Tuesday, February 17, 2004

Something to Discuss!

Current Mood: Headache, Hungry, and (insert H word here. Have fun. ^_~) Listening To: In the Middle of the Night - Billy Joel I admit it, I'm a Billy Joel fan. Mr. Piano Man is just an old classic. He's another one of those guys that just makes you feel good whenever you hear his stuff play. And I just can't help myself. Right, that's not what I wanted to talk about. Tonight I went and saw a play with Natalie called Prymates. It was for her theatre class (the same one I took last semester), and since I like plays so much anyway, we both went. It was written by somebody on campus, I think, and it had some really fabulous actors in it. Four person cast, so it was strong, but the play itself - the written piece - well, it could have been better. It was really hard to pin-point a specific theme. And while plays often don't have just one, there's at least one main one that they all follow, and that was really hard to see in this play. Sometimes that adds to the mystery, but for me, it only hurt it. Although it did bring up a few interesting subjects: using animals as test subjects (the animals in question here were a gorilla, and to some lesser extent, a bunch of chimps), funding for research on AIDS, people who go through strokes, and things like that, and then of course, there were morals in general. So here's the general idea: Mr. Guy wants this gorilla named Graham to use as testing for AIDS. He's mapped their DNA perfectly or something, and he's sure that if he can use Graham as a test subject, he can find a cure for the disease. However, this lady, Ester (who is also deaf, so the whole play was in sign language), who had a thing with this guy, has been working with Graham for 25 years or something and refuses to give him to that sort of treatment, so she ran away with him. The play starts, then, with Guy and his translator (Allison) finally finding Ester and it goes on from there. Like I said before, great acting. Especially the gorilla. Frankly, he was my favorite character, but you can imagine, it's sort of hard to relate to a monkey. Ester was next. Overall, though, the play itself was hard to relate to, and I think that's part of the reason it sort of bugged me. It could have been better - the script could have been better. But, the point of this is, what do you think about using animals as test subjects? The thought of using a gorilla as one - especially one like Graham, where he has a name and even a personality and you know him - sounds pretty horrible to me. Using anything bigger than a mouse, basically, makes me feel sort of ill. It's animal abuse, no matter how much it might help the human race in the long run. Some might argue that if you use the gorillas, what stops you from eventually using humans next? There's only, what, a three percent difference in the genetic codes, right? We're not that different. (I'm not positive that's the number, but I know it's in the single digits.) Then again, some would argue that we are - the fact that we are thinking creatures and that we clearly are the dominant species allows us to do what we will to our surrounding environment. I don't agree with that. We may be dominant, but we also have a responsibility towards our environment. And studies have shown that we clearly are not the only thinking/feeling creatures on the planet. They may not have the same thought processes that we have evolved with, but it's there. They nurish, they protect, they care for, and they mourn. They use their habitat around them to get what they need, and they make tools out of it as well - there's a type of monkey or gorilla I think that uses sticks to get ants out of their homes and eat them. You wouldn't inject your cat or dog with AIDs, either, would you? How is it okay to do the same to other animals? Just because you're not attached to it, doesn't mean the animal is worthless. I'd love to hear what other people have to say about this, and anything relating. Getting a number of different points of view is fun.

Comments (6)