Speciesism at Home

I've been following the activities of a local chapter of a trap-neuter-return (TNR) group called ca-r-ma. At some point a few years ago, a former coworker had posted about them on Facebook and I had become intrigued, since the work in which they engaged stood out a little from the activities of the two local SPCA shelters. I discovered soon enough, however -- and somewhat sadly -- that a common thread they share with the SPCA shelters in my city concerns the manner in which they choose to raise funds for their organization.

I was picking up some cat litter at the store a few days ago when I noticed a colourful poster up on a bulletin board promoting a "Harvest Supper" to be held on Saturday, October 22. Then I noticed that proceeds from the supper were going to ca-r-ma, as well as to The Chickadee Cat Club. Items listed as being included in the supper were baked ham, scalloped potatoes, baked beans, homemade brown bread, mustard pickles and pie. Yep. They are indeed planning to serve up the flesh of one species of animal (i.e. pigs) to raise money for two groups associated with another species (i.e. cats).

This chapter of ca-r-ma has been partnering up with The Chickadee Cat Club often over the past year, which also baffles me somewhat. The club portrays itself as a group devoted to educating people about cat welfare and "responsible pet ownership", when according to its Facebook page, The Chickadee Cat Club is also a Charter Club of the American Cat Fanciers Association (ACFA) and -- how I know it best from observing its goings on in my city -- it regularly hosts cat shows where breeders show up to promote their services as people gawk at caged cats, purebred or otherwise.

I'd brought this up with a friend who is involved with them and her response to me was to insist that most of the money they raise through these cat shows goes directly to ca-r-ma and to the two local SPCA shelters. This misses the point, however, that it is wrongheaded to use some cats as entertainment -- as things -- purportedly for the worthwhile cause of raising money for other cats. It also misses the much more obvious point that promoting the profitable breeding of cats for the supposed purpose of raising money to assist those cats who've been abandoned or left to fend for themselves is, well, kind of ludicrous. According to its Facebook page:

THE MANDATE OF THE CHICKADEE CAT CLUB IS:

To sponsor and promote the welfare of all pedigree cats and household pet cats;

To cultivate friendship among and promote the interest and education of the owners, fanciers and registered breeders of cats;

To host cat shows and promote interest in and knowledge of pedigree cats and household pet cats;

To encourage pedigree breeding toward the ACFA standard of perfection; and,

To encourage kindness and assist in the prevention of cruelty and mistreatment of all animals

The fact that a group like ca-r-ma, dedicated to spaying/neutering ferals, is partnering with a group which both promotes and provides a venue for cat breeders does not make a whole lot of sense on any level. TNR is being turned into a band-aid solution to a problem partially fed into by the deliberate breeding and bringing into this world of more domesticated animals. It's being turned by them into a justification to promote even further breeding of cats, when in the United States alone, anywhere from 3-5 million unwanted dogs and cats are killed in shelters each year. Instead of promoting the breeding of more cats and the refining of purebred traits, wouldn't it make more sense to promote spaying/neutering across the board and to promote shelter adoptions? I mean, that would be the obvious option to me, but what do I know? "But it's to raise money for a good cause," I was chastised, as if questioning their methods was somehow akin to rejecting the cause.

I find it hard to walk away from blatant speciesism, particularly when one type of animal use is engaged in and excused for the supposed sake of helping other animals. Thus, I left a polite comment on one of The Chickadee Cat Club's many posts on its Facebook page which plugged the dinner, expressing disappointment that it would choose to sell the flesh of dead animals to raise money for a different species of animal. No surprise that it was removed with no response. Having already somewhat pointlessly discussed the fundraising with animal products issue with a few of its volunteers, I haven't yet left a comment on my local chapter of ca-r-ma's Facebook page.

It's a shame that the question of rights gets buried in a confused message of welfare. It's also a shame that people who are obviously well-intentioned and who no doubt earnestly care about the well-being of a certain species of animal are unable to connect the dots and to recognize that no nonhuman animal deserves to be treated as a thing -- regardless of who benefits from it.

And yet...

We all start out looking quite the same...



(Initially viewed on the Alice Springs Vegan Society page on Facebook.)

On Bob's Red Mill and Misplaced Indignation

Last week, The Informed Vegan ran a piece about how Bob's Red Mill is planning to donate $25 million towards nutrition education to the Oregon Health and Science University (OHSU). According to The Informed Vegan, OHSU is notorious for animal testing and because of its decision to make this donation, Bob's Red Mill's "standing as a conscious and compassionate company is about to take a serious hit". In last week's piece, it's mentioned that both OHSU and Bob's Red Mill were vague in addressing whether or not any of the donation will be targeted specifically for animal testing, and thus The Informed Vegan goes on to suggest that its "loyal customer base of animal lovers and vegans may boycott" the company in response.

Confusing a "Who" with a "What"

In an update today, The Informed Vegan commented on company co-founders Bob and Charlee Moore's official written response yesterday to the buzz about their donation. And yes, as it was pointed out at This Dish Is Veg (a website which promotes welfarism and vegetarianism alongside veganism) in an editor's note to yet another online expression of outrage over the news, it is indeed the co-founders' donation and not the company's. In February 2010, Bob gave the company to his then 200+ employees. Of course, this sorta relevant information seems either forgotten or blurred in the flurry of blog posts, green website articles, Facebook status updates and angry tweets that have been popping up online over the last few days and with most of them calling for a boycott of all Bob's Red Mill products. Proof of this can be seen in a recent open letter to the Moores from Your Daily Vegan's KD Traegner ("Should You Boycott Bob's Red Mill?"), who informs the Moores that because of the donation, she will no longer be a Bob's Red Mill customer.

Here's the scoop, though: Bob's Red Mill isn't donating money to OHSU. The company's co-founders who are no longer its owners and have not been so in well over a year and a half are donating money to OHSU. As pointed out earlier, the company is now owned by the people who work there -- Bob's former employees. One could argue that the money the Moore's are donating comes from the profits they'd reaped as owners, but boycotting a company from which they no longer profit to retaliate against their using past profits as they see fit just honestly makes no sense. The only ones who'll suffer in the end are Bob's Red Mill's new owners -- those who now run the company. The Moores have already stated that they have already committed themselves to making the donation. The Moores are no longer the owners of Bob's Red Mill. The truth is that this whole proposed boycott begs the question: What is hoped to be accomplished with a boycott in the first place? Of course, this is assuming that a boycott by a small section of a company's customers (vegans, in this case), other circumstances being different, would even be effective. (That's an entirely separate potential blog post altogether, though.)

Cherry Picking and Low-Hanging Fruit

Traegner's open letter reflects the sentiment expressed in The Informed Vegan's follow-up post on the matter that regardless of whether the money goes to directly fund animal research, it's funding an entity which engages in animal research. There are a couple of things I'd like to point out before going any further. First, I'd like to point out (the obvious?) that I certainly have no issue whatsoever with vegans refusing to purchase products either tested on animals or from companies who otherwise fund animal testing or other forms of animal exploitation. As a vegan, I'm against all forms of animal exploitation, whether it takes place on a farm, in a lab, in someone's backyard -- you get the picture. Also, I like Traegner. I've interacted with her over a few topics on Your Daily Vegan's Facebook page and over a period of time have appreciated her responses to others' queries and have enjoyed our own exchanges quite a bit. I was a little surprised to see her get behind the Bob's Red Mill boycott buzz, but it seems that many have taken off running with it, so I hope that she doesn't view me as somehow having nefarious reasons for singling out her website. I've just used it as an example of what's being written by various activists across the interwebs this week.

Now, just to play devil's advocate, let's put aside this whole nasty reality that contrary to over-publicized belief, Bob's Red Mill is not, in effect, donating a cent to OHSU. Let's pretend that Bob and Charlee Moore are, in fact, still the owners of the company (which, as I've pointed out repeatedly, they are not):

Bob Moore isn't vegan. He's not even vegetarian. From 1978 and then until he turned the company over to his employees in February of 2010, Mr. Moore's profits from the company were going to purchase the various food items, sundries, clothing and so on containing animal products which are habitually consumed by non-vegans (and no doubt including the purchase of products involving animal testing). Although some of the company's new owners may indeed be vegan, chances are that all 200+ of them are not, so even now, the company's profits are being taken and reinvested into various forms of common animal exploitation -- no doubt including the purchase of products with ingredients which were tested on animals. Of course, this is the case with the overwhelming majority of food manufacturing companies (e.g. Tofutti) and it's honestly almost impossible to avoid when purchasing any manufactured products.

It's a little odd, nonetheless, how Bob's Red Mill has been held up as some sort of exemplar for "conscious" manufacturing when its previous owner was not vegan and since Bob's Red Mill isn't even a vegan company. Some of its products contain dairy. When I first read the story about Bob's Red Mill's purportedly donating money to OHSU and of how vegans the world over should particularly be outraged, the first thing I did was hop over to its site to see what on earth was already there over which nobody had bothered to previously express outrage. On top of some of its actual products containing dairy, the Bob's Red Mill website actually promotes and facilitates the consumption of animal products. If you check its recipes section, you'll find a sub-category for "vegan", but the use of various animal products is the norm for the majority of the recipes and the default even in those where a reference may have been made to an animal-free substitute as an optional replacement (e.g. dairy-free milk). From eggs, butter and milk listed off in a user-submitted recipe for Kamut Cherry Crumb Breakfast Cake to the cheese and meat in a Bob's original recipe for a Spicy Sausage Kasha Bake, animal-based noms are plentiful on the company's website. Where's the outrage over this? Why initially single out this company for a purported donation to a research facility that conducts animal experimentation but turn a blind eye to the fact that the company both facilitates the use of (i.e. through its recipes section) and sells animal products to begin with?

I've no doubt that this question will be overlooked or dismissed as irrelevant by some. Hell, for the moment it seems as if the more obvious and pertinent fact -- that Bob's Red Mill itself is not making a donation to OHSU -- is being completely overlooked. Do I think it's unfortunate that the Moores have decided to take $25 million and to hand it over to a facility which exploits animals? Absolutely. I also think that it's unfortunate that as non-vegans who once owned a non-vegan company, they're being held to task over this as if they or Bob's Red Mill had ever been exemplars for vegans in the first place. They're not and they never were.

Let's get our facts straight.

What This Vegan Eats

I've been in the Halifax, Nova Scotia this past week, enjoying some downtime while on vacation. Part of that, of course, involved indulging in some cooking and some sampling of vegan fare in local restaurants. Here are a few photos of some of the things either my host and I prepared together during my stay or that I whipped up on my lonesome. Expect a blog post over the weekend concerning the wee little bit of food sampling which went on over and above it.

Many heartfelt thanks to Mike (who's currently transitioning to veganism) for graciously tolerating my taking over his kitchen during my stay, as well as for offering up the use of his digital camera while I was there. Mine died the week before my trip, which means that food photos will be scarce on the blog over the next few months until I do some research and then scrimp for a spell to buy a replacement camera.

Sesame udon noodles with red and green bell peppers, carrots, tamari-marinated tempeh, mung bean sprouts, scallions, tons of garlic, freshly-grated ginger, sesame oil and kelp gomasio.

I'd pan-fried the tempeh separately to make it golden and sort of crisp, tossing it back into the stir-fry near the end.

Organic corn chips and homemade garlicky hummus with paprika -- my hummus-addict host Mike's first delicious attempt to make the stuff.

One the most awesome multigrain bread ever, homemade seitan, pickles, alfalfa sprouts, ketchup and mustard with a side of spinach, carrot and scallions (which mostly ended up tucked into the sandwich before it was devoured).

Leaf lettuce, tomatoes, radishes, carrots and broccoli, drizzled with tamari mixed with sriracha and a little bit of water.

While in Halifax, I picked up a copy of Nancie McDermott's Real Vegetarian Thai at my favourite used book store, JWD. The book is not a vegan cookbook, but the overwhelming majority of the recipes are completely animal-free and most of the handful that aren't include notes on veganizing them. I'm going to work through this book over the next months to try out the various recipes. My first attempt at making a Thai curry turned out really well:

The "before" photo. Red curry paste picked up at a fantastic little Asian grocery store on the Bedford Highway outside of Halifax (I'd meant to go back before leaving to stock up on even more goodies), coconut milk, tofu, bell peppers, carrots, scallions and snow peas.

The finished product!

Snacks for a movie night: Organic corn chips, the aforementioned hummus, homemade guacamole and loads of raw vegetables. (No, we didn't eat all of the chips and hummus, but we did almost clear out the guac and had a fair bit of the wine -- so yummy!)

Noggin-scape

“Life does not consist mainly, or even largely, of facts and happenings. It consists mainly of the storm of thought that is forever flowing through one's head.”

-- Mark Twain

Bits and Blurbs

A short article on veganism in the Purdue University Calumet Chronicle yesterday ("'Ve-gain' your health") had the misfortune of being piled on a clumsy swipe at those who take the rights and interests of other animals seriously. Its writer begins by attempting to correct what's presented as a misunderstanding of vegans as having "an unnatural passion about animal rights". So basically, this statement takes as a given that concern with animal rights is tantamount to having abnormal and out-of-control emotional reactions (i.e. effectively dismissing it while failing to consider that there are indeed sound rational arguments to not involve oneself in the exploitation and slaughter of sentient nonhuman animals). The writer insists, furthermore, that promoting the health benefits of a vegan diet can "outweigh the negative stigma that has been branded on the lifestyle".

The irony here, of course, is that the writer herself has managed -- whether maliciously or not (and most probably not) -- to stigmatize ethical veganism and to perpetuate stereotypes. Somehow, she'd have her readers believe, there's something inherently wrongheaded with making lifestyle choices which reflect respect for others rather than merely reflecting concern with oneself.

----------------------------

Ireland's Independent featured an article today on the rise in incidence of anorexia in young children. I won't weigh in on its merits as a piece on eating disorders, per se. What did stick out quite sadly, however, was that its author chose to include a vague third-party anecdote in the middle of it to lump veganism in with eating disorders. After stating that children need "full-fat milk for their bones", Emma Woolf writes:

My sister tells me about the boys too. One of her daughter's friends is a vegan.

"Yes, vegan, at nine years old! We go round there and he's on this weird diet, he basically eats soy paste and Ryvita, a few vegetables and nuts, everything organic, gluten-free, no sugar, meat or dairy.

"His mum calls it the 'perfect diet' but it's horrendous. He can't eat at friends' houses, he's anxious and nervy around food, emotionally unstable and really weak and pale. He takes about six supplements with every meal."

Imposing such diets on young children has been dubbed "muesli starvation".

The truth is that even the most mainstream health/nutrition organizations agree that children can thrive as vegans. That it's a second-hand anecdote in and of itself leaves the information's validity or credibility questionable. Even if this weren't the case, though, I'd strongly suspect that there was more going on with the child being discussed (e.g. food allergies or pre-existing health issues) since the boy purportedly doesn't consume gluten or sugar.

Plus, I'd be a pretty "anxious" kid too if friends' parents were so closed-minded and judgmental that they would conflate veganism with an eating disorder and view my parents as no better than child abusers. The bottom line is that there was just no legitimate justification to place that anecdote in that particular article, and that including it seems no more and no less than a shameful and uninformed swipe at veganism, as well as a cheap swipe at vegan parenting. I'd like to say that it's just another drop in the bucket where mentions of veganism in mainstream media are concerned. Having spoken with responsible vegan parents about the additional societal pressures of raising their children as vegans, though, I would hate to think that someone might stumble across this article and mistake Woolf for some sort of "expert" and proceed to lean harder on vegan parents who are making responsible choices for their families.

Because the World Needs Another Article About Not Going Vegan

I'm not keeping track, but I'm sure that if I were the type to count on my fingers and toes that I'd long since have stopped being able to log these articles about nothing which present themselves as somehow having anything to do with going vegan. Tim O'Shea's bit in the Concord Monitor ("My so-called vegan life") is yet another to throw into the pit with the rest of them.

These articles, opinion pieces, columns or newspaper blog posts usually split into two general types. On one hand, you have those who are just trying to take a swipe on some level or another at vegans or those who in any way weigh the issues surrounding the exploitation of nonhuman animals seriously. The tone of many of these pieces ranges from mild mockery to outright hostility. On the other hand, you have the more innocuous-seeming articles by people who may (or may not be) be well-intentioned but who at least keep the barbs and schoolyard comments in check. Many of these articles are still these unfortunate fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants excuses to squeeze out copy that presents itself as offering up any sort of useful or valid information on veganism or on what's involved in going vegan. Too many are just heaps of misinformation cloaked in good intentions. Whether hostile or not, the articles frequently present veganism as a diet, often side-step animal rights issues as being at the heart of going vegan, invariably present eating vegan as self-imposed deprivation, and almost always go to great lengths to emphasis the deliciousness and irresistibility of meat, cheese and other animal products.

O'Shea's article definitely falls into the former camp, with the level of derision in it vacillating between gormless and mean-spirited. It's entirely focused on diet, and aside from a token mention of "ethics" as a motivator to go vegan (tucked in between "health" and "because, well, their girlfriend suggested it"), no time is wasted in actually discussing what animal use entails. O'Shea instead begins by bemoaning various things vegans can't eat (including mashed potatoes, for some reason) using words like "forbidden" to describe nonvegan foods and "hardcore" to describe those who avoid bone char-processed sugar. Avoiding nonvegan food = restrictive and extremist.

O'Shea's so-called vegan experiment was, of course, limited to food and was meant to last no longer than a whopping two whole weeks. How did he get ready for it? Apparently, with a few Google searches and by writing it all off as awful before he had even begun. He writes: "I didn't do much preparation other than find a paperback vegan cookbook, conduct some web research and brace myself for my first taste of soy milk." He bemoans his black coffee (because vegans obviously don't use sweeteners or whiteners in coffee) and plain brown rice cakes (because vegans obviously champion the taste of cardboard), as well as the wretchedly awful reality of being forced to eat meatless salads deprived of stinky blue cheese dressing (since salads without meat and stinky blue cheese dressing are naught but so much wilted lettuce). He bemoans the lack of vegan options spontaneously manifesting themselves his cupboards but adds that "we [sic] vegans are creative" and explains how to make a bowl of cereal using almond milk. Any other forays into cooking he makes, he portrays as disgusting, adding that "when you're subsisting on twigs and apricots, you'll seek any safe harbor". A vegan waffle is "supple burlap". A black bean burger ordered at a restaurant is the "vile bastardization of the all-American meal".

And somehow, it's after all this that he asserts that "something went horribly wrong". After one week of a badly-planned attempt to eat a strict vegetarian diet, he throws a dinner party complete with the aforementioned purportedly irresistible animal products which customarily get referenced at some point in articles like O'Shea's, and of course O'Shea finds himself -- in his own home, at his own dinner party -- with nothing but cucumbers and bread to eat, so gives in and gorges himself with gusto on pig and chicken flesh. Shortly thereafter on a trip to NYC, still during his two-week-long supposed attempt at something he mislabels going vegan, O'Shea lumps himself in with vegans again while trying to excuse away what he asserts none but the most "pure" of vegans could possibly resist:

All the willpower in the world faded away as my environment surrounded me. I'd like to tell you I was pure, the pinnacle of principled veganism, but after the bagel with cream cheese, the steak slathered in garlic butter, the turkey BLT with mayo, the bucket of beef brisket nachos and the three pieces of classic New York pizza, I'd only be fooling myself. Yet I dare any vegan among us who's claimed to resist such temptation to cast the first fiddlehead.

Somehow, though, O'Shea insists on continuing to present himself as being "vegan" during the rest of his two-week experiment, post meat/egg/dairy-bacchanalia, mentioning trying to "reclaim [his] vegan pride" while complaining about the disgustingness of quinoa, potatoes, bananas and peanut butter and describing himself on his supposedly last day "as a vegan" as full of anxiety and in "gastric distress". He slips in that his wife even commented on his body odour, as if somehow not eating animal products was responsible. He sums the experiment up as a failure (no, really?) and leaves his readers with this summary of what being vegan inevitably entails:

I spent my days either dreaming of deli meat snacks as my hummus-filled stomach grumbled like low-rolling thunder, or I gorged myself on an anti-vegan menu in fits of delirious indiscretion, justifying my actions through a combination of deceit, rationalization and head fakes. It's no way to live - this vegan life.

It's unfortunate that O'Shea should fancy himself an expert mouthpiece on what being vegan is like when nothing -- not a single stinking thing -- about his experiment involved veganism on any level whatsoever. In the end, sadly, it's just one more article to throw on to the ever-growing pile of mainstream writings in the media both misrepresenting and maligning a way of life which is so simple, so right, so healthy and which is so far-removed from the self-infliction of misery that O'Shea would have you believe it is.

If you haven't already done so, please consider going vegan. By this I don't mean O'Shea's half-arsed newspaper-filler-producing temporary meat-fest fantasy take on it, but that you actually and earnestly go vegan.

What This Vegan Eats

I've been quite lax about posting recently, thanks to being on vacation and indulging in various distractions. At the very least, I guess that I can share some of the bland and uninteresting fare I've been eating the past while to maintain my unhealthy, sickly vegan self:

Romaine lettuce, tomatoes, pickled mild banana peppers, radishes, sweet onion vinaigrette, ground flax.

Tofu marinated in tamari and lemon pepper, cherry tomatoes, parsley and a mix of organic ketchup and sriracha.

Pita pizza with mushrooms, onions, garlic, green bell pepper, pickled hot banana peppers, sliced tomatoes, nutritional yeast sauce, basil & dried chipotle.

Lima bean soup with carrots, collards, hot banana peppers, garlic, scallions, Indian chili powder and dill weed. A half-cob of corn sprinkled with some Louisiana hot sauce.

Stir-fried Asian veggies and udon noodles with a super-spicy coconut curry sauce.


Pita pizza with roasted garlic red sauce and fennel seed, Gardein chunks, black olives, Spanish onions, hot banana peppers, Cheddar Daiya.

Broccoli, green peppers, mushrooms, chickpeas and garlic stir-fried with a bit of tamari. Quinoa with a dollop of salsa.

Romaine lettuce, tomatoes, shredded carrots, radishes, green peppers, Spanish onion, steamed broccoli, hot banana peppers from the garden -- all on a hidden bed of quinoa. I drizzled lemon juice, olive oil and crushed garlic over it before serving.


Wild blueberries blended with almond milk, topped with banana slices and plain soy yogurt.

Chickpea salad w/roasted garlic dressing and diced Claussen dill pickles, tomato and mustard in a whole grain pita. Fries (a rarity for me) and steamed organic carrots and peas on the side.

Carrot slaw, barely steamed broccoli, shredded collards, radishes, tomato, scallions, hot banana peppers from the backyard, cucumber. Tossed with a Dijon balsamic vinaigrette.

Spinach-sweet potato soup with quinoa and Indian seasonings.

Hitting at the Heart of the Problem

Every day that we live, we remake the world. The question is, are we remaking the world in the way that we really want it to be? Would we prefer that animals be nicely treated commodities, still exploited, albeit more gently, or would we prefer that the world be vegan, and recognize the inherent worth of animals as beings with their own subjective experience of the world?

If we want a vegan world, we have to work to produce one, and the only way to produce one is by living one uncompromisingly on a daily basis. Vegan education works to effectively remodel social relations, and to hit at the heart of the problem with animal exploitation. For this reason, our work should focus on the inglorious, quotidian work that’s required for creating a broad-based movement of people who live abolition in their daily life, who work to change the conditions that condemn animals to being mere instruments and property, and who work to educate others about the importance of veganism as a lived form of protest. No amount of negotiating with KFC or McDonald’s or whatever fast food restaurant will have such an impact; no amount of banning gestation crates, or producing cage free eggs will get us there. Only veganism can bring the kind of world we’re after, and only veganism can be the means if we are truly serious about respecting the inherent needs of animals to live free of exploitation and suffering.

-- Excerpt from "All We Have Is Means" by Bob Torres (co-author of Vegan Freak: Being Vegan in a Non-Vegan World)

Reckoning

"It's time. You need to come home," my brother-in-law said to me on the phone. My brother-in-law had never called me before. We ironed out that I'd hop on the bus immediately and that he'd pick me up and rush me to the hospital once I arrived. I called a few close friends who'd made themselves so kindly and wonderfully available to me to ensure that the cats would be looked after, I packed a bag, and then I walked to the nearby bus depot, breathing in/breathing out.

I had just been there. I had been there so often over the previous months and more so during recent weeks. Dad had been drifting in and out of consciousness for several days, lost somewhere between the hallucinations brought on by the hypercalcemia caused by his multiple myeloma, as well as those caused by the generous dosage of morphine he'd been given to ease the time he'd had left. I was returning. It was time for 'round the clock vigils, to make sure that Dad had family with him, that he wouldn't die alone. My shame? That I didn't want to be there for it. I feared it. I did not want to witness my father's ceasing to be.

My sister sat in a chair beside his bed, where he lay breathing quite raspily, nearly immobile, his arms bent and pulled up close to his chest, with his hands cupped and almost leaving him looking as if he could wake up and dive into a dog paddle. I paced, tired from my day at work and with muscles tight from the hours on the bus. My sister told me that he'd had brief moments of consciousness over the previous days, but that the doctors anticipated that between the wear of the drugs on his system and of the cancer itself, all we could hope for at this point was for him to "pass" easily and painlessly. Nobody loves a death rattle, so they'd even given him drugs to quiet his rasp a little. "It's customary," the nurse had assured me.

Dad sat up in bed abruptly, his eyes wide and alert and with arms suddenly outstretched. He was driving. After a beat I tentatively asked him where he was going. My sister rolled her eyes at me, continuing to work on her crossword puzzle. He grinned at me in the sly way I remembered from when I was younger and he'd tease us. He motioned as if pulling up to a stop and proceeded to indulge in some sort of mysterious interaction which I recognised as some sort of shopping errand. In French, he proceeded to hold up his end of a conversation with what I quickly realized was a jeweler, making it obvious that he was shopping for a new watch. Politely, he'd ask to try one after the other, comparing the time on his bare (to me) wrist with the time on the clock on the wall of his hospital room, declining one after another. "Bonjour. Ah non, merci." I tried to insert myself into the exchange -- to help. I asked him what he was doing, and he told me (again in French) that he was "buying time". My sister protested to me that he was tiring himself out and that I wasn't "helping". Soon, though, he and I found a watch he deemed satisfactory and he seemed relieved, finally relaxing against his pillows. He told me that he was thirsty, so I walked over to the bathroom off his room to get him some water in a paper cup.

"Mylène?"

I stepped back out of the washroom surprised to have heard him speak my name for the first time in several weeks. I looked at him, my sweet father sitting up again and staring intently at me, seeming so lucid and so concerned.

"Oui?"

"Es-tu bonne pour continuer?"

Dad asked, in effect, if I was "good to go on". I assured him that yes, I really was. My sister insisted again with annoyance that I was tiring him out, ignoring him completely and oblivious to the entire exchange. He sat back in his bed and I brought him his water and he drank a little and fell back asleep. My uncle came to relieve us a half hour later and my sister and I went to my parents' house just a few minutes from the hospital, on call.

A few hours later, that call came. His temperature was up, his breathing irregular -- we needed to return. My mother, for some reason or other, had blood tests scheduled for the next morning and had been asked to fast. She was in the washroom, sick to her (empty) stomach when my father sat up one last time, looking straight at the clock on the wall in front of him and reaching out with one arm in front of him as if to grab hold of something. He wheezed and sighed deeply, then curled up against me and I held him. My father died in my arms four years ago as I write this. I remember the heat leaving his body as I held him. I remember clinging to that heat and ignoring the nurses who came in to do as gently as they could what nurses do to confirm that someone you love is gone.

I miss you, good and gentle lumberjack. I miss our shared geekiness. I miss watching Nova with you on PBS and miss sharing your OMNIs with you. I miss you telling me all about stars and pointing them out in constellations with the telescope you bought for me, kidding me that I was going to be your "little astronaut". I miss getting up so very early on Saturday morning when you'd make us both toast and cocoa and then read your science fiction books as I watched cartoons, everyone else in the house still fast asleep and with the morning all ours. I miss you teaching me to be kind to others, human and non-human. And later, I miss how you'd assure Mom that the books I brought home as a teenager were fine, whether Sartre or Satanic Bible, and that I was able to suss them out myself. I miss how excited you got over my going off to university, and how years after I had faltered and returned again to finally finish my degree, you were still excited and wanted me to share with you whatever I was learning -- to explain each and every thing to you. I miss that so much, every single day. So today, of all days, how could I not think of you?

(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.

"It's Just Food"

I've written a few times about precisely how not a fan I am of over-hyped short-term so-called "vegan" challenges or cleanses that are usually kick-started with an emphasis on health and weight loss. I occasionally get into the same old tired discussions with non-abolitionist animal advocates over why I'm not, countering their assertions that "any exposure for 'veganism' is good exposure" or that any experience "going" vegan is a potential opportunity for an individual to actually "stay" vegan. The thing is, though, that not eating animal products for three weeks isn't "going vegan". Veganism involves making an ethical lifestyle choice--a step taken to reject living a life that involves the avoidable exploitation of other animals. It's not something tried on like a pair of socks with the intention from the very beginning to go back to consuming (and otherwise using) non-human animals.

Going vegan should, at the very least, involve some sort of intention to stay vegan. Weight loss dieting or health-related cleanses have their place, no doubt, but as primary motivators anticipated to trigger someone's completely and permanently eschewing the exploitation of all non-human animals, eaten or otherwise? I don't really buy it. This may sound like a stretch to some, but I honestly think that the best way to get someone to take the rights and interests of non-human animals seriously is to actually talk to them about why they should take the rights and interests of non-human animals seriously.

I read an article earlier today which served as a reminder to me of why it's problematic to give much credence to faddish short-term public experimentation with what is what is usually just strict vegetarianism. In her Petoskey News article "Vegans are people too", staff writer Rachel Brougham spills the beans that she's a third of the way into a "three-month vegan challenge". Although in her previous articles, Brougham repeatedly refers to her project as following a "vegan diet", she portrays herself in this recent one as identifying with what she describes as the typically stereotyped and judged vegan. She refers to herself as being "vegan" while sharing stories of her interactions with food service employees and dismissive eavesdropping fellow-customers in eating establishments.

There is indeed a fair amount of truth to her realization that far too many assumptions are often made by non-vegans about vegans and that, all too often, those assumptions spill out with awkwardness and hostility. Nonetheless, her inserting this into the article seems a little contrived. It's as if she hopes to cash in some vegan cred of sorts by identifying with what she portrays as ordinarily mocked and maligned vegans--as if she seeks to give some further sense of validity to her entire experience. The thing is, though, that Brougham's experience is far from that of being vegan, or of even understanding veganism in an ethical sense. It's certainly far removed from understanding veganism in an abolitionist sense:

For me, following a vegan lifestyle isn’t about being right or wrong. It’s not about being sane or crazy. It’s not about following a trend or going against the grain. I’m not making a political statement and this isn’t something I’m being forced into as — quite literally — a matter of life or death. It’s simply a different way of living that makes me and countless others feel better.

Although her statement sounds well-intentioned and some parts of it make a sense, it certainly doesn't convey an understanding of what's at stake for animals for whom it is actually a matter of life or death whether or not we continue to treat them as things. To take the rights and interests of other animals seriously and to reject involving oneself in their exploitation is very much a question of making right or wrong choices and of following through with right or wrong actions. Choosing to reject involving oneself in this exploitation will undoubtedly allow someone to "feel better", but to sum up going vegan as "simply a different way of living that makes me and countless others feel better" completely misses the point that going vegan isn't about ramping up one's own pleasure or assuaging one's guilt: Going vegan is about not perpetuating the exploitation and slaughter of non-human animals. It's not about me and you, Rachel -- it's about them.

And of course, as a writer for mainstream media who is testing the waters with strict vegetarianism for a few weeks, it makes sense that she would assert that for her, the experiment wasn't a political statement. Of course it wasn't. It was fodder for an article -- a temporary playing around with some variation on a trendy idea to sell copy. For me, as an abolitionist vegan, actually being vegan and educating others about going vegan are very much both personal and political statements. How could they not be?

Brougham wraps up her article with more comments about exactly how she's feeling better one month in, losing weight and sleeping better. She also makes it clear that whether or not she continues to not eat animals and their products (and to call it "veganism") is completely up in the air and that the outcome is really of no concern to her.

On Oct. 1, I’ll be at a dinner fork in the road. Maybe I’ll go back to my old ways; maybe I’ll eat meat and dairy on occasion; or maybe I’ll stay the vegan course.

Her disassociation with what's involved in continuing to consume animal products and her ambivalence about whether or not to consume them is made most clear, however, when she asserts

I’ll never judge my dinner companion for ordering the steak while I enjoy pasta with vegetables. After all, it’s just food.

As long as anyone continues to hold the belief that pieces of a sentient being are "just food", it's a given that they haven't wrapped their heads around speciesism and haven't weighed what's involved in bringing that piece of an animal to their plate. It's unsurprising, then, that Brougham could be so lackadaisical about whether or not to resume consuming animal products after her experiment. But her experience really just reflects the dozens of other so-called vegan cleanses and challenges so many celebrities, foodies and ordinary old newspaper writers have been droning on about over the past few years. More often than not, the question of animal rights gets tossed to the wayside and (as I mentioned at the beginning of this post) the focus is on health, environmentalism or weight loss. The issue of speciesism--that very state of mind which props up and facilitates the continued exploitation of non-human animals by the general public--is never addressed.

Sometimes mention is made of the treatment of animals, although more often than not when this is done, references are inserted to various purportedly ethical degrees of animal consumption. Readers are reassured that with "happy" eggs, they can have their non-vegan cake and eat it too, and that opting to do so is somehow a good and meaningful step for readers to take without having to engage in the oh so extremist and absolutist refusal to simply reject animal consumption altogether. This is generally why I have a hard time championing these half-hearted forays by non-vegans into murky territory they mislabel "veganism". This is why when fellow-vegans insist to me that getting "the word" out there at any cost is important and that mentions in mainstream media should be celebrated that I'm left wondering whether or not some of my fellow-vegans really realize what's really at stake when clear and consistent messages about the ethics of using animals as things fall short or when this supposed "word" is delivered by unclear and inconsistent messengers.

Let's be clear and consistent messengers about veganism and about what it really is we owe non-human animals. If we won't, who will?

A Kind of Blue

Love, Loss, Life

Someone I know told me recently that he has never wanted to share his home with non-human animals, specifically because of his fear of having to deal with their eventual loss by way of either illness or age. I'd been telling him about my own fears over recent weeks concerning my boy Zeus' latest bout with vertigo. The person with whom I was speaking had, in fact, happened to be visiting around a year and a half ago when Zeus' dizziness had first manifested itself in a major way, leaving him uncoordinated and distressed. We'd taken him to the vet's together to have him checked out and we were both worried about my little guy.

Healers as Harbingers

It was good to have someone else along for the first time in years -- good to have someone to help steady my nerves a little. The vet's office has always been an awkward place for me. Where once upon a time it was a place to which I'd bring various younger members of my feline family, whether to treat the odd minor issue or urinary tract infection; it was also a place to go to get a sense of reassurance. Over the years as various cats who've come into my care have aged, it's become a place I sometimes struggle not to dread visiting. I still remember clearly the early morning well over a dozen years ago I'd risen to get a glass of water and to check email, only to find Tarwater unable to move one of his hind legs. A few hours later, I received the worst diagnosis: saddle thrombus -- a blood clot which lodges itself in an artery in the leg. This was followed by the news that saddle thrombus is often associated with serious congestive heart disease and that in Tar's case, function of his leg might never be restored and that amputation might, in fact, end up required. Furthermore, I was told that because of the clot and the detection of a faint heart murmur that Tarwater would not likely be with us much longer -- that he would eventually succumb to stroke or heart failure.

Tar, as it turns out, lived another 10 years with nothing more than a slight limp which never prevented him from reaching the top of the fridge where he would curl up and keep an eye on me as I hovered over the stove. The damage was done, though. This was my first experience with getting "Really, Really Bad News" from my vet; for the first time, a visit to the veterinary clinic had left me more afraid than reassured.

As the rest of the gang aged and a few older fosters passed through, my visits to the veterinary clinic became more frequently punctuated by worry, nervousness and sometimes sorrow. Hyperthyroidism. Eosinophilic granuloma complex. Asthma. Chronic renal failure. Idiopathic vestibular disease. Some conditions (e.g. the asthma) have been manageable thanks to the amenable cooperation of the cats who know me as their favourite can opener. With other diagnoses, though, often comes the reminder -- sometimes even the confirmation -- that time shared together is coming to an end. The truth is, though, that every relationship we take on with someone reaches a conclusion of sorts, whether that someone is feline, canine or human.

Several years ago, walking home from a university class, I saw a woman calling out to what looked like a wobbly black kitten wandering along the edge of a busy street at the tail end of rush hour. I scooped up this little cat, realizing that as tiny and skinny as she was that she was no kitten. I brought her home and sneaked her into my office before my then-spouse could pause his favourite video game. She was filthy, infested with ear mites, had overgrown claws and what I suspected was ringworm. Her breath was horrid enough to nearly make me nauseous. As the ex and I later watched her devour the food I'd given her, we agreed that after getting her checked out by our vet and then making the appropriate calls to rule out that someone wasn't looking for her, we'd gained a new roommate. Her badly abscessed teeth would require hundreds of dollars to deal with and as we led up to the holidays, some friends and family members questioned that we would show willingness to spend money on this elderly little cat we'd named Maudie, whom we'd also come to discover during the blood-work required before her intensive dental work, had failing kidneys.

Wouldn't it make more sense to cut our losses and have "someone else's (abandoned) cat" euthanized, they asked, especially since we had no way to tell how much longer she'd live. The thing is, though, that "someone else's cat" was now our responsibility and that she had a right to her own life -- a life we'd chosen to share and to weave into our own lives. Maudie had her ups and downs and near the end, I'd be lying if I didn't admit that it was hard to be perpetually aware of the fact that her remaining days were few. It was almost an exact year from the day I'd found her that she decided to let go. Seven years later, I still remember what it felt like to wake up to her slight weight on my head, with her tiny thumb-sized paws kneading my scalp, and of how I'd sing verses of "Maudie Girl" to her.

As hard as it was to watch her fade in her final days and as much as she was and is now missed, I cannot imagine not having helped this little cat -- not having gotten to know this unique little individual who'd nestled herself so sweetly and firmly into our hearts and memories. I cannot imagine having allowed the fear of losing her to have prevented me from ever having had the opportunity to know her. Worse, I refuse to imagine what might have happened to her had I not scooped her up from the traffic that day so many years ago.

Why Let Them In?

When we invite non-humans into our homes, we do so for many reasons. I'd like to ask you to consider what's perhaps the most important reason: In the US alone, 3-4 million cats and dogs are killed every single year in shelters. Consider that 5 out of 10 dogs and 7 out of ten cats killed in shelters every year die simply because they are not adopted; meanwhile, up to 30% of cats and dogs brought into new homes each year in the US come from breeders and pet stores. (You can see some of these statistics here or find similar information elsewhere on the internet.) The bottom line is that adopting a non-human animal from a shelter will quite literally save a life, whether the life of the animal in question, or that of another animal waiting to be taken home. This, in and of itself, is the reason that it's crucial that anyone who has the room in their hearts and homes for a non-human should look no further than their local shelter.

So you want a purebred? Around 25% of dogs relinquished to US shelters are, in fact, purebred. You say you want a kitten/puppy? Talk to any shelter employee or volunteer about what's commonly known as kitten/puppy season in shelters because of the overwhelming numbers of unspayed cats and dogs often relinquished or found with their litters. And if you don't have time to deal with kitten and puppy hijinks, I assure you that the number of adult dogs and cats you'll find -- many of them who are just ordinary loving animals whose only reason for being in a shelter is that they are simply no longer wanted -- is absolutely staggering. No room for a cat or a dog? Adopt one of the many others who also get relinquished to shelters: rabbits, rats, mice, hamsters, birds, et al.

Fear of Loss or Fear of Gain?

I've been spending a lot of time thinking about loss these past few days. On top of other goings on, dealing with recent vet visits, tests and uncertainty during these past weeks for my pal Zeus' on and off again (and consistently misdiagnosed) condition of the past year and a half has left me working hard to not dwell on heartache. Having loved and lost often over the past few years, I've learned that it's far from anything you get used to and that one loss invariably seems to compound or amplify the fear of another. It also smarts when I see friends and acquaintances trying to wrap their own heads around the potential (or actual) loss of loved ones of their own, whether human or non-human. It smarts even more to watch them deal with the aftermath since it's all too familiar. Although they may become fewer as time passes, there are always reminders.

Every single one of us reaches a point in our lives where we're left to deal with some sort of tear in the fabric of what constitutes our immediate existence. So many different factors influence each individual's own experience with it, that how we're each left dealing with it varies greatly, with the common thread being that awareness in that very moment that the loved one is just no longer "here" in whatever capacity the loved one was "here" in our everyday-ness. We try to find meaning in what's left and, with time, to pick up those threads and to patch the tears however we can. This is all that we can really do.

The sense of loss, however, isn't limited to coping with the final amscraying into nothingness brought by the death of another. Although people walk in and out of our lives constantly as we also walk into and out of theirs, we find ourselves focusing on the few who bring us some level of happiness and and we end up weaving our interactions with them into our mental meanderings about the future. Some become close friends, while others we choose as romantic cohorts to accompany us on this crazy trip called life. Those individuals get factored in. All of the goodness they bring to our existence and the accompanying opportunities for reciprocity get factored into the "stories of us" we unwittingly build for ourselves; our dreams and anticipations spill over and wrap themselves around frameworks we've tentatively assembled, our makeshift ever-afters.

The truth is that as much as we cannot control that a loved one dies, we cannot -- ultimately -- control when someone will consciously choose to otherwise remove themselves from our lives. That's also part of this thing called "living". What we can control, however, is whether we take a chance and open up and risk being loved and risk loving back. What we can control is our willingness to take that opportunity to come together with somebody and to share time together. We ultimately control who we let in and we completely control what we are willing and able to give to that other. It's all we can do and sometimes, for another, it's everything.

On Loving Non-humans

I've had more than a handful of animal rights activists say to me over the years that there's something inherently wrong in admitting that we derive pleasure from our relationships with the non-humans we adopt or rescue. I've had animal rights activists say to me that there's something inherently selfish about saying "I couldn't imagine not living with a cat", as if to say it somehow implies that we're objectifying cats. I think that really misses the point concerning speciesism and concerning society's general view and use of non-human animals. The truth is that for many of us who share our lives with dogs, cats, rabbits and other non-human persons, those relationships are indeed profoundly meaningful and there is indeed reciprocation. I can't help but think that anyone claiming to me that non-human animals are unable to develop emotional bonds with humans has simply never spent more than a few hours with a non-human animal. And yes, letting a non-human in and allowing oneself to love him or her leaves oneself open to the pain of the eventual loss of that individual, but isn't that ultimately what life and loving are all about?

Please give a non-human animal in a shelter a chance at living out his or her life in comfort and happiness. By giving someone this opportunity, you'll not only save a life, but you will indeed gain a friend. It breaks my heart to know that millions of non-humans in North America alone are dying every year merely for want of having someone let them in. It breaks my heart even more to think that these millions are dying and that they won't, in fact, be missed. They'll just be statistics when they could be a Maudie or a Tarwater -- or a Zeus.

Truth and Ridicule

It is the fate of every truth to be an object of ridicule when it is first acclaimed. It was once considered foolish to suppose that black men were really human beings and ought to be treated as such. What was once foolish has now become a recognized truth. Today it is considered as exaggeration to proclaim constant respect for every form of life as being the serious demand of a rational ethic. But the time is coming when people will be amazed that the human race existed so long before it recognized that thoughtless injury to life is incompatible with real ethics. Ethics is in its unqualified form extended responsibility to everything that has life.

-- Albert Schweitzer