Does Intelligence Determine Worth?

I need to share some thoughts, so this might seem a little disjointed at first, but bear with me.

I ran into two articles on the internet today. One was on MSNBC about three people who were keeping four mentally disabled adults chained up in a basement with only a jug of orange juice and some buckets to go to the bathroom in. I think it said something about how the perpetrators might have wanted to use their victims' identification and other information to get money or something. In any case, looking at the 200+ comments on the article, people were pretty outraged and disgusted at this crime, some saying the criminals should be treated the same way as they treated their victims.

Once upon a time, the mentally handicapped were not so well thought of in society, nor so well protected. Once upon a time, limits on a person's mental functioning also meant limits on the worth of that person's life. It's wonderful to see that this is, for the most part, no longer the case. People see the mentally disabled as real people who deserve protection and love. Varying levels of intelligence have no real influence on our judgment of the worth of fellow human beings.We see what these criminals did as unacceptable, perhaps even more despicable because their victims were childlike and vulnerable... exploiting them for their own purposes is generally agreed to be wrong.

Will there be a time when the same can be said for animals? People justify exploiting animals because human beings have a higher intellectual capacity than other animals. Smart adult animals have about the same mental capacity as human children... probably roughly similar to what these adult victims have. Animals are vulnerable and childlike in many ways. But we see them as inferior because of having less mental capacity. So, it's okay for us to lock them in concrete or steel enclosures for extended periods of time, letting them live in their own waste, without regard for their emotional health, without regard for their physical suffering. Because they're not as smart as we are. And there's money to be made off them.

Why is it different? Because we're human, and they're not? Is it just because we only look out for our own kind? How is that so different from saying it's okay to enslave people of other races, because we're white, and they're not?

Well, some people get outraged when they see videos of abuse at meat, egg, and dairy farms... but they don't believe that this sort of thing happens all the time. They think it's just an isolated incident... they say the individual person beating the animal should be arrested, and this is often true, but there's more going on than just one case of a single psychotic farm worker. They can't see, or else choose to ignore the fact that it's the industry itself which is encouraging this abuse. It's the way we think about animals. As objects. As inferior because of intelligence, because of a different physical shape or color... or something.

I wish there were some way to open people's eyes, and get them thinking. What is the difference, really?

The other thing I read today was a post from the Action for Animals newsfeed on my facebook page. As much as I dislike bringing up the Holocaust.... It talks about how some people didn't want to believe that the concentration camps of the Holocaust were real, and that it was just individual, evil officers in isolated incidents of abuse. Looking back now, most people agree that the concentration camps were real, and that thousands of people died there, because they were seen as inferior. It was the way that people thought about the Jews, the mentally disabled, and other "Others" which brought about this black mark in history.

The beginnings of this kind of tragedy still live inside of all of us. Any time we think of another living being as inferior, as an object which can be disposed of at our whims, which has no inherent value in itself... we are echoing the root cause, the spirit of the Holocaust.

So I invite you to read it, and think about it. It's not very long. Just think about it. What is the difference? Is there one?

The Article: We Can't See The Truth Through Rose-Colored Glasses.