söndag 9 juni 2013

Problems with petitions against e.g. live cooking of lobster

 I think such petitions are problematic, since they send are either sending the implicit message/often interpreted to mean by the readers that there is a difference between animal cruelty of different countries, and difference between animal cruelty of different species, and also only condemning one sort of animal cruelty against this species (the campaigns sends the implict message that the problem is the "live cooking", the problem is not ALL killing). I think those petitions confuse many non-vegans, making them think they are helping animals without challenging their speciecism and their non-vegan habits of animal cruelty against other species for food. Here are some more problems:
http://bloganders.blogspot.no/2013/03/single-issue-campaigns-such-as-anti-fur.html
I think we should focus our time on this kind of education: http://bloganders.blogspot.no/2013/06/varfor-fordomer-vi-djurplageri-men.html [in English, see instead: http://articles.philly.com/2009-08-14/news/24986151_1_atlanta-falcons-quarterback-vick-illegal-dog-dog-fights ] - i.e. showing non-vegans that all animal exploitation is inherently wrong and showing that they already agree with the basic premise, which will they cause them to go vegan if they just follow what they believe.

What do you think?


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Quote by Gary Francione (Author of http://www.abolitionistapproach.com/ ):
"You claim that those who are critical of Asian practices, such as eating dogs, are racists. Does that mean that you are a cultural relativist? Do you think it's okay that Asians do that?"

My reply:

First of all, I do *not* say that anyone who criticizes such practices is a racist. I say that such campaigns tend to encourage racism and xenophobia because they characterize what others do as morally worse or as more "barbaric" than what is done by those in the culture or society of the person making the criticism. That is, such campaigns almost always result in people who eat cows and chickens and other animals characterizing Asians as "bad" people. I have a problem with that. Don't you?

Not everyone who makes a negative comment about eating dogs is a racist but some certainly are. Look at the comments that are made whenever anyone posts a story about dog eating. Many comments *are* just downright racist. But I am not interested in judging individuals on matters of intention. I am, however, interested in discouraging campaigns that inherently lend themselves to expressions of racism and xenophobia.

Second, if there is anything I am not, it is a moral relativist of *any* sort. I am a moral realist. I reject relativism of any type, including cultural relativism. I think it is terrible that anyone eats dogs. But I also think it's terrible that anyone eats cows or chicken or aquatic animals, or drinks milk, or eats eggs or cheese, etc. I don't see eating dogs as morally distinguishable from eating cows, chicken or any other animal products. Period.
 
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 Seagull LivingStone: <The cruelty of Asian cultures towards animals is infamous> I would suggest that Asian culture has no monopoly here. Several minutes ago, I received an email saying that "We don't skin animals alive the way Orientals do." Putting aside that rugs may be "Oriental" but people are Asian, anyone who would say such an ignorant thing has never been in a US slaughterhouse, where animals are often alive when being cut and skinned. Indeed, the Washington Post did an article on this several years back. Have you ever seen the way animals are slaughtered here in the "humane" US? In any event, to say that Asians deserve special mention here is, indeed, both racist and xenophobic and I would ask that you not make those comments here. Thank you for your cooperation.

---Vincent Guihan I think it's vitally important for animal advocates to unpack the inherent racism (sexism, classism, ableism, etc.) in many welfare-oriented, single-issue oriented campaigns. Not only is this a moral duty, in practical terms, it marginalizes animal advocacy as a 'whites only, middle class only, patriarchs only' venture.

It doesn't help that leading proponents of engaging 'other communities' in the welfare/SIC/MDA community engage in a practice that shows a serious disconnect between their nominal view that people of colour, the poor, women, etc., should feel welcome in animal advocacy, unless they're Asians, Latinos, slaughterhouse workers, scientists or waiters, women, etc., since animal advocacy groups tend to vilify these groups when there's a nickel on the table to do so.

(Although I think the notion of engaging 'other communities' often tends to be benevolently misguided when it amounts to a tacit assertion that people of colour, the poor, etc., are not already part of the advocacy community, which it often is. They are; my understanding is that they often just aren't explicitly interested in engaging with advocates who trade on racist, sexist, classist and ableist ideologies in order to promote an advocacy that could not reasonably achieve positive impact or outcomes for animals -- that is, they have the same critique of mainstream animal advocacy that anyone who is not drowning in welfare ideologies has).


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 Which is to say, it's not that veganism is 'too white', 'too male', 'too middle class' for segments of society that are not white, middle class and male -- as some suggest; it's that the proponents of welfare and SICs -- at almost every turn -- alienate these groups but also show that they operate under magical thinking about the relationship between work done and results achieved.

If there's anything that someone who is not white, not male or not middle class (not overtly privileged) in North America understands, it's that you can't waste time, effort and resources on things that won't achieve the results you hope they might.

When advocacy groups don't align these things, they signal their privilege (off the backs of nonhuman animals and marginalized groups) -- that they have all the resources in the world to engage in ridiculous frivolities. No one who's endured anything remotely like a serious social challenge can look easily at a group like that and say "awesome, where do I sign-up?? I see myself here."


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 Which is to say, it's not that veganism is 'too white', 'too male', 'too middle class' for segments of society that are not white, middle class and male -- as some suggest; it's that the proponents of welfare and SICs -- at almost every turn -- alienate these groups but also show that they operate under magical thinking about the relationship between work done and results achieved.

If there's anything that someone who is not white, not male or not middle class (not overtly privileged) in North America understands, it's that you can't waste time, effort and resources on things that won't achieve the results you hope they might.

When advocacy groups don't align these things, they signal their privilege (off the backs of nonhuman animals and marginalized groups) -- that they have all the resources in the world to engage in ridiculous frivolities. No one who's endured anything remotely like a serious social challenge can look easily at a group like that and say "awesome, where do I sign-up?? I see myself here."

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In order to believe that petitions and other single issue campaigns will be effective as a method of animal rights activism you also have to believe that not only will they change what they intend to change but that they will also influence people's attitude so that they will not simply shift their exploitation somewhere else. Foe exaple, will those who suddenly find dog meat unavailable start eating tofu instead of another type of meat? Will those disappointed at the loss of the 'bull run' suddenly stop visiting other events where animals are exploited for entertainment? I'm afraid there is absolutely no substantive evidence to suggest this is the case, therfore no reduction in the overall burden of animal exploitation results from these campaigns.

Alan O Reily

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