“I now establish my covenant with you and with your descendants after you and with every living creature that was with you-the birds, the livestock and all the wild animals, all those that came out of the ark with you-every living creature on earth.”
To degrade humans to animal status, to debase a religious group's struggle, to justify the comparison between animal slaughter and the holocaust is insulting. The parallel was purposely controversial to try to prove a point, to elevate the status and seriousness of animal cruelty, but also lessen the status of the Holocaust to the Jewish people as a community. Yes the holocaust victims were treated like animals, but what makes it so horrendous is that they are PEOPLE. "People are conditioned to be indifferent to the animal suffering that is part of our network of social institutions (Sztybel, 226)." But people are NOT conditioned to be indifferent to the suffering of their own.
Racism is NOT the same as Speciesism, and it would be a bold statement to say such. I guess both groups were seemingly innocent, tortured, and left to suffer until systematically killed, but at least the killing of animals serves a purpose for man kind. Animals provide food, clothing, entertainment, pets, companionship, intrigue, and they are killed because of such things. Even though the carcasses may be tossed aside, unlike the pile of pigs, the pile of human beings is obsolete. Using human skins to make tallows, or hair to stuff pillows, or carcasses for scientific research is not because of the natural urge to survive, it is purely extra and unnecessary.
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