Thanks for sharing! It's a good resource and not one I've come across before.
So I do very much appreciate the spirit of your comment: that we should attend to less visible (and more easily addressed) harms, and not get caught up in 'celebrity causes,' so to speak.
But I think where I differ from you is that I don't view it as an either-or paradigm. I'd say to people "Go ahead and try to help these monkey individuals, and also work for, e.g., food-farmed nonhumans (who are easier to help, etc.)"
I appreciate the risk you're citing, that people could effectively "waste" time and resources on a case like this. But I'd argue there's a greater risk in approaching ethics as A) zero sum, and B) generalizable. I'll elaborate:
A) It's certainly true that we only have so many minutes in the day and so many dollars in our wallet. But I think these zero-sum resources are often not the final limit on what we can do. Rather, the limits we reach are emotional and psychological energy - which is often not zero-sum. Getting engaged in an issue (especially when it's an issue that radicalizes you) can actually increase the amount of time and resources you find for other issues. (I.e., you reclaim it from less important stuff.)
B) I'd argue ethics is patently not generalizable (in the sense that you're suggesting - i.e. that everyone should reach the same conclusion about which cases are worth effort), simply because humans are so varied. One person might have tons of money and be happy to spend on this cause in addition to whatever they give to help farmed nonhumans. Another person might feel a special bond with monkeys that makes this an easy, non-taxing (or even net-energy-positive) issue to engage in. Yet another person might currently find the plight of food-farmed nonhumans overwhelming to consider, but these monkeys will be a stepping-stone issue that help them get there. Etc.
Interesting. And you think these monkeys shouldn't make anyone's list? (I'm inferring, given that you began by addressing "anyone" with ethical concerns.)
I'd understand if you said they didn't make the cut for you personally, but I'm not sure why you'd be invested in ruling them out for everyone.
(And this a sidebar, but I think one could quite reasonably believe that advocacy here is worthwhile in exactly the bang-per-buck utilitarian sense you're invoking. For instance, people who are galvanized on behalf on these monkeys might then change their actions towards less visible, less relatable nonhumans like pigs, chickens, and fishes.)
Would you respond the same way to ethical concerns about the treatment of a small number of humans? If we could find larger groups of humans facing worse treatment (and surely we could), you might conclude that the smaller, less-poorly treated group is simply not worth discussing. But I'd argue in that case (as I would in this one) that the conclusion is mistaken.
Also, if I may ask, do you think we have to choose between caring about these individuals and caring about those in factory farms? I personally care about both (as well as plenty of other ethical issues, naturally). And I imagine other people feel the same. So your suggestion that we measure the two causes against each other is rather confusing.
So I do very much appreciate the spirit of your comment: that we should attend to less visible (and more easily addressed) harms, and not get caught up in 'celebrity causes,' so to speak.
But I think where I differ from you is that I don't view it as an either-or paradigm. I'd say to people "Go ahead and try to help these monkey individuals, and also work for, e.g., food-farmed nonhumans (who are easier to help, etc.)"
I appreciate the risk you're citing, that people could effectively "waste" time and resources on a case like this. But I'd argue there's a greater risk in approaching ethics as A) zero sum, and B) generalizable. I'll elaborate:
A) It's certainly true that we only have so many minutes in the day and so many dollars in our wallet. But I think these zero-sum resources are often not the final limit on what we can do. Rather, the limits we reach are emotional and psychological energy - which is often not zero-sum. Getting engaged in an issue (especially when it's an issue that radicalizes you) can actually increase the amount of time and resources you find for other issues. (I.e., you reclaim it from less important stuff.)
B) I'd argue ethics is patently not generalizable (in the sense that you're suggesting - i.e. that everyone should reach the same conclusion about which cases are worth effort), simply because humans are so varied. One person might have tons of money and be happy to spend on this cause in addition to whatever they give to help farmed nonhumans. Another person might feel a special bond with monkeys that makes this an easy, non-taxing (or even net-energy-positive) issue to engage in. Yet another person might currently find the plight of food-farmed nonhumans overwhelming to consider, but these monkeys will be a stepping-stone issue that help them get there. Etc.