And when the child cannot speak for itself?

Humanity’s first global lawsuit! In this 10th-century Islamic fable, animals put mankind on trial for the crimes of the extraction economy. We unsettle the habitus of human exceptionalism to ask: would we change the story’s ending because we couldn’t handle our own complicity?

Discover the original Omelas in “The Case of the Animals versus Man.” It’s early Iraq and modern ethics, Peter Singer’s speciesism, Haraway’s companion species, and the colonizing “thingification” of nature. Was Le Guin’s story about animal rights? Or, are animal rights linked to our ideological privileging and moral shame?

Episode 6.32 –

The Original Omelas: The Case of the Animals vs. Man

Readings & Resources:

Ikhwān al-Safā’ - “The Case of the Animals Versus Man Before the King of the Jinn” (Classical Astrologer pdf) (10th century)
Le Guin, Ursula K. - The Word for World Is Forest (1972)
Le Guin, Ursula K. - The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas,” The Wind’s Twelve Quarters (1975)
Le Guin, Ursula K. - “Vaster Than Empires and More Slow,” The Wind’s Twelve Quarters (1975)
Achebe, Chinua - Hopes and Impediments (1989)
Aristotle - Politics, Book 1 (~330 BCE)
Bacon, Francis - The New Organon (1620)
Cavarero, Adriana - Horrorism: Naming Contemporary Violence (2009)
Césaire, Aimé - Discourse on Colonialism (1950)
Derrida, Jacques - The Animal That Therefore I Am (2008)
Fanon, Frantz - The Wretched of the Earth (1961)
Haraway, Donna - The Companion Species Manifesto (2003)
Singer, Peter - Practical Ethics (1979)

Some Key Terms from this episode:

Speciesism: Systematic discrimination against an “other” based solely on the generic characteristic of their species. Follow-up Reading: Peter Singer, Practical Ethics.
Thingification: The psychological and economic process of conditioning an oppressor to see a living, feeling being as a mere inanimate object that exists solely for utility. Follow-up Reading: Aimé Césaire, Discourse on Colonialism.
L’inerme (The Defenseless): The completely unarmed, helpless being attacked with deliberate violence. Follow-up Reading: Adriana Cavarero, Horrorism: Naming Contemporary Violence.

Listener’s Guide Reflection Questions

The Evidence of Excellence: The humans in the trial list their architecture, sciences, and religions as proof that they “own” the world. If you were the judge, would you see these accomplishments as evidence of human greatness, or simply as a list of things we’ve built using stolen materials?
The Purpose of Pain: We often tell ourselves that animals (or even other people) don’t really “feel” their suffering because they aren’t smart enough to understand it. When we tell ourselves that someone is “too ignorant to know real joy,” are we describing their reality, or are we just making ourselves feel better about the bargain we’ve made?
The Master’s Logic: In the episode, we look at Aristotle’s idea that “the lower is for the sake of the higher.” If you truly believed that your comfort was the highest purpose of the natural world, what part of your own empathy would you have to switch off to keep living that way?
The Power of the Silence: The original story ends not with a victory for humans, but with a saint who recognizes the value of all worthy thought. Why is it so much harder for us to accept an ending where no one is “the boss” than one where we are clearly the winners?
The Hidden Price: If you found out that the “mathematically infallible happiness” of your city required you to ignore the cries of the things that feed and clothe you, would you try to change the system, or would you try to erase those cries from your mind so you could keep enjoying the peace?

Complete Resources: https://waywordsstudio.com/project/le-guin-omelas/

CHAPTERS

00:00 Trials and Tribulations
02:52 Intro Theme
03:28 10th Century Courtrooms
17:04 Bacon, Extraction Economies, and the Voices of L’inerme
26:49 Speciesism, Le Guin, and Peter Singer
33:57 19th Century Crimes
41:48 Synthesis & Superiority
45:13 Closing Credits

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Transcript and Bibliography: https://waywordsstudio.com/general/transcript/original-omelas-case-animals-vs-man

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Literary Nomads is the main program of Waywords Studio (https://waywordsstudio.com). The podcast posts new material each week, with thought-provoking examinations of literature around selected questions or themes and several smaller supplemental episodes in between the larger programs: history, writing, and contemporary applications of ideas.

Visit us for expanded resources for guests and the Waywords community, for other programs and writing, and for opportunities to support our goal to expand reading. Resources available can include full bibliographies of material referenced, full and partial texts, annotated editions, supplemental and expanded episodes, fictional explorations, teaching and learning resources, additional essays, and online courses.

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CREDITS:

Original music by Randon Myles (https://randonmyles.com/)

Chapter headings by Natalie Harrison and Sarah Skaleski

USING THIS WORK:

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. It is open to be used and adapted for all not-for-profit uses with proper attribution.

MLA CITATION:

Chisnell, Steve. “6.32: The Original Omelas: The Case of the Animals vs. Man,” Literary Nomads. Waywords Studio, 18 April 2026, https://waywordsstudio.com/project/le-guin-omelas/.