Animal Liberation: A New Ethics for Our Treatment of Animals

As the book’s title suggests, the idea of “animal liberation” is central to Peter Singer’s arguments. At its most basic level, the term suggests a history of oppression and enslavement that the public may not connect or associate with animals. Despite the general ignorance toward the treatment of animals in both the past and present, the history of humanity’s attitude toward animals has been built upon religious and cultural foundations. While also the name of the Animal Liberation movement, the term in and of itself is a symbol, a metaphor for the “dominion” of humans that results in the imprisonment of animals in a cycle of use and abuse. Just as mankind is responsible for the mistreatment of animals, it, too, has to be the solution. Human intervention is unfortunately unavoidable. While the title is a summation of Singer’s points on “speciesism,” it also speaks to the ultimate goal that he believes both society and the individual should be working toward. The title also taps into radical rhetoric used in the civil rights and feminist movements, an echo of the comparisons Singer himself repeatedly uses to bolster his arguments throughout the book.