他？它？牠？我們以外的那些生命 | He? It? She? The Lives Living Outside Our Lives
每每打開臉書總是能看見很多人——還是你也是？經常上傳和寵物一同玩樂的自拍照，親暱地將其稱作「毛小孩」，像是自己的親生小孩。也經常看見動保團體聯署抗議。那是否代表現在的人類越來越有關懷心？對待動物越來越人道？遺憾的是，這只是大眾看見的假象。如果你讀過黃宗潔教授於今年九月出版的「牠鄉何處？城市‧動物與文學」就會發現，在光照不到的所在許多我們不知道—— 或選擇不知道的真相。
「希望本書能夠作為那些關心動物倫理問題卻不知道從何開始的人，檢視這類議題的切入點」
黃宗潔教授任職於國立東華大學。而在她今年開設的課程中，有一門課程是「城市‧動物與文學」，恰好就是這本書的書名。她說，這門課今年已經是第三次開設，當初出版社也正是因此而希望她能夠寫一本在未來各大學的中文系所教導動物文學時，可以當作延伸書目或課程大綱的文學讀本。然而她上課的時候不只是通過文本分析，而是從生活中的議題切入；而且現階段的大學中文系所雖然會有自然書寫的科目，但會將動物分出來討論的卻幾乎沒有。此外這些議題牽涉到大量的哲學、社會學、心理學等學門，這樣的書把中文系所當目標讀者似乎不是這麼合適。因此她與出版社協商，將這本書定位成大眾關心這類議題的入門書。
但在這本書的編排上，仍然留有一個教科書的想像。在每一個章節的本文之後都有設計練習習作和選讀文本，作者對此則說道：「現在的出版環境產出太快，很多書還來不及被讀者看見、被記得就已經淹沒掉了。如果有一些很精彩的文學或是哲學作品能夠與實驗動物、經濟動物、城市流浪動物這些議題鏈接討論，那我就把它引用到書裡。
至於延伸閱讀的部分，則是希望凡是涉及相關主題的書籍，只要可以提供一些對話或思考的，都盡可能將它們列進來。這些書不見得是寫得最好的，因為這並不是一份年度好書的書單概念，而是希望讀者可以由此延伸出去，成為了解相關觀點的開始。而習作提問則是給想要開設動物文學這門課程的老師一個可供討論依據的方向，以及一些讓讀者在讀書會、課程、或是生活中能夠從各種思考的角度去討論的題目。」
在這本書裡，作者從各種角度剖析新聞事件中動物如何受到不人道的遭遇，因為新聞事件是一個一個真實發生在我們周遭的例子，它直接地凸顯了人們是怎麼看待動物以及回應的方式，從而反映出各種說法的衝突及矛盾對立。這些案例之中有一些是台灣在地發生的事件，而大多數是海外不同國家的新聞案例。她提及文章內容的時候說道，這本書不從大眾較有印象的當紅事件去切入，而是特意選用大眾忽略的、沒有注意到的案例。以此強調這個動物議題是跨領域、跨文化 的，即便是西方國家也會發生動物虐待、安樂死、不友善畜牧這種動物權利議題。如果大眾看待這類議題的時候直接將政治立場、意識形態先入為主的話，在議題中動物的主體性就會被模糊掉了。也因為動物事件是持續發生的，新聞報導也一直不斷的出現。所以書中的新聞選用除了盡量收錄國外案例，也找一些新發生的事件，盡可能讓這案例和讀者當下的現實處境能夠產生共鳴。
近年來大眾對動物似乎漸漸地開始會考慮「人道」，看起來是件好事。但在作者的觀察中，這些人道主義仍然比較局限在寵物、展演動物這些與人類切身利益不那麼相關得的，而會影響人們生活上切身利益的議題，推動起來的難度會更高。作者對此說道，對為什麼無法用人道的方式待動物，有時候是因為有些人覺得動物與人的生活沒有相關而忽略。但除此之外的另一個面向是動物作為食物跟人們的生活太貼身太相關了，人們不想要去意識到這個議題這麼地切身。對大眾而言，關懷動物的心理門檻比起生存需求和口腹之慾的門框高太多了。
書籍終於出版了，然而動物保護卻不會有「終於」的一天。動物倫理議題是不斷在持續的發生， 除了案件一直不停地發生，也因為看待這件事的角度也無時無刻不在變化。即使是現在，它也未曾暫停過。這本書並沒有辦法將每一個觀點、每一個議題都收錄進來，作者對於這本書也不敢有太大的期望。「希望這本書能夠為讀者打開不一樣的視野，然後停下來思考,那些過去我們覺得很理所當然的，或是我們可能從小習慣接收的那些價值，其實裡面有很多並不是真的理所當然的地方，它是可以重新再去用一個不一樣的眼光去看待它的，如果我這本書能夠有一些什麼樣的作用的話，大概會是在這裡吧」。
Every time when we go on Facebook, we see many people posting selfies of having fun time with their “furry-little-one.” From these photos, you can see how people treat their pets as their biological children. We can often see protests held by animal rights activists and organizations. Does it mean that people nowadays tend to be more sympathetic about animals? Are human-beings progressing to treat animals more humanely? Unfortunately, what the public see is just a hallucination. There are much more unknown truths that we do not know, or just choose to ignore.
“I hope, with this book, to provide some suggestions for those who care about animal ethics but don’t know where to begin.”
Huang Tsung-Chieh is an associate professor of Sinophone Literature at National Dong Hwa University. Among many courses she teaches in this semester, there is one special course called “City, Animal, and Literature,” eponymous of her aforementioned new book’s subtitle. She said that this has been the third semester since she offered this course. As for the book, Where Is Their Home?, it was an invitation from the publisher, New Sharing, that she should write an animal literature reader for related courses in Chinese departments of Taiwan’s universities. However, what she put in the book is not only literary texts but also key issues about animals we may encounter in our daily life. Professor Huang noticed that even though there are courses about nature writings in Taiwan’s universities, animal issues are rarely discussed as an independent topic among them. In addition, the issues covered in her book involve a lot of background knowledge on philosophy, sociology, and psychology. Because of that, she thought it might not be appropriate to target Chinese major students as her book’s readers. She then negotiated with the publisher and positioned the book as an introductory guide for those who care about animal issues.
Despite being a book for the general public, Where Is Their Home? is still proved useful as a textbook. After a selected thematic reading in each chapter, there are exercises and extended reading suggestions. Professor Huang explained, “We do this because every day there are too many books published in the market and many of them would disappear very soon before they are seen or remembered. If any good literary or philosophical works may connect and relate to the issues like laboratory animals, economic animals, or stray animals in cities, I would put them in my book as references. As for the extended readings for each chapter, I listed them in order to offer more opportunities for the readers to think or bring up their own ideas. Not every book in the extended readings is perfect since it’s not my intention to make it like a “best-of-the-year” list. The main purpose is for the readers to connect and understand the related issues, and from there, they can reach further and further. The exercises are for the teachers of animal literature to use for class discussion. They can also be used by the readers in a reading group, a formal class, or even their daily life to ponder on animal issues from different possible angles.”
Professor Huang also analyzed pieces of news about how animals were badly and inhumanely treated in her book from various angles. News events are the real cases that happen every day around us, and they directly highlight how people see and treat animals as well as how people respond. And people’s responses would reflect conflicts and paradoxes within the discussions about animal issues. Some of the news used in the book happened in Taiwan, but most of them were from abroad. She mentioned that, in the book, she didn’t use cases that were popular and likely known by the public. Instead, she chose those neglected and unnoticed by the majority. The purpose is to emphasize that animal issues are multidisciplinary and cross-cultural. Even in the developed western countries, cases like animal abuse, animal euthanasia, and unfriendly husbandry happen. If people bring their political standpoints and ideology first into the discussion concerning animal issues, the subjectivity of the animals in these issues would be erased. Also, as incidents of animal rights happen every day, the news about animal issues will never stop from release. That’s why she included cases from as many countries as she could. She also collected recent incidents in the book in order to allow the readers to relate to the current situations in reality.
Recently, people seem to treat animals in a more humane way. It seems to be a good thing. But according to Professor Huang’s observation, this humanitarianism still puts emphasis mostly on pets and recreational animals, which are less connected with human interests. On the other hand, it is harder to advocate animal rights in terms of the issues strongly connected to people’s interests. She said that sometimes the reason why some people cannot treat animals humanely is that they don’t think animals are part of their life and therefore tend to ignore them. However, as food, animals are actually so related to people’s life, but people tend not to realize this fact. To the public, the threshold of caring for animal rights is much higher than that of needing them as food for existence and appetite.
The book has finally been published. However, animal rights movement will never come to an end. Discussions about animal rights and ethics continue because related incidents happen all the time and the perspectives about animal issues change in every minute. Even now, animal issues keep changing. There are still so many issues and views that cannot been included comprehensively in this book. Professor Huang modestly didn’t dare to expect too highly of the book. “Only do I hope that the readers can extend their horizon after reading this book and stop to think over those things we used to take for granted. Perhaps some values that have been passing down to us when we were little are not really that clear and obvious. They can be viewed and examined in a totally different way. If there is any difference that my book could make, it probably is that.”