Animal protectionism

Part of a series on
Animal rights
Overview Animal welfare Around the world History Timeline Animal cruelty Veganism Vegetarianism Primate rights in research
Movement Advocates Vegans Vegetarians Groups
Animal abuse Animal–industrial complex Killing Mutilation Wild animals Consumption Dogs Horses Cats Cattle Bloodsports Bullfighting Hunting Fishing Animal testing Cosmetic Captivity Zoos Circuses Oceanariums Companion animals Puppy mills Abandonment
Ideas Abolitionism Animal protectionism Carnism Personism Sentiocentrism Speciesism
Related topics Cultured meat Environmentalism Radical Deep ecology Humanism Welfarism
Animals portal
v t e

Animal protectionism is a position within animal rights theory that favors incremental change in pursuit of non-human animal interests. It is contrasted with abolitionism, the position that human beings have no moral right to use animals, and ought to have no legal right, no matter how the animals are treated.^[1]

Animal protectionists agree with abolitionists that the animal welfare model of animal protection—whereby animals may be used as food, clothing, entertainment and in experiments so long as their suffering is regulated—has failed ethically and politically, but argue that its philosophy can be reformulated. Robert Garner of the University of Leicester, a leading academic protectionist, argues that animal use may in some circumstances be justified, although it should be better regulated, and that the pursuit of better treatment and incremental change is consistent with holding an abolitionist position. Gary Francione, professor of law at Rutgers School of Law-Newark and a leading abolitionist, calls this approach "new welfarism". He regards it as counter-productive because it wrongly persuades the public that the animals they use are being treated kindly, and that continued use is therefore justifiable.^[1] Francione regards the abolitionist position as the only one that can properly be called animal rights.^[2]