Misrepresenting the Abolitionist Approach, Part II: On Hugs and Merit Badges

On Calling Not Changing the Subject "Changing the Subject"

In his post offering up the reasons he had changed his mind about participating in a podcast discussion with Gary Francione, James McWilliams had stated that "it [would] accomplish nothing except intensify the polarization that [McWilliams was] trying to minimize". Rather than take the opportunity to substantiate claims made during his recent public criticism of abolitionist advocates, he'd written that his intention was to instead continue developing his own arguments on his blog. The message received, based on his followers' reactions in the comments (reactions to which he did not respond and which he did not correct) was that debating the differences between abolitionist animal rights and welfarism is a waste of time and that he was no longer going to waste his own time doing it. I figured he'd meant that. So I was disappointed to amble over to his site the other day to find that he'd chosen to re-post an article by Melanie Joy in which she dredges up the welfare-abolition debate and takes a few passive-aggressive swipes at abolitionists.


A Reluctant Finger-Wagger

Joy starts off echoing McWilliams' message about how debating the fundamental differences between welfarism and abolitionist animal rights is a waste of time that she's always avoided, but that the apparently horribly traumatic and negative effects of those differences' having recently been aired forced her make an exception and to give up some of her time to weigh in. She starts off assuring us that there's nothing left to be said in the welfare vs. abolition debate -- she says it's "gridlocked". She implies that focusing on it at all is a soul-sucking time-sink. So? She offers up a fix -- a "reframe", she calls it, to make all of our lives "more peaceful" and our activism "more effective".

Critical Discourse and Debate Are "Non-Vegan"?

Joy suggests that we step away from what she calls the "content" of the issue (i.e. the facts and ethical arguments) and focus instead on "the way we communicate" -- the "process". She sets up a false dichotomy, suggesting that advocates can do one of two things. We can be "argumentative" so that

[o]ur consciousness and process can mirror the speciesist [...] culture we are working to transform, thus reinforcing, for instance, ideological rigidity, black-and-white thinking, defensiveness, bullying, self-righteousness, and hostility.

Otherwise, we can be "cooperative" and let our, um, consciousness

reflect the core principles of veganism – principles such as compassion, reciprocity, justice, and humility – the essence of a “liberatory” consciousness (and process), a way of being (and relating) that is fundamentally liberating and that I believe can significantly empower the important strategic conversations we need to continue to engage in.

She goes on to use the term "non-liberatory" to describe the former, which is also what she writes she's observed is brought to the table when differences in goals, strategy and tactics are discussed.

Conflating Diversity Within One with the Differences Between Two

Joy brings up that old familiar notion of the strengthening effect of diversity and extrapolates from it that we should somehow recognize that there is similar strength in our "differences" as advocates. She suggests that we should see the fundamental differences between what I've already mentioned in my previous post have realistically become two altogether different animal advocacy movements -- one welfarist focusing on how other animals are used and the other abolitionist and focusing on whether other animals are ours to use at all -- and that we should see liken these differences to mere diversity within one movement and as "opportunities" to strengthen what Joy calls "our movement". The thing is that likening diversity to those differences goes beyond comparing apples to oranges and makes as much sense as comparing a bowl of nooch gravy to a piece of granite. To insist otherwise merely undermines the seriousness of those differences.

Things get a whole lot more skewed in the article as Joy continues to weave into her text as a given that we're all apparently focused on the same goal -- i.e. that we're one movement with our collective eye on the same prize. She mentions "differences in terms of how effective various strategies are for ending animal exploitation" and that although some of those strategies may be "counterproductive" that "we" (i.e. members of an apparently comprehensive movement bent on ending animal use) need to discuss our different strategies "openly" and without "argu[ing] with each other"... but what exactly does she mean by "arguing"?

Debating = Evil

Surely, you would think that she's dismissing "arguing" in its common sense, when emotions are heated, tables are flipped and fists are shaken in the air? But no, according to Joy, merely having a rational critical discussion where you're expected to defend claims you make is tantamount to falling into this supposed non-vegan and "non-liberatory" mindset. Joy, in effect, decides to attack the entire idea and usefulness of debating, in and of itself. This form of critical engagement -- this rational exchange of information and arguments to clarify and substantiate claims and positions -- is purportedly rigid and extremist, according to Joy. It's just a contest and is all about winning. In fact, not only is it all about winning, but it's about labeling the person with whom you're engaging in critical dialogue a "loser". It apparently leaves the observer or listener to said debate limited to accepting one of two positions (obviously not the so-called loser's) and leaves the observer or listener completely in the dark about possible nuances to whatever topic is being debated. Presumably, this is because Joy thinks that people are incapable of listening and then reflecting upon and processing what they hear?

She contrasts debate with "dialogue" as if they're two completely altogether different things. Dialogue alone, it seems, allows for the sharing and exchange of information. Dialogue alone fosters an awareness of "multiple perspectives". Dialogue alone leads us to contemplations and thoughtfulness upon hearing different perspectives. Debate? It just leaves us pumping the air all "non-liberatory"-like, itching to see a victor and a vanquished. She writes: 

Achieving our objective of animal liberation depends on developing a comprehensive, complex, sophisticated, and flexible strategic approach to targeting a comprehensive, complex, sophisticated, and ever-changing form of institutionalized oppression. It is unlikely that the reductive, black-and-white rhetoric of debate can ever produce such nuance and analytical richness.

I've said it before and I'll say it again: I smell straw. It's possible that she comes by it honestly and that Joy's own experience with debates has left her unnerved -- that a bad experience has left her with a limited and one-sided idea of their purpose or process. There's a certain irony in that something that's such an ordinary part of what I should hope most thinkers or academics view as critical dialogue ends up made a straw man by Joy and that her contrast between this straw man and her notion of "dialogue" is in and of itself as narrow and "black and white" as the outcome she purports results from engaging in debate. Debate, she claims, is "problematic" and is in fact "an obstacle". It's "non-liberatory" and thus (gasp!) non-vegan.

I'm a Pepper, He's a Pepper
She's a Pepper, We're a Pepper

Having established that debates are a Big Bad, Joy branches off from this to get to what I think is the true purpose of her essay, which is explain why it's just plain silly that some who call themselves abolitionists would want to engage in debate with others they call welfarists. According to Joy, advocates are just plain old confused. They've mistaken strategy for ideology (with the latter presented as "morally loaded", as if it's somehow horrible to attribute rightness or wrongness to something and to take a stance accordingly). Her concern, it seems, is that self-described abolitionists who busy themselves educating others about not using animals and who see other advocates focusing on how animals are used (and not engaging in vegan education) are making a big mistake in assessing those actions as reflecting the other advocates' ideology. According to Joy, those differences are just strategic and we're apparently all, in fact, seeking the abolition of animal use. She writes that it's only "when we untangle ideology from strategy [that] we can redirect the conversation to how best to bring about this end without getting sidetracked by moral argumentation. (Because who on earth would want to lose their way advocating for the rights of others by getting distracted actually discussing silly things like "rights" or other "morally loaded" junk?) 

I won't go into detail about how Joy rambles on about how there is absolutely no evidence that promoting welfare reform will or won't bring about the abolition of animal use, except to suggest to she should put down her Cooney and pick up a copy of Gary L. Francione's Rain Without Thunder: The Ideology of the Animal Rights Movement or (better yet) The Animal Rights Debate: Abolition or Regulation? and that she perhaps consider taking a quick look at some of the (dare I say it?) nuanced writings on his website about why one should opt to focus on educating others to go vegan rather than waste time on attempts at welfare reform (attempts which often end up reinforcing the idea to non-vegans that other animals are indeed ours to use). Joy writes that "our investment in being right can prevent us from being effective" which misses the point altogether that for abolitionists, our investment is not in being "right", but in convincing others to go vegan. For me, hearing that someone's connected the dots and has rejected animal use is what's effective. Joy's investment in thinking that I'm participating in a contest or sporting event is preventing her from seeing that I'm fighting a holocaust.

To Joy, though, we're all on the same side, albeit some of us are trying to play soccer and to force other advocates into forming an opposing team so that we can just whup their arses for the sake of whupping arses. Debating, according to Joy, is just the "othering" of fellow advocates for the sake of arse-whupping. In fact, she points out, the whole "welfare-abolition debate" is a perfect example of this. It's a "myth", she tells us. It's just a construct slapped together by those who call themselves abolitionists. Why? Supposedly to force into a make-believe opposing camp other vegans who don't self-identify as having any sort of specific political or ethical stance when it comes to the question of the morality of animal use per se. If their actions reflect a political or ethical stance (e.g. through participating in or promoting regulationist campaigns)? Joy says that using a descriptor to identify them is antagonistic and irrelevant if they, themselves, don't self-identify with that same descriptor. (An aside: I wonder if Joy would take this one step further, then, and assert that if someone doesn't self-identify as, say, a sexist, that this person cannot rightfully be called a sexist?) Plus, throwing that descriptor out there is tantamount to actively foiling the hard work that other advocate is doing, whatever that "work" may be.

Identification with a position has largely been the province of a small group of vegans who have constructed an identity around their strategic-ideological approach and who have constructed labels for both themselves and the other “side.” In our soccer analogy, it’s as if there is only one team trying to win the game; the rest of the individuals don’t even think of themselves as a team and are simply moving across the field, only kicking the ball when it gets in their way.

Even when she admits for a second that maybe there is indeed something to abolitionists contrasting themselves with advocates whose focus is not on use, but on treatment, Joy insists that the difference between welfarists and abolitionists is still somehow make-believe -- a "myth":

To be fair, just because only a minority of vegans have a “team” identity, this does not mean that the majority play no role in constructing the debate. It is entirely possible that the small, vocal minority have developed a cohesive group identity because they have felt that their valid and pressing concerns have not been taken seriously by the broader vegan culture. Both “sides” must work to defuse the Myth of the Great Debate.

So in the end, there is no such thing as a welfarist or an abolitionist according to Melanie Joy -- all vegans are ultimately abolitionists (Joy's obviously never heard of Wayne Pacelle, Paul Shapiro or of Erik Marcus). Oh, and for heaven's sake -- don't try to debate her on this, because you'll just be kicking a soccer ball in her path and blocking the effective advocacy in which she is currently engaged by trying to blur distinctions between two altogether different movements. Joy's intention seems to be to shame and to silence the one movement that is unequivocal about its focus on animal rights while fighting to end animal exploitation. She seems to want to co-opt the descriptor "abolitionist" as it is understood now in animal advocacy circles, and to stretch it out to include anyone and everyone who wants to self-identify with it, regardless of their ethical stances or of their actions and complicity in the reinforcement of speciesist attitudes. I'm guessing that explaining to her that terms come with context and with definitions would just lead to an accusation that I was being confrontational and "non-liberatory".

Descriptors Aren't Merit Badges

Isn't it funny? This whole business of calling those who are actually abolitionists and who reject animal use things like "extremist", "divisive", "bullies", et al. while wanting to co-opt the term for people who aren't actually abolitionist but who still involve themselves in perpetuating animal use by focusing on treatment, it's really no different than animal-using vegetarians calling vegans extremist, divisive, bullies, et al. and then vegetarians wanting to co-opt the term "vegan" to self-identify as some "degree" of vegan as they continue to deliberately engage in avoidable animal use. Vegans get scolded and shamed into accepting vegetarianism (i.e. animal use) as somehow being no more than a wee moral sidestep (lest they be deemed holier-than-thou, judgmental, the vegan police, elitist, et al.). Now abolitionists are being scolded and shamed into embracing welfarism and into allowing those who focus on animal treatment to co-opt the term "abolitionist" for themselves -- regardless of their political or ethical stances or of the nature of their hands-on advocacy. If you try to point out that they're different, according to Joy, you're obviously a bitter trouble-makers who's gobbling up the time of those who could otherwise be doing their tabling or starting Care2 petitions to stop Safeway from selling brown ducks on Tuesday mornings. I mean, how dare you?

Welfarists and abolitionists aren't just grumpy siblings sniping at each other in the back seat of a car while on summer vacation. There is no rift in one unified movement; we are two separate movements. Our differences goes far beyond being mere "diversity", but it seems that hammering that out by engaging in critical debates that would make this evident is "non-liberatory" and not in keeping with vegan principles. Joy claims that we need to be truth-seekers, but seems to want us to do so blindfolded. And if in their own truth-seeking, advocates around us do more harm than good to other animals, we should nonetheless "value" them for their truth-seeking-ness; instead of tapping them on the shoulder and suggesting that they're doing it wrong, we should give up on our own fixation on doing it "right".

According to Joy, judging another's actions is always "shaming" and shaming is non-liberatory (and thus goes against vegan principles). According to Joy, judging always involves bullying. (Critical thinking means less time for hugs?) Joy's investment in keeping us from stepping on each other's toes is preventing her from acknowledging that for each misstep one of my fellow advocates takes, there may be additional lives lost. It's not about us; it's about them. If I point out to you that spending all of your time trying to get non-vegans to sign a petition to convince a fast-food burger chain to only use eggs from chickens who have an extra three inches of room in the cages in which they spend their entire miserable short lives, I'm not doing it to hurt your feelings: I'm doing it because I'm thinking about those chickens and that the chickens in those cages would rather not be in those cages at all. It's not about us; it's about them.

What Now?


She's right that we have "much work to do". Some animal advocates educate the general public about veganism; other advocates choose to educate the public about not not buying shoes made of kangaroo leather from one specific company while not addressing that no leather from any animal should be purchased and that all animal exploitation is problematic. As an abolitionist and an ethical vegan who truly wants to see an end to speciesism and to the horrific cycle into which billions of other sentient beings are enslaved and slaughtered every single year, part of my work involves sometimes tapping the kangaroo shoe petitioner on the shoulder and suggesting that more could and should be done. If someone like Joy wants to insist that that my doing so somehow goes against vegan principles -- that it's "divisive", so be it. At the end of the day I'd still offer Joy a big ol' hug. Then I'd ask her to substantiate her claims and to give me an opportunity to refute them, because this is where real learning and understanding come from -- not from smiling and nodding and turning a blind eye to others' fumbling around us.

HSUS: Carving Out a Niche for Family Farmers One Campaign at a Time

HSUS president and CEO Wayne Pacelle has popped up in dozens of mainstream articles over the years to defend HSUS to American farmers. Pieces in which he insists that HSUS is not a pro-vegan organization have shown up anywhere and everywhere to assuage the fears of those who raise animals for human consumption. Now it seems that even those who raise animals for slaughter themselves are stepping up to defend it for the work it has accomplished to make the idea of consuming animal products even more acceptable (dare I say 'palatable'?) to the general public.

HSUS' director of rural development and outreach, Joe Maxwell, is actually a Missouri hog farmer. He recently spoke on HSUS' behalf at a Nebraska Farmers Union state convention to explain how HSUS helps both facilitate and ameliorate sales for American farmers who raise animals for slaughter. Nebraska Farmers Union president John Hansen even emphasized its'

"commitment to help develop and expand marketing opportunities to help reward farmers and ranchers for producing livestock in a mutually agreeable fashion."

Perhaps I'm oversimplifying things, but to me, this sounds an awful lot like taking the millions in donations HSUS receives each year and investing them into animal agribusiness to help promote and perpetuate the continued exploitation of animals.

Joe Maxwell, as it turns out, could be a poster child for how lucrative HSUS' welfarist or regulationist work has been to American farmers. According to the article, Maxwell

is not only a member of HSUS, but also raises hogs and is part of a cooperative group of farmers who sell certified pork into whole foods and other markets for a premium using a value-based method of humane animal production.

The "humane" label, it seems, can indeed be more profitable to farmers. Lump HSUS' rewards to them in with this aforementioned premium and it sounds as if collaboration with HSUS can only be a win-win situation for them. Maxwell reinforces this clearly, stating: "They have helped create a market that has allowed my family to continue to raise pigs when most people can't find a way to do that."

HSUS' mandate seems to be to give a kinder gentler appearance to the raising of nonhuman animals for slaughter. According to Maxwell, even its support base consists of those who choose to continue to consume animals. One suspects that its supporters and staff would also like to think of their continuing to do so as somehow possibly involving a kinder gentler process, as Maxwell defends HSUS as striving to bring this to its supporters:

"They want to find more ways to assist family farmers," Maxwell said. "Why do they want to do that? Because they believe that it is more likely family farmers are exactly who HSUS' 11 million people are likely to buy products from."

He said 95 percent of the members of the HSUS are meat eaters and HSUS is not a "vegan organization."

Although Pacelle and some of his HSUS cronies like Paul Shapiro have already made it repeatedly clear in mainstream media that HSUS is not a pro-vegan organization, it's interesting to hear its director of rural development and outreach overtly describe both HSUS' financial supporters and staff as being the people with perhaps the greatest interest in the success of HSUS' campaigns so that they too, in turn, may continue to consume nonhuman animals and their products with less guilt:

"They want to find more ways to assist family farmers," Maxwell said. "Why do they want to do that? Because they believe that it is more likely family farmers are exactly who HSUS' 11 million people are likely to buy products from."

He said 95 percent of the members of the HSUS are meat eaters and HSUS is not a "vegan organization."

[...]

HSUS would rather reach out to organizations, such as the Nebraska Farmers Union, that are willing not only to work toward common goals of humane animal welfare, but also to create marketing opportunities for those producers to sell their animal products to a growing market of people who are asking for that type of accountability when it comes to the humane treatment of farm animals.

So perhaps, then, it isn't an oversimplification to assess HSUS' goings on with the millions in donations it receives as its -- quite literally -- investing in the continued practice of treating nonhuman animals as things existing for human pleasure. It's also become even more undeniable that their goings on are tantamount to what Gary L. Francione has described as the selling of indulgences. But as Francione has written,

buying a few shares of cage-free egg compassion from some organization is not going to keep animals out of the hell that most certainly exists for them and in which they suffer and die every day.

Perhaps even more so than ever before, we need to focus on formulating and delivering a clear unequivocal message -- the simple message that nonhuman animals are not ours to use, that their exploitation is immoral, and that their consumption is in no way necessary. It may not be profitable to deliver this message, but in terms of what it is that we each owe nonhuman animals, it is surely the right thing to do. To learn more, please visit Animal Rights: The Abolitionist Approach.

(Not) Veganism in the Media

HSUS' Wayne Pacelle has been making the rounds recently to promote his book, The Bond: Our Kinship with Animals; Our Call to Defend Them. The articles I've been reading here and there about his various appearances have not offered up anything surprising; they've mostly reflected his continued commitment to ensuring that Americans feel more comfortable about using non-human animals. This recent piece in Michigan's Lansing State Journal, for instance, turned up more of the same. Strangely enough, the article starts off quoting Pacelle as saying that "we [...] need to be mindful and intentional in a society where our attitudes toward animals are conflicted and contradictory". Given the conflicted and contradictory messages HSUS has been disseminating over the years, Pacelle's plea for mindfulness and an associated thoughtful intentionality when it comes to how we think of non-human animals seemed ironic at best -- and disingenuous at worst.

The article's emphasis seems largely placed on Pacelle's great "passion" and charisma. I've no doubt that HSUS' president and CEO is still able to seem enthusiastic while engaging with ease in essentially churning out the same old message he's been churning out for years now. Pacelle's become adept at reassuring people that HSUS is no "us" to the general public's "them" -- that everyone, regardless of actual concrete follow-through has some sort of good intention, and that this good intention is enough.

People of every background and experience have a passionate connection to animals and they want to do something to make the world better for them.

And just what sort of people share Pacelle's "passionate connection" to animals and want "to make the world better for them"? People like attendee Gita Mahabir, who insists that she's "not like a crazy animal person" but that she "just do[es]n't like to see things [sic] suffer". Basically, Pacelle's message is palatable to people who view those who take the rights of non-human animals seriously as nuts. In repeatedly dodging opportunities to talk to the public about going vegan, Pacelle also implicitly endorses this mindset.

How exactly does Pacelle manage to obtain and hang on to the attention -- and financial support -- of people like Mahabir? By making it clear to them that to walk shoulder-to-shoulder with almighty defender Pacelle, you need not worry yourself about being lumped in with the "crazy animal people" who choose not to use animals. Although he asserts that that eating is a moral act, his interpretation of its morality completely sidesteps exploring the notion that anyone should consider the bother of depriving themselves of the taste of animal flesh and secretions.

It doesn't mean you have to be a vegetarian but you have to be conscious and perhaps buy products from farmers who are raising animals humanely [sic].

According to the article, his book contains "50 ideas to help animals" with "many" actually involving cutting back on animal consumption. I wonder how many times Pacelle actually brings up not using animals as a possible way to "help" those locked into this cycle that inevitably ends in their slaughter? (I haven't read it, but would be happy to do so and to give it an earnest review if somebody wanted to send me a copy. A bonus: I own a good shredder!)

So hey, Wayne? Instead of suggesting to people that they "perhaps buy products from farmers who are raising animals humanely" and presenting it as the very least they can do, how about offering veganism as your so-called "prescription" for the immorality of what we're putting billions of non-human animals through every single year? Is it really so far-fetched to consider telling your HSUS donors that not using non-human animals altogether is even a viable option? Is it really so unfathomable to present not using non-human animals at all as the only truly "humane" option when it comes to whether or not we should treat animals like things and continue to breed them for slaughter? C'mon? Think about it.

Finger-pointing for Absolution: A Few Words about the Four Corners Story

Four Corners

For the past few days, animal advocates across the internet have been discussing the recent so-called expose "of the cruelty inflicted on Australian cattle exported to the slaughterhouses of Indonesia". The story broke on May 30 when the ABC (i.e. Australian Broadcasting Corporation) television program "Four Corners" aired a program containing undercover footage of the cows fattened in Australian-approved feedlots and then slaughtered in Australian-approved slaughterhouses by Australian-trained Indonesian workers. I have not seen the footage, myself, for the same reason I don't gawk at accident scenes -- I've no doubt that it's completely awful.

Judging by the hundreds of related news articles from around the world covering this story (along with thousands of readers' comments left in response to those articles) and that the link to the story has been shared just short of 7000 times on Facebook and all over other social networking sites, it's evident that even the non-vegan general public is outraged. The story has gotten enough attention that the expression "treated like Indonesian cattle" has now even started being used to describe the grossly ill treatment of humans.

Follow the Money

So much of the focus is being placed on the fact that Indonesia's "standards" for slaughtering non-humans are not as high as Australia's. A definite "us versus them" mentality has been reflected in the responses of the Australian government and cattle industry, proclaiming loudly and clearly that the cruelty involved in this whole mess is a deplorable exception limited to practices in Indonesia. The livestock export industry has promptly communicated its indignation to the press, as well. Faced with criticism for its direct involvement in the Indonesian abattoir expose -- as well as the possibility of a more generalized criticism of exporting live animals to a different country altogether for slaughter -- LiveCorp CEO Cameron Hall insisted in a press release that they really do want what's best for Australia's dear old homegrown cows:

"Cruelty to Australian animals is simply unacceptable. We will not tolerate it," Mr Hall said today. [...] Mr Hall said there was more work to be done, particularly at the point of processing, however if Australia was to cease exporting cattle, animal welfare would only go backwards. "No other nation has the same commitment to animal welfare as Australia and no other country invests in animal welfare like we do."

Australian politicians who've expressed the most indignation over the story have also been making it clear that it's not that cows are being raised for slaughter that's a concern and that Australian animal slaughter practices are somehow ethical and good. It's not even the stress of the cramming together and shipping off of animals to another country that's a concern for most. In fact, a strong argument being presented in response to the Indonesian slaughterhouse story is that ending exportation could ultimately help the Australian economy:

The end of live exports would boost domestic jobs with the processing of the animals done here rather than offshore, [independent MP] Andrew Wilkie said. "We should be processing these beasts in Australia," he said.

In tandem with this, many animal welfare groups and animal advocates have been propagating petitions to ban the further exploitation of live Australian cattle to Indonesia or featuring the story on their websites, often with gory clips from the original broadcast or with excruciatingly disturbing details of the footage which was taken.

When "Exception" is Really the Status Quo

The truth is that one need not single out Indonesia for abhorrent practices when it comes to the killing of non-human animals for human consumption; random undercover footage taken at slaughterhouses in many countries frequently display goings on which shock the general public. As Prof. Gary L. Francione commented on his Facebook page on May 31:

Does anyone believe that Australian slaughterhouses and slaughter in Australia as a general matter are "humane"? Any such belief would be mistaken. This is really a perfect example of how we try to delude ourselves into thinking that there are "civilized" ways to exploit nonhumans.

Minor punishments are doled out, promises are made to make nice with the cows and then after a collective sigh of relief is issued, it's all forgotten. Francione elaborated further by suggesting of this outrage-provoking news story that "it makes people [...] feel better to be able to point to someone else who does the same thing as 'uncivilized' while we pat ourselves on the back". Ground beef, rib roast and so on continue to appear on grocery lists and are then purchased and devoured without a second-thought being given to what a mere few weeks prior had seemed inexcusably "inhumane" -- at least until the next random undercover video of habitual goings on at slaughterhouses ends up making the rounds. Lather, rinse, repeat.

"We Need to Start Somewhere"

I got into a brief discussion with a vegan animal advocate yesterday who'd posted a link on a social networking site to a petition to ban the exportation of Australian cows to Indonesia. I asked if she thought her time and energy were being well spent in implicitly endorsing one form of animal slaughter as preferable to another, when she could instead take the opportunity to educate people about what is inherently wrong in any situation where a non-human animal is raised for slaughter. "But we need to start somewhere," she said. Why, though, should that "somewhere" involve contributing to the delusion that there is such a thing as an acceptable manner in which any animal could be raised and then killed for trivial reasons dictated by human habit or whim? Why waste a perfect opportunity to directly question the ethics of treating sentient beings as things which merely exist for human use? Why engage in activism which merely reinforces the idea that animal use -- animal slaughter -- is normal, and that it can somehow be morally acceptable?

Why can't that "somewhere" from which we need to start involve talking to people about going vegan? Think about it.

Either / Or?

It's exasperating the number of people who exert so much energy to try to justify a lesser degree of animal use as a fair and reasonable alternative to simply not using them at all. The increasingly undiscerning folks at Huffington Post recently let one such person, marketing consultant Val Brown and self-identified friend of Kathy Freston's, have her say about veganism and whether it's really all that warranted ("Is Half a Vegan Better Than None?").

As so many of these articles start out, Brown falls all over herself to try to establish her credibility as a warm-hearted lover of fluffy non-humans. She posts "cute animal videos on Facebook", she tells us, and she has a soft spot for her cat. If that doesn't convey her earnestness, Brown delivers a KO by waxing nostalgic over her more innocent days:

My favorite childhood journey was to the Catskill Game farm, where you fed little bottles of milk to the baby lambs, pigs and deer. The pigs and I both squealed with delight.

Of course, it's easy enough to love the animals we call "pets" or "companions" and who doesn't love a cute animal video to tug at our old heartstrings and entertain us? And of Brown's warm fuzzies over her squealing bottle-feeding visits, she fails to elaborate that the Catskill Game Farm was a zoo filled with exotic animals and that when the zoo closed down because of financial problems, just under a thousand animals ended up auctioned off in single day to the highest bidders -- many of them sold off to organizers of canned hunts. "Clearly, I am an animal nut," says Brown. Indeed...

So with her solid lover-of-cute-fuzzy-animals cred established, Brown slips into semi-confessional mode to display her inconsistency and absolute moral confusion to all by talking about her own set of limits and loves when it comes time to choosing which animals she will or won't use:

My love for animals led me stop eating meat and poultry 15 years ago, but I've never been able to make the leap to veganism, and I constantly feel guilty about it. Am I weak, cruel, vain? Perhaps. I love ice-cream, omelets, and salmon; shoes, belts and bags. I draw the line at buying leather coats, which is really just to save face -- I don't want what I'm wearing to scream "dead animal carcass." Leather shoes are smaller and less conspicuous.

One is left to wonder what sort of bandwagon she's on, since it seems clear that she almost seems proud or flippant in describing how she occasionally self-flagellates over her "love" and continued consumption of dairy, eggs, fish, leather.

Brown goes on to weave her "friend" Kathy Freston's Oprah-hyped purported vegan cred into her article, mentioning how Freston recommends moving towards a "vegan diet" in increments to "improve your health, the environment, and of course, lessen animal suffering". Brown admits that that in 15 years of her supposedly -- and she adopts Kathy Freston's catch-word here -- "leaning in" towards veganism, she's mostly engaged in self-deception to excuse away her use of animals:

For years I blindly (and somewhat intentionally) operated under the incorrect assumption that in buying leather products I was simply utilizing the by-products of meat eaters. I now know that's not true. And while I do seek out 100% man-made shoes [...] if really taken by a pair of leather boots, I will buy them. For the most part, I buy non-leather handbags [...] and belts if they're decent looking. But again, if I fall in love with something leather, I seem unable to keep myself from buying it.

She admits that her possible impulse control disorder is all about vanity. She asserts that she's just plain ol' powerless to resist, regardless of the fact that she claims, herself, that most of the animals used to satisfy her leather fetish come "from nations where animals are notoriously badly treated" (a distinction here being akin to pointing out that someone was tortured on a plank rather than being tortured on a badly-inflated air mattress). Even making this meaningless distinction in her head, though, leaves her claiming that she just can't help herself. For Brown, the lure of a cute purse trumps the torture of a sentient creature -- however "notorious" she qualifies said torture to be.

Her confusion becomes even more apparent when she starts justifying her eating fish. She draws the line at boiling lobsters alive (who are not fish, but I digress) and at eating farmed fish (for health reasons, because of the "murky, chemical laden water" in which they're raised). The rest are on the menu for her since they're "harder to relate to than [cute] furry mammals, our brethren". (Obviously, Brown's brethren don't include animals whose skin is used to make her shoes and purses.) She then once again focuses on the treatment of animals typically raised for food by asserting that unlike farmed mammals, fish lead good lives -- up until they don't. Yet even then, she admits that she is aware that the manner in which those fish have their lives taken is heinous and she asserts that even knowing this is not enough to keep her from continuing to consume them.

Perhaps a day on a fishing boat watching nets full of fish squirm and jump and gasp for life might cure me of my fish habit, or seeing the unfortunate sea turtles, dolphins and other lovely aquatic creatures that get caught in the nets.

She basically discusses animals in terms of the degrees she perceives in their treatment, then admits that treatment is actually mostly irrelevant to her. She writes of her awareness of the meaninglessness of the expression "free range" in the egg and dairy industries. She describes how chicks are habitually ground alive and the conditions under which chickens are kept. She writes of the repeated impregnation of dairy cows, who live, in her own words "miserable lives" and whose offspring fare no better to keep up with the human consumer's demand for dairy.

So what's Brown's solution? Although she seems to have bought into and understood the arguments that groups like HSUS and PETA use when targeting areas in animal agriculture in need of so-called brand spanking new and improved regulations, or when they single out specific forms of animal use as worse than others, Brown merely muses about a less "cruel" manner in which to continue raising them for her use.

Maybe we're meant to use some animal by-products -- eggs and milk and wool [...] -- but to do it without cruelty could perhaps only be accomplished on a small farm. The size and needs of our society make it difficult to meet demand. But still, there are many ways it could be done more humanely, even with mass production, though the agriculture lobby is strong and resistant.

Brown herself asserts that when it comes to going vegan, she "stop[s] short". All of this talk of the cruel treatment of animals has merely left her admitting to repeated self-deception or in portraying herself as being otherwise too helpless to resist. It's left her musing about a world where "cruelty" could (purportedly) be taken out of the equation so that she could continue to buy her leather purses without feeling "guilty". This is what all of the information she's absorbed about the treatment of animals has left her wanting -- guiltless use. And it doesn't happen, she'll still continue using some animals and compartmentalizing her justifications as she goes along. For Brown, it's about her -- not about non-human animals. Referring to herself as too selfish and as just not having had that epiphany that would leave her considering going vegan, she calls out to (Kathy-vegan-catch-word) "veganists" and attempts to bond by getting them to share their stories and then asking them for absolution until she is able to "surrender [her own] selfishness", pleading: "[I]s half a vegan better than none?"

In Brown's world, either you use animals a little or a lot and they're either treated badly or treated "humanely". Hopefully she can let go of her self-cajoling long enough to realize that the real either/or involves the decision to either continue using them, or in weighing the rights and interests of all non-humans seriously enough to choose not to use them at all. And this is why when we talk to Val Browns, we really need to deliver a clear and unequivocal vegan message.

Veganism in the Media

A solid little article debunking some assumptions or stereotypes about veganism in Milwaukee's UWM Post got my attention this morning ("Not your regular '-ism'"). In it, Sarah Hanneken writes about how veganism isn't a religion (although veganism and religious or spiritual beliefs are certainly not mutually exclusive), that true animal rights advocacy isn't about sensationalist propaganda, that veganism isn't about asceticism and self-deprivation and that advocating for the rights of non-human animals doesn't mean that you're against human animals. In describing what veganism and the animal rights movement actually are, Hanneken clarifies that the "goal is to put an end to prejudice and bigotry based on physical differences" -- to end speciesism. She emphasizes that animal advocacy is essential for "dissemination of the truth and an end to ignorance" about animal exploitation and asks us to question our moral schizophrenia:

In addition to disseminating the facts, veganism encourages people to question the societal norms we’ve been brought up with. Why is it socially acceptable to kill and eat a chicken or a pig but not a dog? It’s the same kind of arbitrary distinction that whites used for centuries to rationalize the enslavement of blacks and other racial minorities. This all goes back to ending discrimination. We cannot justify our arbitrary categorization of sentient beings for the sake of convenience or pleasure.

Veganism is about deconstructing popular worldviews that involve discrimination and subjugation and extending compassion to all living creatures, regardless of their genetic similarity to humans. Sentience is similarity enough.

After making these points, Hannekan ends her piece by referring to what she calls "poor ambassadors for the cause".

She describes the "Oh woe is me!" vegans who cling to martyrdom, constantly whinging that veganism is difficult. The truth is that this sort of behaviour isn't exactly conducive to getting non-vegans around us to stop treating non-human animals as things and to go vegan; it makes something logical and doable seem incredibly daunting. Hannekan then mentions "preachy" or "self-righteous" vegans, who certainly do exist and are often people who would be bragging up other things about themselves if not doing so about their veganism.

The sad truth, though, is that speciesism is so deeply entrenched in our society that even merely talking about not using animals is often viewed as proselytizing by non-vegans and non-vegans toss the word "preachy" around to shame and silence those who speak up for non-human animals. Asserting that using others is wrong when you refrain from engaging in exploitation as much as you can yourself can also lead people (who may or may not feel guilty about their own complicity in exploitation) to label you "self-righteous". I think that it would have been effective for Hannekin to contextualize her comments because of this. Otherwise, for non-vegans who assume that all vegan advocacy is unwanted and self-important preaching, her comments at the end may merely feed into that unfortunate taboo against vegans' speaking up for non-human animals.

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The Huffington Post featured yet another opinion piece yesterday by someone trying to convince the world that she is a concerned and conscientious animal exploiter. In "Meat, greet, eat", Ellen Snortland talks about the importance of getting to know the animal whose body parts end up on your plate:

Some of you might recoil at the idea of being on a first-name basis with your dinner. I understand that reaction. However, I think being intimately involved with your food is important and far more empowering than buying factory-farmed meat or produce shipped from another hemisphere.

Snortland goes on to say that she doesn't "take food for granted" and is careful not to waste any bits of the plant or animal she prepares for human consumption. Basically, efficiency and lack of wastefulness is somehow meant to convey a more ethical sort of animal consumption. Lest you worry whether she may actually have some sort of reverence for the animals that end up on her plate, she throws in the obligatory insensitive pun when she mentions that "we've all got a major steak -- err, stake" in where our food is sourced.

Something this opinion piece accomplished was to reaffirm my strong belief that animal advocates pimping the works of guys like Michael Pollan and Jonathan Safran Foer as gateway books to veganism are ultimately just leading non-vegans into a speciesist fog. Snortland recommends both and writes:

[y]ou may become a vegetarian from your research, or you may be like me, an often-conflicted yet steady omnivore deeply concerned about the care of our food sources. I go out of my way to "do the right thing," to buy "organic" or "free range," and I'm furious because, according to Safran Foer, consumers who try to be conscientious are being duped over what "cage free" or "free range" often means. Since there are no government standards for these terms, they can be abused.

So basically, Foer (who repeatedly praises "happy meat" farmers in his book and in interviews about it) has purportedly educated her about the fact that consumers trying to "do the right thing" -- but stopping short of considering not using animals -- are somehow being done wrong by fraudulent claims of "happy meat" production. The focus is on how non-human animals are treated, and the knowledge that treatment is generally heinous and that even those claiming to be treating animals better (which in and of itself is completely meaningless, since all use is abuse) doesn't sway Snortland. Nope! She absolves herself of any accountability by just conveniently blaming fraudulent producers for misleading her. Of course, even these so-called horrors of animal treatment haven't been enough to convince Foer himself to go vegan, so her reaction to his work isn't much of a surprise.

Nevertheless, Snortland claims that falling short of not using animals, we can still "get moral about our food" by eating locally, choosing animal products that are "certified humane" by the Humane Farm Animal Care (HFAC) program. She plugs them emphatically and ends her article conveying perfectly just why it is that animal advocates desperately need to keep talking to the public about going vegan and need to shift their focus to educating others about ending the use of non-humans -- not just changing how we treat those we use:

If you can handle being vegan, do it. So far, I can't, but you can certainly learn to make vegan dishes for your vegan loved ones. Meanwhile, I continue to thank Bluebell and every sentient being that has ever helped me grow and live.

Please spend some time this week talking to people about how easy it is to cut animal products out of their lives and of how eating animal flesh and secretions is unnecessary for either human health or taste bud satisfaction. Talk to them about sentience and about how "thank[ing] Bluebell" doesn't change the fact that non-human animals aren't ours to use any more than our fellow humans are ours to use. For more information, please visit the Abolitionist Approach website.

Animal Advocacy Leaders Hall of Fail

Animal Advocacy Leaders Hall of Fail

Years ago when I'd first stopped eating animal flesh, the writings of John Robbins were recommended to me by many vegetarians. Robbins is the one-time heir to the Baskin-Robbins ice cream empire who purportedly walked away from it permanently and completely to

"...pursue the deeper American Dream... the dream of a society at peace with its conscience because it respects and lives in harmony with all life forms. A dream of a society that is truly healthy, practicing a wise and compassionate stewardship of a balanced ecosystem." (Read more here.)

He began his pursuit by writing several books about the health and environmental implications of factory farming, as well as of the cruel conditions under which non-humans are kept on such farms. From what I remember and from recently discussing him with others, he generally dodged using the term "vegan" in his books and either opted for "vegetarian" or referred to following a "plant-based diet". He may very well have been either vegan or a strict vegetarian at some point, but he's been quoted a few places online as having stated in this 2006 interview with Raw Vegan Radio that he will eat animal products while traveling. (I guess it's hard to "respect" others while on the road, as Peter Singer and Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson have also expressed.)

Knowing all of this, it wasn't that much of a surprise to read Robbins' latest Huffington Post article ("The Brutality of Factory Farms: An Inside Look"), in which he unapologetically excludes some animals from his aforementioned dream world. Focusing on the treatment of dairy cows and this or that lawsuit of PETA's (who can keep track?) with which he is getting involved, he asserts the following:

My concern, let me emphasize, is not with small-scale family farms. I have no problem with the many hard-working families who treat their cows well, take care of the land and try to bring a healthy product to market. My problem is with the much larger agribusiness enterprises, the factory farms to whom the animals in their care are nothing but sources of revenue.

He's done a bit of an about-face since insisting on his own website at one point in response to a reader that there is no such thing as a "happy" dairy cow. I guess that this is where things get tricky when you focus on the ethics of how animals are treated, rather than considering whether or not they're ours to use at all. The truth is that Robbins is perfectly OK with animal use. According to one of his websites, he's not even out to ban the billboards referenced in the Huffington Post article. He writes:

My ideal goal would actually not be to ban the ads. My preference would rather be to see the dairy industry reconcile the discrepancy between the conditions portrayed in the ads and the actual reality. If the industry treated cows in the manner exhibited in the ads, I’d drop the suit in a heartbeat.

When I'd originally read a couple of Robbins' books around 15-16 years ago, I was just at the very beginning of a stage of my life where I thought I was making a difference as a lacto-ovo-vegetarian. Part of my motivation to stop eating animal flesh at the time had to do with the health and environmental arguments that Robbins presented in his books. I seem to remember his having advocated a strictly vegetarian diet with some emphasis on the treatment of animals on factory farms. As I learned more about ethics and animal rights, my own way of viewing what we owe non-humans changed drastically, so I left behind Robbins' books and didn't keep track of the path he continued to follow. I'm now really glad that I never bothered.

Regulationism Fails

Not 'How', but 'Why'

I read an article this morning by columnist Anne Else of New Zealand's Independent News Media ("A fair adjectival cow: Why cubicle farming is a really bad idea") that got me thinking again of how crucial it is that abolitionists continue to educate people--whether inside or outside of the animal advocacy movement--about the immorality of using nonhuman animals. When welfarists focus on regulating the treatment of animals, they miss the whole point; this focus implies that one some level, it's moral to continue enslaving nonhuman animals and depriving them of the very basic right to live out their own lives without existing solely to satisfy the selfish pleasures of those who exploit them and the others who provide the demand for this exploitation. There are so many people talking about treatment right now for any number of reasons; reading their morally confused arguments and assertions just adds so much more weight to my conviction that to do anything other than focus on use detracts from the problem at hand. Focusing on treatment is in fact detrimental when attempting to educate others about taking the interests of nonhuman animals seriously.

So, Anne Else wrote an article expressing a fair amount of outrage over a recent plan in New Zealand to house 18,000 cows being used for their milk in cubicles. In all fairness, Else makes it clear that she is not an animal activist. She writes:

I'm not a vegetarian, let alone a vegan, and I don't stick to organically produced food. But I do care about how the animals that produce my food are treated. And I'm convinced that ensuring our already rather battered claims to be clean, green and 100% pure become a reality is the only way our economy can survive, let alone prosper.

So Else is not someone who thinks that it's wrong to consume animals or their products. She consumes them quite happily herself, whether or not they have the sort of meaningless so-called humane stamp of approval they would have if certified as having been produced according to organic standards. Nope, Else is concerned about appearances. It would look bad to consumers if New Zealand farmers were to start adopting means of raising cows since the "clean green" image [they] depend on so heavily will be completely down the tubes" and the "reputation of [the] entire dairy production will be tainted". She even quotes a member of New Zealand's Green Party as saying: "British consumers literally taste freedom when they eat New Zealand butter."

Freedom, huh?

Else goes on to shift her focus somewhat to how the cows in question will be fed and the environmental impact this will have. She writes that the cows will likely be fed the recent subject of much media controversy--palm kernel expeller, and that New Zealanders will become complicit in the destruction of "fragile rainforest environments". For insight into the palm kernel expeller controversy in New Zealand, please read Elizabeth Collins' Independent Media Centre piece from this past September ("Why are we blaming the farmers?") and listen to Episode 38 of her New Zealand Vegan Podcast. There's not much else that I can say about it, except to agree wholeheartedly with Elizabeth that if there was no consumer demand for cow's milk, this palm kernel expeller fiasco wouldn't be an issue in the first place. (But I digress, since Else's article isn't about use, but about how they are used--their treatment.)

Else raises other concerns about the cubicles that deal with the cows' health and the discharge of their effluent into the surrounding area and the ensuing environmental toll. With this, she brings the article's focus back to her initial concern--that of appearances:

Even if they do manage to meet all the requirements and keep damage to cows' health, and to the environment, to a minimum, what is the point of farming this way in grassy, temperate New Zealand? There can be only one answer: because it enables inhospitable, fragile, and otherwise "unprofitable" landscapes, such as the stunning Mackenzie Basin, to be turned into a conglomeration of giant factory farms. We will indeed be catching up with the rest of the world.

So throughout this article, which takes issue with a new method introduced in New Zealand to confine cows used for their milk, it's made clear that this treatment of them will harm New Zealand's reputation as a provider of happy grass-fed cow produced milk. Hell, it will also harm the appearance of the landscape surrounding the area where the cows will be confined! This really big knot of superficial concerns revolves around the 18,000 or so cows at the center of the story who will, indeed, continue to be used as things to produce the milk products the industry wants to sell to the consumers who are demanding them.

Else managed to write an entire article loosely focused on the treatment of these 18,000 cows, and nowhere in it is the use of these cows ever questioned, since it's a given to Else (and others who in any way ever discuss the treatment of nonhuman animals) that these cows will indeed continue to be used, however it happens. It's also a given for welfarist groups like HSUS, which uses millions in donations to mount campaigns that concern themselves with how animals are used instead of questioning why they are used. This is why it's crucial, if the actual interests of nonhuman animals are to be taken seriously, that someone deliver a clear and consistent abolitionist message; this is why it's crucial that nonviolent and creative vegan education be a strong main focus of animal rights campaigns. Otherwise, we're not leaving people asking why nonhuman animals are being used or considering the morality of their continuing to use them. If we truly want to strive toward abolishing the exploitation of nonhuman animals, we need to get others asking the right questions--not 'how', but 'why'.

Talk to someone about veganism today.

Wayne Pacelle, Get That Elephant Out of Your Living Room, Will You?

It seems that Wayne Pacelle, President and CEO of HSUS, has been busy traveling coast to coast, spending some of HSUS' millions to field pre-submitted questions from HSUS supporters. According to his blog post on October 22, many people have been asking what they can "do to help The HSUS and animal protection". Pacelle's enthusiasm was definitely infectious at the beginning of his blog post; I have to admit that I got a little excited, myself! I thought, "50 whole options! Surely one of them must be..." and then found myself shaking my head a little sadly as I made my way through the items.

Pacelle asserts that the "movement" can only succeed if millions "take these positive actions" and adds that "we can all pitch in to raise funds to support the vital work of The HSUS and allow it to grow and be a more powerful and effective force" (i.e. please send bigger donation checks). So what are the positive actions? Pacelle presents them under different categorical headings:

In Your Community:

• Encourage your local media to run information and PSAs from HSUS and distribute HSUS leaflets at events.

Get Training -- Get Activated:

• Take advantage of HSUS' various humane education programs to learn to spread the HSUS message, attend HSUS conferences and awards ceremonies, volunteer at HSUS events, take a course through HSUS' Humane Society University.

Volunteer To Help Animals:

• With HSUS' Wildlife Land Trust and the Humane Society Veterinary Medical Association Field Services program. It's also mentioned that you can volunteer at your local shelter, although it sticks out a little as a non-HSUS option.

Political Activities:

• Lobby, lobby, lobby for HSUS campaigns and initiatives.

Work with Local Schools:

• Get kids involved in HSUS initiatives and help get HSUS into your local schools.

Give Us Your Moolah:

• Support HSUS corporate sponsors. Buy things through HSUS.

Speaking of Moolah:

• Give HSUS more of your own money, organize HSUS fundraisers to raise additional money for HSUS, and finally, host a social event and invite an HSUS representative to come talk to your friends and family about why they should be giving money to HSUS.

How About What Wayne Pacelle Thinks You Should Do on a Personal Level:

• Sign up for HSUS alerts and promote them through your blog / website / social networking and support their highly-publicized and celebrity-endorsed single issue campaigns (e.g. the illogical "Boycott purchasing / eating one kind of Canadian animal until the Canadian government stops killing another kind of Canadian animal" campaign).

Four of the other suggestions Pacelle makes are sound enough: Adopt or foster from your local shelter, keep your cats indoors, learn to co-exist with wildlife without resorting to killing said wildlife and establish a "pet care trust" for animals in your care lest anything happen to you.

The remaining suggestions about what you can do on a personal level to "help The HSUS and animal protection" were just more of the same old stuff I've come to expect from this welfarist group. Pacelle basically lists off a bunch of half-hearted things that are more about making yourself feel better than they are about taking the interests of animals seriously. He does so while walking around the big ol' elephant in his living room (or swank HSUS office, whichever the case may be). That elephant is veganism.

In a list of 50, there is no mention made of simply not using or exploiting animals as a viable option to "help" them. Instead of suggesting that you purchase animal-free cosmetics, he says to ensure that the cosmetics you use haven't been "tested" on animals. Instead of suggesting that you frequent vegan restaurants, he suggests that you try to talk restaurants into carrying more "cage-free" eggs. Instead of suggesting you go vegan, he suggests you reduce your meat consumption and avoid factory-farmed products. He does mention replacing "meat and other animal-based food with vegetarian food", which is confusing. By "animal-based food", does he mean things that contain animal flesh and that these should be replaced with eggs or dairy? I mean, if by "animal-based food" he meant eggs and dairy, then he should have said that they should be replaced with VEGAN food instead of side-stepping the issue and treating 'vegan' as if it's a dirty word.

What's HSUS going to do about that elephant in your living room, Wayne? 'Cause surely, ignoring him isn't humane. Isn't it time for an HSUS "Go Vegan!" campaign?

Celebrity and (Non-)Veganism

Ecorazzi announced some of this years annual VegNews awards winners today, including that Ellen DeGeneres won for Favorite Celebrity readers' pick (you can read it here). Aside from the fact that it seems that you cannot be an American celebrity and not endorse and / or shed your clothes for PETA in recent years, I've always really wondered what the sense is in attributing any sort of significance to public figures who decide to flirt with animal advocacy while sending mixed messages about animal exploitation. Unapologetic meat-eater Oprah Winfrey, for instance, comes to mind, having won PETA's 2008 "Person of the Year" award.

Things become even more problematic (and often confusing) when veganism is thrown into the mix. For instance, DeGeneres, who was also honoured by HSUS earlier this year, may have won readers choice for "Favorite Celebrity", but she's a spokesperson and model for Cover Girl, a company owned by Proctor & Gamble that both uses animal products and engages in animal testing. So, DeGeneres, who is currently profiting from the exploitation of animals, somehow gets a few back pats from the odd welfarist organisation or two and suddenly vegetarians and vegans the world over assume that she's an exemplar of sorts. We're also left with the general public viewing her non-veganism as being vegan.

Ecorazzi's story on this also features a link to their own Top 5 Vegan Celebrities list from this past June. DeGeneres, the "vegan" who profits from animal exploitation, is on it. So is "vegan" actress Ginnifer Goodwin, who came under fire this year for wearing an assortment of animal products for a magazine photo shoot for a piece about (wait for it...) her veganism. Then there's NBA star and PETA supporter John Salley, a "vegan" who went vegan for health reasons and whose activism involves promoting vegetarianism. Then? Alicia Silverstone, another solid PETA supporter who is now making the rounds promoting her new book, The Kind Diet, in which she subcategorises veganism into three levels, one of which includes eating animal products. Then there's actress Emily Deschannel, yet another vocal PETA (and HSUS) supporter who, when interviewed, mostly focuses on the environmental reasons to be vegan. (Not that there's anything wrong with promoting all pluses of abstaining from eating animals, but is it too much to ask that these self-professed vegan celebs actually talk about the problem at hand -- animal exploitation?)

In short, these supposed vegan celebrities are touted as exemplars of veganism. Most of them are vocal and public supporters of welfarist animal organizations that don't promote veganism as any sort of necessary moral baseline in advocating for animals and some of them have otherwise additionally misinterpreted and misrepresented veganism. Is there any wonder that the general public is confused? At the end of the day, should vegans really be applauding these celebrities outing themselves as vegans (i.e. regardless of their confusing things) since "it brings veganism into the mainstream", or should we actually be concerned (or in my case, sort of irritated) that these folks are just further warping people's understanding of what it means to take the interests of nonhuman animals seriously?

Another Fundraising Fail from the Humane Something or Other

It feels like it was just yesterday that HSUS was embarrassing itself by holding a fundraiser to raise money for its "Save the Seals" campaign by handing out animal-based appetizers to event attendees gathered to pressure the Canadian government to end its annual seal hunt. Oh, yeah... The event was held in a hip non-vegan restaurant in Washington, DC that featured--and still features--PEI mussels on its menu. It should not be much of a surprise that its "separate lobbying affiiliate", the Humane Society Legislative Fund (HSLF), should end up following suit with its own fundraising fail.

What's it all about? Apparently it's about having a party. A whole bunch of them, really. The friendly folks behind HSLF (including its president Mike Markarian, who is also HSUS' Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer) are asking those who "care" about animals to register to host what they're calling a "Let's Pass a Law" party on October 25. Not only do party attendees get to help HSLF by raising funds, BUT they get to participate in a conference call in which the winner of the "There Oughta Be a Law" contest will be announced. The idea, I guess, is that you submit ideas for a new federal animal protection bill and a panel of judges will pick a winner. (Parties and contests, oh my! How much more feel-good could it get, really?)

I was curious about guidelines HSLF is offering for these parties, particularly in terms of what food / drinks should be served. In the Party FAQ section concerning how to set one up, HSLF reminds hosts:

If you want to make sure your event stays under budget try to have a pot-luck or solicit food donations from local restaurants or stores. If you would like to make your event an upscale fundraiser, serve wine and delicious food to your guests. Remember, this is your party; you can design it to fit your needs and budget.

So, no mention is made of serving animal-product free (i.e. vegan) food, which HSUS staff and supporters often tout as being a supposed rule of thumb for ordinary fundraisers thrown by HSUS, itself.

I got a little (hopeful?) excited when I found a link they provided to "tips and advice" from someone they called a "seasoned host" for their Party Animals events, a woman called Debra Berger who is described as a Georgia animal advocate. Then I read this:

HSLF: What tips do you have for hosting a great party to help animals?
DB: The best way for hosts to ensure happy guests is by serving lots of delicious vegetarian (my emphasis) and/or vegan food, and making sure you have enough.

Basically, HSLF is organizing a big fundraising campaign to get people on board to raise money for them and to participate in a fun contest to come up with suggestions for animal protection laws. And it couldn't even bring itself to take the opportunity for the slightest little bit of vegan education? Did it think that it would be too off-putting to suggest to people throwing these parties for them to purportedly "help" animals to actually not serve animal products as food?

Considering that there is as much (and often more) suffering in the lives of egg-laying hens and dairy cows than in the lives of animals raised for their flesh, and given its affiliate HSUS' focus on the treatment versus the use of nonhuman animals, you'd think that someone--anyone--over there might have thought it a good idea to promote the serving of vegan food at these oh-so-fun parties. The fact that they're not merely drives home that these fundraising events are more about making humans feel good about themselves than they are about helping nonhuman animals (see Prof. Gary L. Francione's essay "A Revolution of the Heart" to learn more about welfarist organizations and their selling of indulgences). The truth is that these events really have little to do with taking the interests of animals seriously or with moving towards ending the exploitation of nonhuman animals. These events are about raising money. Period.

Do you really want to help nonhuman animals? Go vegan. If you already are vegan, then talk to others about veganism. Please don't throw your money at an organization that promotes the continued exploitation of nonhuman animals.

(If you're on Twitter, please sign this Twitition started by Prof. Francione, asking HSUS to have one--just a wee single one--"Go Vegan!" campaign.)

ETA: I fixed the first link in my post. It was meant to connect to this story on the Abolitionist Approach website.