"Abolitionist" Gary Francione Laments State of Animal Rights Movement
Gary Francione, who argues that to be authentic all animal rights believers must be vegan and lead by example (I agree with him on this), is unhappy. He worries that the animal rights movement is falling backwards because of the "humane meat" campaigns that, in his mind, have made carne respectable to consume for some who were once abstainers. As evidence, he points out that the Food Standards Agency in Britain has found that the number of people eating a partly or completely vegetarian diet fell from 9 per cent in 2007 to 7 per cent in 2008. As evidence that the humane meat movement is undercutting animal rights, properly understood, he quotes from an article by former vegetarian Tessie Williams. From his column:
The reason for Williams' return to meat: "I see my decision to return to meat as part of a bigger change in Britain's food culture. We've shifted away from the old-school "meat is murder" approach, and now well-sourced meat is seen as healthy and natural.I agree with Williams that meat is a natural food for human beings. And I have often criticized equating animal slaughter for food with the murder of human beings as misanthropic. But, Francione is absolutely right about the impact of humane meat: If it becomes widely accepted among animal advocates, it will devastate the pure animal rights concept, which asserts that human beings have no right to use animals for any instrumentalized purpose, no matter how beneficial to us:
This is where the happy meat/animal products movement is leading. And it is certainly not confined to Britain. In the United States, animal protection organizations promote initiatives such as California's Proposition 2, which will do nothing to help animals but will falsely reassure humans that animals are being given significantly improved "humane" protection.Francione is also upset with PETA's oft-utilized stunt of using soft core porn to sell vegetarianism:
The underlying premise of the modern "animal protection" movement is that it is acceptable for humans to use animals as long as they are treated "humanely." Those who support this position may want better treatment than the welfarists of the 1940s or 1950s sought, but the principle is the same: use does not matter; only treatment does. That is a fundamental difference between the abolitionist approach and the approach adopted by the large new-welfarist organizations. The abolitionist position rejects all animal use and sees creative, nonviolent vegan education as the primary strategy to employ.
It is unclear to me why PETA and those who think that this sort of thing is acceptable do not recognize that sexism and speciesism are very closely linked. As long as we continue to commodify women, we will continue to commodify nonhumans. Sexism is not only inherently objectionable; it is a most ineffective way to increase consciousness about nonhumans. PETA has been promoting its sexist anti-fur campaign for over almost 20 years now. Has it had any effect? The fur industry is stronger than it has ever been.Yes, well PETA's first and foremost rule is to garner attention for itself. Sex sells and ads such as the one not played on the Superbowl are guaranteed attention-getters--particularly from the teenage boy crowd.
Gary Francione is an idealist and a principled advocate. But in promoting veganism he is both pushing against nature and a society that is increasingly geared toward indulging desires rather than promoting virtue. I understand his pain.
posted by Wesley J. Smith @ 9:26 AM
14 Comments
14 Comments:
I find myself agreeing with Francione on PETA's portayal of women in it's ads. I think that PETA's actions are totally misogynistic in this regard, no matter how loudly its members claim to be feminists-actions speak louder than words.
Re: the Super Bowl ad, this is a scam PETA has pulled before. The last one I remember was their ad that was based on "Girls Gone Wild" videos, and was truly tasteless.
The scam goes like this:
1) Create an ad that the networks will never, ever run.
2) Try to buy ad space so the network is forced to turn down their money on grounds of taste.
3) Claim censorship.
4) Use the resulting free publicity to get people (mostly teenage boys in this case) to watch the video at no cost to you.
Gets them at least as much publicity as the Super Bowl would have, without spending the $2-5 million.
Remember that the head of PETA, Ingrid Newkirk, happily describes herself as a "publicity (street name for prostitute)."
Wow, well said, padraig.
Francione, Newkirk, whoever. If you've heard one animal rights extremist, you've heard them all. And no matter their tactics, they are for the abolition of animal domestication, something that will NEVER fly with the public.
Frankly none of them have any principles at all.
Susan -
I'm afraid I have to disagree with you. I don't agree with Francione's mindset, but I will say that he's a very *good* person, in that he doesn't advocate violence of any sort, that he's totally committed to treating animals well, and that he has disciplined himself to living a vegan lifestyle. I have never seen anything in him that I find harmful.
I used to work in a deli, and one of my co-workers (and yes, she sliced meat all the time) was a vegan. She ate no meat or cheese, used nothing animal-based, and used soaps and shampoos that had no animal byproducts or were tested on animals. I asked Lael (that was her name) why she worked in a deli if she was a vegan. She said that she didn't object to other people eating meat, but that she couldn't, in good conscience, do so. She didn't believe animals had souls, but she believed that since they don't belong to us, but rather to God (and she's the one I credit for pointing that out to me), that she felt she had no right to eat meat or use animal-based products.
Francione may disagree with her in that he doesn't want to see anyone use anything animal-based, but he is like her in his patience and his ability to treat *everyone* respectfully, even if he disagrees. I can't see any reason to malign him.
I'm not saying this to be mean to you, Susan. I fully understand why you feel as you do. I just think that he falls outside of the norm of extremists, because he's not anti-human, just pro-animal.
Disagreeing in a civil manner and having good dialogue as you do is always beneficial for both parties.
Pursuing the cause of humanity toward non-human animals is an ardous and enormous undertaking that is being done, by those willing to do it and committed to doing it, in a multi-faceted way. I admire Gary Francione's integrity. I also admire PETA's ingenuity, though I don't think they need to sell out in terms of what has been mentioned here; but anything that gets attention for the issue has a purpose.
T.E.: I agree with you. He's not anti-human. Anything that makes us think and brings attention to the plight of helpless animals (both human and non-human) is good, and the more humane we are to the other animals, the more humane we are to our own species. Dr. Neal Barnard, affiliated with PETA and the founder of Physicians For Responsible Medicine (I don't think I have the name of that organization exactly right but it's at the least pretty close), argues against eating meat on the grounds that it's unhealthy for humans. His family has a cattle ranch, from what I've read, and he says he came to believe that vegetarianism is better for humans when he saw what eating meat and dairy products does to human bodies. We all have self-interest; non-human animals do just as humans do, and non-human animals' rights are based in their own self-interest, just as our not abusing them is in our own self-interest.
Susan: They know that animal domestication never will end. PETA's staffers bring their pets to work. What they are after is making sure that horrible treatment of animals that has flown with the public, with or without the public's awareness, will no longer be tolerated by the public. I'm sure you don't approve of animal suffering either. Most people don't. It's kept out of public view because those who cause it know perfectly well that most of the public would be appalled if they could see it.
Wesley: That he's pushing against the increasing self-indulgence of society makes it all the more important and necessary as well as admirable that he's doing it. It's not entirely against nature; some people, depending on their blood type, are healthier as vegetarians, and if one isn't going to eat an animal, which is a matter of survival for those whose physical make-up requires it, it isn't right to use that part of it that isn't meat. I also agree with the wisdom of Native American and other cultures which considered it not right right not to use the whole animal once one has killed it for food, and not to kill the animal without a sense of reverence. The ancients may have done animal sacrifice to the gods not just in order to propitiate, or even thank, the gods, but also out of the same sense of reverence for life, including non-human animal life, and the sense of regret that any humane person feels on killing another living being, even for the sake of survival. As for vegetarianism, as we have evolved to date, some of us are more carnivorous than others.
I respect vegetarians who make an ethical choice to not eat meat. I also respect monastics who make an ethical choice to remain celibate. I think they are in the same category of human exceptionalism, given that only humans would willingly forgo natural activities for the sake of morality, or to put it the other way around, since no animal would ever forgo eating part of its natural diet for ethical reasons, nor intentionally not have sex.
Ianthe -
Wow. You bring up an interesting point.
In the Bible, God comes right out at one point and tells Jonah that He had a good reason to make Jonah preach repentence to his enemies - to save the lives of all the people in that city, as well as all the animals there.
Also, in the story of King David, a prophet told David a story about a man who had a beautiful lamb he treated like a daughter, and someone came and stole the lamb and killed the man. David announced that the killer should be punished severely, only to be told that the story was about a sin *he* committed. But the thing is, the love between the owern and the animal was so strong that nobody was surprised that David was angry about the story.
Animal sacrifices were precious *because* the animals meant something to the humans who lived with them. It was hard to part with the animals.
Compare with modern society: animals are slaughtered by the hundreds on factory farms, where they're mostly numbers. Large parts of the animal are wasted, or worse - recycled into feed for more of the same animals. The reverence for life isn't there the way it used to be.
I do see what you're saying when you say we have to stop animal experimentation. We've lost a lot of respect for our four-legged children. When animal lives become throw-away, it's not too far from human lives becoming throw-away.
I *still* have to disagree, though, that *all* animal experimentation is bad, since some of it leads to good cures for ailments for both humans and other animals. The trick is to ensure that whoever performs the experiments understands the value of the animal's life. Like Wesley, I don't believe that animals have the same exceptionalism that humans do, but I do believe that they don't belong to *us*, and therefore we will be held accountable if we mis-use them.
But the big issue is to try to get people thinking beyond "human and animal" and thinking "life" first, and to be respectful and handle it properly.
Wesley -
The big problem is that people have a knee-jerk reaction to "vegan" and automatically think "eco-terrorist."
People who follow their moral values need to be judged based on their actions. Most vegans do *not* promote harm to humans, and should be respected for their beliefs, as you said.
We have to remember to weed out the eco-terrorists from the moral vegans and treat them accordingly.
Wesley: I think it's not human exceptionalism, but humans just doing what humans are capable of doing, and being themselves, just as other animals do what they are capable of doing and being themselves. I think the error comes in when we distinguish ourselves from other animals on the basis of our being able to do what they can't; in fact, every animal does what other animals can't. It's not us v. them, or them v. us.
T.E.: Exactly! When animal lives become throw-away, it's not too far from human lives becoming throw-away.
I do know what you mean about animal experimentation being capable of leading to good cures for ailments of both humans and other animals. But the problem is, no one can argue that in experimentation that benefits veterinary medicine, for example, the value of the life of the animal, for example a cat, used in the experiment is no less than that of the animal, for example another cat, that the experimentation will help. That's the queasy part, and when something makes us queasy, we need to stop right there. Similarly, experimentation on humans without their consent is considered anathema. And when it causes a sentient being pain, it doesn't matter who the beneficiary is, it's wrong. Our scientific and medical system, which we consider advanced and a reflection of how wonderful we are, and regard (well, I don't, but "human exceptionalism" does) as yielding benefits to us and therefore justified in causing suffering to other sentient beings, is primitive and barbaric, I don't care how "wonderful" it's "high-tech" aspects are. What we need is wisdom and the willingness to do the work of using our brains, being profoundly logical, putting reason and common sense, being willing to allow instinct to prevail. Those are the things "modern science" makes take a back seat. Other cultures have done far more "advanced" things in medicine and healing without the kind of fanfare and back-slapping with which we regard our own "medical advancements." The use of animals in research reflects our own lack of talent and sophistication, and our own backwardness. The proof is in the callousness of modern medicine, its regression in terms of ethics and humanity, and in the death culture itself. We just want what we want when we want it and feel entitled, and aren't up to being wise, patient, and enlightened.
T.E. That should have been, no one can argue that in experimentation that benefits veterinary medicine, for example, the value of the life of the animal, for example a cat, used in the experiment is less (not is no less) than that of the animal, for example another cat, that the experiment will help.
"Human exceptionalism" argues otherwise as a rationalization for doing the unethical. The unethical can't be rationalized. Rationalization only inevitably leads to problems down the line.
I agree with what you said about cats and their being psychic a section or two back, by the way. A vet once told me about the psychic link they have with their owners. In fact when I am thinking of them more than usual, the lady who is taking care of them for me invariably calls me; she picks it up from them that I am having that thought.
PETA is only hurting their cause as much as they are helping it with their over-the-top tactics. I was once handed out leaflets about how horribly animals were slaughtered for meat, complete with pictures of baby chickens being minced alive, cows slaughtered, etc. Of course, then you see in very fine print that the photographs and examples aren't taken from any particular country. Being in a country where we export, not import, meat, it seems dishonest to try and tug the heartstrings by referring to practices in other countries. In the end, no matter what I stop eating here I can't stop chickens being minced overseas, because I am not their consumer. Jamie Oliver was much more successful in promoting free range eggs by showing what actually happened to chickens in ENGLAND, not in some extreme third world country. Basically, if the vegan campaign is going to succeed, it needs to treat its adherents like intelligent people, not gullible and emotional. And humane meat might be a stepping stone on the path, rather than an alternative route.
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