The worry has echoed around these last few months. When I'm taking a lesson, it is not uncommon for the instructor to yell out across the dusty arena "You're the boss! Tell the horse what to do, not the other way around!" When you hear this, the horse is coughing from the dust and you are on your 10th lap around the ring; the end not quite in sight. And amidst the heat and the sweat and the crop you use to motivate your steed to acceptable speeds, you have to ask yourself, "Wait. Is this right?"
Sure, Ayer would just say "Boo horse-riding boo!" and leave it at that. But the non-logical positivists amongst us still feel unsatisfied.
I've never arrived at a solid answer to the query on if animals have souls or consciousness. Heck, I'm not even sure if humans have souls or consciousness (best, for maximum societal meshing to assume that they do; sorry if that sounds cynical). But let’s say they do have souls/consciousness, as everyone loves to imagine of their beloved pet. Well if that’s the case, what about what the horse wants?
If a horse has a soul, shouldn't we enter into an equal, peer-like relationship with them? Or are their more qualifications to consider when deciding to treat an animal as an equal? Some might say intelligence. Humans are more intelligent than horses, so it’s alright if we command them. But to me this logic just doesn't fly. Enlightened Despots never lasted long being enlightened and leading the ignorant masses. When dealing with people at a societal level, one person's lack of "intelligence" isn’t grounds for different treatment. Or it shouldn’t be.
On top of that, what are our values that we decide what makes up intelligence? Is it fair to judge all creatures on a human scale of intelligence? Horses may have a totally different value system than ours and it could be completely outside of our imagination or understanding. Do we just give our values preference because we communicate amongst ourselves for consensus?
All I'm saying is... if aliens land on earth and start riding us around to play polo, I'd be pretty pissed that they would assume that because they couldn’t comprehend us they would use us as ends for their own game and, as a default, prefer their species over ours.
Which leads me to some ethical schools of thought. When I try to apply this question of horse-riding to The Big Three (as I affectionately call them) Utilitarianism, Kantianism, and Virtue Ethics, I get some confusing results.
I.
Utilitarianism is problematic from the beginning. Every human being in this schema is worth "1". Well animal bias is built in! How much are they worth? .5? .3? Is their score based on their "usefulness" to human people? Come on! One person riding and having fun is worth 2 hedons, but one Horse getting ridden and just not feeling like it is worth 1 doller... this is nonsense. Next ethical school of thought, thanks.
II.
Kantianism. Ah, Kant. I just wish I could sit down with this reclusive man and ask him myself over a cup of tea. We would probably get further than I could ever get with Miller's mummified head (another doller on Utilitarianism's likeability tally!)
"Now, Emmanual, I need answers, can you tell me if this horse riding business is ethical?"
"Ah yes, well, you must ask yourself the question, does this act use the horse as a mere end, or as a means as well?"
"Well, if I understand the question, I care for the horse in addition to just riding it around. I look out for its general health, and not just because I want to keep riding it, but because I like it too."
"That’s a good start, but are you respecting the full agency of the horse? Giving it a choice?"
"Oh, I see what you are saying but what if that’s not what a horse wants? And if it had a choice, it might choose to be in a wild heard, running over craigy land, then soft fields, rocks and grasses, under stars. Well I took that life from that horse. We drained the Colorado River, and we posted letters on the hills. I've created a world where the horse couldn’t live without me, so how does that figure into my reckoning? Am I morally obligated to care for this dependent creature?"
"Is that what you would wish for universally?"
"I don’t know, I guess, but that’s only because I can’t imagine a world any different. Does this universal application account for a revolution of how we interact with animals?"
"Have another cup of tea."
I am getting ansy in this parlor, I have to get up and leave. Virtue ethics is next.
III.
Now my initial problem with virtue ethics is more of a personal problem, hardly worth mentioning since I am nearly sure no one else experiences this. Its just that... when in virtue ethics you are supposed to imagine what a perfectly virtuous person would do, and then do that, I imagine a kingly-type man, rather like a knight, riding a noble steed. I never critiqued this mental image until I started worrying about equestrians. It was then that I realized that my perfectly virtuous, perfectly fictitious role model was a reflection of an activity that has a dubious moral nature. I have to scavenge around my brain for a more neutral candidate to emulate. Still... I must plough on.
Would a virtuous person ride a horse?
Would a brave person ride a horse?
Would a wise person ride a horse?
Would a temperate person ride a horse?
The answer to all of these questions is, historically, yes. So what do I do if I want to re-imagine a new world? I can’t use the custom of how things have been to dictate how things will be!
I think on this mental image I've had, of the knight-ly king, king-ly knight, whichever, and it is still causing me some concern. He is like some drawing from a children's book published in the 1960's ... something that would be in my Grandmother's bookshelf of books she read to my mother. I emulate a 1960's perception of a chivalrous male? Before I can think any further on horses, I need to re-evaluate my life some more.
So here I am where I started. Concerned. Speaking of youth (children’s book illustrations that is) I can’t help but note the basic homogenization of horses in literature, especially children’s books. They are often romanticized. An excerpt from Mary O'Hara's My Friend Flicka shows the epitome of horse-portrayals. The second excerpt, from Lucy Corin's Everyday Psycho Killers: A History for Girls is aware of the standard dealings with horses in literature and rips it right open.
They struck at each other with their forefeet, then, curving beautifully,
dropped sideways. The hairs of tails and manes stood out strongly, moving with a
separate life of their own. One head rose, curling over the other to nip at the
back of the neck. The other stallion twisted out from under, reared higher,
striking. They coiled and uncoiled inside the floating fringes of their hair in
flowing, incessant movement, and the sun blazed down of them, making shining
mirrors on thier round haunches and the bulging neck muscles (O’Hara, 70).
The horses run around and around the track. At the track, the highest compliment
you can pay a horse is to say it’s a machine. That horse is a real machine,
you’d say… The horses run around and around the track until they break down.
That’s how they say it, breaking… Either way, at the track or at the farm, the
horse is in a box, or moving in circles, one of the other, all life long (Corin,
73, 74).
It is almost cruel to put the selections side by side. Yet I am convinced that both accounts of horses are true, nearly incompatible, but true. So how do I decide what is ethically encouraged? I turned in my equestrian team dues yesterday. And all I have in the argument is a handful of mental images: a mummified head, a cup of tea, a knight, happy horses, broken horses. More polished thoughts are necessary.
Looking back on this post, I think a better format for this consideration would be poetry. After all, it is Nietzsche that says aesthetic valuation is the only way to deem significance to life. His system of morality may be confusing to apply to animal ethics, but it was also Nietzsche who was said to have put himself between a lashing whip and a horse out in the street.
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