
Luxembourg's leaders have proposed a far-reaching animal rights bill - sethbannon
https://news.vice.com/article/luxembourg-is-set-to-become-the-most-animal-friendly-country-in-the-world
======
kilovoltaire
> The legislation wouldn't apply to most farm animals, a common provision in
> animal rights laws.

I expect that farm animals are the most numerous and most abused large animals
in most countries, oh well…

~~~
GraffitiTim
Very much agreed, but still happy to see people trying to take a step in the
right direction. They do mention ending the practice of killing male chicks,
which is currently universal among egg-producing farms.

~~~
ars
> They do mention ending the practice of killing male chicks

Why?

I mean if you want to make sure animals are not in pain, and treated well, no
problem.

But what's the reason for not killing the male chicks? What do they plan to do
with them? Release them back into the wild?

~~~
MustardTiger
Only produce female chicks in the first place. The tech is already available,
only introduces a small increase in cost, and I believe Germany is mandating
its use in a few years already.

~~~
ars
> The tech is already available

There is no such tech. If you think there is post a link to it.

At best there is current _research_ (not actually a product yet) to identify
the chicks while still in the egg, and I see absolutely no difference between
killing them in the egg or out of it.

Just kill them painlessly (i.e. extremely quickly) and move on.

~~~
semi-extrinsic
I believe the GP comment wasn't too far off. This article from last year says
the Germans have done promising research and intend to have a working
prototype this year, which sexes (technical term) chicks at just three days
after inoculation.

[http://m.thepoultrysite.com/news/34741](http://m.thepoultrysite.com/news/34741)

I also understand there is no tech used to identify the sex of chicks at a
young enough age. It's a highly specialized skill (chicken sexing) that takes
lots of training. I think it's even specialized between different types of
poultry.

~~~
ars
> I believe the GP comment wasn't too far off.

"The tech is already available, only introduces a small increase in cost"

vs:

"have done promising research and intend to have a working prototype this
year"

I consider that quite far off. They don't even have a prototype to show that
it even works, let alone cost information for "a small increase in cost".

------
Wissmania
While it gives me hope that legislation is at least acknowledging that the
suffering of animals is something we might care about, it still is sad to see
the same arbitrary pet/livestock divide.

Of course extending such legislation to farm animals would be politically
impossible, but it still hurts to read

> the animal's dignity must prevail over the profitability of the industrial
> activity

when we all know it's not true.

------
gggggggg
honest question here. What is a animal vs a rodent vs a insect vs a pest?

I am all for this, but what are the edge cases? I couldn't find it anywhere in
that article.

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morgante
The article says the bill will "ban people from giving animals as gifts or
prizes." Can someone explain why giving animals as gifts is inhumane or
something we should ban?

Giving a relative a dog to raise seems altogether kind (especially a rescue
dog) and beneficial for both (assuming you know the character of the person
who will raise the dog and that they are ready/willing).

~~~
unvs
you'd be amazed at the number of dogs in animal shelters who are there cause
the kid who got it for Christmas suddenly got tired of it. banning it might be
extreme, but I wish more people would think of the consequences of gifting
someone an animal.

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daodedickinson
It says legislation wouldn't apply to most farm animals, but it bans the
poultry industry (unless they have some billionaire ready to adopt a bunch of
roosters?).

One can easily see that the call to "limit the sales of dogs and cats to
reputable breeders" is gonna make some of these bill authors unjustifiably
rich at a higher likelihood than it protects a cat or dog.

~~~
tomjen3
The poultry industry won't be hurt too much, since there is no good reason you
can't sell rooster meat (actually they will typically be a little bit larger
than the females) but I don't know if they do already sell them.

The egg industry will be hit somewhat, since it will essentially double the
price of eggs. Probably it will also hurt the pre-made goods industry
(cookies, etc) and they will likely be forced out of Luxemberg.

(Essentially nobody, other than people who raise chicks in their backyard, use
the same chickens for eggs and meat, since different chickens species are
optimized for either so this probably won't impact those who raise meat
chickens much).

~~~
maxerickson
Industrial broilers of both sexes are raised to slaughter.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broiler](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broiler)

I think it's also the case that requiring something else be done with males
would have much less than 2x effect on the price of eggs. A hen will produce
~300 eggs a year. Whatever extra it might cost to raise the less efficient egg
breed roosters for meat would be less than the cost of feeding a hen to
produce that many eggs.

~~~
tomjen3
It is not just that they are less efficient, it is that they supposedly taste
terrible.

~~~
maxerickson
The bad taste has the ring of folk wisdom.

------
marcoperaza
Isn't it interesting that calls for animal rights are strongest among those
who don't interact with any animals except pets? We've become too far removed
from the realities of nature. It leads to pointless feel-good laws like this,
which "prohibit[s] the poultry industry practice of killing male chicks
because they don't lay eggs" among other things.

In general, I think it is totally inappropriate for governments to put human
beings in prison for crimes against the well being of an animal. The coercive
authority of the government must only be used to protect human interests. That
doesn't mean that we shouldn't have environmental law; that's about protecting
a shared resource, not about protecting the well being of any animal as an end
in itself.

~~~
adrusi
I don't know if I agree with you but I see your point, and it's not the sort
of thing that people should be downvoting, I don't think.

I usually think that the law shouldn't exist to enforce morality, but I'm not
sure if that principle should be applied in the absolute sense or not. Anyway,
its not clear that it's immoral under any secular ethics to "mistreat" animals
in the first place, especially if there's a clear benefit to humans. Even if
it is immoral, its not clear which animals should be valued. Most people seem
to agree that chimpanzees should be treated with more consideration than
jellyfish. My personal utility function values warm blooded animals higher
than all others and below humans, but that's just an intuitive preference, not
based on any rigorous analysis. I have hope that the next few decades of AI
research might shed some light on this issue by giving us an idea of what
"sentience" really means, but this is far from guaranteed.

I suppose I'd like to see efforts focused on restructuring meat subsidies to
make meat more expensive (and better reflective of the costs of production).
I'm sure doing this would be a political nightmare, and I don't have the
necessary understanding of agricultural economics to give any suggestions for
exactly how to do this, but it seems doable. Higher meat prices will also
hopefully make synthetic meat research more attractive. Synthetic meat would
conveniently bypass this whole debate.

Other measures that should probably be attempted before we turn to fining and
jailing people for mistreating or disrespecting animals should probably
address the pet breeding industry, people who aren't looking for a dog to aid
with hunting or foraging or some other specialized purpose should have more
incentives to prefer a shelter over a breeder than currently exist. And maybe
make it a crime to intentionally kill or hurt certain animals for no reason.

------
jpatokal
> "In North America, the fur trade is an example of the sustainable use of
> renewable natural resources," Herscovici told VICE News. "This is the key
> concern of modern environmental thinking."

The chutzpah is strong in this one.

------
B1FF_PSUVM
There was a nice SF novel by Clifford D. Simak where all the humans eventually
migrated to Jupiter, to cavort pleasantly amongst the clouds, and the world
was literally left to the dogs.

All we need is the migration to Jupiter.

~~~
venomsnake
"City" it is called to whomever is concerned. Pretty good stuff.

------
vermooten
It's a good start.

~~~
metaphor
...to what end, from your perspective?

~~~
dave2000
Can't speak for the OP but for many people the billions of animals killed
every year for food, clothing and fun is a major moral crime which will be
looked back on in the future - both the activities and the almost total lack
of consideration given that it's even a problem - as completely unbelievable,
just like women being unable to vote, black slavery and so on.

~~~
justsaysmthng
> is a major moral crime

And spiritual too.

I believe the proverbial "forbidden fruit" in the Bible is actually animal
flesh. That's what transformed Heaven, were humans an animals cohabited
peacefully, into not-Heaven - Earth.

Consequently, at least in theory - not eating animal flesh would transform
Earth back into Heaven. And that is the grand challenge for us as a species.

As long as there are slaughterhouses there will be battlefields (Leo Tolstoy).

Overcoming the meat addiction requires a higher level of spiritual awareness,
which also leads to non-violence towards other humans - or Peace.

~~~
phd514
Make your case for not eating meat, but you can't do it from that passage in
the Bible. The Bible's forbidden fruit was unambiguously fruit from a tree,
not animal flesh. Adam and Eve's taking of it was direct rebellion against
God. Turning Earth back into heaven requires atonement for that rebellion
against God. It has absolutely nothing to do with eating meat. In fact, one of
the very first things that God does in Genesis 3:21 after Adam and Eve take
the forbidden fruit is provide animal skins as clothing for them, partially to
foreshadow the system of animal sacrifices that would be instituted by God in
the book of Exodus for the nation of Israel.

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KaiserPro
it almost makes up for the systematic tax dodging and money laundering that
the country relies on to keep a float.

 _almost_

~~~
scatters
Yeah, nice to see they've found a way to square their consciences with
stealing from the taxpayers of Europe.

~~~
rosege
depends on your view, I see the politicians and the ones living at the expense
of others as stealing from the tax payers

------
pcardh0
Symptoms of a dying society (fertility rate of 1.57). Can't wait to see what
they think of next.

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jensen123
Freedom is very important to me. Keeping animals locked up makes me
uncomfortable. Of course, the fact that I enjoy being free, does not
necessarily mean that freedom is important to animals as well. Perhaps animals
are too dumb to appreciate freedom.

I have tried eating a vegan diet a couple times. I was surprised by how much
delicious vegan food there is. I actually didn't miss the eating of meat much.
However, my energy levels were really low, so I went back to eating meat.

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jensen123
> Isn't it interesting that calls for animal rights are strongest among those
> who don't interact with any animals except pets?

That's an interesting observation. My impression is that the most intelligent
humans typically move to large cities, whereas the dumbest ones remain in the
rural areas. Most farmers don't seem terribly bright (there are of course
exceptions). Could this have something to do with it?

~~~
dang
You can't slur entire populations of people like that here. That's a bannable
offense on Hacker News, so please don't do it again.

We detached this subthread from
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11702913](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11702913)
and marked it off-topic.

------
atomical
What about rights for ladybugs?

~~~
yeukhon
What about it? Is there anything specific you want to raise up as an issue?

~~~
atomical
My point was obvious. Why are animals valued more than other living organisms?

~~~
humbledrone
Ladybugs are animals. Note the "Kingdom: Animalia" here [1].

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coccinellidae](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coccinellidae)

