I wonder what makes us so afraid of our proximity to apes. Maybe we are afraid to stay in front of our animality.

There are four great apes: chimpanzees, gorillas, bonobos and orangutans. Chimpanzees and bonobos are separated from us with only 1% of the genome. We can even exchange blood transfusions with them, respecting the same blood type. However, they belong to the genus Pan and we, to Homo. A quite forced difference in rating, because they are other primates, such as the common gibbon and the Siamang that are included in the same genus despite being separated 2.3% of the genome. It’s been over a decade that many scientists worldwide have prompted a review of the classifications and the inclusion of the great apes, or at least of chimpanzees and bonobos, in the genus Homo. However, when a slight recognition of our proximity to the great apes is suggested, enhancing their obvious humanity, and, as a result, the brutalities we made with them, quickly appear a cataract of nasty reactions against it. From the stupid jokes to the hypocritical outrage: “You care more about the monkeys than humans”. A demonstration, in the end, of the monstrous resistance encountered when Darwin published The Origin of Species 150 years ago. Ignorance and stupidity are difficult to eradicate.

I wonder what makes us so afraid of our proximity to the great apes so that we act so aggressively, relentlessly, perhaps afraid to face our animality. When in 2006 a proposition of law in the Spanish Parliament approved a law to promote the protection of great apes, the idiots free attacks that the initiative received resulted that, eight years later, it continues to be forgotten in a drawer. The only thing that we asked was the guarantee of the respect for life, liberty, and not to suffer physical or psychological torture. What there is of so scandalous or inadmissible in a so obvious proposal?

Parliamentary Association for the Defence of Animals and GAP Project filed, two weeks ago, a Manifest demanding  the ecognition of the great apes as non-human persons. The Manifest, written, among others, by philosopher Jorge Riechmann, is an eloquent and wonderful text. The text quotes Joseph Fletcher (1905-1991), a founder of Bioethics and his famous list of 15 characteristics or attributes to define human personality: minimal intelligence, self-awareness, self-control, sense of time, sense of future, sense of past, ability to relate to others, concern and care for others, communication, control of existence, curiosity, and ability to change rates, balance of reason and feelings, and idiosyncrasy of the neocortex activity. Thus, numerous scientific studies have shown that great apes share with us all these features, in varying degrees, of course, because chimpanzees are not as smart as Riechmann (however, seem more intelligent and more human than many individuals). The great apes are able to learn sign language and teach it to their children; perform simple mathematical operations; manufacturing tools; mourn for their dead; care for their loved ones; get dressed up and recognize in front of a mirror. And we do atrocities with them. Why we pulled out their teeth so they don not to bite and their the larynx, so they do not  scream.  This was told us by Pedro Pozas, director of GAP Spain.

Great apes are dying, we are exterminating them along with tropical jungles, which fall under chainsaws to make room for plantations of palm oil or soybean biodiesel. We’re creating a massive ecological disaster, which relies on two lies: the falsehood that biodiesel is environmentally friendly and the fact that FAO counted as vegetable zone these mono climate areas, when in reality they are green deserts devoid of all life. In Indonesia, the world’s third plant reservoir, 51 square kilometers of jungle are cut every day (the equivalent of 300 soccer fields per hour). Orangutans only live in Indonesia: in five years they will be gone. And then, then, bonobos. And very soon, the other great apes. We are committing genocide and almost nobody cares. Our descendants will watch with horror and disbelief the way we treated great apes, just as we’re seeing with horror slavery now. If you want to sign the Manifest, which has the support of dozens of scientists, click here. Recognize great apes as non-human persons. Let us try to protect them from hell.

Rosa Monteiro, journalist and writer, El País newspaper, Spain