Everybody's gotta eat, but not everyone's gotta fuck a dog
this post was submitted on 17 Jun 2026
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Asklemmy
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none of it is about consent anyway. it doesn't even make sense. do you get consent from doors before you jam a key in them, open them, and put your whole body through them?
But zoophilia is not about consent at all!
Scientists use dummy ostriches to collect sperm. Ostriches approach and... use the dummies, by their own volition.
If there was a human in there, it wouldn't be very different from the perspective of the real ostrich. So it'd be technically possible to consensually bottom an ostrich.
But why the fuck would you do it?
This is what people actually despise about bestiality. It's a gut feeling, before any rationalisation
Edit: you could very much argue that the ostrich dummy method is still non-consensual as it involves some form of trickery. But, regardless, I think it's telling that people would treat it differently depending on whether there was a human in it or not, even though from the animal's perspective there is no difference.
"Animals can't consent" is one of the strongest arguments given against zoophilia. Any conditioned trickery by a human would get considered as sexual misconduct.
People raping and killing for their own enjoyment is sick. Someone else doing the dirty work for our enjoyment (i.e. eating meat), well that's different. If somehow zoophilia were proven to enhance meat flavor, we'd probably be OK with it
Thanks for taking this question in purely analytical manner and questioning the conflicting social values. There are many comments here which tries to answer the question but get engaged into sense of social shame and prejudice rather than focusing into the logical consistency with given premise.
In a perfect utopian society I would hope we wouldn't be doing either.
Thanks for acknowledging the inconsistencies within social values and showing optimism for the ideal outcome.
Why do so many vegans seek conflict instead of educating others? It's pretty clear that this post seeks solely to declare non-vegans hypocrites.
Good idea using your shit-stirring alt for this one though.
I have no mischievous intent against any group. I just saw some moral inconsistency. So I though let's AskLemmy about their opinion on this topic. People are answering pretty rationally and are not just outright dismissive.
Your question is clearly dismissive itself. I have no reason to think it's in good faith, especially considering you seem to only post from this account rarely and to stir up shit
I am sorry for making you feel this way.
False premise. Zoophilia isn't condemned because animal rights etc. It's condemned because 'ew WTF we don't want people doing that, to the extent that we will make laws against it.'
It's the same reason that we have laws against incest. Had laws against homosexuality.
I'm not saying it should be allowed because we (some of us) grew up and realised that laws against homosexuality were stupid. Just that, that is the reason. Collective societal disgust. It's only justified by using animal rights (and rightly so, because EW) the same way we justified antihomo laws because it goes against some obscure biblical / Koranic rule.
It's the same reason that we have laws against incest.
I'd argue it's also the fact that because of the low genetic diversity of the parents children born from incest have a higher chance of developing genetical diseases.
The chance is lower than most people presume but at the same time: why gamble?
What about same sex incest, or where one or both partners are sterile, or between adopted siblings who aren't related genetically? That would still be considered wrong, right? Even though there wouldn't be genetic consequences
Personally? IDGF about what two consenting adults do in bed. My only objection is when it comes to children being born from incest because of the higher risk of genetic diseases.
between adopted siblings who aren't related genetically?
Don't know where you from but AFAIK that's perfectly legal in Germany.
Yes but that is also a rationalization after the fact. First, it was ew, then we figured out that there were also rational reasons against it.
It's been the norm in many countries for centuries, so can't have been seen as EW as you claim
That's a great justification for the EW
It's about squick.
Think about how they call sex with animals "bestiality". It's not "oh it's because it hurts the animals!", it's because "ew, gross, you're stooping to the level of an ANIMAL!".
I don't think it's about consent, either. If you were somehow able to communicate well enough to actually get consent (which, to be clear, is pretty iffy what with the whole language barrier and such), people would still be squicked.
(also I'm pretty sure "zoophilia" is more about being into animals rather than actual sex with them, which is the whole "bestiality" thing. You can be into someone/a group of people without wanting to rape them.)
It's probably because most of society fundamentally doesn't see other animals as people, and therefore killing them is totally fine ("what? they're not people!"), but having sex with them is Evil and Bad ("why would you want to have sex with them? they're not even a person!").
Yeah it makes no sense.
Iβm pretty sure βzoophiliaβ is more about being into animals rather than actual sex with them
I wasn't sure about this, due to the common link with sexuality - but it looks like - at a semantic level - you're right.
From the original Greek via Aristotle;
philia is commonly translated as friendship or affection. Its conceptual opposite is phobia
Continued today with Bibliophilia, Dendrophilia, Thalassophilia etc (Books, trees, the sea) - all non-sexual, and there are hundreds of other examples "used in everyday language to describe completely normal, passionate hobbies and aesthetic appreciation"
Is there any historical evidence that relates zoophilia to decreasing the domesticated animals' population thus causing food scarcity? Is there a material basis for the condemnation? [Some religious scriptures suggest to kill the animal after performing copulation.] I never thought that way.
One is torture.
The other is a means of survival.
It's acceptable to kill for survival.
It's not acceptable to torture and hurt for sexual gratification that can be gained solo with no one else involved.
Modern meat consumption is very disconnected from survival for most people though.
More humans could survive with more food if we reused the land growing food for animals for growing food for humans to eat. We would need so much less land that we could rewild a lot of it, and massively reduce the amount of carbon being released into the atmosphere as well.
But people like meat and will react badly to anyone suggesting that eating less is a good idea for everyone.
I do feel like most people I talk to irl seem to agree that eating less meat is good for everyone, but that's very local of course, and agreeing and doing it is also not necessarily connected π
I get what you mean, but as somebody that hasn't eaten meet in 35 years I would argue its not needed for survival.
So shouldn't the same logic dictate that it is not acceptable to kill for culinary satisfaction, if nutrition can be gained without killing a creature? (Which is very possible in most parts of the world)
You do not need meat to survive lmao. You eat it because you like it, at least be honest with yourself
Valid argument - assuming you live in the woods and hunting and gathering is the only way you can get food.
- Zoophilia is Rape (sex without consent)
- Killing animal is Murder .
In both cases we should be considering animal's perspective (what animals feel in both cases). We can't just involve human's perspective for our own convenience. Do animals consent to be murdered? I don't think so.
From what I've been told by rape victims, I'd much rather be murdered.
Who do you personally consider a bigger criminal?
- Human murdering other animal without their consent?
- Human raping other animal without their consent?
(We are making judgments solely based on the animal's perspective. So we can't include disingenuous human arguments like "They died a noble death for our survival".)
Society condemns one and accepts the other
I was looking for the logical consistency. They are accepting killing of animals (murder without consent) while condemning the rape (sex without consent) of animals.
This is the reason.
Different taboos in different places, I guess.
Perhaps zoophilia affects the human doing it negatively; eg the human may start to hurt other people some time?
You're not worried about killing and eating animals having the same effect?
No, most people who eat meat wouldn't wanna kill an animal themselves
Edit: i guess the question is more directly about killing animals than eating meat though
There was an article many years ago about people working in the meat industry, and how they are under extreme stress. So yes, the meat processing industry has detrimental effects on people. Is there evidence that these people commit more violent crimes? It is well documented that psychopaths / serial killers usually have a history of torturing / raping animals in their youth. Taken together, this may be an additional reason beyond laws against sex with animals. (Before you pop a vessel: I am vegetarian and most of my meals are vegan).
Iβve spent a lot of time around German butchers, who specialize in two of three areas during their training: 1-slaughtering, 2-meat production, and 3-sales. In my experience (so take this with a big grain of salt), people who specialized in 1 are significantly more callous towards human life than those who didnβt.
My husbandβs hopefully passing his licensing exam today and though he specialized in 2&3 (hence the big grain of salt), he still had to work at a slaughterhouse for a few weeks during his training. Heβs not a squeamish person at all (he once knowingly selected The Lullabyβs Smile [trigger warning: this is very effective body horror that so paralyzed me with anxiety to listen to that I couldnβt make myself get up to turn it off] to fall asleep to and is a big fan of schlocky horror movies), but he could not stand it. He hasnβt paid for meat since (though he does save things from the trash, both for himself and for a network of people we know who are happy to accept free meat past its sell-by date and capable of determining whether itβs safe to eat) and will work at a vegan butcher shop after his licensing as a direct result of his experiences at the slaughterhouse.
vegan butcher shop
Uh, what?
They sell vegan meat imitation products made by actual trained butchers. Some of their stuff is wild. I used to eat meat, but Iβve never been able to digest pork and itβs never appealed to me, and I find their pork-style products way too realistic to eat (confirmed to be accurate and not just unappealing by my husband, lol).
Wow, that's... Interesting. TIL