How not to argue using animals

Have you ever found someone who cites the animal kingdom to justify their arguments about human phenomena? And isn't it striking that the same person can use it to criticise human activities? 

Perhaps you don't follow me yet. Here are a few cases I've observed among Indonesian netizens.

1. Human evolution. Too often whenever one says that human beings, as a result of evolution, are related to primates, some people would yell, 'So you believe that your ancestors are monkeys? We don't buy that, because mine is Adam'. Here, they deny any evolutionary ties of kinship between human beings and animals.
2. Homosexuality. Report any news about same-sex relationship, and these people would be quick to say, 'But even God has created male and female animals, and none of them have same-sex copulation. It's against natural law.' Here, they criticise homosexuality as a deviant human behaviour and liken man-woman relationship to male-female animal relationship. Well, if only they read that homosexuality is also prevalent in animals. Knowing this unexpected fact, they will cry, 'But humans are different from animals!' See? they justify human heterosexuality with attribution to the animal kingdom but criticise human homosexuality on the basis that animals and humans are in no way alike. 
3. Polygamy. The proposers of polygamy rarely cite animal sexual behaviour as justification for its practice. Well, polygamy, does exist in animals, and it is even statistically much more prevalent than monogamy. If these people are faithful to 'natural law', then polygamy must be considered the norm of human marriage whereas their monogamous marriages are seen deviant. And of course, the cry 'But humans are different from animals!' will be heard again.
4. You behave like what you eat. They say, 'Don't eat pork because you will behave like pigs.' They mean to say human laziness and greed represented by pigs. Here, they recognise the influence of animal meat on human behaviour. Using the same logic, so what good is done to those eating chicken and beef, vis-à-vis pork? Flapping your limbs but cannot fly?  
5. Inspiration. These people are fond of taking inspirational or religious lessons from animal behaviour. For example there's a saying, 'Sekejam-kejamnya macan tidak akan memakan anaknya' (Even the cruellest tigress won't eat her cubs). Another example, if there's an unusual lovely relationship between a dog and a cat, they would see it as a lesson to make peace on Earth. Well, what inspiration then can we draw from a female praying mantis that preys her male counterpart after copulation? Or, a newcomer lion that kills cubs of the previous lion so that the lionesses will be willing to have sex with him?

Clearly, then, these people are cherry-picking examples from the animal world. Why is it that a particular instance of animal behaviour is used for justifying a case of human behaviour, whereas another is used against? As a result, their arguments are not tenable, lacking consistency. Therefore, I'd suggest you to keep off arguments using animal metaphors; you can either defend or criticise homosexuality, polygamy, or whatever dimension of human sexuality, but never take animal behaviour to explain your arguments.

The best way to justify human behaviour, I'd say, is moral consideration because it's precisely morality that makes our species distinguished from other animals. We do share some behaviour with animals, but animals don't have the capacity of moral judgement; their behaviour is morally neutral, amoral. It is us humans who decide where to put a particular action in the continuum of good and bad.

Next time a friend of yours commits the above-mentioned mistakes, kindly tell him/her to ask the animals in question if what they do is good or bad.