The Vegans on the Bus Go Round and Round! New Campaign Announced

I am pleased to announce that The Abolitionist Vegan Society (TAVS) has launched its crowdfunding campaign to place vegan advertisements on the back of buses in major American cities. This is a cost-efficient means of bringing the vegan message to a large demographic of people, directing them to the TAVS "Why Veganism?" website where introductory anti-speciesism theory and vegan shopping resources are readily available.

This media tactic has already been widely adopted by groups like PETA and Mercy for Animals, but never in a coherent manner that takes the interest of Nonhuman Animals seriously. TAVS seeks to bring a truly vegan, truly anti-oppression message to the American public. I had a chance to speak with Sarah K. Woodock, founder of TAVS and designer of the campaign. She explains, "This campaign gives us the opportunity to reach literally millions of people with veganism. It would take us tens of thousands of hours of leafleting and tabling to reach the same number of people that we will reach over a period of months instead of years."

"Furthermore," she adds, "as abolitionist vegans, we talk about all of the ways not to do advocacy (i.e. engaging in nonabolitionist campaigns, using sexist tactics, using racist tactics, etc.). But here is a campaign that all vegans can confidently support—one that promotes veganism as the moral minimum and that is run by an organization that takes a pro-intersectional approach to vegan advocacy."

TAVS is hoping to meet their target by the end of 2015, can you help make it happen?

Click here to offer your support. 

The Social Psychology of Speciesism Lecture Series

For those new to social psychology, I've published an introductory four part hour long lecture on the science of human-nonhuman relationships. In the first lecture, I make a case for the inclusion of Nonhuman Animal issues in the social sciences. In the second lecture, I cover a few important social psychological concepts that help explain institutionalized violence against animals. In the final piece, I criticize the use of other animals as research subjects in the discipline.

Lecture 1: Social Psychology of Human & Nonhuman Relationships (Part 1) 

Exploring how social psychology relates to nonhuman species and the role of human supremacy in otherizing nonhuman species.

Lecture 1: Social Psychology of Human & Nonhuman Relationships (Part 2) 

Lecture 2: The Social Psychology of Speciesism 

Exploring various theories of social psychology to explain the institutionalized violence against other animals.

Lecture 3: Animal Research in Social Psychology 

Exploring the ethical problems with using animals in social psychologial experimentation, highlighting prominent research, and suggesting alternatives.

What the IJC Whaling Ruling & Social Media Response Tell Us about Racism and Western Imperialism

By Stevie Lynne

TRIGGER WARNING:  This post discusses racism and includes racist and racially insensitive screengrabs.

Before we get this post under way, I want to make it absolutely clear that from my perspective I would prefer that no nonhuman animal be exploited or die unnecessarily. However, morality is rarely that straight forward and there are other things I like to take into account before deciding whether or not a campaign or an outcome is really the boon it seems to be on first glance.

Australia took Japan to the International Court of Justice to challenge its claims of whaling for scientific research. The ICJ has recently handed down their verdict (12-4) that the current Japanese whaling research conducted in the Southern Ocean is unscientific and must cease immediately under the International Whaling Convention.

Amongst the cheer and uproar of my Facebook friends, I have my serious misgivings about the ruling, not for the nonhuman animals but for the hints of imperialism and racism that seems deeply embedded in the pursuit of this case and its outcome.

I was watching the news unfold on the Australian public funded news channel, ABC News’ Facebook page. It’s pretty safe to say that the majority of individuals responding to this news are not vegan.

Part of the reason I think that the anti-whaling movement has so much popular currency in Australia is precisely because it attacks a non-white other.

Johanna over on the Vegans Of Color blog posted an excellent blogpost about U.S. vegans attacking other countries and other cultures. She writes:

...we in the West feel it’s our high-and-mighty duty to go & tell other countries, with which we have had an adversarial & racist relationship, what to do. Instead of listening to local activists & supporting them if & when they request it (& in the manner they request), US activists love to barge in, without thought to cultural context or self-determination & autonomy for folks in the countries they’re honing in on. (& yeah, go figure, the whole exotification thing makes it a lot easier to point fingers at OMG those weird savage people!)

This racist elements of the IJC decision were highlighted with people wishing harm against Japan if they broke the ruling. One person had the audacity to use a racial slur for Japanese people as well other disgusting and dehumanising language in his comment. I reported it to Facebook and they removed the comment.

Japanese Responses

Some Japanese individuals jumped on this discussion thread to show their support of the decision.

However, other Japanese individuals were less enthused.

Katsuyoshi Kanahashi’s response shows further issues of classism as well as imperialism present in the debate. 

Even on this one English language thread, Japanese people are shown not to be homogenous and have a diversity of views.

Japanese newspaper The Japan Times, which is published in both English and Japanese, ran an editorial on the ICJ decision. But one thing which struck me as significant was the following paragraph which neatly surmises issues of Western imperialism as well as violence used against the Japanese in pursuit of this imperialism:

Opposition to whaling on environmental or animal welfare grounds has often been viewed in Japan as an attempt to impose Western values in disregard of Japan’s whaling and culinary traditions. In recent years, Japanese whaling operations have been severely hampered by radical environmentalists’ violent sabotage activities.

This should jar with animal advocates. On the one hand we are trying to end the oppression of nonhuman animals, on the other, we are perpetuating an oppressive ideology backed by racism and fueled by violence.

Japan’s Whaling and Indigenous Hunting Practices

We see similar outrage and obsessions in Australia over Indigenous hunting practises. As if to underscore the way in which opposition to whaling and opposition to Indigenous hunting are linked, commenters responding to the ABC’s Facebook post showed how they thought the issues were very much intertwined.

These comments came as a surprise to an Aboriginal/Torres Strait Islander identified individual who wrote:

For many of the commenters, their racist attitudes seem to extend not just to the Japanese, but also to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders.

We Can Do Better

It’s easy to see that growing up in a racist, imperialist society can mar the Animal Rights movement. When I first went vegan, I held onto my own white, racist, imperialist ideologies. But I see that like animal oppression, just because everyone around me is doing it, just because it is sanctioned by institutions and my government, doesn’t make racism and Western imperialism okay to participate in.

Stevie Lynne co-hosts Team Earthling Vegan Radio, a weekly Australian podcast.

See also from this blog:  

Everyday Vegan Racism:  Live Sushi

On Moral Relativism, Post-Racism, and Animal Liberation
Animal Rights and the Indigenous Fixation

PeTA Perpetuates the Sexual Politics of Meat and Classism in their Most Recent Pokémon Parody Game

By Stevie Lynne

PeTA released their latest Pokémon parody game, Pokémon Red White and Blue, in late 2013. PeTA have a very valid criticism of Pokémon in so far as Pokémon reflects and perhaps reinforces the speciesist idea that nonhuman animals are ours to use. However, there are a few things I wish to specifically focus on in their new parody, namely classism, sizeism and sexism.

Their latest parody game is loosely a sequel their earlier game Pokémon Black and Blue, a parody of versions Black and White. The aesthetic of PeTA's most recent parody game mirrors the first: all the scenes are dripping with obscene amounts of blood. PeTA's acceptance of and indeed over-top violence in this game warrants its own article.

The story in Red White and Blue follows newly liberated Pikachu, identified by the broken shackle around his neck, bandages, and a chunk missing from his ear. The game opens with a cow-like Pokémon, Milktank, being beaten up by McDonald's mascot, Hamburglar. Hamburglar has slipped through into the Pokémon universe to capture Pokémon to use in McDonalds products. Pikachu
steps in, defeats Hamburglar and saves Miltank. Pikachu and Miltank then follow Hamburglar back to the real world where they discover that McDonald's is using cute Pokémon toys to sell animal products to children. Together, they find various people who are involved in exploiting animals and use physical violence to overcome these “enemies”.

While I agree vaguely with PeTA's critique of McDonald's as a corporation using manipulative advertising to indoctrinate children, there are several elements of this game that are intensely problematic.

The “Fat” McDonald's Customer vs. the “Attractive” PeTA Protesters 

When the Pokémon first enter the “real world” they come across a McDonald's with a customer standing outside.

It's important to note that the McDonald's customer is portrayed as wearing ill-fitting clothes, is covered in food stains, and is also larger than the other characters depicted in the storyline. Here, PeTA are drawing on fat-shaming stereotype of larger people being slovenly and disgusting.

It's not as if PeTA aren't well known for being sizeist. Their 'Save the Whales' campaign remains one of their most offensive ideas to date.

To strengthen the association of the McDonald's customer being “gross”, after battling and defeating the McDonald's customer, the party encounters a group of PeTA protesters outside McDonald's. None of these figures has a similar body shape to the McDonald's customer. Jigglypuff even asks “Are you all so attractive?”

By inference, being larger, like the McDonald's customer is “not attractive”.

The Evil Slaughterhouse Workers – How PeTA Perpetuates Classism and Racism 

Part way through the game, one of the enemies the liberated Pokémon encounter are two slaughterhouse workers. They are characterised by menacing facial expressions, wearing white coats, and carrying meat cleavers. They are splattered with blood.

The portrayal of slaughterhouse workers as being an evil enemy of Pokémon and animal liberation reeks of classism. In the United States, slaughterhouse workers are predominately poor people of colour, an unknown percentage of whom are undocumented and as such have limited access to workers rights (Source: Food Empowerment Project).

In addition, slaughterhouses are environments which are psychologically damaging to people as well as being horrific for nonhuman animals. One study in the United States looking at 581 counties discovered that “slaughterhouse employment increases total arrest rates, arrests for violent crimes, arrests for rape, and arrests for other sex offenses in comparison with other industries.”

In Australia, the Northern Territory has recently proposed a scheme for making prisoners work in a new abattoir opening up later this year, despite evidence that slaughterhouse work is psychologically damaging and leads to increased crime rates.

PeTA by setting up slaughterhouse workers as the enemy in this game clearly have no idea about ways in which structural oppression ensures that lower class, people of colour, undocumented migrants and even potentially prisoners, are forced to carry out psychologically traumatising work.

Slaughterhouse workers are not the enemy of the animal rights movement and it's ignorant to suggest that is the case.

Jigglypuff as Lettuce Lady and the Sexual Politics of Meat 

One of the battle moves PeTA has designed for Jigglypuff is “Lettuce Ladies”. This is most certainly not a move present in the original games. When you execute this move, Jigglypuff turns to the camera, suddenly holding two lettuce leaves as a “bra” over her chest before lashing out at the opponent.

In Carol J. Adam's seminal text, The Sexual Politics of Meat, she defines the sexual politics of meat as “an attitude and action that animalizes women and sexualizes and feminizes animals.”

PeTA have done exactly that with the character of Jigglypuff.

Here Jigglypuff is clearly sexualised, drawing on the common and ineffectual campaigning technique by PeTA of placing women out in public covered only by lettuce leaves. But here Jigglypuff is supposed to be “liberated”, but is instead being sexualised as feminized object.

This type of gendering of the oppressed non-human animals as feminine in imagery often appears in animal exploitation advertising. For example:

But the vegan movement is no stranger to sexualising and objectifying women.

As Corey Wrenn has written: “The vegan movement also favors the tactic of turning women into consumable objects in the exact same way that meat industries do.” She also notes why this is problematic from a systemic level: “Instead of empowering women on behalf of animals, these approaches could be disempowering women by preserving a patriarchal framework.”

In the Pokémon parody PeTA do to Jigglypuff what the meat industry does to the bodies of animals. Just like this image of a sexualised pig, PeTA are repeating similar structural oppression of nonhuman animals:

Photos from Carol J. Adams' blog.

Typical PeTA Tropes 

Critiquing Pokémon for its reflection and potential promotion of speciesist values is a valid undertaking. Critiquing McDonald's for using cute Pokémon toys to manipulate children is also a valid undertaking. However, PeTA's latest Pokémon parody replicates similar oppressive structures as found in some of their other campaigns – including, but not limited to: sizeism, classism, and sexism.

PeTA is sadly a broken record, continuing in their contributions to oppression while all the while being the most well-known “face” of the animal rights movement.

Stevie Lynne co-hosts Team Earthling Vegan Radio, a weekly Australian podcast.

Fat-Shaming, Sexism, and Other Horrors from the Tom Regan Archives

TRIGGER WARNING: Contains graphic depictions and descriptions of violence against women.
NOT SAFE FOR WORK: Contains sexually suggestive images and adult language.

Last November, I traveled to Raleigh, North Carolina to visit the Tom Regan Animal Rights Archive at North Carolina State University. I'm conducting a content analysis of animal rights literature from the 1980s through today for my dissertation. While I was specifically looking for evidence of factionalism between professionalized non-profits and the marginalized radical groups, I couldn't help but take notice of some really problematic ads, articles, and tactics.  Enjoy these cringe-worthy finds from the Tom Regan vaults...

Professionalization

The exact moment when Compassion over Killing sold out. Earlier issues promoted radical activism and veganism. As CoK professionalized and became more dependent upon conservative funding, they switched to pricier glossy paper and vegetarian rhetoric.

Homeless-Shaming

Remember when PETA used to give away despoiled animal hair jackets to homeless persons? Far from altruistic, the intention was to damage the high status of "fur" by associating it with society's most undesirable and stigmatized. As you will see, PETA is pretty shameless when it comes to exploiting the vulnerability of marginalized groups for their gain.

Fat-Shaming

I can safely conclude that PETA has been promoting weight stigma for at least 20 years now. Thanks to PETA for their important public service announcement that undoubtedly spared thousands of fat people from spontaneous combustion.

I actually remember receiving this issue as a young kid, which is pretty sad. This is the last thing 13 year old girls need to be reading.

Weird. Someone want to explain to me how I gained 30 pounds in my 14 years as a vegan?

If I had a pair of these sweet 90s jeans, maybe I'd have some incentive!

Animalizing Women

The level of misogyny in this Friends of Animals advert is truly astonishing.

Because institutionalized violence against animals, pleather suits, and masturbation are a logical combination.

Animalizing groups to degrade and otherize them is kind of defeating the purpose, isn't it?

Some of the earliest "lettuce ladies." Presenting women as food maintains women as commodities and protects patriarchy. This ad is especially problematic because the African woman is presented as "wild mushrooms." African women are often stereotyped as "wild" and "animal-like."

Annoying and Unnecessary Sexualization

Ethics, health, saving the earth?  Nah, the most convincing case for veganism is combating impotence.

Oh here we go, a woman whose existence doesn't revolve around her sexual availability to men . . . 

No, nevermind, more fat-shaming!

Reverse Sexism

... doesn't exist. Notice in the rare cases men are showcased, it is comical and rarely "sexy." This is because 95% of subjects who are sexually objectified are women, so when the roles are reversed, it is seen as so out of the ordinary it becomes funny.

Animal rights: Fighting patriarchy with patriarchy...PETA sells penis power over animal ethics.

PETA's Misogynistic Obsession with Women Who Wear Animal Hair

...as though men don't wear shoes, jackets, belts, wallets, etc. made of cow's skin. We live in a patriarchy, so men don't make easy targets. Society already hates women and condones systemic violence against them, so anti-fur campaigns can cheaply cash in on misogyny.

Women are narcissistic and frivolous. 

Women are airheaded and ditzy. Here PETA awards a male reader for his astonishing skills in stereotyping women.

Violence Against Women

Here, PETA frames their misogynistic obsession with women as a "war," offering readers "ammo" and "combat tips." Remember, women are the primary persons wearing animal hair. Homicide is also one of the leading causes of death for women. Millions of women are also stalked, beaten, and assaulted every year.

Todd Oldham the misogynist reminds us, 'If you were a mink about to be vaginally electrocuted, you wouldn't think of anti-fur activists as bullies." 

PETA describes the ideal reaction to a woman alone in public wearing "fur":  have a man follow her and intimidate her. An excellent tactic in a misogynistic society where women are constantly harassed, bullied, beaten, maimed, raped, and killed by men. Tapping into misogyny is low-cost activism for an organization that doesn't understand  the meaning of social justice. Strange, I never saw any 'how-to's" for readers who come across men wearing jackets made of pig or cow skin.

Sexy Violence Against Women

PETA often draws on imagery of dead or maimed women to threaten women into compliance or to appeal to patriarchy. Most often, they are naked, nearly naked, wearing excessive makeup, or are otherwise posed in a sexual way. In a misogynistic society, sexualizing harm to women plays into familiar gender scripts that maintain male dominance and female subservience.

Women who wear "fur" risk fatal retribution.

Because human corpses are buried naked...and nothing is sexier than a young naked woman than a dead young naked woman.

The ultimate symbol of femininity merged with the ever popular imagery of bloodied women.

Compassion over Killing suggests women who wear animal hair should be killed and used as rugs.

Here a woman is animalized, sexualized, and brutalized. The message is supposed to be about ending animal abuse, but it draws on imagery of women being beaten into submission.

Again, associating sexualized women with death.

I don't think cowgirls are vegan...nor do I think they would be very effective at their job in Daisy Dukes and giant sun hats...

For anyone with a disability who would like text descriptions of the images, please feel free to email me at academicabolitionistvegan@gmail.com and I would be more than happy to accommodate you.

Best Vegan & Animal Rights Literature & Outreach Material

As a longtime critic of popular vegan outreach literature, I am often asked what alternatives I would recommend. Many presume that the single-issue, reduction-based vegetarian literature plastered with donation requests produced by large professionalized welfare organizations like PETA, Mercy for Animals, Vegan Outreach, etc. are "better than nothing." Yeah, it stinks they won't say "go vegan," it stinks they don't acknowledge structural racism, but, they're cheap, glossy, and "better than nothing."

Well, that certainly isn't the case. We do have a choice. Some groups are making some pretty excellent outreach material.  I am a fan of the Boston Vegan Association's booklet (which is color, high quality, and free to abolitionists who fill out a contact form). Peaceful Prairie Sanctuary hosts lots of excellent printable flyers.  More recently, the Food Empowerment Project has released some astounding activist resources. In addition to their bilingual mini booklets and flyers, they have just launched a series of mailed newsletters (Food Chain) designed to retain new vegans.

Lauren Ornelas was kind enough to send me the entire set, and I have to say they are rather amazing. While these are not intended for handing out to random people on the street (they are better suited to persons who have had some contact with vegan activists or are otherwise already interested in learning more), they offer an important longterm outreach plan to those who are interested in changing their relationship with food. Each issue introduces different topics on food ethics, making the complexity of vegan politics more digestible. The newsletters are glossy with beautiful illustrations. It's not just depressing stuff; they also cover happy endings at sanctuaries, nutritional information, and excellent vegan recipes.

What I love most about the series: They are intersectional and they are vegan. Veganism is presented within an anti-oppression framework in a welcoming way. Importantly, these newsletters are designed to reach beyond the middle-class white demographic by specifically acknowledging human oppression.

So, please, skip the "Vegan" Outreach compromise flyers/donation requests. We can definitely do better!

Blaming Individuals for Structural Oppression: Why I Can't Stand this Vegan Meme

The following meme has been making its rounds on Facebook this week. I've seen it shared by Vegan Publishers, Vegan Outreach, The Thinking Vegan, and even, I'm sorry to say, Carol Adams. Well-meaning as it may be, I find it quite offensive and counterproductive.

The meme reads:

The difference between people who state veganism is easy and those who state veganism is hard, is those who say it's easy are focused on the victims, while those who say it's hard are focused on themselves.

Allow me translate:

The difference between privileged middle-class white people who state veganism is easy, and poor persons and persons of color (who are living under institutionalized oppression and are dealing with structural barriers, environmental racism, and food deserts) who state veganism is hard, is those who say it's easy are ignoring human victims, while whose who say it's hard are focused on themselves, as they're struggling to stay alive.

And the movement wonders why veganism is considered elitist? And why brown people and poor people tend to steer clear of animal rights activism?

If we want to succeed as a movement, we must strive to be cognizant of structural barriers and how oppression restricts the freedoms of millions of people living in the United States and abroad. Blaming marginalized people for their limited choices is unfair and cruel. Instead of tooting our privilege horn, perhaps we could widen our lens and work to dismantle the oppression that hurts and kills humans as well as nonhumans.