Well for those that read this blogg, you can see we’re plagued by spamming pests but for keepers of birds, or any animal for that matter, there is another more serious pest which is threatens our very right to own and keep animals and that is the so called Animal Rights Movement.  Simply pick up the Philippine Star on Saturdays and there every week the enemy espouses their ideology from the platform of the Pet section.  How ironic it is that they should use this platform to promote their insidious message.  While the majority of pet owners, animal farmers and carnivores are responsible caring people they are not presented that way and this is how they promote their ideology.

The most notable of these rights groups include People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals  or Animal Liberation are  whose deluded agenda places people and animals as equals at best and at worst they believe that the world would be better off without humans.  A revealing analysis of the founder of PTEA can be found on the Center For Consumer Freedom site which reveals just how misinformed and misanthropic the founder of the movement is.

Animal rights activists often engage in such extreme measures to promote their animal rights agenda that they themselves become outlaws engaging in illegal and destructive behavior in a bid to stop the keeping of all animals, the consumption of meat, research or anything for which the animal can not consent.  Even relatively moderate groups such as Advocacy For Animals do not believe that anyone has the right to keep birds because they are wild animals.  Their arguments are focused and persuasive but are so narrow they they miss many contra-indicative details in order to promote their point, however to an uneducated public brought up on talking sentient, talking Disney animals it is people like us that keep animals that often look look like the extremists.   Peter Singerand the other animal rightists may promote this view but the facts speak for themselves even if the animals can’t.

If the general public, rightly or wrongly becomes engaged in an issue then democratic governments have to act so we as keepers must not be complacent to the call for responsible ownership. In Europe animal welfare advocates have lobbied heavily to change the production standards for meat and laying birds based on assumed best practices, which when tested after implementation have shown to be antagonistic to the goal they hoped to achieve.  The March, 2008 issue of Poultry International shows that morbity and mortality rates of chickens produced under welfare friendly and organic systems are an order of magnitude higher than those produced under  conventional conditions.  Studies reported  the ABC Science Unit in January 2009 tell us that common assumptions made about the stress suffered by poultry kept under intensive production systems are false.  When measured objectively using blood cortisol levels as stress indicators, the “bird friendly” free-range system is far more stressful to far more birds than a cage system.  Further the incidence of disease, including those transmissible to humans is far higher in the free range systems.

Assumptions made as to to an animal’s welfare, based on it’s right to freedom or capacity to express natural behaviours are inherently flawed when those rights are those that should be applied to humans!  Without exception, if an animal’s welfare is affected by captivity it is because the conditions under which it is kept are not suitable.  Animals have different desires and drives, each as diverse as the species examined and it does them no service to be managed as one and especially to use humans as the model for their welfare.  As bird owners, keepers and breeders we should not underestimate the reach of PETA or similar groups for it is the creaky hinge that receives the oil and it is they that are getting heard not us.