• Partner With Us
  • Focus Areas
    • Cause Selection
    • Global Health & Wellbeing
      • Abundance & Growth
      • Effective Giving & Careers
      • Farm Animal Welfare
      • Global Aid Policy
      • Global Health & Development
      • Global Health R&D
      • Global Public Health Policy
      • Scientific Research
    • Global Catastrophic Risks
      • Biosecurity & Pandemic Preparedness
      • Forecasting
      • Global Catastrophic Risks Capacity Building
      • Potential Risks from Advanced AI
    • Other Areas
      • History of Philanthropy
  • Grants
  • Research & Updates
    • Blog Posts
    • In the News
    • Research Reports
    • Notable Lessons
  • About Us
    • Grantmaking Process
    • How to Apply for Funding
    • Careers
    • Team
    • Operating Values
    • Stay Updated
    • Contact Us
  • Partner With Us
  • Focus Areas
    • Cause Selection
    • Global Health & Wellbeing
      • Abundance & Growth
      • Effective Giving & Careers
      • Farm Animal Welfare
      • Global Aid Policy
      • Global Health & Development
      • Global Health R&D
      • Global Public Health Policy
      • Scientific Research
    • Global Catastrophic Risks
      • Biosecurity & Pandemic Preparedness
      • Forecasting
      • Global Catastrophic Risks Capacity Building
      • Potential Risks from Advanced AI
    • Other Areas
      • History of Philanthropy
  • Grants
  • Research & Updates
    • Blog Posts
    • In the News
    • Research Reports
    • Notable Lessons
  • About Us
    • Grantmaking Process
    • How to Apply for Funding
    • Careers
    • Team
    • Operating Values
    • Stay Updated
    • Contact Us

We Love Animals. Why Do We Torture Them?

  • Focus Area: Farm Animal Welfare
  • Content Type: Farm Animal Welfare Newsletters

Table of contents

Some animals are more equal than others

Apathetic human, hidden animal

If they only knew…

Published: July 18, 2023 | by Lewis Bollard

This post originally appeared in the monthly farm animal welfare newsletter written by Lewis Bollard, program officer for farm animal welfare. Sign up here to receive an email each month with Lewis’ research and insights into farm animal advocacy. Note that the newsletter is not thoroughly vetted by other staff and does not necessarily represent consensus views of Open Philanthropy as a whole.

People love animals. Cute cat videos rule TikTok and YouTube, the Puppy Bowl clocks up 420M social media views, and Disney movies venerate animated creatures. Two thirds of Americans have at least one pet and 88% of them consider their pets to be family members, whom they lavish $137B on annually — more than the economic output of most nations.

People also hate animal abuse. Hollywood movies proudly proclaim “no animals were harmed,” while social media platforms all claim to ban content involving cruelty to animals. Ask ChatGPT if animal abuse is wrong and it drops its standard moral neutrality in favor of an empathetic “yes.”

A 2019 Faunalytics survey found that most Americans agreed that “people have an obligation to avoid harming all animals,” while a 2015 Gallup survey found that fully a third of Americans believe animals deserve “the exact same rights as people to be free from harm and exploitation.”

Even the worst politicians and corporations don’t dare defend animal cruelty publicly. Vladimir Putin is a self-proclaimed animal lover who made time between invasions of Ukraine to sign an animal cruelty bill into law. Tyson Foods claims to view the handling of animals as “an important moral and ethical obligation” — even as its contractors confine billions of them in abysmal conditions.

Vladimir Putin: mass murderer and puppy lover. Source: Business Insider, 21 Photos Of Vladimir Putin That Will Melt Your Heart.

Our laws reflect this. Animal cruelty is a crime in most nations and a felony in every US state. In many cases, abusing an animal is punishable by a term of one to 10 years in prison — a similar punishment to assaulting a human. As legal scholar Cass Sunstein points out, these laws implicitly acknowledge that animals have “rights” — legally enforceable protection from harm — even if those rights are seldom enforced.

These laws typically exempt farm animals. But popular concern doesn’t: in a 2018 Faunalytics survey, 62-79% of Americans, Brazilians, Indians, and Russians agreed “that animals used for food have approximately the same ability to feel pain and discomfort as humans.” (Fewer Chinese agreed, but in a 2021 survey, more than 80% said it was somewhat or very important that mammals and birds are well cared for.) In a recent survey by Michelle Sinclair and colleagues, over 75% of respondents in 14 diverse nations agreed that the welfare of farm animals “is important to me” — a similar share to those who said so for companion animals.

And yet we also have factory farms, which confine over a dozen animals for every human alive on earth, in conditions so wretched that they have to be exempted from animal cruelty laws. What’s going on? How to explain the gulf between our belief, that we love animals, and the reality, that we torture them on an unprecedented scale?

Most people agree that the welfare of farmed and companion animals in their country is important to them. N= 4,291 respondents, with 250 – 500 per country. Note that the sample was not demographically balanced, random, or standardized (with a mix of online and in-person interviews). Source: Michelle Sinclair et al, International perceptions of animals and the importance of their welfare, in Frontiers in Animal Science (August, 2022).

Some animals are more equal than others

Popular theories blame our cognitive dissonance about animals on science, the law, popular culture, anthropocentric bias, and linguistics. Science reduces animals’ cognitive complexity into arbitrary tests like whether they can recognize themselves in a mirror. (Dogs can’t, but they can recognize their own scent, which we can’t.) The law reduces living, feeling, sentient beings to mere property. Popular culture celebrates dogs and cats, but seldom chickens or fish. Anthropocentric bias leads us to favor animals that look like human infants, with rounded faces and big eyes. Even our language, full of euphemisms like “meat processing” and “depopulation,” obscures the reality of what we’re doing to animals.

There’s something to all this. But I’m not sure it explains why we mistreat animals.

Consider mice and rabbits. Science recognizes their complexity, which is why both are model organisms for human neuroscience, including for complex cognitive ailments like depression and anxiety. Animal cruelty laws, which typically cover at least mammals, nominally protect them — even if the laws are seldom enforced. Popular culture celebrates them: there are few more famous animals than Mickey Mouse and Bugs Bunny. Anthropocentric bias should favor them: baby mice and rabbits are adorable (see below). And our language hardly hides our use of them: “mouse traps” and “rabbit meat” are euphemism-free. Yet we poison, trap, experiment on, and factory farm them by the hundreds of millions.

Baby rabbits are adorable. This one has unusually uncoordinated floppy ears. Source: Sandy Millar/Unsplash

Another popular theory blames the limits of our moral circle. We love animals inside it — pets and charismatic wildlife — and disdain those outside it — pests and food. Sure enough, a recent study by Bastian Jaeger and Matti Wilks found that Americans, Australians, and Brits rated dogs and elephants as deserving much more moral concern than fish and rats (see below). But they also rated cows as highly as members of the opposing political party — not bad for a bovine.

And moral hierarchies are confusing. The Sinclair study found a much flatter hierarchy when they asked people in 14 countries about the relative importance of the welfare of different species. Chickens scored as highly as dogs, while fish swam ahead of turtles. Nor are moral circles static: depending on the time and place, rabbits are pets, wildlife, pests, and food.

 

“Participants rated the extent to which they feel obligated to show moral concern for the welfare and interest of each target on a scale that ranged from 1 (absolutely no obligation) to 9 (very strong obligation).” Source: Bastian Jaeger and Matti Wilks, The relative importance of target and judge characteristics in shaping our moral circle (Sept 2022), preprint.

Apathetic human, hidden animal

A simpler explanation is that people abuse animals when it’s convenient to do so, normally because there’s money to be made. Or in the words of the great Ruth Harrison, a forgotten founder of the modern farm animal movement: “if one person is unkind to an animal it is considered to be cruelty, but where a lot of people are unkind to animals, especially in the name of commerce, the cruelty is condoned and, once large sums of money are at stake, will be defended to the last by otherwise intelligent people.”

Yet only a tiny fraction of people systematically abuse animals. Factory farms and slaughterhouses employ far less than one percent of the world’s population — and the bosses calling the shots are fewer still. So why do the rest of us allow, and pay, them to abuse animals?

I blame ignorance and apathy. Most people have no idea how farm animals are treated. Factory farms don’t welcome visitors; the one that did, Fair Oaks Farms (“Dairy Disneyland”), turned out to be hiding a few things. Sentience Institute surveys find that most Americans agree that “the animal foods I purchase … usually come from animals that are treated humanely.”

That’s partly thanks to misleading labeling — leading brands of factory farmed chicken are labeled “all natural” and “humanely raised.” It likely also owes to our disbelief that salt-of-the-earth farmers, revered in children’s books and trusted by 88% of Americans, would abuse animals.

But I suspect we mostly just don’t want to know. Unlike other social crises, like climate change or rogue AI, farm animal abuse will never affect us or our children personally. Humans have a millenia-long history of ignoring or belittling moral crises that don’t affect them personally; why stop now?

It may not help that the most commonly proposed solutions — eating less meat or going vegan — ask a lot of us. Garrett Broad, who has run focus groups and surveys on our attitudes toward animals, concludes, “People adamantly did not want to stop caring for their pets, and they weren’t ready to give up meat either.”

Most Brits agree that common factory farming practices are “not acceptable.” Source: Bryant Research based on n=1,000 representative sample survey of UK adults in July, 2022.

If they only knew…

What to make of all this? It’s weird, even infuriating, that most humans consider themselves animal lovers while allowing the greatest abuse of animals in human history to continue unchecked. But it also gives me some hope.

Most social movements have to persuade people to agree with them. We don’t: most people already oppose abusing farm animals. In a 2022 survey, Bryant Research found that just 2-13% of Brits thought common factory farming practices were “acceptable.” In Faunalytics’ survey, a majority of Americans, Brazilians, Chinese, Indians, and Russians backed a law to require farm animals to be treated more humanely.

Our task is to mobilize that support into corporate and legislative change. That’s not easy: ignorance and apathy are powerful opponents — as is the farm lobby. But the industry’s apparent power rests on a tenuous foundation. Its practices are so unpopular that its only hope is to hide them behind ag-gag laws and locked doors. That’s seldom worked for industries in the past; just ask Big Tobacco.

It also creates an opportunity for advocates. Undercover investigations and corporate campaigns work because the disconnect between factory farm conditions and consumer perceptions is so great. The mere act of exposing those conditions is enough to shock consumers.

Advocates sometimes shy away from talking about farm animals, preferring to talk about more human concerns like our health. I think that may be a mistake. People’s love of animals, and distaste for cruelty, is our greatest asset. We should use it.

Subscribe to new blog alerts
Open Philanthropy
Open Philanthropy
  • We’re Hiring!
  • Press Kit
  • Governance
  • Privacy Policy
  • Stay Updated
Mailing Address
Open Philanthropy
182 Howard Street #225
San Francisco, CA 94105
Email
info@openphilanthropy.org
Media Inquiries
media@openphilanthropy.org
Anonymous Feedback
Feedback Form

© Open Philanthropy 2025 Except where otherwise noted, this work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 4.0 International License.

We use cookies on our website to give you the most relevant experience by remembering your preferences and repeat visits. By clicking “Accept All”, you consent to the use of ALL the cookies. However, you may visit "Cookie Settings" to provide a controlled consent.
Cookie SettingsAccept All
Manage consent

Privacy Overview

This website uses cookies to improve your experience while you navigate through the website. Out of these, the cookies that are categorized as necessary are stored on your browser as they are essential for the working of basic functionalities of the website. We also use third-party cookies that help us analyze and understand how you use this website. These cookies will be stored in your browser only with your consent. You also have the option to opt-out of these cookies. But opting out of some of these cookies may affect your browsing experience.
Necessary
Always Enabled
Necessary cookies are absolutely essential for the website to function properly. These cookies ensure basic functionalities and security features of the website, anonymously.
CookieDurationDescription
cookielawinfo-checkbox-analytics11 monthsThis cookie is set by GDPR Cookie Consent plugin. The cookie is used to store the user consent for the cookies in the category "Analytics".
cookielawinfo-checkbox-functional11 monthsThe cookie is set by GDPR cookie consent to record the user consent for the cookies in the category "Functional".
cookielawinfo-checkbox-necessary11 monthsThis cookie is set by GDPR Cookie Consent plugin. The cookies is used to store the user consent for the cookies in the category "Necessary".
cookielawinfo-checkbox-others11 monthsThis cookie is set by GDPR Cookie Consent plugin. The cookie is used to store the user consent for the cookies in the category "Other.
cookielawinfo-checkbox-performance11 monthsThis cookie is set by GDPR Cookie Consent plugin. The cookie is used to store the user consent for the cookies in the category "Performance".
viewed_cookie_policy11 monthsThe cookie is set by the GDPR Cookie Consent plugin and is used to store whether or not user has consented to the use of cookies. It does not store any personal data.
Functional
Functional cookies help to perform certain functionalities like sharing the content of the website on social media platforms, collect feedbacks, and other third-party features.
Performance
Performance cookies are used to understand and analyze the key performance indexes of the website which helps in delivering a better user experience for the visitors.
Analytics
Analytical cookies are used to understand how visitors interact with the website. These cookies help provide information on metrics the number of visitors, bounce rate, traffic source, etc.
Advertisement
Advertisement cookies are used to provide visitors with relevant ads and marketing campaigns. These cookies track visitors across websites and collect information to provide customized ads.
Others
Other uncategorized cookies are those that are being analyzed and have not been classified into a category as yet.
SAVE & ACCEPT