Singer's "Animal Liberation"

In “Animal Liberation,” Peter Singer argues that human exploitation of non-human species is a “continuing moral outrage,” because there is no justification for treating the interest of any being which has interests as less morally important than the like interest of a human being. Justice is a matter of treating equals equally, but not all inequalities matter for the relevant conception of equal treatment: for example, we should not think that minor genetic differences between races or sexes should result in different social, civil, or political rights even if those differences were found to correlate to small but measurable differences in average IQ. In short, Singer argues that it would be objectionably speciesist to believe “that we are entitled to treat members of other species in a way which it would be wrong to treat members of our own species,” because the relevant capacity for equal treatment is the capacity to suffer, and the members of many, many animal species have that capacity. He then draws out the implications of this view for current practice: vivisection, animal research, and factory farming are all morally impermissible because they brutally harm animals—animals who, by virtue of their capacity to suffer as we do, are thereby also entitled to the same level of respect and compassion.

Exxon, Redeem Thyself

Jad Mouawad
NYT 05.08.2010:

The oil industry is inherently more dangerous than many other industries, and oil companies, including BP, strive to reduce accidents and improve safety. But BP, the nation’s biggest oil and gas producer, has a worse health, environment and safety record than many other major oil companies... The industry standard for safety, analysts say, is set by Exxon Mobil, which displays an obsessive attention to detail... Analysts credit that focus, in part, to the aftermath of the 1989 Exxon Valdez grounding, which spilled 11 million gallons of crude oil into Prince William Sound in Alaska. “Whatever you think of them, Exxon is now the safest oil company there is,” said Amy Myers Jaffe, an energy expert at Rice University.

Deepwater Horizon

Wikipedia:

An explosion on the Deepwater Horizon offshore drilling rig, operating in the Gulf of Mexico off the coast of Louisiana, on April 20, 2010, resulted in a fire that sank the rig and caused a massive-scale oil spill. Eleven rig workers are currently missing and presumed dead, the explosion also injured 17 others. The oil spill covers a surface area of at least 2,500 square miles (6,500 km2) according to estimates reported on May 3, 2010 by CNBC. The oil spill, originating from a deepwater oil well 5,000 feet (1,500 m) below sea level, is currently discharging an estimated 5–25 thousand barrels (210,000–1,100,000 US gallons; 790,000–4,000,000 litres) of crude oil daily. The spill is expected to eclipse the 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill as the worst US oil disaster in history.