"No Orangutan Writ of Habeas Corpus" / "Orangutan Declared a 'Person' by Argentine Court

First, I’ll start with the article “Orangutan Declared a ‘Person’ by Argentine Court” by Alisa Mullins is very bias because Mullins works with PETA. Her arguments aren’t as strong as they could be, for example, she quotes Roland Ennos when he says, “They show a lot of engineering know-how in how they build their nests”. If we look at any animal in the wild they are masters at building their shelters because of adaptation and natural selection and every other animal theory out there. I don’t think that Mullins has a very strong case for why apes should be considered non-human persons. I agree that Sandra shouldn’t be confined to small areas in the Buenos Aires Zoo, but declaring these animals to have “personhood” might be a little overboard. That brings me to the next article we had to read today, “No Orangutan Writ of Habeas Corpus” by Wesley J. Smith. I couldn’t find the right word for his tone throughout the article; it went from sarcastic, to disbelief, to humorous. I would have to agree more with his take on the issue though. Yes these animals have a right to live outside their confined spaces and I personally am not a fan of zoos, but animal rights activists have gone to far. However, Smith says their goal is to reduce our definition as humans to “just another animal in the forest”. But do you think that is really their goal? Do you think that someday animals will be more treasured than humans? When it comes to feeding and taking care of our animals, will we feed them over humans?