Feminism and animal rights

[LostinaPaperCup]

I posted a bit about veganism in the diet thread, but it's not the place for it really. I wanted to start a discussion about why, as feminists, when we are in a position to choose not to contribute to the suffering of others, we don't always think of animals or wider environmental concerns.

I have an ongoing (peaceful) disagreement with a fellow sex-industry survivor. I believe that there are parallels to be found with the sex-industry and the meat/dairy industry, in that sentient beings are treated as highly profitable commodities. She says I'm being offensive by comparing women to animals.

I sort of am, but only in the sense that the way men treat women in the sex trade is similar to how people treat farm animals, and there's also a 'I wouldn't want my daughter to be in porn' v 'I wouldn't eat my pet' type logic going on.

What do you all think? Carol J Adams is probably the most famous feminist for this issue - she has written The Sexual Politics of Meat and The Pornography of Meat.

This is an interesting article as well, by Gary Francione: he compares the abolitionist approach v animal welfare with the abolitionist approach v harm reduction in the sex industry. Just to confuse everyone here, he differentiates between radical and postmodern feminism, and doesn't mention liberal feminism at all!

www.abolitionistapproach.com/postmodern-feminism-and-animal-welfare-perfect-together/

There are also other issues I'd like to discuss concerning the overbreeding of farm animals to the detriment of the poorest people, and the damage the meat/dairy industry does to the planet, but I think that's enough for now.

Hope this was coherent: I'm lying in bed with my laptop sideways (lazy).

Ormiriathomimus that is a really good point. I remember some years ago there was a documentary featuring what happens in a slaughterhouse, and there was a pig that died of a heart attack walking in...he was so frightened he dropped dead. The next day I tried to talk to people at work about it - all of them meat eaters. And all of them, without exception, told me they didn't want to know, or they covered their ears or talked over me. It was safer for them to pretend it was all fine and dandy in these places. It was weird to me how I was the only one who watched what the animals went through when I was the one who didn't eat meat!! People don't seem to want to care. The same goes for abused/exploited women. The ones benefitting from it are the ones who don't want to be educated.

The point about vegetables was not flippant, btw. I think far too much emphasis is placed on sentience. I think it's perfectly possible for a plant to have interests in a similar way to an animal.

I don't think it's wrong to kill any animal or plant for food, whatever branch of the evolutionary tree it inhabits. I do think it's wrong to cause unnecessary suffering. That's why I am against factory farming. It's also why I don't eat beansprouts, forced celery or rhubarb and why I can't stand looking at bonsai trees. Plants have interests - light, soil, water, space to grow - simple things, but still.

I've known a couple of right misogynist bastards who were vegan, btw. The two don't always go together.

OP, I completely and utterly agree with you that animal rights is extremely important, but don't necessarily see it as a feminist issue. Unless feminism is multi-species (which of course it isn't) and could address the plight of dairy cows and battery hens, for example.

As a feminist and long-time animal rights campaigner (vegan, ex-hunt sab etc), I'd like to paraphrase Jeremy Bentham: The question is not, "Can they reason?" nor, "Can they talk?" but "Can they suffer??

"The ones benefitting from it are the ones who don't want to be educated."

Yes Miloben. Before I was vegan I was almost embarrassingly pro meat eating. I hated hearing about vegetarianism at feminist conferences (and all those who've been to feminist conferences - you must be aware there's a strong veggie component to the snacks!).

I will try to find some links re eco-feminism; in the meantime you can always google it. :)

Feminism probably isn't multi-species but patriarchy certainly is. I didn't say that feminists must be vegan, but vegans must be feminist. Vegans recognise the rights of all sentient creatures to have a life apart from what others want from them.

Plants don't have a brain or central nervous system. You really can't compare broccoli with a pig. At least I hope not.

Feminism probably isn't multi-species but patriarchy certainly is. I didn't say that feminists must be vegan, but vegans must be feminist

I think you are loading far too much on the poor old patriarchy here, its humanity that eats animals, not just male fat cats. And claiming all vegans are feminists is a huge leap.

This is an example IMO of why Feminism has suffered a backlash and is becoming less and less attractive to most women - this issue has clearly got nothing to do with Feminism, is an extreme view (to put it mildly), yet is here being injected into the Feminist canon.

The majority of women will go "you must be fucking bats joking, we don't subscribe to this" and walk away - from Feminism, which didn't create the issue in the first place.

IMO Feminism, for its own credibility, has to look at issues like these and say yes, we see where you are coming from, and people have every right to protest them, but it has absolutely nothing to do with us

Plants don't have a brain or central nervous system. You really can't compare broccoli with a pig. At least I hope not.

I don't see why not, if you can compare a pig and a human. I know plants don't have a CNS. That's not my starting point for deciding what is ok for me to eat.

Most of all, I don't see how it helps women if I stop eating meat.

I don't think it helps women to have yet another set of things to feel bad about when it comes to food, unless there's some strong, definite link that I'm missing?

That's a pretty reductive view of most women, whatmeworry. Some may well do that, others will just reject the premise and decide for themselves that patriarchy is not multi-species, or vegans all feminists.

That's a pretty reductive view of most women, whatmeworry. Some may well do that, others will just reject the premise and decide for themselves that patriarchy is not multi-species, or vegans all feminists.

Actually, I think most people are pretty reductive, they haven't got the time or inclination to go into the whys and wherefores and who in Feminism is a vegan etc etc.

If Feminism quacks like a crackpot duck, people will just assume it is a crackpot duck.

Pigs are more comparable to humans than broccoli because of their capacity to suffer (I don't really need to say that do I?).

I never said all vegans were feminist, but that they MUST be logically. If not, they're either vegan for health reasons or they don't understand the ethics behind veganism.

No, it won't immediately help women if one woman stops eating meat. But the more the attitudes around meat eating are challenged, the more the nature of violence and oppression are challenged.

Violence towards animals and women and children come from the same place: entitlement, dominance and submission. It is objectifying an animal and showing your power over it to reduce it to the leg, the shoulder, the rump etc.

It is why lots of men think vegetarian men are less masculine. To be a MAN you show your dominance. Steak = macho food.

Am I being clearer yet? I get in muddles myself as it's not an easy area.

As for the alienating women thing; feminists are always accused of this!

I think you have some interesting points and I see where you're coming from but there are difficulties.

For instance - ethically I would say that a vegetarian who consumes dairy products produced in the mainstream way is participating in more cruelty than someone who consumes animal products but only buys top notch organic free range or produces the products themselves / trades with other who do.

Where does fish fit into all this? If plants are stressed by unpleasant conditions (which undeniably are) then how does that compare to a mussel or clam?

How does squeamishness about things "like us" fit in - with people being happy to eat eg an octopus or squid (v intelligent) but not a mammal of similar intelligence?

It is a huge debate and while I can see crossovers / parallels with the way humans are treated in some situations, I think fundamentally for most people they are separate debates.

Violence towards animals and women and children come from the same place: entitlement, dominance and submission

Most violence towards animals comes from the fact the the human species eats them. Its what we do. Its what we have always done.

It is objectifying an animal and showing your power over it to reduce it to the leg, the shoulder, the rump etc

We don't reduce it - at least not before we grill, boil, fry, braise etc etc it first :o

The proto humans who ate meat pretty much reduced those who didn't to exctinction, its what we are.

"For instance - ethically I would say that a vegetarian who consumes dairy products produced in the mainstream way is participating in more cruelty than someone who consumes animal products but only buys top notch organic free range or produces the products themselves / trades with other who do."

Absolutely, but we don't need to eat any of them.

The human species has always eaten animals? Where? Large parts of the world have always been mostly vegetarian.

How we eat animals now and how other animals eat each other aren't comparable. We artificially breed the animals especially for slaughter and to exploit the females' reproductive systems. This isn't just cruel to the animals but is harming the planet and starving people. We could feed people directly using less land than we use to rear cattle.

The more cruelly the animals are treated (overcrowding, growth hormones), the more profits are made. It's highly organised violence and exploitation, which is why it resonates with me with regards to how women are treated.

"The human species has always eaten animals? Where? Large parts of the world have always been mostly vegetarian."

I'm fairly sure that humans, as omnivores, have always consumed flesh if it was available. Fish, shellfish, small mammals, birds, anything they could get their hands on.

Large parts of the world are vegetarian now (and have been for a long time of course) for religious reasons.

Your remark about "mostly" vegetarian is a bit of a cop out!

Surely your argument is about capitalism? And the exploitation that results from a constant desire for more and more profits?

"I believe humans are superior to sheep"

I'm sure sheep would beg to differ!

This is a bit of a tangent but I've always wondered what the moral rationale for eating fish but not meat is. I've heard some people say they are vegetarians but still eat fish. Can anyone enlighten me?

eats fish but not meat = pescatarian

rationale = little fluffy animals are sweet, fish aren't
or something

Honestly the illogical positions some people take irritate me.

The human species has always eaten animals? Where? Large parts of the world have always been mostly vegetarian.

As a species we are omnivorous, its no accident - we either always were, or adapted - either way we got bigger and edged out (ate?) the vegetarian proto human apes if any exiseted.

Large swathes of humans became largely veggie when mass agriculture led to very stratified societies with god-king warlords able to take everything the peasants had. I don't know if the olde veggie only religions were a reaction to this or independent, but its interesting that they exist mainly in the same places (untl the 20th century when they are mainly OECD middle class rather than Asiatic poor)

Yep, you can't cuddle a fish!

You could make the argument that it's all about capitalism, but some take the view that pornography is all about capitalism. Capitalism is obviously a large part of it, but there's also the issues of power and control, objectification, othering, desensitisation to another's suffering and so on.

I used to get defensive around vegetarians (especially at feminist conferences!) and noticed I exhibited behaviour that resembled that of the men (and some women) who tried to argue in favour of porn. And when I noticed this I realised I had some thinking to do. Didn't want to do it because I loved eating meat and cheese.

I'm not that interested in whether as omnivorous beings we should eat meat. The fact is that we do not need to, and the way we eat it is causing harm.

Also, the 'is it natural' debate really doesn't have much to do with feminism. (Although I could probably shoe-horn an analogy if I tried hard enough.)

I am actually surprised that not many women here associate the two movements: feminism has a long history of animal rights concerns. Did you not notice all those LENTILS on the Vanessa Engel's documentary 'Women', when it showed the London Feminist Network organising a conference? They were practically in every scene. Obviously it was necessary to make feminists look like hippies or something. :)

Thing is if I get told that to be a feminist I need to be a vegan/vegetarian as well, I'm going to run fast.

I can see the point you're making, but...

It's a bit like when we had threads on here saying is it possible to be right wing and a feminist and the response in general was no, not really. But we have some posters on here who are right wing and I personally wouldn't say that they can't be feminists or something. I can see that the lefty-nicey-vegan-communes-wiccan vibe IYSWIM is a certain thing but actually feminists are drawn from all types of backgrounds and so on and I don't think that excluding people because you don't agree with the politics / diet or whatever is the best direction to take.

I mean, I struggle to see how voting for the conservative party is compatible with feminism. But oTOH if a woman believes in right wing philosophy but also believes that women are equal and takes action around that then I'm not going to quibble.

IYSWIM.

And yes I totally agree with the entitlement thing. I eat meat because I enjoy it. I am fortunate enough to be able to buy free range / organic to assuage my conscience. Undeniably it hurts animals. But I want to eat meat so my bottom line answer to that is that fundamentally I don't care.

Which is exactly the same response that you get about porn. People know it hurts women, but they enjoy it, and so they don't care.

Whatmeworry - you have said what I wanted to, but so much more eloquently.

Funnily enough I just got this in my FB feed.

imaginedmag.com/2012/07/twenty-years-of-the-sexual-politics-of-meat-an-interview-with-carol-j-adams/

Yes Sardine, the argument about not caring but assuaging your conscious by only buying 'happy meat', and the comparison with 'happy hookers' is addressed in the Gary Francione essay I linked in my OP.

Of course you don't have to be vegan to be a feminist. I was feminist for 15 years before I was convinced by the vegan argument; I'm not more of a feminist now. Just connecting more dots I suppose.

I don't even think I'm more of a feminist now than when I was in the sex industry (where I convinced myself I was empowered - denial is a wonderful thing). I'm not saying 'I am more feminist than thou.' I just wanted to start this conversation on here because it is part of feminism - even if just a fringe part.

Maybe I should read the link in the OP

Sorry.

I didn't mean it like that! No need for sorrys :)