The dignity of Swiss goldfish

Apart from their penchant for yodelling, the Swiss must be counted among the most dignified people on the planet. And now their parliament has decreed that goldfish, too, must be treated with dignity. From September 1, a new law sets rigorous standards for the treatment of all "social animals". Swiss aquariums must have an opaque side to allow the fish live in a natural cycle of day and night. It will be an offence, too, to keep a single goldfish, guinea pig or budgerigar. Or one rhinoceros, apparently, because the law also covers pet rhinoceroses.

The Swiss are pioneer dignitarians. In 1992 Switzerland was the first country in the world to begin to phase out battery hens. Since then the law has become even tougher. In 2006, for instance, a researcher was forbidden to give thirsty monkeys a drink of water because a reward mechanism to get them to carry out a task was deemed harmful to their dignity.

And if that is not absurd enough, it now seems possible that the ever-expanding boundaries of non-human dignity will include plants.

The Swiss Constitution requires respect for "the dignity of creation when handling animals, plants and other organisms". The body in charge of interpreting this Delphic phrase, the Federal Ethics Committee on Non-Human Biotechnology, has just released a discussion paper about the dignity of plants. In due course its astonishing conclusions could become law.

Among them is that "decapitation of wild flowers at the roadside without rational reason" is essentially a crime. In fact, the committee was unanimous in its agreement that any "arbitrary harm caused to plants [is] morally impermissible". Genetic modification of plants would be permitted - but only if their "independence", including their reproductive ability, is ensured. This could mean, for instance, that producing sterile roses or seedless fruit would become an offence under Swiss law.

None of this is the legal equivalent of yodelling. The world’s leading science journal, Nature, recently reported that Swiss biologists are worried. Funding for their work might get cut off if they offend the dignity of plants.

Switzerland’s passion for the dignity of all creatures great and small, however, rings hollow in view of its treatment of human beings. It is one of the few countries in the world where assisted suicide is legal. The best-known agency for DIY euthanasia, a Zurich-based group called - what else? - Dignitas, recently opened its thanatorium in the same building as Switzerland’s biggest legal brothel. Surely that violates one of the numerous provisions in the constitution guaranteeing human dignity. As it is now, there seems to be about as much bureaucracy involved in killing a Swiss goldfish as there is in killing a human being. (Special chemicals are required since flushing fish down the toilet has been deemed undignified.)

The poor, befuddled Swiss have clearly lost the plot on what dignity is and who is entitled to it.

But they are not alone. Around the world the concept of human dignity is in crisis. Influential government reports in country after country are now condescendingly placing scare quotes on either side of the phrase "human dignity".

Britain’s Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority last year complained that "it is difficult to gain a consensus on the definition of human dignity". And the Irish Council on Bioethics last month declared that "its exact meaning is elusive". The President’s Council on Bioethics in the US has just released a fat report which tries to clarify what it is. Although many of the contributors defend it, neuroscientist Patricia Churchland guts "human dignity" of all content. She contends, like many of her colleagues, that morality and free will are essentially illusory and that past defenders of "human dignity" have been self-righteous, totalitarian fanatics.

The trigger for this controversy is a widely-discussed paper written four years ago by an American bioethicist, Ruth Macklin, in the British Medical Journal. She stated bluntly that "dignity is a useless concept in medical ethics and can be eliminated without any loss of content".

Well, the Swiss folderol suggests we will all be very sorry when "human dignity" is eliminated. The scope of human dignity in Switzerland has shrunk to the point that international death tourism there has become a boutique business. At the same time, the scope of non-human dignity has expanded. This is to be expected. For years the radical fringe of animal rights activists has attacked violence against animals by using violence against humans.

What is unexpected is that there seems to be no brake on the ever-expanding circle of non-human dignity. Somewhere above spiders and slugs, perhaps. But the Swiss experience suggests otherwise. Once the DNA of human dignity has been tampered with, it keeps expanding by some crazy logic, unfettered by common sense, until it includes plants, and even "other organisms". Now it threatens to turn treading on wildflowers into a crime. And it might not stop there. What constitutes respect for the dignity of bacteria and viruses must send shivers through the Swiss pharmaceutical industry.

The Swiss need to recover the conviction that human beings deserve a special status because they are unique in the universe, the only beings with reason and free will. That is not only the wellspring of human dignity, but the source of our obligation to treat animals and plants with due care. Otherwise the Swiss will end up conferring rights upon irrational beings who cannot appreciate their dignity and stealing rights from rational beings who can.