me or otherwise hit me up if you ever want to talk about utility math.
2374454 The problem with logic of course is that you won't always have time to apply it before making a decision. Even worse, sometimes you'll have time to apply it in a slipshod manner, giving a false veneer of certainty to a poorly thought-out choice. So it is my opinion that it is important to spend time considering your instincts, so you will know good rules of thumb when you can trust them and how to quickly correct for their errors. And the better you understand an error, the more general of a lesson you can learn from it. Correspondingly, you want to know what you're likely to miss when trying to run through a choice methodically; the unconsidered analysis is doomed to incompleteness.
Besides, the various arguments against utilitarianism demonstrate how easy it is to miss something and arrive at an incorrect conclusion, given the complexities of the real world. It's helpful to find a heuristic for when a decision deserves deeper inspection before you commit, and the heuristic "does it feel wrong?" is at least an easy one to implement.
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All true, but we're getting on a tangent. We have the time and means to test and come to a truer conclusion than gut instinct. Of course, seeing a problem makes me what to fix it.
With utilitarianism, all the various critiques I am aware of that bring it to some absurd conclusion are fixed with better math. Specifically, logistic scaling, and sorting utility and harm separately. The first is a reasonable intuition considering diminishing returns, and needs a formal proof that is as yet beyond me. The latter is empirical- You can test this yourself next time you have some pain that needs salving by treating it with masturbation. You'll find, at best, that you have an orgasm and pain at the same time.
2379292 . . . I think I can guarantee that I will never attempt to treat pain with masturbation. The closest I can even imagine is coincidentally masturbating while there's pain I'm failing to care about, and even then I doubt that ignoring pain would put me in the right mood.
Anyway, it's really not a tangent. The question was always "this is why bestiality isn't wrong in general, somebody either explain why the argument feels wrong or find a way that it is wrong." I'm never going to outsource the majority of an ethical decision to a bunch of people I don't know on the internet, so asking for ideas worth considering is the furthest I'm likely to ever go.
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Well, I hope that I at least pointed you in the right direction. The problem with not trusting others conclusions is that it takes time and effort to do the research and learn the truth for yourself. I hope you do find the truth in separating bestiality with harm from bestiality without harm, and ideally that you publish. I worry what could happen to you if you did, though, due to rind et al.