Risking Your Life for an Animal

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PeteZaHut

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Is it morally permissible to risk your life for the welfare of an animal or animals? This came to mind when seeing a TV show about New Orleans zookeepers who stayed at the zoo to care for the animals during hurricane Katrina.
 
I don’t see why it wouldn’t be permissible. We’re not talking about you purposely killing yourself, only placing yourself in danger in an attempt to save one of God’s creatures. Firefighters will make an effort to save animals in a burning building, once all humans have been saved first. As long as you focus on people first, then any animals in a dangerous situation, I’d say you’re a very noble and heroic person.
 
I don’t know what the right answer is here, but I certainly would never forgive myself if I had known later I could have saved an animal who meant something to someone and I didn’t.

In a time of emergency, it’s usually a reactionary thing; many times you don’t have the time to weigh whether it’s morally correct or not or even whether it’s risky or not.
 
I think it depends on your situation in life. If you have four kids and a wife at home who depend on you, then I think your first obligation would be to them rather than an animal.
 
Another thing is, would it put other people in danger if they have to come save you?

I love my animals. I rescue exotic birds and reptiles.😃 I would do everything within reason to save them. But, if it ever came to the point that any human was placed in mortal danger to save my animals I would stop them from helping. Pets can’t be replaced 😦 but humans can’t be replaced ether.
 
One has to consider the degree of risk. One takes slight risks every day for even less worthy causes - walking to the corner for an ice cream cone has some slight risk. On the other hand one could not accept certain death to save an animal. I don’t know where the line is.
 
I love my animals dearly (four cats and four dogs), but I would not put myself or anyone else to certain death or unreasonable risk to save them. Nor would I except a firefighter to rescue my pets if the house (God forbid) caught on fire. If it was possible, I would try to bring them out of the house with me, or toss them out of the window if I had to break a window to escape, but I wouldn’t put my life into danger to save them. And if we were facing a hurricane and I couldn’t bring my pets to safety with me, I would probably ride it out at home. But never would I expect anyone to lay down their lives for my pets, and I would not lay down my life for any animal.
 
PeteZaHut said:
Is it morally permissible to risk your life for the welfare of an animal or animals? This came to mind when seeing a TV show about New Orleans zookeepers who stayed at the zoo to care for the animals during hurricane Katrina.
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What is greater human life or an animals life. I have nothing agianst animals, however, I would never risk my life for them, mine or anyone elses. Ever. No way, no how. There is nothing in this world that would make me lose my life to save my dog’s life. :nope:
 
Mirror_Mirror said:
What is greater human life or an animals life. I have nothing agianst animals, however, I would never risk my life for them, mine or anyone elses. Ever. No way, no how. There is nothing in this world that would make me lose my life to save my dog’s life. :nope:
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I believe the OP’s question was whether or not it is morally permissible to risk one’s life for an animal, not whether or not we actually would. I don’t think it is wrong to take your position, I am just wondering whether or not you think it morally permissible for me to risk my life by grabbing my cat before fleeing my burning house or sticking around in a hurricane to help defenseless zoo animals. I know I would, but I also don’t have a family dependent on me.
 
What animal? If you mean, my cat, then I was brought up to believe that when I adopted a pet, I adopted a responsibility right along with it…and if I didn’t want the responsibility, I needed to forego the animal…
So, if we mean, my cat, I believe that I have an absolute responsibility to do anything in my power to care for her, even if that means danger to myself.
Last year, my house filled up with smoke one night. I found the cat, put her in the car in her carrier, & then called 911 on my cordless phone.(Which I had also put in the carrier).
It turned out to be my washing machine. (No, not the dryer, the washer: They too should not be left running unsupervised). The fire never spread outside the machine, & the new one works fine…but is supervised.

Now, if you are asking about a case of an animal whose care is not one of my obligations in life, I think that is another question. Then, it would be my job to inform the appropriate authorities to take care of the animal or animals…If you work at the zoo, or at the vet, or whatever, your responsibility is higher than the average person’s.

Obviously, I indeed feel that it is not only morally right to risk my life for an animal, but that there are cases where it would be morally wrong for me to fail to take such action…and I fully expect to be blasted by someone, for saying this. That’s OK, too; saying something unpopular is sometimes another part of my responsibilities as a pet owner.
I have broad shoulders; I can deal with it.
 
Zooey said:
Obviously, I indeed feel that it is not only morally right to risk my life for an animal, but that there are cases where it would be morally wrong for me to fail to take such action…and I fully expect to be blasted by someone, for saying this. That’s OK, too;
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Well, I don’t want you to be disappointed. 😃

Is the question really, would you be willing to knowingly trade your life for that of an animal?

As has been said previously, it depends on the degree of risk (assumed to be serious, as in “risking one’s life”), and one’s responsibilities.

That being said, one also has the responsibility to one’s self to preserve their own life, and not to knowingly take unnecessary risks with that life.

There may be no greater love than laying down one’s life for a fellow man, but I’m afraid that doesn’t apply to animals, at least as I can tell. 😉
 
Newbie2 said:
There may be no greater love than laying down one’s life for a fellow man, but I’m afraid that doesn’t apply to animals, at least as I can tell. 😉
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If you’re talking certain death, then I would agree with you. But the OP’s point doesn’t talk about certain death. A lot of people did survive Katrina but their pets didn’t or got lost, which only added to their misery. And pets have been known to improve health and the quality of life, which is not a bad thing, is it?

Without going into too much politicking, certainly better planning could have saved more humans and animals and property.
 
Yes, agreed that certain death is not the crux, but a reasonable chance of it is how I read it.

Pet’s certainly add to people’s lives; that’s little better known in my veterinary profession…but think of what the loss of a human who tried to rescue a pet and failed would cause, that’s more my point about this topic.
 
I’m with Mirror Mirror on this issue. There’s a reason why humans are humans (made in the image of God) and animals are not, no matter how much we may try to anthropomorphize (?sp?) them.

Example: Every now and again you hear about someone who swerves his/her car trying to avoid hitting a cat/dog/squirrel/deer/whatever, and losing control and crashing. Not me. I’ll do as good a straight-line brake job as I can, but in the final analysis I’m not going to risk my life and the life of whoever is riding with me.

Extend the analogy to other situations.
 
PeteZaHut said:
Is it morally permissible to risk your life for the welfare of an animal or animals? This came to mind when seeing a TV show about New Orleans zookeepers who stayed at the zoo to care for the animals during hurricane Katrina.
Click to expand...
I don’t see anything wrong with staying behind and risking your life for animals. In fact with my familly if for some odd reason if we get a hurricane, we are staying behind if we can’t take our animals with us.I dont think anyone in my family could forgive themselves if we lost one of our pets and we could have prevented it.
 
<<< Example: Every now and again you hear about someone who swerves his/her car trying to avoid hitting a cat/dog/squirrel/deer/whatever, and losing control and crashing. Not me. I’ll do as good a straight-line brake job as I can, but in the final analysis I’m not going to risk my life and the life of whoever is riding with me. >>>

While I would be the type to stay behind in a hurricane to take care of my animals, I am also from Michigan and we have a great deal of deer traffic around us. Put simply, if Bambi gets in front of my little Oldsmobile we’re going to be eating venison for quite awhile. You can take measures to survive a hurricane, but a car accident happens way too fast to make more then a spilt second decision. And my decision would be to protect myself and my passengers, no matter how sad I would be over hitting an animal.
 
DaveBj said:
I’m with Mirror Mirror on this issue. There’s a reason why humans are humans (made in the image of God) and animals are not, no matter how much we may try to anthropomorphize (?sp?) them.

Example: Every now and again you hear about someone who swerves his/her car trying to avoid hitting a cat/dog/squirrel/deer/whatever, and losing control and crashing. Not me. I’ll do as good a straight-line brake job as I can, but in the final analysis I’m not going to risk my life and the life of whoever is riding with me.

Extend the analogy to other situations.
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:tiphat: I could not agree more. And that is the point that I was trying to make, if there is even the slightest chance that I myself could lose my life to save the life of an animal, there is no way I would allow myself to stay in that situation. If a category 5 hurricane is coming and in the midst of all the chaos I would forget a pet, sorry I would not risk my life going back to save them. Just me, I feel that my life and my family’s life is more important.
 
Fifty years ago the town where I lived in Connecticut was heavily flooded by a hurricane. Four or five rescuers in a boat tried to save a woman from a second story window but she wouldn’t come without her dog. In the course of trying to get the dog the boat upset and they all ended up in the water. The dog easily swam ashore.Fortunately the rescuers were able to cling to on the line to the boat, and were pulled ashore. However the woman was found dead, several days later, in tree many miles south. She was the only one lost in our whole town.
 
<<< Fifty years ago the town where I lived in Connecticut was heavily flooded by a hurricane. Four or five rescuers in a boat tried to save a woman from a second story window but she wouldn’t come without her dog. In the course of trying to get the dog the boat upset and they all ended up in the water. The dog easily swam ashore.Fortunately the rescuers were able to cling to on the line to the boat, and were pulled ashore. However the woman was found dead, several days later, in tree many miles south. She was the only one lost in our whole town. >>>

This should be a reminder to everyone that all families need an emergency plan, including provisions for any four legged family members as well as the humans. Granted, ours is not too sophisicated, but we do have a basic outline of a plan if we had to evacuate. And even if we had no pets, we’d probably be the types to stay during a hurricane to protect our home as best as we could. Thankfully, our diasters in this area are more like blizzards and tornadoes, both of which mean staying in the house. Yet another reason I love Michigan.
 
Actually, I probably would swerve out of the way if I saw an animal jump in front of me even if there were a lot of traffic. That’s partly out of principle, instinct (I always swerve out of the way without even thinking about it), and safety (if it’s a deer, I don’t want that running into my tiny car). I don’t know, maybe I just like animals more than people…
 
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