Animal rights law: radical activism, or reasonable idea?

A few years ago, the word that commonly went with "environmental" was "activist". They do still go together, but there are now also words like "impact", "health", "protection" - and, of course, "Agency". We have moved from ridicule to recognition.

Now, that doesn't mean that every word like that has a similar journey, but "animal rights" may well go with "laws" in a few years’ time. Not because it is a radical idea, but because it is a reasonable one.

There are plenty of arguments in support of the status quo: we've always eaten meat, it's part of our culture, it’s natural, animals give us the countryside we know, necessary for our health, "woke" nonsense.

These are not wrong – maybe some of them are - but let's pick three of the arguments in support of giving rights to animals: it would be better for the planet, better for us, and better for animals.

First, better for the planet: most of the meat we eat comes from intensive agriculture, which is noisy, pollutes the water and the land, and is a remarkably inefficient use of land, crops, and water.

Secondly, better for us: we are already discouraged from eating red meat, but reducing our meat consumption more broadly is good for our health. A meat-free diet is healthy.

And finally, better for animals: the lives of all intensively farmed animals are nasty, brutish, and short. As well as noisy, smelly, and violent. We don't want to know what happens in a factory farm or an abattoir, and with good reason: it would put us off our dinner. We don't know about it, but the animals do–all the animals in factory farms are sentient, meaning they do know what is going on. Ethically, it’s hard for us to defend eating meat.

So, good for the environment, for human health, and ethics.

And going back to the arguments against animal rights laws. To protect the right to do all these things, to pollute, to harm our health, to be violent to animals? To deny our better angels?

Of course, there are animal welfare laws, which make a significant difference to the quality of life of animals, especially farmed animals. But animal welfare laws only go so far, and they have not ended factory farming or animal experimentation. For that, animals need something better: they need rights.

The general public, even in the UK, is almost certainly not ready for wide-reaching rights for animals. A full-bodied law would affect our eating habits and our medical research, at the very least.