Non-Speciesist Suffering

Every other form of life is just as selfish, self-centered and gratuitously self-pleasing as the human race.
They all have, they all are and they all will act in order to promote their own genes. That is what life is all about and consequently that is what all the living creatures are about.
As long as there are sentient creatures on this planet, there will be violence, exploitation and suffering

The history of life on this planet has been written with pain and suffering.
We mustn�t accept suffering just because it happens in the forest or the savanna, and to nonhuman animals by other nonhuman animals. Suffering is bad when it is considered natural just as much as when it�s considered artificial. All suffering should be stopped, it doesn�t matter how we define it and where it happens.

�Natural suffering� doesn�t hurt less than �artificial suffering�. Suffering is wrong and should be stopped even if it occurs in �nature�. Savanna, forest, desert, battery cage or dairy farm, for the sufferers the location is meaningless. Taxonomy and Geography are not relevant when it comes to suffering.

The species of the suffering causer and of the sufferer are meaningless too. Why suffering that humans cause to nonhumans is considered unnecessary or artificial? Is it because it is taken place on concrete and not on bare ground? When orcas are playing volleyball with a seal, is it natural because it happens in the ocean and because it�s nonhumans who hurt other nonhumans?

Violence, rape and exploitation are routine in what humans call nature. Are they o.k because they are done to nonhuman animals by nonhuman animals? Do you think that a female sea lion feels relieved that the human narrator of the National Geographic TV show says that rape among sea lions is common? Does she care who rapes her? Does she care why she is being raped? Does she care that humans call it natural? She doesn�t. And if she doesn�t you shouldn�t either. She just wants it to stop. And you should help her.

For many animal rights activists nature represents perfection, something ideal from which we should learn, or something spiritual that we should worship, something that ought to be preserved and never criticized.
We want to take you into a journey to the true nature of nature�

We will start the journey with humans� favorite wildlife animal.
With a permanent smile (which is purely anatomical no more indicative of the animal's state of mind than the tusks on an elephant) and graceful locomotion, the dolphin is probably the cutest oppressor.

dolphin Dolphins occasionally surround a group of harbor porpoises, single out an individual, and ram him repeatedly, they using their beaks to toss the unfortunate creature in the air. The porpoise dies of multiple injuries, such as skeletal fractures and severe internal trauma.
The two species don�t compete for the same food and don�t eat each other. It's not territorial either. It�s a form of bullying. The dolphins do it for fun.

Dusky dolphins often herd great shoals of fish, drive them to the surface, which acts as a wall, and then swirl about them, concentrating the bait fish into a packed ball. The dolphins take turns swooping through the terrified fish, snapping up several in a single swoop. After such a meal, the dolphins leap acrobatically, sometimes dozens of times, as if in excited celebration.

Infanticide is a common reproductive strategy among dolphins. Female dolphins become sexually attractive to males within days after losing a calf, so male dolphins kill newborn calves very often.

And to finish the true characterization of the symbol of beauty�
Gang rapes are very common among dolphins. A few dolphins group together, drive females in estrus away from the group, and repeatedly rape them.
The males sometimes band together in what are called coalitions, to fight off other bands of male dolphins that are looking for the same thing themselves.

The cat, humans� second best �pet�, is actually a sophisticated little battle machine.
They hear sounds at a higher frequency than most animals and have an incredible ability to use their ears like satellite dishes. The cats hearing ability is a very efficient �intelligence� in the �battle� against rodents, birds and insects.
Cats also have night vision. They are better able to see at night than most other animals because the lining of their eyeballs has an exceptional ability to reflect light, thus they catch a stronger image in dim light.

The cat�s whiskers are highly mobile and incredibly sensitive, supplied with many nerve-endings which transmit information to the cat's brain about any contact they make or changes in air pressure that may occur. In a split-second they can detect the body outline of their prey and react accordingly.

They also have more than two hundred million olfactory cells, so if they missed their prey even though they see better at night, and if the current victim was very quiet so their great hearing failed too, the cats can still smell him.

But cats are not intelligence unit only, they are a full battle machine and their weapons are claws and teeth. They have a great advantage over many other clawed animals who's fixed claws are worn down by day to day wear and tear. The cat is permanently carrying 20 pin-sharp sheathed daggers and can draw them out for use in a split-second.

cat

Cat's teeth are lethal weapons and represent certain death for any unfortunate prey.
An adult cat has thirty teeth, consisting of: four canines, twelve incisors, ten premolars and four molars. The large pin-sharp canine front teeth are used to stab when hunting, defending or attacking.

Satiation doesn't prevent cats' hunting urges because the aims are not nutritional only in the first place. Cats get a thrill out of the chase and the torture. Instead of chasing-catching-killing-eating, they release their victims and recatch them, again and again. The panicked creatures are trying to do everything they can in order to escape, they think that they are going to die each and every time. Bitten and beaten, they are sometimes killed by the cat and sometimes released heavily traumatized and severely wounded.

The violence is also interspecies.
A female cat in heat does an advertising show with loud calls, excessive scent-marking, and coy seduction movements. The female�s goal is to enlarge her mating options by increasing competition. Putting it differently, the female is calling all the males in the neighborhood to street fight over her. And cats� fights are very violent.
The mating itself is also very violent. The male usually mounts the prone female and bites the nape of her neck to keep her calm. The penis has a bone and the tip has backward pointing spines. The spines role is to keep the penis in and to cause pain upon withdrawal which stimulates ovulation.

So cats are battle machines in disguise of �pets�. The following are some of the more notorious terrestrial predators.

As opposed to common conception Hyenas get the majority of their nourishment from live prey, scavenging is only a little part of their overall diet.
Hyenas chase their victims for long distances, biting and tearing at the prey's back, belly and legs, while still on the run. The victim finally succumbs to exhaustion. Hyenas have large front paws for holding down a carcass while they tear off the meat, and they have strong forelegs for carrying off large hunks of meat and bones.

Female Cheetahs catch live prey for their cubs to use as hunting practice such as rabbits, fawns, or young gazelles with which the cubs practice their skills in chasing, tripping and eventually the suffocating bite.
The cubs accompany their mother on the hunt from around 3 months, although they do not take part at this stage.

When pursuing large prey, wolves generally attack from all angles, targeting the necks and sides of their prey. Wolf packs test large populations of prey terrestrial by initiating a chase, then targeting on the less-fit prey, the elderly, diseased, and young.

When salmon availability is high, bears go only for the fatty skin, brain, and eggs, removing these parts while the salmons are still alive for much or all of the time they are being eaten.

Chimpanzees are largely fruit eaters but they are not vegetarians, red colobus monkeys account for more than 80% of the Chimpanzees� prey.
They do not select the colobus they kill randomly, they pick infant and juveniles. The hunters often target monkeys carrying small infants and will take the defenseless baby.

They do not use their canine teeth, they grab the prey and strike it to death on the ground or against a tree limb.
No wonder that these are humans� closest species.

aerial If a cheetah is the classical example for a terrestrial battle machine, then an eagle is an aerial one.
Just as war planes detect their targets from thousands of meters above, so do eagles. They spot their prey, perceiving even the slightest color shift or the slightest movement on the earth. The eagle�s eye has an angle of vision of 300 degrees and it can magnify a given image around six to eight times.
They can scan an area of 30,000 hectares (300 square kilometers) while flying 4,500 meters above it. They can easily distinguish a rabbit hidden among grasses from an altitude of 1,500 meters and spot a white snow rabbit on a snow surface, from a 2 kilometer distance. They can dive at a prey at over 100 kilometers per hour.
Their feet are equipped with sharp, curved talons for capturing prey, and their strong beaks are hooked for biting and tearing flesh.
Being swift fliers, some hawks can attain speeds of over 150 mph (240 kilometer per hour) when diving.

As opposed to owls� image of calm and peaceful creatures they are sophisticated battle units as well. Not only do owls have about 110 degrees vision range, with about 70 degrees of binocular vision (seeing an object with both eyes at the same time, which means 3 dimensions vision and the ability to judge distances in a similar way to humans), they also have a very flexible neck with 14 vertebras, (twice as many as humans) which allow the owl to turn his head through a range of 270 degrees, and if that�s not enough, owls� ears are asymmetrically placed on their head. This results in a slight time lag between a sound wave reaching right and left ear, which enables the owls to accurately locate the direction and range of a sound made by a potential prey, in total darkness.

The classic example of marine battle machines are sharks, with their under skin electrically sensitive receptor cells who locate prey and of course their unique jaws, compound with sharp, skinny, long, pointed, triangular teeth which are continually replaced by new sharper teeth, every 6-8 weeks to avoid a wear.

marine Less famed as a fierce predator is the Octopus.
Octopuses use their eight sucker-lined arms to capture their prey which is mostly bottom-dwelling crustaceans and fish. When the victim has a shell, the octopus pierces it and injects poison that causes paralysis. The venom contains some maculotoxin, a poison more violent than any found on land animals, and tetrodotoxin, which causes motor paralysis and occasionally respiratory failure. The senses of the prey are often intact, meaning the victims are aware and remain fully conscious but unable to respond. Then the Octopuses release salivary enzymes, loosening the meat from the inner shell and then use their hard, parrot-like beaks to tear pieces of meat.

The seabed is full of violence and manipulations with thousands of horrible hunting techniques. Armed with a huge powerful club, the mantis shrimp smasher is one of the seabed bullies. The Smashers use this ability to attack snails, crabs, molluscs and rock oysters. Using their blunt clubs enables them to crack the shells of their prey into pieces.
Because the smashers strike so rapidly, they generate cavitation bubbles that produce measurable forces on their prey when they collapse, in addition to the strike itself, so even if the initial strike misses the prey, the resulting shock wave can be enough to kill or stun the prey.

bleeding to death In order to tackle an elephant seal, Great White Whale typically attacks from below and behind, immobilizes the seal with a tremendous bite to the hindquarters, then retreats and waits for his prey to bleed to death before returning to eat him. Pieces of blubber and flesh are sawed away at the surface, but taken to the bottom to be swallowed. Smaller seals, such as the 1.5-metre Harbor Seal, are grabbed at the surface and pulled underwater until they stop struggling, then eaten at or near the bottom. Juvenile Harbor Seals are simply plucked from the surface like grapes and eaten whole.

It is no wonder that the most spectacular act of cooperation among marine mammals regards to hunting. The Humpback Whales hunt fish by direct attack or by stunning them by hitting the water with their flippers or flukes. But they also use a very inventive feeding technique that is called bubble net fishing. A group of whales swims rapidly in wide circles around and under a school of fish, blowing air through their blowholes. The bubbles form a visual barrier that serves to confine the school within an ever-tighter area. The whales then suddenly swim upwards and through the bubble net, mouths agape, swallowing thousands of fish in one gulp. This technique can involve a ring of bubbles up to 30m (100ft) in diameter and the cooperation of a dozen whales at once.

Orcas are like cats, they like to play with their food. They toss seals back and forth between each other like volleyballs.

When attacking large whale, orcas hunt like wolves pack. Often they try to exhaust one whale from the group or separate a calf. When attacking a sperm whale, the orcas don't let him dive because they can't chase him in the deep. Sometimes they don't eat the whale but choose to eat only the tongue, lips and throat area.
Orcas also attack and kill animals on shore, they are the only whale that do that.

Humans are not the only species suffering from stress based diseases such as high levels of the wrong sort of cholesterol (LDL), increased blood pressure, hardening of the arteries, ulcer, depression and anxiety.
The social life of male baboons can be extremely stressful due to the harsh hierarchy.
They often get beaten as victims of displaced aggression. When a male baboon loses a fight, frustrated, he spins around and attacks a subordinate male who was minding his own business. An extremely high percentage of primate aggression represents frustration displaced onto innocent bystanders.
They carefully search for some tuber to eat and clean it off, only to have it stolen by someone of a higher rank and so on. Glucocorticoid levels are elevated among low-ranking baboons and among the entire group if the dominance hierarchy is unstable or if a new, aggressive male has just joined the troop.
The arbitrariness, the fact that the baboons never know when will be the next attack, puts the baboons in a constant state of stress.
As for females, their number one cause of stress is male immigration, when a new male enters a group and may threaten to bully and kill other baboons, especially infants.
stress Besides male immigration, reproductive state, predation and rank instability also triggers female stress.
Anxiety levels also rise when males, attempting to assert their power, kill infants. For several days after an infant�s murder, his mother would scream and flee whenever the killing male approached.

Long before the slaves of ancient Egypt, Assyria and the Roman Empire, some species of ants are known to attack and take over the colonies of other ant species. Others are less expansionist but just as aggressive, they attack colonies to steal eggs or larvae, which they either eat or raise as slaves.

slavery The Amazon ants are one of these salve making ants. The colony send a scout - who travel up to 150 yards, search under rocks and leaf litter for a disguised subterranean nest of the Formica ant species, the scout finds her way home, and then leads about 2,000 workers on a slave raid back to the Formica nest.

The workers of Amazon Ants have lost the ability to forage for food, feed their brood or queen, or even clean their own nest. If the ants relocate the nest, they don't even move themselves to the new nest - the Formica salves ants carry them. The Amazon ants have become so specialized at obtaining slaves from the related genus formica to do these chores for them that they are not bothered by the deficits.

Rape, sex in a forceful or coercive form, is very common in a variety of species. In some species rape and violence is the only common way of reproduction. All the individuals were born through rape.

Female geese, ducks, some herbivorous, some species of bird, bottlenose dolphins, arachnids, whales and sea elephants are raped as a way of habit.

rape During spring and summer, drakes (male ducks) invade flocks that are in their post breeding period, pick a hen and take her to what is called a �rape flight�. Number of drakes (both mated and unmated) fly around the hen and gang rape her. The rape flights are more frequent during late afternoons, at a period when incubating hens are taking their recesses and so are more prone to drakes' attract.

When a male Sea Elephant wants to mate, he throws a flipper over the side of a female, grips her neck with his teeth and begins copulation. Resistance by a female only results in the male moving his large and heavy body on top of the female so she is unable to move.

Certain species of mole rape their own species newborns, so that when those moles mature and become fertile, they will become pregnant with the sperm of the mole that raped them at a very young age.

Infanticide is another example of interspecies violence and it is another form of rape.
The males who kill infants from their own species, do it to force the females who just lost their offspring, to mate with them. It is a common reproductive strategy among mammals, especially in lions, bears and dolphins, in which females are not sexually receptive while rearing young.

Another common form of cannibalism is infanticide. Classical examples include the chimpanzees where groups of adult males have been observed attacking and consuming conspecific infants.
Chimpanzee cannibalism was so far mostly considered as a form of sexual selection related to infanticide same as with lions, where females who lose their offspring will return to fertility more rapidly than those who maintain their offspring.
It has been observed that infant killings seem to be also a result of male-male aggressive episodes rather than sexual selection. Chimpanzees seem to plan their attacks with an almost military like efficiency. They first chase the mother away, seize the infant and bite into his forehead and face. Head biting infanticide has also been observed among langur monkeys and general cannibalism has also been reported amongst other nonhuman primate groups such as the Red-Tailed Monkey, Japanese Monkey, Chamba Baboon and Mountain Gorilla.

Cannibalism has been observed in over 1,500 species of animal in the wild, protozoas, snails, mammals, fish and birds.
These numbers are increasing all the time as zoologists start to take more interest in observing and recording instances of cannibalism.

Though sexual cannibalism (where the female eats the male after mating) as recorded for example for the female red-back spider, black widow spider, preying mantis, and scorpion, is much more familiar, the more common form of cannibalism is size structured cannibalism, in which large individuals consume smaller conspecifics.

A female preying mantis eating her mate

Such size structured cannibalism has commonly been observed in a variety of species including octopuses, bats, toads, fish, monitor lizards, salamanders, crocodiles, spiders, crustaceans, birds (crows, barred owls), mammals, and a vast number of insects, such as dragonflies, diving beetles, back swimmer, water strider, flour beetle, caddisflies and many more. Cannibalism seems to be especially common in aquatic communities, in which up to 90% of the organisms engage in cannibalism at some point of the life cycle.

Unlike previously believed, cannibalism is not just a result of extreme food shortage or artificial conditions, but commonly occurs under natural conditions in a variety of species. Some species of sharks for example eat their sisters and brothers while they are still inside the womb.

Asking what is the difference and why is that important that someone was killed and eaten by someone from his own species or by someone from another species, is asking the same question we ask all along. The species of the suffering causer and of the sufferer are meaningless. Suffering is suffering and it should be stopped, regardless of the species origin of both sufferer and suffering causer.

Maybe the most famous interspecies violence is male to male fights.
What may look to us as cute and funny, the hippo's familiar yawn, is actually an aggressive gesture, a challenge to fight. The two contestants rear up out of the water, huge mouths wide open, trying to slash each other with their long tusks. Terrible gashes are inflicted but they quickly heal. The aim of the fight is to break a foreleg of the opponent - this is fatal because the animal can no longer walk on land to feed.

During the rut (breeding season), the male deer fight over females, using their antlers in ritualized contest to determine which male is the strongest. They form small territories that they mark and fiercely defend from other males. They use their antlers to fight each other during the fall breeding season and drop them off in late winter. They grow a new set of antlers the following summer. male agrasivness

Salmon males drive away their rivals, whilst the females are spawning.
The males are constantly fighting, tearing each other on the spawning-beds. Many injure each other to death.

Lobsters establish a hierarchy of dominance. They usually fight once, sometimes with great ferocity, to determine who will become the boss.
Males fight for shelters and defend them while competing for mates, females also may compete aggressively with males and other females for shelters.

Each dominant sea elephant male controls access to mating opportunities with a group of females. Less dominant males are restricted to the fringes of a colony and continually try to gain access to females, resulting in battles between males and aggressive charges by the dominant male. This may result in blood-shed. They bite and tear at each other on the neck and shoulders, drawing blood and creating scars on the tough hides.

Autotomy is a self-defense mechanism whereby an animal severs one of his own appendages, to elude a predator's grasp. Geckos, skinks and other lizards that are captured by the tail will shed part of the tail structure and thus be able to flee. The detached tail will continue to wriggle, creating a deceptive sense of continued struggle and attracting the predator's attention away from the fleeing prey animal.

Autotomy in lizards is enabled by special zones of weakness at regular intervals in the vertebrae below the vent. Essentially, the lizard contracts a muscle to fracture the vertebra itself rather than break the tail between two vertebrae. Sphincter muscles in the tail then contract around the caudal artery to minimize bleeding.

We tend to treat Autotomy as a marvels example for animals and nature�s way to solve problems. "Animal Planet" shows present the performing animals as very resourcefulness and smart. As usual humans treat every phenomenon, every aspect of animals� lives as an interesting trivia item, style, �did you know that lizards can�.�, but in fact Autotomy is one of the most extreme and painful defense strategies.

There is nothing amusing in autotomy. It is not only painful in the short run, it represents a loss of fat and protein (energy), that will be used to the regrowth of a new tail instead of their usual functions. During this time, young lizards especially, are at higher risk for being preyed. During the recovery period, they stop growing.

Autotomy is another example of the cruel nature of nature. It takes a very cruel world in which such a violent phenomenon can be a natural self-defense mechanism.

We would like to end this horrible journey into nature's true nature with a few of the most notorious creatures on earth, starting with spiders.

After paralyzing their prey, some spiders may wrap them up in silk to make it easier to carry them back to the nest. Some species actually cover the prey in silk before injecting the venom, making it easier to attack. A female spider may carry wrapped prey back to her young spiderlings, and a male may bring the wrapped prey to a female as a courtship gift.

spiders Most spiders don't eat their prey whole, instead, they eject digestive enzymes onto or into the animal to liquefy him. Some spiders use their fangs to inject the digestive fluid directly into the animal. This sort of spider liquefies the animal's insides, leaving the exoskeleton more or less intact. Then the spider sucks the liquefied remains into his stomach through hairs on his chelicerae and mouth, which act as a filter.

The Hobo-spider�s webs aren�t gluey but depend on their deceptive surface to snare insects. What seems a solid, smooth place to land is actually a layered network of filaments. Insects� feet fall between the strands, their claws snagging and delaying their escape long enough for the spider to seize them.

The trapdoor spiders construct burrows with a cork-like trapdoor made of soil, vegetation and silk. The trapdoor is difficult to see when it is closed because the plant and soil materials effectively camouflage it. Prey is captured when insects or other arthropods venture too close to the half-open trapdoor at night. The spider detects the prey by vibrations and when he comes close enough, the spider pops out of his burrow and captures him.

Scorpions generally use their chela (pincers) to catch the prey. Depending on the toxicity of their venom and the size of their claws, they will then either crush the prey or inject their neurotoxic venom. This will kill or paralyze the prey so the scorpion can eat him. Scorpions have quite a unique style of eating which uses chelicerae, small claw like structures which protrude from the mouth. Chelicerae are very sharp and are used to pull small amounts of flash off the prey for digestion. Scorpions can only digest food in a liquid form, so any solid matter (fur, exoskeleton, etc) is disposed of by the scorpion.

Observe how vast, inherited and natural violence is in our world. When a fer-de-lance snake strikes a rodent, he releases the victim right away and sits back and waits. The snake actually needs the prey to be alive so that the animal's heart can pump the injected venom around his body and break it down from the inside out.

Snakes� venom not only contains toxins that paralyze or kill, but also powerful digestive enzymes which break down tissue and actually starts digesting the prey from the inside. This is essential for snakes who don't have chewing or tearing teeth.

snake The viper's venom acts as a diuretic, causing the rodent to urinate involuntarily as he runs, leaving a scented trail that the snake can follow. The snake also leaves little amounts of his own saliva and venom on the fur of the prey. This has a smell unique to the snake, and so after the venom has killed the prey, the snake simply follows the doubly scented trail.

Not less horrible are constrictors snakes who suffocate their victims.
They squeeze their prey to death, like the Pythons that coil themselves up around their prey, tighten enough to stop the prey's breathing (they might crush the rib cage) and/or blood circulation.

"Prey luring" exists in snakes such as viper, elapid, and boa snakes as well as six colubrids. Nearly all of these involve caudal luring whereby tail motions mimic invertebrate larvae and serve as lures, typically for lacertilian prey.

In this horrible world animals are terrified every time they drink.

Once an alligator captures someone, he will hold him in his mouth and drag him underwater to drown him. He must then get back above water to swallow him - otherwise, the alligator's stomach and lungs would fill with water. crocodile Using his incredibly powerful jaws, an alligator will break bones or crush shells (in the case of turtles) to create a chunk of flesh that can fit down his throat. Then he will raise his head, open the palatal valve and swallow the piece as a whole. An alligator can digest anything he swallows - muscle, bone, cartilage, etc, all digested completely.

Crocodiles have 60 sharp teeth that can crush bone at strength of 900 kilograms.
They grab their victim, shake, twist, turn and toss him - tearing him to peaces until they are small enough to swallow.

And last but definitely not least (cruelty speaking), are wasps and one of the most gruesome �natural suffering� phenomenon.

Wasps don�t hunt for their own nutrition needs. Adult wasps, much like bees, butterflies, and moths, derive all of their nutrition from nectar. They hunt to supply food for their offspring. The wasps paralyze their prey by injecting him with venom through their stingers. They then inject their eggs into the prey, when the eggs hatch, the larvae eat the prey alive, saving the vital organs for last. They pupate inside the prey's body, and upon becoming adults, cut a hole in the prey's skin and fly out.

wasps Perhaps the most well-known, and gruesome, form of wasp parasitism occurs on the larvae of sphinx moths, or hornworms. A tiny kind of wasp will lay numerous eggs inside the body cavity of a growing caterpillar. After hatching, the wasp' larvas feed on the caterpillar's internal tissue without killing him, just causing him to continue to eat without metamorphosing. When the wasps are ready to create their cocoons and complete their life cycle, they emerge all over the back of the caterpillar to do so.
The photo above shows the wasp larvae spinning their cocoons after emerging through the skin of the host. The caterpillar is still alive at this point.

How many times have you heard from meat eaters you were trying to convince to go vegan, that �there is nothing we can do, it is the circle of life�. It took us a few years but now we know they were right all along. Ironically their excuse for accepting the world as it is and not even considering to take the primal moral decision � convert to veganism, is our argument why we mustn�t accept the world as it is and break this horrible circle of life by all means and as fast as possible.

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