Well, I'm home for spring break, and interestingly enough I wasn't even home for an hour before I was reminded of this class and forced to think about my position on animal rights. I came home to see my very sick cat for the first time in her sick state. Jill, my cat, has a tumor in her arm and is extremely wobbly when she walks... (we aren't sure why, but my mom likes to call her 'the drunk cat' when she attempts to walk around). Anyway, it's interesting that Jill is all of a sudden the center of attention in the house when, before this point, I was never very attached to her even though I've had her since Kindergarten.
Anyway, I made an off-hand comment while sitting at the kitchen table with my mom, a comment I didn't really think through before. "Have you ever thought about, ya know, putting her to sleep? I don't really want to wake up and find her dead..." I asked my mom. Her response was surprisingly defensive and said "well, that's for your convenience...she has her own interests...how would you like it if I decided to do that to you because you were sick?" She was half joking but I sensed something very truthful from what she was saying. I was immediately embarrassed that I even hinted at that and replied with, "oh yeah you're right, I should probably go back to my animal rights class, huh?" We laughed at it, but I thought about my comment later. Was there a difference between jumping to euthanasia and thinking it's okay for my cat but not for, say, my sister? Was it selfish of me to imply that putting her to sleep would be the best thing? I'm not sure, but this incident did make me think about what I said and if I really meant it...
