Love of animals

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Love of animals is selective. Dinner together. Drawing by Harrison Weir around 1880.

As a love for animals is a general or individual, sometimes exaggerated felt human affection to (certain) animals referred. While an ethical is directed ratio of people to animals in general on the welfare of animals and, among others, in the design of an animal protection law expresses, is in the love of animals often a as compassion perceived custom image such as a house or pet the animal owner in Foreground.

Attempts at definition

There is no clear definition of love for animals. According to Schneider and Huttenlau, it describes the "acceptance of the animal's independence", which requires an awareness that animals and humans are "parts of nature" and are "related". Gerhard Staguhn , on the other hand, describes love of animals as a sometimes "brutal appropriation, keeping captive, subjugating" and "exploiting animals". The term suggests that animal husbandry is based on mutual love .

According to Jean-Claude Wolf, the individual love of animals is integrated into socio-cultural values. Socially established preferences for certain animals are opposed to an aversion to other animals. The preference for pets such as dogs or cats is called idiosyncratic because it cannot be justified rationally any more than the simultaneous fear of spiders or snakes. Domesticated mammals generally enjoy a privileged position, apart from cultural taboos, according to which, for example, in Arab-Islamic societies the dog is considered unclean for religious reasons. Animal love is therefore not the same as caring for the animal's welfare.

A study by Brown et al. (1972) pointed out that a pathological love of animals can lead to a shift and turning away from other people. Irrational love for animals can - according to Ebermut Rudolph - be interpreted psychologically as a felt bond with fate: The animal becomes the idea of ​​an alter ego . The “animal lover” increasingly humanizes his pet until he gradually takes over its behavior and physiognomic characteristics to a certain extent through more and more intensive contact with the animal. In mythology, the stories of the werewolf describe the person who transforms himself into a wolf who experiences not only a change in shape, but also a change in nature.

In the political discussion about animal welfare laws, according to Ullrich Melle, the “animal welfare lobby” promotes compassion for animals that is anchored in society. So-called “animal lovers” have an eye on the unconditional protection of animals , which often contradicts scientifically based arguments, according to which, in order to preserve an ecosystem, it may be necessary to reduce individual animal populations.

See also

literature

  • Jürgen Körner : brother dog & sister cat. Love of animals - Man's longing for a lost paradise . Kiepenheuer and Witsch, Cologne 1996, ISBN 978-3-462-02527-9 .
  • Bernhard Kathan : The poultry shears or the invention of the love of animals. Österreichischer Studien-Verlag, Innsbruck, 1993. ISBN 3-901160-17-5
  • Ullrich Melle: Animals in Ethics. The question of the limit of the moral community. In: Journal for Philosophical Research, Volume 42, Issue 2, April – June 1988, pp. 247–273
  • Ulrike Pollack: The urban human-animal relationship: ambivalences, opportunities and risks . Volume 6 of Social Rules, Universitätsverlag der TU Berlin, 2009, ISBN 3-798-32112-4
  • Ebermut Rudolph: The “other me” of humans in animals. A contribution to the question of the "coherence of life" and other psychological and paranormal phenomena in the human-animal relationship. In: Journal of Ethnology, Volume 107, Issue 1, 1982, pp. 23-68
  • Gerhard Staguhn : Love of animals .: A one-sided relationship. Hanser, Munich 1996, ISBN 3-446-18545-3
  • Jean-Claude Wolf: Why be moral towards animals? In: Journal for Philosophical Research , Volume 46, Issue 3, July – September 1992, pp. 429–438

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Ulrike Pollack; The urban human-animal relationship: ambivalences, opportunities and risks Technische Universität Berlin 2009, p. 35
  2. ^ Jean-Claude Wolf, p. 432
  3. ↑ Daniela Schmidt: Animal-assisted pedagogy: The horse as an educational medium in inpatient youth welfare: a fad or a method with promising possibilities? , Diplomica Verlag, 2012, p. 94
  4. ↑ Ebermut Rudolph, p. 52f
  5. ↑ Ullrich Melle, p. 247f