The Latin word animalĭtas came to Spanish as animalidad . This is what the animal condition or nature is called.
Animals, meanwhile, are sentient living beings that move by their own impulse. Beyond its intelligence, the traditional definition of the concept of animal refers to its irrationality , as opposed to the reasoning capacity that people have.
Animality, in this framework, is that of an animal . The notion is associated with instinct or the essence of these organic beings.
Animality is often referred to to describe or explain actions of an animal that, from the human perspective or transferred to the behavior of a human being , are cruel or bestial. This animality breaks out when a lioness goes hunting and kills a cub of another species for food, to mention one possibility.
Take the case of a dog that lives as a pet in a house. The dog's owners usually humanize it, buying it clothes or celebrating its birthday. However, despite domestication, the dog is still an animal. His animality may appear, for example, if he attacks a child because he feels threatened. This attack cannot be judged with ethical criteria (it is not a “bad” act), but rather it has to be understood from the animal condition of the dog.
This is one of the most common cases of overlooking animality. Almost all human beings who live with dogs (and cats, too) treat them as if they were "just another person", something that in principle has nothing wrong, but rather reflects the love they feel for them. It is not uncommon to hear them say "I love him like a son" or "I treat him like a peer." The problem begins, however, when they are required to follow all of our rules .
The conventional definition of animality includes an appreciation regarding the functioning of animals' brains, in particular their inability to reason. It should be noted that not everyone agrees with this statement, but even if it were true we should not forget that the reasoning or way of thinking of each species is probably different. For this reason, without going into accusations about the brain potential of each species, we cannot expect a dog to respect the laws written by a human being, just as we would not be able to respect those of a wolf.
It is common, on the other hand, to talk about the animality of the human being . In this case, mention is made of the traits given by biology or that are not influenced by culture, or of actions that do not present the inhibitory brakes that are acquired socially.
At this point we enter once again into the derogatory tone towards animals: we say that culture distances us from animality, as if animals did not have their own culture. Just because we don't understand their codes doesn't mean they don't have them; It is enough to observe any species closely to discover that its world is as rich as ours, although different. This does not mean that all living beings with certain characteristics in common have a certain degree of animality, something that cannot be removed through social impositions.
In our case, unlike what happens with the rest of the species, we rely on the protection provided to us by the security forces and the Judiciary: if someone threatens us or harms us, we report it and trust that the State protect us. We accuse this individual of not having " controlled his animality", something that makes him strange and dangerous . We, on the other hand, act according to the laws. In short, animality does not mean being less sophisticated, but more natural: if they attack me, I defend myself; If I am hungry, I get my food by my own means, without resorting to exploitation.