by Scott Douglas Jacobsen, In-Sight Publishing

Doris Lin, an attorney specializing in animal law and the VP of legal affairs for the Animal Protection League of NJ. holds a degree in Applied Biological Sciences from M.I.T. and has worked for the Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection and the US Environmental Protection Agency. She is a former chair of the NJ State Bar Association’s Animal Law Committee, and she is the author of the Wildlife Protection chapter in the NJ Environmental Law Handbook. Here she talks about her life, work, and views.

… Doris Lin: I think most people don’t realize how their morals are influenced by the culture they were raised in. That’s why most Americans think it’s OK to eat cows, pigs, and chickens, but are horrified by the idea of eating dogs, horses, and whales. They are full of moral outrage at the thought of eating these other animals.

They don’t think of cows, pigs, or chickens as thinking, feeling beings. Obviously, they are thinking, feeling beings. We know that nonhuman animals are capable to emotions and thought because we see it in our pets every day. There’s also objective scientific evidence; a conference of neuroscientists signed a declaration that nonhuman animals have consciousness… >>MORE