Monkey business

It's true: Reality has overwhelmed satire. You can't make this stuff up. Consider the following Associated Press dispatch from Vienna, Austria:

"Animal rights activists, campaigning to get Pan, a 26-year-old chimpanzee, legally declared a person, vowed Thursday to take their case to Austria's Supreme Court after a lower court threw out their latest appeal."

The story quoted Martin Balluch, president of the Association Against Animal Factories, as saying, "It is astounding how all the courts try to evade the question of personhood of a chimp as much as they can."

Indeed, that is astounding. But how do we know the chimp actually wants to be a person. What if he'd rather be a dog or a cat or a bird?

Of course, animal rights activists, anticipating ridicule, argue that they're not really trying to get Pan declared a "human." Rather, they say they're using the legal system in an effort to ensure the chimp doesn't become homeless after the animal shelter at which he's lived for the past 25 years recently filed for bankruptcy. If the animal is declared a "person" under the law, a guardian of the group's liking would be appointed to look out for his interests and it would allow Pan to receive private cash gifts.

"The question is: Are chimps things without interests or persons with interests? A large section of the public does see chimps as beings with interests," said Mr. Balluch. "We are looking forward to hear what the high court has to say on this fundamental question."

And so are monkeys everywhere.