I briefly talk about the issue in my book--
Part of the difficulty of simply stating what can and can’t be done to animals is that respectfulness has fuzzy boundaries. .... A friend of mine recently remarked that birdwatchers are a bit like stalkers, the way they pursue birds and spy on them with binoculars. Stalking people is disrespectful, but what about stalking birds? Must birdwatchers think hard about their hobby? To produce the marvelous series The Life of Mammals, David Attenborough’s film crews surreptitiously invaded the space of animals in the wild. In one particularly fascinating segment, they drilled down into the burrow of a platypus – an egg-laying mammal – and inserted a periscope-like camera, giving viewers a chance to see a drop of milk emerge from the mother's skin and a blind, wriggling tiny newborn. It’s fascinating footage, but does this amount to a disrespectful violation of the private space of these animals?Is "no" really, obviously, the right answer? Here's the footage (about 3:15)--
David Attenborough (a hero in my house) is warm and wonderful, but drilling into that burrow does strike me as overbearing, intrusive, certainly questionable. But how can that be an appropriate reaction if the platypus had no awareness of the probe and wasn't hurt?
Things to think about before trying to say:
- The Truman Show. People inside the bubble aren't aware that they are on camera, and aren't hurt by it.Yet the audience on the outside are doing something wrong.
- Babies. Suppose a psychologist wants 24 hour footage of an infant. Should I allow a camera to trail my child, assuming the footage will be anonymous and the child will never find out?
- More about babies. Why not blow off some steam while taking care of your infant? You could address him as "you little asshole" or worse. The kid won't be aware of it, so "no harm, no foul"?
- The severely retarded. Why not set up a webcam so weirdos can watch them take baths, and the like? They'll never know it, so "no harm, no foul"?
OK, so what's wrong with drilling into the burrow of a platypus? I would say this: the platypus has a "subjectivity" of her own--a point of view, a set of experiences. To drill in and watch is to treat this "subject" purely as an "object." As an object of fascination and wonder, so it's not all bad. But it's dubious.
In the article, Dr. Mills says, "We can never really know if animals are giving consent, but they often do engage in forms of behaviour which suggest they'd rather not encounter humans, such as running away or building a burrow. The question constantly posed by wildlife documentaries is how animals should be filmed - they never ask whether animals should be filmed at all."
The platypus enters the burrow for privacy and protection. It's not anthropomorphic or far-fetched to think that's what she prefers. To intrude and watch is therefore quite clearly to act on your own preferences and to flout the animal's. As in, "I don't care if you want to be watched or not. I can, so I will." The filmmaker is insisting on his own point of view, instead of empathizing with the animal's.
But is it really wrong, really disrespectful? I did leave this as an open question in my book. I didn't say Yes, but I think it's wrong to laugh off Dr. Mills, as if the answer were obviously No.
P.S. What if there are invisible alien intelligences drifting around, completely impossible for us to detect? What if there's an invisible camera pointed at your face right now, and your image is being beamed to billions of aliens, scattered across the universe? And what if they are all thinking that you're weird looking, what with your bizarre nasal protrusion, the tongue that occasionally protrudes from your mouth, your glassy eyes, etc. Isn't there something wrong with what they're doing?