The Case for Animal Rights

About “The Case for Animal Rights”

Tom Regan (1938–2017) was an American philosopher and a trailblazer in the animal rights movement. While Jeremy Bentham and utilitarians like Peter Singer argue for animal protection based on the capacity to suffer, Regan takes a different route—one rooted in rights and moral equality. In the preface to The Case for Animal Rights, Regan lays out a clear and passionate foundation for why animals deserve rights, not just better treatment.

Regan begins with a striking confession: he didn’t always believe animals had rights. In fact, he once bought into the idea that animals were there for us to use—whether for food, research, or entertainment—as long as we were “kind” about it. But that changed. Regan came to believe that kindness wasn’t enough. We don’t just owe animals better conditions—we owe them justice.

The heart of Regan’s argument is the idea that animals are subjects-of-a-life. That means they aren’t just biological machines—they have beliefs, desires, perceptions, memories, a sense of the future, and the ability to experience pleasure and pain. In short, their lives matter to them, whether we recognize it or not. Because of this, animals have inherent value—value that isn’t based on their usefulness to others but on the fact that they are someone, not just something.

Regan argues that animals, like humans, have rights—and those rights can’t be traded away just because it benefits the majority. He sharply criticizes utilitarianism for reducing individuals to mere units in a pleasure-pain calculation. For Regan, this kind of math allows too much moral wiggle room. If harming one being brings greater happiness to many, utilitarianism might say “go for it.” But rights theories say: not so fast. If an individual has a right not to be harmed, that right should be respected—even if it’s inconvenient. 

This is where Regan’s view becomes radical (in the best sense). He doesn’t want to reform factory farms—he wants to abolish them. He doesn’t think animal testing should be more humane—he thinks it should stop altogether. For Regan, the problem isn’t how we treat animals, but that we treat them as tools for human ends at all.

In the preface, Regan writes that this is a book about revolution—not a violent one, but a moral and philosophical one. He wants readers to rethink their assumptions about animals, ethics, and justice. He’s calling for a shift in consciousness, a reimagining of our relationship with the nonhuman world.

So if Bentham asked, “Can they suffer?” Regan is asking something deeper: “Are they someone? Do they have a life of their own that matters?” And if the answer is yes, then we’re not just being unkind by exploiting them—we’re being unjust.