I think the main reason why some people say that zoophilia/bestiality is wrong and that the perpetrators should be punished is because most people have a belief (I'm not quite sure where they get this belief from to be honest) that animals DO NOT WANT TO have sex outside of their own species.
....And if we were to look at the human species we would see that this is pretty much true. Most humans only want to have sex with humans- they feel very disgusted at the idea of them having sex outside of their species. Something we know of as a zoophile or zoosexual is RARE among humans. Human society at large is very anti-zoophilia and zoophiles are hated by the vast majority of humans. If we were to look at humans, it is true that individuals of a given species more often than not DO NOT want to have sex outside of their species.
How does a zoophile argue against that underlying belief convincingly?
Because if an animal truly would rather not engage in bestiality that is a way that it could be said that bestiality is animal abuse.
Some animals can give very convincing signs that they want to be bred. A mare for example can "wink" her vulva in front of a human, yet the anti-zoophilia people say this is just instinct. Their reasoning is flawed, because humans also have the innate instinct to mate with other humans.
I think antis often use the word "instinct" when they mean "reflex". I agree that instincts are sufficient for the reasons you give, but if it's a reflex for a mare to "wink" when in season in the same way human males can get a reflexive erections from anal penetration...
I have a vagina and it sometimes does "twitching/clenching" things. But that happens without my conscious intention- it especially tends to happen when I'm asleep at night (this is only really on rare occasion). Sometimes I will get really wet during the day but it is usually because I am feeling happy or calm. I don't think it means that I want to have sex with whomever happens to be around me at the time. To the contrary, there is no human I see that I want. I really don't like humans in a sexual way.
I don't think a mare is signalling to you that she wants to do things with you if her vulva winks in front of you- she could be very much just in her own world. I'm skeptical. I'm a skeptical zoophile because just because I desire to have sex with animals doesn't mean that the feeling is mutual. I wish it was though.
I SO wish it was crying
Yeah but sometimes, the winking is done when for example when I'm grooming a mare's flanks, and I'm imitating stallion grunting noises and she is in heat. But agreed isolated winking does not always mean a mare is receptive.
Wouldn't it be better though if you could use a human language with your mare? Wouldn't it be better if you could discuss your desires to be with her sexually, if you could tell her "I really really like you" wink... "if you know what I mean"
Yes it would awesome. Though the mare was not mine (but I did have permission to be in her paddock).
Perhaps the use of a human language would be a necessity in order for a human and a non-human to have consensual sex together.
I would go with the opposite and say it would be a necessity that a human use the animals language in order to have consensual sex together.
Off the top of my head, even if the animal cares about reproduction (and there is evidence that they might not), I'd ask if they even know that we are a different species from them? I mean that in a somewhat serious way. I've been sitting down on a sofa watching TV with a friend when his horny male dog knocked me over and humped me, despite there being a bitch in the same room.
That is a very good point. It is another thing to consider whether animals have as strong a sense of identity as humans do. You hear a lot of people that say things like "so and so (a certain animal in their lives) thinks he is a human being!" they laugh.
I'd argue against this by saying that human beings have not been artificially selected in the same way as domesticated animals. I would agree that by and large wild animals do not want to have sex with animals that are extremely different from them (though interspecies mating does happen in the wild, it's usually between closely related species). But by domesticating animals for thousands of years, human beings have been selecting mates for, among other things, increased breeding stock (more frequent estrus cycles, larger litters, etc.) and affinity for humans (tameness or docility, but also friendliness in some cases). It seems to me fairly obvious that these two traits combined would result in a significant number of domesticated animals wanting to have sex with humans. Add in the likelihood of imprinting to humans due to spending much of their time cared for by human beings and not free to socialize with their own kind, and we have a recipe for domesticated animals wanting sex with humans.
Ah. Imprinting. So you seem to be saying it is possible for humans to imprint on animals. If this is the case doesn't it seem somewhat like incest if you raised an animal from a baby and you provide for this animal and then you try to have sex with the animal when the animal comes of age? How is this not like growing up and then having sex with your parents one day? And I think most animals are not as trusting of humans who are not the animal's owner. It would seem that if imprinting really occurred then animals would be rather open to human strangers because they may think in their minds that the human strangers are "sexy" much in the way that we zoophiles will see an animal we don't know personally but may think that the animal is "attractive" and may wish to have a flirtatious encounter with that animal.
This was pretty much what happened in my earlier example of a friend's dog jumping me. It was only the 3rd time the dog had met me, I think.
Yes, it does seem a bit like incest, particularly if the animal is raised from infancy by the same human being (which is often the case, but not always). I'm not sure how the instincts against incest and for imprinting would interact in an interspecies case, or even whether an animal would have some sort of revulsion towards this sort of adoptive incest.
As for the idea that similar reactions might occur to strangers, I think this likely, though much would depend on how the animal is trained and socialized. There might be a way to test such an "imprinting theory" in their reactions to strangers (particularly strangers similar to those who raised them when they were young), but it's difficult to tell otherwise.
Animals frequently have sex outside of reproductive purposes, and this includes interspecies sex. There are also cases of animals with a definite sexual preference for humans (this is documented very well with birds) due to sexual imprinting.
That's fine if there are some which appear to have a preference for humans (isn't this all rather subjective) but should we err on the side of caution? Should we try to avoid the risk of causing an animal psychological harm because perhaps A PARTICULAR animal only wants to be with his/her own kind sexually? It is too bad that they can't communicate this directly to us. It is too bad that they can't say, "What I really want is.... etc fill in the blank" Come on, zoos, don't you care about their perspective and/or their culture?
Erring on the side of caution is still erring. The best way to gauge in an individual case is to get to know the animal, and learn their personality. If you decide to make a pass at them, be slow and careful, and use their response to figure out whether to continue, not your own lust.
They can communicate an interest or disinterest. I think you're getting into some deeper areas that, while interesting, maybe aren't exactly relevant. Say a dog mounts a human with intent to masturbate. As far as the dog's perspective is concerned, he's getting his sexual release and whether or not the human is as well is irrelevant. This kinda ties into the thing about AI, that animals probably don't really know or care about the difference between someone stimulating their junk to collect semen, or simply for fun.
In the past, I've addressed this argument by saying that animals are fundamentally opportunistic. They have no concept of reproduction while they're having sex: depending on species and biological sex of the animal, they would be doing the deed out of instinct or sexual desire (we know that animals feel sexual pleasure and seek it where they can), and are capable of seeking it from a human they trust, who can satisfy them.
Animals are not robotic: they are not coded to the understanding and reasoning of anti-zoos. Saying an animal cannot seek and enjoy sex with a human calls into question most generally-accepted interspecies interactions. Must a herding dog dislike flyball or agility work because it satisfies an instinct rather than being, in itself, the original use for that instinct (ie, stock herding)? Must a dog dislike sex with a human because it satisfies an urge that would be satisfied by another dog if zoophiles didn't exist? I argue that the opportunism of most animals in sex means they don't draw these species distinctions at all, and they certainly have no morality to contemplate.