Animals in Research: Groupthink?

My email box overfloweth with references to an article in the Chronicle for Higher Education penned by Lawrence Hansen, M.D., a pathologist at the UCSD Medical School.
Dr. Hansen is an animal rights extremist who came to national attention with a fight to eliminate dog physiology lab classes from the UCSD medical education program. Since that era, he has penned a number of editorials and opinion bits that make it clear he has a more general interest in stopping the use of animals in research.
or…some animals, anyway.

Dr. Hansen writes:

Groupthink among animal advocates, unless it leads to violence, is harmless enough, but it’s self-defeating when the goal is to rally public opposition to vivisection…A huge reservoir of empathy for our fellow primates and for companion animals goes untapped when PETA demonstrators protest biomedical research on mice or trivia like presidential fly swatting.

He’s dismayed, of course, because other people’s highly theologically driven, personal-preference agendas are getting in the way, he thinks, of the success of his personal-preference agenda.

It may well be that a Gandhi-like respect for all animal life represents the ultimate in human ethical evolution, but until that “consummation devoutly to be wished” is realized, apes and monkeys and dogs and cats are being confined, vivisected, and killed while animal advocates are ignored as a lunatic fringe.

It is an interesting strategy. The fact that violent animal rights extremists are indiscriminate about which animals used in research trigger their violence and intimidation…

Fliers identifying 13 UCSC scientists, some of whom use mice, fruit flies and other nonprimate creatures in their research, were discovered at a downtown coffee shop Tuesday. The fliers say, “Animal abusers everywhere beware; we know where you live; we know where you work; we will never back down until you end your abuse.” The names, home addresses, home phone numbers and photos of researchers were published on the fliers.

…has been increasingly on public display. Is it this lack of care about which species are being used that leads to them being “ignored as a lunatic fringe”? After all, many American taxpayers swat fruit flies and trap mice or rats in their homes every day of the year. Many Americans are “wedded*” to pest free kitchens
Or is it the violence and intimidation itself that seems insane to most people? Is it perhaps the case that people like Dr. Hansen who wink-wink in approval of extremist acts and rhetoric, and perpetuate the most egregious of misrepresentations and lies about the use of animals in research, simply do not gain traction for other reasons having to do with the credibility of their arguments?
I don’t know for sure but with all the possibilities, I doubt very much that it is the failure of the extremists to distinguish between fruit flies and monkeys that is blocking Dr. Hansen from succeeding with his agenda.
Personally, I would rather credit the US public with a bit more depth of view. These decisions to use animals in research are not simple. There really are benefits from the science that accrue to the public..in the immediate and the longer term perspectives. People understand this. Assertions that we can do it by unspecified “computer models” or “alternative methods” that have not been established or even well described by the critics ring hollow because that is what they are…hollow assertions. I credit the public with being able to discern this. I also credit the public with a healthy skepticism. Not just of the conduct of animal research but of the arguments of a lunatic fringe of extremists who are clearly motivated to further their theological, personal-preference agenda by any means necessary- i.e., by lying, intimidating and violently attacking.
I would also credit the US public with a great deal of humanity. Of empathy for other humans who suffer from diseases and health conditions that we have not yet fully addressed and have a very good chance of ameliorating or curing with additional scientific studies. The extremists, like Dr. Hansen, wish to condemn other people to the status quo. Additional research on the behalf of people who suffer from uncured afflictions is not important to them, relative to the use of purpose-bred laboratory animals under humane and well regulated conditions to solve these afflictions.
This, Dr. Hansen, is what keeps you from making more progress with your agenda. Not the actions of a lunatic fringe, but rather the fundamental inhumanity and lack of empathy for sick humans that is at the heart of your personal-preference agenda. Advancing scientific understanding at the pace of what can be gleaned from people who die of natural causes may be enough for some scientists**, but it is not enough. Not even close.
I encourage my readers to make their comments at the CHE site as well as here.
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*Hansen made a crack about researchers being “wedded” to their research models and therefore being conflicted about “cost benefit analysis” of using cats, dogs or monkeys in his CHE bit. Read this for context on how individual this decision really is.
**and really, a pathologist who is “wedded” to science based only on people who die of natural causes bringing this up is….precious. It sure would raise the standing of pathologists in the pantheon of science if all experimental work on animal subjects was prevented, wouldn’t it? If this criticism doesn’t fit you Dr. Hansen, then you should be ashamed to direct it against others.