In Defense of the Small, Green, and Slimy
 99/07/19

In general, I approve of "hands-on" classroom activities in the schools. Having been home educated, I understand the importance of learning things by touching, feeling, experiencing and observing as opposed to only reading textbooks and solving problems. There is one area, however, where I would rather see more textbooks and less hands-on work, and that is the study of anatomy.

A major part of anatomical study in highschool (and sometimes earlier) is the dissection of animals. The student will usually start with simple forms of life such as earthworms, and then "graduate" to more complex animals such as grasshoppers, fish, frogs, squirrels, rabbits, and cats. These are all examples of animals that are known to have been used for dissection in grade schools or highschools.

It's important for people to learn about anatomy. Some students will graduate from highschool to study medicine, veterinary medicine, or other biology-related fields, and direct observation of the internal workings of living things is necessary. Even students who aren't entering such careers should know something about anatomy; with all matters of health-- not just sex education, as the schools have already acknowledged-- it is vital that human beings understand the way their own bodies work.

But is it necessary for the latter group of students to kill animals in order to learn what they need to know? Would they not be adequately served by reading textbooks and observing the functioning of their own living bodies? Dissections have been taking place in schools for many years, and only recently have begun to be questioned. There are deeper issues involved than merely the quality of education.

Many children, upon facing the prospect of dissection for the first time, shy away from the idea. It's disgusting, it's gross. I don't want to kill anything. True, a few individuals will refuse to do it, and most schools these days are required to respect a student's refusal. However, most children, by this time, have been in the school system long enough to know that stubbornness (free will, perhaps, or independent thinking?) is frowned upon, and that it's easier to put up and shut up.

The message that is sent to the students is that one's own gut feeling should be ignored for the sake of the work. Granted, all human beings will face situations in which they have to do things that they don't want to do-- but there's a difference between laziness and conscientious objection. Getting used to doing your homework on time will teach you the rewards of not being lazy. Being coerced into killing an animal when you think it might be wrong to do so succeeds only in showing you that your own feelings and thoughts are not valid, and that it's better to simply do what you're told without complaint. It is vital that the next generation of human beings-- scientists and others alike-- knows how to listen to their own hearts when they feel that something is wrong. The alternative is a society in which people don't work for change because they don't trust their own feelings, and because they believe that it's better to follow the crowd and not make noise.

The other alarming aspect of dissection is the propagation of the notion that animals are disposable resources to be used once and thrown away, like rubber gloves and those little paper lab masks. There has been a move in the schools to promote concern for the environment (my 11th-grade chemistry course, for example, included an entire unit devoted to a case study of illegal chemical waste dumping), but to continue acquiring frogs in bulk and thoughtlessly killing them in the name of education sends a mixed message.

It encourages not only a lack of respect for the environment in general, but also a lack of respect for life on a smaller, more individual scale. If you are desensitized to the idea of nonchalantly killing a squirrel or a cat (something you would probably otherwise be repulsed by), and if that act stirs up no more emotion in you than the act of switching off a computer and taking it apart, then how deadened will you be to human suffering and death later in life? Do we really want to teach our children that it's okay to kill a living thing without a second thought? Much blame has been placed on the television and movie industry for desensitizing people to violence, and video games for making them more prone to committing violent acts impulsively. Perhaps we need to reexamine the skills and attitudes that our children are absorbing from other less obvious and less blatant sources. As for those students who do wish to enter careers where hands-on experience in anatomy is required, dissections can be saved for first-year college or university, when the students are old enough to have a better-developed sense of self and belief in self, and where ethically tricky activities can be accompanied by courses devoted to discussion of ethical issues.

Schools have accepted individual students' ethical objections to dissection, and have permitted students to opt out of participating in dissections without any academic penalty. By doing so, they have acknowledged that dissections in classrooms are not always necessary for a child to get a proper education. If one child can successfully complete highschool without participating in casual and unfeeling destruction of animals, why can't they all? By teaching children to love and respect life, we will set our culture on the road to a healthier and less violent future.

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