My Experience of Animal Experimentation at Oxford University...

Pro- vivisectionists make it a point of their defence to argue that animals are used in research only when absolutely necessary, and when no alternative is available. This personal account by a former Oxford University student suggests that desensitization is endemic all the way up Oxford’s educational ladder and beyond. The use of animals is encouraged as an easy option, and evidently, ethical considerations are given no airtime as an essential part of the curriculum. Early indoctrination means students are ill-prepared to make informed choices about exploitation, and largely accept as a matter of course that things are done this way, thus perpetuating the cycle of abuse.

As part of my degree in psychology and philosophy at Oxford University I had to complete either a dissertation on a philosophical subject or a psychological research project. I chose to do a research project investigating the effects of exercise on exploratory behaviour in rats.

I chose this project because my tutor suggested it to me; it was an easy option and I because I wanted to get my degree. Ethical considerations were sacrificed in the name of self-interest.

My project involved two groups of rats, the experimental group and the control group. Both groups had to be treated in exactly the same way in every respect; this was to rule out the possibility of other variables affecting the rats’ subsequent behaviour. The only difference between the groups therefore, was that the experimental group were exercised and the control group were not.

Both groups of rats were dyed; they were dipped bodily into black dye leaving just their heads white, so that in a maze, a special camera could detect their white heads and thus their movements could be recorded. Both groups then underwent a schedule of familiarisation with the various pieces of equipment used, including a treadmill where the experimental group were to be exercised, and the maze where their behaviour was to be recorded. As the treadmill was in a different building to that building which housed the maze, we had to familiarize the rats with the procedure of carrying them, two at a time, in boxes from one building, across South Parks Road to another building. During the weeks of experimentation this schedule was repeated, and this time the experimental rats were exercised and then their behaviour was recorded, while the control group were simply placed in the treadmill without exercise and their behaviour in the maze was also recorded.

The main purpose of this project was simply to give undergraduates the opportunity to learn how to plan and carry out an experiment, analyse results and write a report. As a result of this the 40 rats would have been killed after experimentation, as they were no longer ‘naïve’; the fact that they had been experimented on would act as a variable, which might confound the results of any other experiment in which they were used.

Rats are intelligent sensitive beings and all the procedures we subjected them to would no doubt have been stressful for them. To a rat, a human being would appear like a giant, and our constant handling them, moving them from one place to another and placing them in various pieces of equipment would have been frightening to them, especially since they had no understanding or control over what would happen to them next. The treadmill in particular would have been very frightening to them, as they were forced to run in a machine that was making lots of noise.

I am ashamed that I never consciously faced the implications of what I was doing even when I was with the rats. We, (my college friend with whom I did the experiment and myself) enjoyed the time we spent with our rats, we were told to handle them as often as possible as this would familiarise them to us and thus reduce their stress at being handled (we were not told to do this for the rats benefit, rather ruling out stress as a variable affecting the results of the experiment was required). After we had dyed them (the dying process being inexact and producing markings which individuated them more clearly one from another) we gave them names according to their dye marks. One we called Charlie because of his Chaplinesque moustache, another we called Spats because he appeared to have two black shoes and white spats on his ankles. Despite enjoying the time I spent with them, I still divorced myself from the implications of what we were doing, and what would happen to the rats after we had finished.

At home as a child I had lived with two beloved cat companions. I was involved in every aspect of their care; I fed them, I played with them, and I went with them to the vet. As experimenters, we were not given full responsibility for our rats; we did not feed them, or clean out their cages. We were not required to kill them. If we had been given full responsibility for controlling all aspects of their lives and deaths, which is what should have happened if the procedure was to be done with any honesty, I know I would not have been able to go through with experimenting on them at all. Somehow, because of the way the whole thing was set up, I managed to disassociate from what would happen to them after we had done our experiment. The killing of them after the experiment was never mentioned. They were killed somewhere removed from us, and this meant we did not have to face up to this.

Whilst I now take full responsibility for my part in the suffering and deaths of these 40 individuals, I feel that the attitudes of both my tutor and my student friend had a big influence in determining my participation in this vivisection, and as such both share some of the responsibility for this.

My student colleague had a hardened attitude to life in general and particularly towards the feelings of sentient beings, be they those of humans or non-humans. She had no concern for the stress or suffering of our rats. When the tail of one of our rats got caught in the treadmill and a one-inch long length of his tail was skinned, she laughed on its discovery. I was horrified and immediately removed the rat and placed him back in his box. I should have insisted he see a vet, but I did not. No one had told us what we should do in the interests of the welfare of our rats. And being intimidated by my student “friend”, I did nothing.

My tutor used her position of power and influence to indoctrinate her students into the unquestioned accepted norm of using animals in laboratories. It is often stated that animals are only ever used in vivisection as a last resort. As you can see from my story, this is patently untrue. My tutor was perfectly happy for me to experiment on 40 rats, even though I could have written a philosophical dissertation instead, or done a research project on an aspect of psychology which did not involve the use of animals. I do not know how many other students she introduced to vivisection in this way, or how many animals’ lives were wasted in the process. I do know however, that because of her influence I chose to do something that I will regret for the rest of my life.

At no point, during the entire three years of my time as an undergraduate at Oxford University, were the ethics of using animals for research even mentioned, let alone discussed, and yet as undergraduates we daily learnt about information that had been obtained through vivisection.

Every experiment using any animal is morally indefensible. It is justified by an extreme conceit, which allows scientists to believe that they have a right to use living, sentient non-humans as research models for the purposes of obtaining some knowledge that may be in the interests of humans.

It is wholly unethical, it is very, very wrong.

As Mohandas K. Ghandi said:

“Vivisection is the blackest of all black crimes that man is at present committing against God and His fair creation. It ill becomes us to invoke in our daily prayers the blessings of God, the Compassionate, if we in turn will not practise elementary compassion towards our fellow creatures.”

I now live with a deep feeling of regret for taking part in, and condoning animal exploitation and abuse. That is why I have joined the group of compassionate people who stand on South Parks Road every Thursday afternoon protesting against the building of the new laboratory. We will not let it be built. And we will go on campaigning until we see the end of the vile practise of vivisection.

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