Quotes on Animal Welfare

It is inexcusable for scientists to torture animals; let them make their experiments on journalists and politicians.

Most people have forgotten how to live with living creatures, with living systems and that, in turn, is the reason why man, whenever he comes into contact with nature, threatens to kill the natural system in which and from which he live.

Very little of the great cruelty shown by men can really be attributed to cruel instinct. Most of it comes from thoughtlessness or inherited habit. Extract from 'Memories of childhood and youth.'

When a man wants to murder a tiger he calls it sport; when a tiger wants to murder him he calls it ferocity.

As custodians of the planet it is our responsibility to deal with all species with kindness, love, and compassion. That these animals suffer through human cruelty is beyond understanding. Please help to stop this madness.

Animals share with us the privilege of having a soul.

To insult someone we call him 'bestial. For deliberate cruelty and nature, 'human' might be the greater insult.

The animals of the world exist for their own reasons. They were not made for humans any more than black people were made for white, or women created for men.

I had been involved in animal welfare groups, but DDAL presented an opportunity to actually create and pass legislation aimed at issues which really matter to so many people. From local spaying and neutering ordinances, to legislation against puppy mills, to standards to prevent animals from being tested for the sake of a new cosmetic, we could - and did - make a difference.

Whatever the reason, for most of the present century, the literature and publicity of the old established [animal welfare] groups made a significant contribution to the prevailing attitude that dogs and cats and wild animals need protection, but other animals do not. Thus people came to think of "animal welfare" as something for kindly ladies who are dotty about cats, and not as a cause founded on basic principles of justice and morality.

It is vitally important that we can continue to say, with absolute conviction, that organic farming delivers the highest quality, best-tasting food, produced without artificial chemicals or genetic modification, and with respect for animal welfare and the environment, while helping to maintain the landscape and rural communities.

Man is the only creature that consumes without producing. He does not give milk, he does not lay eggs, he is too weak to pull the plough, he cannot run fast enough to catch rabbits. Yet he is lord of all the animals.

I ask people why they have deer heads on their walls. They always say because it's such a beautiful animal. There you go. I think my mother is attractive, but I have photographs of her.

What I think about vivisection is that if people admit that they have the right to take or endanger the life of living beings for the benefit of many, there will be no limit to their cruelty.

We call them dumb animals, and so they are, for they cannot tell us how they feel, but they do not suffer less because they have no words.

Animals are such agreeable friends - they ask no questions; they pass no criticisms.

The animals of the planet are in desperate peril... Without free animal life I believe we will lose the spiritual equivalent of oxygen.

The worst sin toward our fellow creatures is not to hate them, but to be indifferent to them: that's the essence of inhumanity.

A dog has the soul of a philosopher.

I think everything in my life has led to my animal welfare work.

I abhor vivisection with my whole soul. All the scientific discoveries stained with innocent blood I count as of no consequence.