First of all, animals should not be used for work because :im-vegan: . But having said that... I see how human labor creates surplus value. And I think I understand why machines don't create surplus value. But what about animals that get exploited to perform work, say the mule that pulls a plow? Like humans, they require a "real wage" to sustain them i.e. food, shelter, and medical attention, right? And if the value of labor power of a day of a mule is say 2 hours (that's how much human labor is invovlved in making feed, etc), then if this mule works for more than 2 hours, are they not creating surplus value for the capitalist that claims to own them?

  • Commander_Data [she/her]
    ·
    3 years ago

    Dogs and horses have been genetically modified for centuries to do those "jobs".

        • usernamesaredifficul [he/him]
          ·
          3 years ago

          they aren't but they do involve it. how the animal feels about things depends a lot on how their trained and treated

            • usernamesaredifficul [he/him]
              ·
              3 years ago

              yeah if a horse is broken they will hate riding but if you train them by building trust and continue to treat them with care and compassion they will enjoy riding.

              breaking a horse is just one particularly way of getting them to take a rider and it's an evil way of doing it

        • HumanBehaviorByBjork [any, undecided]
          ·
          3 years ago

          i'm not gonna make any blanket statements about animal domestication but i have no idea how anyone can learn anything about horse training and riding and think the animal is doing everything voluntarily lol

        • usernamesaredifficul [he/him]
          ·
          3 years ago

          breaking horses is one way to get a horse to take a rider but there are other ways. You can train a dog by beating them and you can make a man work by whipping them but those aren't the only ways to do so