Postscript to my previous blog entry

The following comment was written by Karin Hilpisch:

Critics of new welfarism are often confronted with the objection that they deny that other activists want the abolition of animal exploitation. That is not the case.

Since we don't have the ability to read minds, we don't know if what others purport to want is what they really want. But we can make valid predications about whether someone’s actions are logically and credibly consistent with what they claim to pursue. Furthermore, we can make valid predications about the structural conditions under which someone acts and the relevance of these conditions to what they can possibly pursue.

As a general matter, an organization whose running costs are paid for by membership fees and donations cannot act independently of the interests and goals of its members and donors. In order to continue to exist (and to grow), the organization has inevitably to act in accordance with the interests of those whose money forms its financial base.

This means in the context of animal advocacy:

In a society in which 99% of the population uses animals, mainly by consuming animal products, and consider this just as necessary or at least as unproblematic as breathing air and drinking water, the majority of the members and donors of an organization which appears to act on behalf of animals is formed by animal users, unless the orgainzation would do nothing but promote veganism, or the acceptability of members, donors, and sponsors would be linked to their being vegan.
Where this is not the case, the organization will, in order to persist, inevitably act on behalf of those who use animals and who, not being educated why it is wrong to use animals, wish to continue to do so. In other words, for reasons of self-preservation, the goal to abolish animal exploitation CANNOT seriously be pursued by this organization. The possibility of its existence is principally incompatible with that goal. And an institution which economically sustains functionaries and employees cannot be conceived as one which is intended to become ''superfluous'' by eliminating what makes it allegedly necessary. Accordingly, the institution's policy will be one which results in making animal exploitation appear more morally acceptable to make people feel more comfortable about it.

Abolitionists' point is not to deny other activists their true convictions or honest intentions. Honesty, however, requires one to reflect self-critically on the structural conditions which inevitably render one's course of action inconsistent with one's goals and to take the necessary steps to rectify this.

The Happy Meat * Movement and the Animal Welfare / Animal Industry Partnership

by Karin Hilpisch and James Crump

*meat here represents all animal products

Animal welfare legitimises animal use

In his books, articles, and blog essays, Gary L. Francione has analysed comprehensively and in detail the status of nonhuman animals as property which is embedded in laws that regulate animal use and is reinforced by welfare reform.

Jeff Perz puts it this way on an Internet forum: ''One of the reasons why abolitionism inevitably involves a critique of animal welfare is that, every time a new animal welfare law gets passed, the property status of other animals is that much more codified and entrenched'' (1)

And Dan Cudahy notes on his blog: ''More and more regulations add a regulating structure to animal exploitation supported eventually by more bureaucracy, more inspector jobs, and more ‘legitimacy’ to the entire enterprise, entrenching animals ever deeper into property and commodity status.'' (2)

This is inevitably so because animal welfare reform aims at improving the treatment of nonhumans but does not challenge their being used by humans. In fact, ''[c]ampaigns for welfare reform make sense only if the use of animals is morally acceptable and the issue is only how we treat the animals we use.'' Francione, Context Makes All the Difference.

It is self-evident that the legitimization of animal use and, thereby, the reinforcement of the property status is diametrically at odds with the abolition of animal exploitation.

On his blog, Francione writes: ''In much of my writing, I have argued that the promotion of the ‘happy meat’ approach has led not only to making the public more comfortable about consuming animal products but it has resulted in the creation of a disturbing partnership between animal advocates and institutionalized exploiters.''

The regressive and counter-productive ''happy meat'' movement is also the subject matter of Francione's blog essay, ''Happy Meat'': Making Humans Feel Better About Eating Animals which refers to other entries dealing with this issue.

Animal welfare and animal industry: good business and mutual interests

An example, as illustrative as it is disturbing, of the partnership between animal advocates and animal industry is the agreement between People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) and Kentucky Fried Chicken (KFC) about the gassing of chickens, the so-called controlled atmosphere killing, an agreement in which there were ''no differences of opinion about how animals should be treated,''and in which a welfare organization performed as an ''unpaid public relations firm'' of a company that sells death and as a free advisor to animal industry about how they can increase their profits. But PETA got its money's worth as well: proclaiming an “enormous victory,” a “historic victory,'' the organization ('‘half of our members are vegetarian and half think it’s a good idea’') can be sure of an constant stream of donations.

But it would be unfair to single out PETA in this regard without mentioning that the Humane Society of the United States – the largest and most powerful welfare corporation in America – also acts as a marketing division of, and as an economic advisor to, industry, the former by promoting “humane” animal products, and the latter by producing economic analyses detailing the higher profitability of, for example, group housing for sows as compared to the gestation crate. See A ''Triumph'' of Animal Welfare? Moreover, PETA and HSUS both make millions of dollars in donations by systematically misrepresenting the nature of welfarist regulation. Even though welfarist reforms are invariably based on increased exploitative efficiency and would be implemented by industry on economic grounds anyway, they are nevertheless portrayed by PETA and HSUS as great victories and successes for the animals.

But the collaboration between welfare and industry thrives not only on the other side of the pond.

The ''happy meat'' movement in Austria: a case study

In 2008, a programmatic essay, entitled, ''Abolitionism versus Reformism or which type of campaign will lead to abolition eventually?''(3) in English and German (4), authored by the president of the Austrian Association Against Animal Factories [Verein gegen Tierfabriken] Martin Balluch, was spread on the Internet (and critically commented on by Francione: A ''Very New Approach'' Or Just More New Welfarism?). Therein, the author sets out his view that while there is a philosophical gulf between animal welfare and animal rights, there also is a political and psychological continuum, i.e., a continual development of society and the individual from regulated animal exploitation to abolition, i.e., from animal welfare to animal rights.

Balluch conceives this development as one in which welfare has a psychologically and politically indispensable role to play and, therefore, cannot be 'skipped'. Consistently, he thinks that vegan education, thought as the only way to abolition, ''cannot but fail''. This view becomes manifest in the association's policy of a massive promotion at all levels of ''humane'' exploitative practices and products:

Campaigning

— ''Straw makes happy'': a campaign which conveys to consumers of pig flesh the advantages of keeping pigs on straw rather than on slatted floors. (5)

— advertising of barn and free-range husbandry of chickens and rabbits (6)

— advertising of ''cage-free'' eggs which are being contrasted with battery eggs as an ethical alternative to a ''product for which sentient living beings are being relentlessly exploited as egg-laying machines.'' (7) (They 'forgot' to mention here that sentient living beings are also relentlessly exploited for ''cage-free'' eggs.)

— an initiative recommending that Austrian ''companies which have rendered outstanding services in changing from battery eggs to cage-free eggs'' were given a ''Good Egg Award'' (8)

In the USA, PETA and other welfare groups are publicly praising a retailer for selling the corpses of ‘‘humanely’’ raised and slaughtered animals. (9) See '''Happy'' Meat / Animal Products: A Step in the Right Direction or ''An Easier Access Point Back' to Eating Animals''

The VGT's demand for ''incentive systems'' rewarding the use of abattoirs which are closest to the farm (9) matches perfectly PETA's giving its ''Proggy Award'' to a ''visionary'' slaughterhouse-designer. See '''Happy'' Meat.

Marketing

The VGT markets animal products which have been produced in compliance with guidelines for ''animal- appropriateness'' by means of an official body / auditing agency which was founded in 1995 by three welfare associations in Austria, ''as a neutral and independent organization for inspection''. The job of this institution is the ''control, certification and monitoring of producers and suppliers with regard to compliance with the guidelines'' according to ''criteria concerning species-appropriate chicken husbandry that have been developed by experts''. Products gained from such husbandry are certified ''animal welfare tested,'' a registered trade mark. (10)

Trademarks which certify the ''humane'' treatment of animals and are being promoted by welfare groups encourage the public to consume animal products which results in increased demand and, thereby, increased profits for suppliers.

When last year Balluch, along with nine other animal activists, was arrested and spent three months in prison, a number of open letters were written in support of the detainees. In one of them, Toni Hubmann, an ''organic'' egg farmer, lauds the teamwork between him, Balluch and two other welfarists that has been practised at the institution mentioned above since 2002. Hubmann writes: ''Any improvement or change in husbandry has been accepted by said gentlemen and implemented in agreement with the concerned farmers and merchants. This has led to said gentlemen's having had a significant role in the high acceptance of cage-free and fee-range systems in Austria. (…) Not only could the animal welfare organizations gain successes for the further development of national and international animal welfare but, with their commitment, they have helped sustain numerous small farming businesses.'' (11)[our emphasis]

In line with the VGT's view of animal rights animal products which have been ''animal welfare tested'' are promoted in a ''shopping guide for products from species-appropriate animal husbandry'': ''The VGT which for more than five years now has been engaged resolutely against cruel factory farming and the negative excesses of modern agribusiness, has, on the other hand, always been the first privately organized contact address in the search for alternative animal products.'' ''More and more people are striving towards a cultural progress in dealing with farm animal and wish to provide them, as reward for their ''services'', at least with a bearable life before death.'' (12) Occasionally, products ''from species-appropriate animal husbandry'' are not only advertised but also distributed to passers-by. (13)

Changing the system but not people's minds?

Balluch argues against spreading veganism in society on the grounds that ''[m]any people, who did turn vegan, fall back to consuming animal products.'' For this there is, indeed, more than one example. And that this is so has mainly to do with the societal impact of those who, like Balluch, publicly declare that being vegan is extremely difficult and requires great energy expenditure. But as long as organizations and individuals who are perceived as animal advocates send a message to the public that consuming products from ''species-appropriate'' or ''animal-appropriate'' farming is morally acceptable, and that we can discharge our moral obligations towards animals by making exploitation more ''humane,'' most will not even consider going vegan.

According to Balluch, the animal rights movement's job is not to change the way people think about animals but to change ''the system'': ''The opinion of the majority or single people in society is of secondary importance.'' With this view, the VGT's policy is completely in line. It does not change people's minds but reinforces the notion that we can effectively protect animals and use them at the same time. But without changing people's attitude towards nonhuman animals, the ''system,'' which consists of people, will never change.

Struggling for animal rights or battling for market shares? The ''enemy'' is a partner

In his programmatic essay, Balluch claims that

— the struggle for animal rights is carried out between the animal rights movement and the animal industries, ''the only enemy in the political conflict to achieve animal rights,'' in which each tries to pull the public, which ''stands indifferent at the start,'' on its side;
— it must be the primary aim of the animal rights movement to produce political pressure to achieve incremental reforms which weaken and damage the animal industries.

In the light of what has been said above, however, it is difficult to see in what way the VGT's activities are possibly suited to weakening and damaging animal industry. When two parties are inextricably entangled, as is evident with the animal welfare movement and animal industry, this relationship can hardly be characterised as a "conflict" but rather as symbiotic, representing two sides of one exploitative system, with the result that to the animals, it does not matter much whose side the public takes. Temple Grandin, the ''visionary'' slaughterhouse designer, put it best when she said that ''proper handling of animals that are to be slaughtered 'keep[s] the meat industry running safely, efficiently and profitably.''' (14)

Obviously, the organic sector of animal agriculture is not referred to as the ''only enemy in the political conflict to achieve animal rights.'' But it is, more than anything else, the partnership between animal welfare and animal industry that is the stumbling block to abolition because in it, both sides figure as animal exploiters. There is no morally relevant difference between a battery egg and a ''cage-free'' egg, or between the flesh of a pig that has been kept on slatted floor and the flesh of a pig that has been kept on straw. The one who furthers the demand for animal products is no less an exploiter than the one who supplies it. Producing and consuming animal products are rights violations; so is promoting animal products: it treats nonhuman rightholders as much like commodities as producers and consumers do. It is just as immoral. An immoral institution – animal industry – cannot be fought by another immoral institution – animal welfare.

Organizations like the VGT are the most powerful societal force against veganism and animal rights, i.e., nonhumans' right to full membership in the moral community, their right to be recognized as persons and to be no one's property.

Sources:

(1) quote Jeff Perz,
http://www.animalrightscommunity.com/abolitionists/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=287&st=0&sk=t&sd=a&start=20
(This forum us available only to registered members of the board.)

(2) quote Dan Cudahy
http://unpopularveganessays.blogspot.com/

(3) Abolitionism versus Reformism
http://www.vgt.at/publikationen/texte/artikel/20080325Abolitionism/index_en.php

(4) Abschaffung versus Reform
http://www.vegan.at/warumvegan/tierrechte/abschaffung_vs_reform.html

(5) ''Straw makes happy''
http://www.vgt.at/presse/news/2008/news20080314.php

(6) free-range chickens
http://www.vgt.at/presse/news/2004/news20040409.php

free-range rabbits
http://www.vgt.at/publikationen/infomaterial/Kaninchen/071112_FB_kaninchen.pdf

(7) ethical alternative
http://www.vgt.at/presse/news/2004/news20040413.php

( 8) Good Egg Award
http://www.vgt.at/presse/news/2007/news20070321.php

(9) "Dear John,*

The undersigned animal welfare, animal protection and animal rights organizations would like to express their appreciation and support for the pioneering initiative being taken by Whole Foods Market in setting Farm Animal Compassionate Standards. We hope and expect that these standards will improve the lives of millions of animals."

* John Mackey, CEO of Whole Foods Market
http://www.abolitionistapproach.com/media/pdf/pr_01-24-05.pdf

(10) incentive systems
http://www.vgt.at/presse/news/2008/news20080828.php

(11) official body / auditing agency
http://www.vgt.at/presse/news/2004/news20040401.php

(12) open letter
http://www.vgt.at/actionalert/repression/prominente/offener%20Brief%20Toni%20Hubmann%20Juni%202008.pdf

(13) shopping guide
http://www.vgt.at/presse/news/1997/news026.php

(14) ''In addition, leaflets and 'Toni's free-range Easter eggs' ['Toni's Freiland-Ostereier'] in a 4-pack are distributed to passers-by.''
http://www.vgt.at/presse/news/1998/news046.php

(15) ''According to Grandin, proper handling of animals that are to be slaughtered 'keep[s] the meat industry running safely, efficiently and profitably.'''
Gary L. Francione, Abolition of Animal Exploitation: The Journey Will Not Begin While We Are Walking Backwards

More on Welfarism

I recently posted quite a long comment on a forum which I thought I'd reproduce here:

In order for a probabilistic or inductive argument for the claim that welfarism is a gateway to abolition to get of the ground, there must be evidence to suggest that welfarism can effect an overall reduction in demand for animal products. But there is, of course, no such evidence. For welfarism is correlated, not with an overall reduction, but on the contrary with a massive increase, in animal exploitation and slaughter.

The counter-claim, that were it not for welfarism animal exploitation would be even worse, is flawed, on multiple levels. First, even contemporary welfarist measures as, for instance, CAK and group housing for sows, are explicitly predicated on increased exploitative efficiency, and as such would be supported by industry on economic grounds anyway.

Second, it does not provide even weak (probabilistic/inductive) grounds for the belief that welfarism is casually related to abolition, for it rests of course not on the premise that welfarism can effect an overall reduction in animal exploitation, but instead that, with welfarism, animal exploitation will indeed keep on increasing, just not as rapidly as it otherwise might! - and it is difficult, if not impossible, to see why that should be considered as a viable strategy, at least from the perspective of animal rights.

Lastly, even if welfarism were correlated with an overall reduction in demand, it still wouldn't follow that we should support it, if only because abolitionist vegan advocacy is more conducive to abolition than welfarism.

As for the claim that it is a betrayal of animals, even speciesist, to reject welfarist regulation, it is an absurdity. In particular, the claim that welfarism is the best we can do, given existing social conditions, is, among thing things, based on a failure to recognize that animal exploitation is (partly) the consequence of the welfarist paradigm's own existence; for, as Francione argues, the latter, so far from eroding animal exploitation, has had the effect of producing a concretion of speciesism (by making exploitation more efficient and by making people feel better about consuming animals); and, furthermore, it will continue to have this effect, for obvious reasons.

The upshot of this is that the welfarist movement - when it claims that welfarism is the best we can do for animals, at least in the short term, given that people are unreceptive to animal rights - justifies, decadently and shamelessly, its own existence by means of a problem that it itself party defines (by claiming that veganism is "fanatical") and creates (by promoting welfarist regulation which benefits exploiters).

Activism that focuses on supply (e.g. factory farming) rather than demand is almost worthless, for this reason: factory farmed animal products can simply be imported from elsewhere - something that consolidates demand behind larger exploiters, exploiters that not only have more lobbying power, but that also can exploit animals more cost-effectively.

In sum: how many more animals have to perish uselessly before we realize that the only genuine, non-hypocritical, and effective form of animal rights advocacy is that which posits veganism as a moral baseline and as a requirement of anyone who takes animals seriously?

Are "Humane" Animal Products a "Gateway" to Veganism?

One version of the "if you ask for 100%, then you get nothing" argument goes something like this: if we ask people to transition to veganism all at once, suddenly, without any interim steps, they will turn away from us. Therefore, we must promote "humane" animal products in order to give them a "gateway" to veganism.

Clearly, however, there is nothing self-contradictory in supposing that someone could transition to veganism without going through any interim steps. Nor is there anything particularly unreasonable in making such an assumption.

Second, suppose for the sake of the argument that people generally cannot transition to veganism without any interim steps; would it follow that we therefore should promote "happy" animal products and/or vegetarianism? Of course not. For people can go vegan in steps by following Gary Francione's "1-2-3" method whereby they would eat one vegan meal per day for the first week, then two vegans meals per day for the second week, and then, finally, three vegan meals per day for the third week. In fact, to see the ideologically-motivated nature of the welfarist position quite clearly, one need only consider that the welfarist movement could in fact promote Francione's "1-2-3" vegan method but instead chooses to promote "humane" animal products on the flimsy pretext that they are a "gateway."

Third, from the fact that A follows B, it doesn't follow that B causes A. Thus, even if people generally do consume "humane" animal products and also support welfarist campaigns prior to going vegan, it does not follow that the former cause the latter. This phenomenon is merely a function (as well as an expression) of the fact that welfarism is the dominant paradigm, a paradigm the representatives of which promote "conscientious omnivorism" as the default position on human-nonhuman relations while charaterizing competing and incommensurable paradigms, such as abolitionism, as extreme and even "fanatical."

Fourth, people go vegan in spite of "happy" meat campaigns rather than because of them.

Fifth, "humane" animal products, when they are presented (by the animal movement) as morally good or desirable in any way, shape, or form, necessarily function as an argument against veganism.

Finally, social attitudes to veganism are conditioned through and through by the animal movement's promotion of "cage-free" eggs and "happy" meat, in that in the light of the latter veganism appears extreme and even "fanatical." But veganism is not fanatical, not merely to the animal rights movement but also to people in general. For, as Francione points out, most people agree that it is wrong to inflict unnecessary suffering on animals -- and eating animal products cannot plausibly be described as necessary (as it serves transparently trivial human interests). Thus, far from being extreme and fanatical, abolitionist vegan advocacy simply makes more articulate what was there all the while.

In conclusion: "happy" animal products are a "gateway" to nowhere. They close the door on veganism. The only "gateway" to veganism is clear and unequivocal vegan advocacy: and the only "gateway" to abolition is an abolitionist vegan movement.

Postscript to My Previous Blog Entry

One counterargument to abolitionism asserts that we need to promote "humane" animal products because some people will never go vegan.

While I agree that some people will never go vegan, there are two inferences that we definitely should not draw. First, that vegan education has failed as a movement tactic. Second, that we need to promote "humane" animal products.

To take the former point first, the belief that vegan education has failed is vacuous as it is grounded in no empirical evidence. To quote something I posted in a previous blog entry:

If the empirical effects of vegan education seem minimal to people, then this would undermine the abolitionist approach only if vegan outreach were the animal movement's primary mode of campaigning. But it isn’t. On the contrary, welfarism is. Ironically, therefore, the empirical evidence that is supposed to undermine abolitionism – that people are unreceptive to veganism; that it has had a minimal impact; etc. – and to recommend welfarism in fact undermines welfarism and leaves abolitionism untouched. For it strongly suggests, not that vegan education won’t work (how could any empirical evidence show that vegan education won’t work when, as an empirical matter, vegan education has never been made the animal movement’s primary mode of campaigning?), but rather that it won’t work while the animal movement concurrently promotes welfarist measures (“happy” animal products, welfare regulation etc.) which provide people with an almost endless number of elitist excuses to continue exploiting animals.

Regarding the claim that we need to promote "humane" animal products because some people will never go vegan, I would reply with the following. As Gary Francione asked in a recent interview, why are we pitching the message to the people who are completely unreceptive to veganism? Why are we wasting our time with this group of people? Why aren't we pitching the message to the people who are concerned about animal ethics and who would go vegan if only they were presented with a clear, unequivocal, and compelling vegan message? In short, why aren't we focusing, singly and concentratedly, on the potential vegans?

Second, the welfarist movement, with its fetishization of the absurd notion of "conscientious omnivorism", has been instrumental in convincing the public that certain sections of animal industry are "humane" in their exploitation and slaughter of animals. This "rebranding" exercise (pioneered by welfarist groups (HSUS, RSPCA etc.)) is the expression of a brutish forgetfulness of animals' dignity and vulnerability. Moreover, it has had the effect of producing a concretion of speciesism such as could not be achieved under any other conditions. For it has convinced many people - who otherwise might be vegan - that they can consume animal products with a clear conscience.

It follows from this that the problem of people's unwillingness to go vegan is not the effect of some blind fatality, but is, rather, (partly) the effect, indeed the logical outcome, of the welfarist paradigm. To quote something I posted in a previous blog entry:

Welfarist advocacy...creates more socially acceptable (as well as more cost-effective) animal exploitation. This anti-animal rights effect, created by welfarist advocacy, partly accounts for the fact that people are unwilling to embrace animal rights.

It follows from this that animal advocates often rationalize their support for new welfarism by means of problems that are partly created by new welfarist advocacy. A vicious circle has been established: the absence of abolitionist claims (about why veganism should be a moral baseline, for example, or about why we should not seek to regulate the institution of animal slavery) makes nonveganism possible; nonveganism makes welfarism possible, or more accurately, the two – welfarism and nonveganism – are interdependent; welfarism (by creating socially acceptable animal exploitation) makes the absence of abolitionist claims possible; and so on.

The solution, of course, to the vicious circle that has been established by new welfarism is categorically and unapologetically to reject new welfarist advocacy in favor of the abolitionist approach to animal rights.

Doesn 't Every Little Help?

I would like to make a few points with regard to the claim that animal welfare is a "step in the right direction" because it convinces people to go vegan.

First, the sentimental "every little helps" approach is the expression of a model of animal advocacy whose central idea is that we should support any welfarist measure that will reduce animal suffering. But it would be difficult, if not impossible, to make incremental progress toward abolition using this blunt (utilitarian) instrument. After all, if we subscribed to this model of animal advocacy, all industry would need to do to stymie the progress of the animal rights movement indefinitely would be to intermittently offer excruciatingly modest concessions which we would be obliged to support because of our uselessly reductive conception of how to effect social change.

Second, people do not go vegan because of campaigns that merely call for the regulation of animal slavery: they go vegan in spite of them.

Third, let's assume for the sake of the argument that welfarism is conducive to veganism. Now imagine this scenario: every day I stand on my head and recite the alphabet backwards. One day a lunatic walks past and, as a result of my strange behavior, decides to go vegan. Prejudiced by the Singerian notion that, with respect to the problem of animal exploitation, "every little helps," many activists now claim that, on pain of not caring about the animals, we are obliged to support any person or group of people who stand on their heads while reciting the alphabet backwards, as doing so may be conducive to getting lunatics to go vegan.

Now, I do not think that the attitude expressed by the activists in this hypothetical is too far removed from the attitude of many activists to PeTA. I often hear people say things like, "I cannot but support PeTA's 'I'd-rather-go-naked-and-play-suggestively-with-vegetables-than-wear-fur/eat animal products' campaigns as they have convinced some people to go vegan." But just as we obviously should not infer, from the fact that standing on one's head while reciting the alphabet backwards might be conducive to getting lunatics to go vegan, that we should encourage people actually to do this, so we also should not infer, from the fact that some people may go vegan as a result of seeing PeTA activists undressing while playing suggestively with vegetables, that we are obliged to support PeTA. Why not? Among (many) other things, it is because undressing while playing suggestively with vegetables - or standing on one's head while reciting the alphabet backwards - does not (it goes without saying) represent a maximally effective use of time and resources. Indeed, the point can - and should - be put more strongly: how many people have PeTA, with its fethishization of sexist campaigns, and also with its attempt to rebrand KFC as "humane," prevented from going vegan?

Accordingly, the claim that we should support PeTA because it has convinced some people to go vegan is really nothing but a veiled rationalization for a less than maximally effective strategy. More strongly, I offer my scenario with the "activist" who convinces someone to go vegan by standing on his head while reciting the alphabet backwards as a reduction to absurdity of the claim that we should support everything that is claimed to be "conducive to veganism," an idea which is an expression of the "every little helps" approach to animal advocacy, which in its turn is one of the main (ideological) causes of the modern "animal protection" movement's profligate wastefulness. Following Gary Francione and other abolitionists, I suggest that we should support (financially and ideologically) only that form of advocacy which is maximally conducive to veganism, by which I mean clear, unequivocal, and creative vegan advocacy.

One counterargument to the claim that vegan advocacy is maximally conducive to veganism goes something like this: granted, welfarism cannot lead to abolition; but how do you know that vegan advocacy can? But this is like asking: why should we promote a clear, coherent, and unequivocal (vegan) message as opposed to an unclear, incoherent, and equivocal (welfarist) message? Furthermore, imagine a counterfactual scenario in which all of the animal movement's institutional resources had been spent not on welfarist reform and "happy" meat campaigns, but instead on clear and unequivocal vegan education. Does anyone seriously think that had the animal movement done this there would be fewer vegans today?

Someone who is undeterred by my rhetorical questions, who thinks, that is, that it may be preferable to present an unclear and incoherent welfarist message as opposed to a clear and coherent vegan message, will probably fall back on some version of the "if you ask for 100%, then you get nothing" defence. But as Gary Francione points out, what reason do we have to believe that if we promote veganism then we will (or are likely to) get nothing? For if people are concerned about the animal issue, then, even if they don't go vegan, they will do something; and if they are so unconcerned about this issue that they would do nothing when presented with a vegan message, then what reason is there to believe that they would do something (89%?) if they were presented with a "happy" meat message? Moreover, as Francione points out, if we present people with a vegan message, then, even if they don't feel ready to go vegan straightaway, we will at least give them something to which they can aspire. But if we tell them that they can be "conscientious omnivores", that they can discharge their moral obligations to animals by eating "happy" meat and "cage-free" eggs, then that is all they will do.

Thus, in opposition to the vacuous mantra: "If you ask for 100%, then you get nothing", I would say: "If you do nothing, then you get nothing". In other words, if we do not campaign for abolition - if we do not clearly, lucidly, and uncompromisingly advocate it to the public - we will never get abolition.

"Humane" Animal Slavery

The problem of people's unwillingness to go vegan cannot be fully characterized or specificed independently of the special cultivation by the welfarist movement of "humane" forms of animal slavery. For in promoting cage-free eggs and organic or "happy" meat, the welfarist organizations are continually reproducing (and thereby reinforcing) the very speciesist views of animals (as e.g. commodities or objects) whose application prevents people from seeing the reality of animals in their suffering - a form of moral blindness that is the prerequisite of institutionalized animal exploitation.

New Animal Rights Website: Animal Rights Violations

I'd like to draw attention to a great new animal rights website created by the abolitionist Roger Yates. The site is called Animal Rights Violations.

Abolitionist Outreach Materials

The abolitionist community has produced some excellent outreach materials which can be viewed and/or downloaded at the following sites:

Pamphlet by Gary Francione and Anna Charlton. This pamphlet has been translated into several different languages, including French, German and Spanish.

Pamphlet by the Boston Vegan Association.

Pamphlet by Joanne and Vincent (The Starting Point Is Veganism blog).

Poster by Nathan Schneider. This poster has also been translated into German and Spanish.

Welfarism: a Vicious Circle

Many animal advocates claim that welfarist regulation and "humane" animal products are the best we can do for animals, at least in the short term, given that the public is (and will be for the foreseeable future) unwilling to embrace animal rights.

The problem, or rather one of them, with this way of thinking is that it persistently fails to look into its starting point -- into what sets the stage for the fact that people are unwilling to embrace animal rights. For, as Gary Francione compellingly argues, welfarism does not dispose people to take animal interests seriously: on the contrary, it creates more socially acceptable (as well as more cost-effective) animal exploitation. This anti-animal rights effect, created by welfarist advocacy, partly accounts for the fact that people are unwilling to embrace animal rights.

It follows from this that animal advocates often rationalize their support for new welfarism by means of problems that are partly created by new welfarist advocacy. A vicious circle has been established: the absence of abolitionist claims (about why veganism should be a moral baseline, for example, or about why we should not seek to regulate the institution of animal slavery) makes nonveganism possible; nonveganism makes welfarism possible, or more accurately, the two – welfarism and nonveganism – are interdependent; welfarism (by creating socially acceptable animal exploitation) makes the absence of abolitionist claims possible; and so on.

To put the point a different way, welfarism fosters the phenomenon which it is supposed to "cure." It can lead only to an exchange in the form of animal exploitation and as such is self-defeating.

The solution, of course, to the vicious circle that has been established by new welfarism is categorically and unapologetically to reject new welfarist advocacy in favor of the abolitionist approach to animal rights.

A Breathtaking Example of Cynicism and Incoherence

Farm Sanctuary recently sent out an action alert requesting donations to help it rehabilitate 148 hens rescued from a "free-range" farm . Farm Sanctuary tells us that:

These sweet hens are living examples of what goes on behind closed doors even at facilities thought to be "humane." The hens' bodies are underweight and "spent," as the industry calls them, as a result of intensive and unnatural egg production. And, they show the painful scars of "debeaking."

So, Farm Sanctuary is asking for donations to help it rehabilitate (some of) the victims of the welfarist paradigm that it - promotes! (Farm Sanctuary was an aggressive promoter of Proposition 2 in California, for example, a regulatory measure that will – it is claimed (by welfarists) – make animal agriculture more "humane," but which will, in reality, do nothing to protect animals from the abuses inherent to being used as property). Farm Sanctuary's position is analogous to that of an organization that promotes beating up people – "humanely," of course – while at the same time begging for money so that the battered and bruised victims of its policy can be rehabilitated.

But, it is perhaps unfair to single out Farm Sanctuary. For the latter's latest begging letter is merely a dramatic example of the breathtaking cynicism and abject incoherence of the corporate welfarist movement in general.

The solution, of course, to the plight of animals brutalized and degraded by the "humane" farming industry is to refuse – without equivocation – to promote "humane" animal products or "humane" methods of animal exploitation.

Go vegan.

Conference - Trade Opportunities from Animal Welfare

Several prominent welfarist organizations, including Compassion in World Farming and the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, are organizing a conference the aim of which is to promote the benefits of animal welfare -- not to animals, but, on the contrary, to animal industry; in the words of Adolfo Sansolini, trade policy advisor for RSPCA, Compassion in World Farming, Eurogroup for Animals and WSPA: "Farmers, retailers and governments have got a lot to gain by working together on animal welfare...Animal welfare is no longer only a just cause [sic], but also a trade opportunity that should not be missed." Indeed, according to the welfarist organizers of this conference, the link between animal welfare, on the one hand, and increased exploiter profits and increased consumption (of animal products), on the other, "is increasingly being recognised by institutions such as the World Bank’s International Finance Corporation and the United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organisation."

This begs the question: why is the official animal rights movement still clinging with corrupt fidelity to welfarism?

Means and Ends

The prevailing new welfarist paradigm rejects the notion of the interrelation of means and ends as "ivory tower consistency" which doesn't help actual animals; instead, it stresses that we should just do "whatever works". However, our insistence on the adaptation or suitability of means to ends is not the expression of a high-minded dismissal of animal suffering; on the contrary, it is partly based on the pragmatic realization that unless are ends are operative in our means then the latter will not be suited to achieve the former.

An Abolitionist Pamphlet

Gary Francione and Anna Charlton have produced an abolitionist pamphlet that "presents the abolitionist approach in an accessible way," and that they hope will facilitate people's efforts to educate their families, friends, and communities about veganism in a nonviolent and creative way (to paraphrase Francione).

Please download the pamphlet and distribute it far and wide!

CAK, Welfarism, Militancy

I wrote a long forum post recently which I thought I'd reproduce here:

PeTA's own report on CAK clearly states that CAK will increase production efficiency for animal industry. Therefore, how can the welfare movement seriously claim that CAK represents incremental progress toward abolition -- in other words, that it is a step on the road to emptying the cages?

Animal industry will survive for as long as animals remain economically viable commodities. And animals will remain economically viable commodities for as long as industry can make profit from them. Therefore, if we are to eradicate animal exploitation, we must abolish animals' commodity status.

Now the abolition of animals' commodity status can be achieved either directly through the imposition of constraints on what exploiters can do to animals in the recognition that animals have inherent value, or indirectly through mitigating cultural speciesism through vegan education. And of course these things are not mutually exclusive but are, rather, two sides of the same coin - that coin being animal liberation.

Yet CAK cannot seriously be claimed to erode animals' commodity status either directly or indirectly.

First, CAK will reduce the cost of exploiting chickens and, correspondingly, increase their commodity value. This, of course, is in direct opposition to the aim of abolishing animals' commodity status.

Second, the increased profits that will come from the increased production efficiency will be cyclically invested by industry in more animal exploitation. This means that CAK, promoted by welfarists, will be a causal factor in the expansion and growth of animal industry.

Third, the decreased production costs probably will cause a decrease in the price of chicken. This in turn will cause an increase in demand, as people who couldn't afford these products pre-CAK will now buy them and people who could afford them will probably buy more of them. This increase in demand, driven by an increase in exploitative efficiency, will in turn cause a net increase in animal suffering because more chickens will be being exploited.

Fourth, PeTA's CAK campaign represents free advertising for KFC. PeTA have publicly announced that they have called off their KFC campaign - something that is suited to make people feel better about consuming chicken at KFC in particular, and to increase social acceptance of animal use in general. For if even a self-proclaimed animal rights organization no longer sees the need to oppose KFC, then what reason could the public have for opposing it? Moreover and deplorably, these statements by a self-proclaimed animal rights organization will be taken to have generalizing authority, in that they will be taken to apply to other forms of animal use.

The self-inflicted unimaginativeness involved in the reply that we should support any welfarist measure that is thought to reduce suffering is astonishing. If the idea here is that welfarism is a precondition of abolition, then I would reply: if you think that regulations which militate for industry's efficiency and profitability are a precondition of abolition, then you are in the kind of error (at least on issue of the abolition of animals' commodity status) that makes meaningful discussion impossible.

Second, these regulations would exist anyway, that is, independently of the welfare movement and of welfare campaigns, since, as I said, they protect only institutional animal interests, interests that relate to animals use as economic property. Only if they represented a recognition that animals had inherent value would it make any sense to be concerned about their being repealed.

Third, if the idea is that people have to find it intelligible that they should be kind to animals in order to find it intelligible that they have rights-type obligations, and that this means we should continue to promote welfarism, then I would reply with the following. Even though people generally accept the welfarist idea that they should be kind to animals, this has not, as an empirical matter, translated into welfarist regulation that reflects inherent valuation of animal interests. If welfarism is empirically unable to erode animals' property status, then welfarism has no abolitionistic function -- and so should rejected by the abolitionist movement.

Fourth, if the claim is that welfarism sustains a certain attitude in people's minds, namely, that people should be kind to animals, and that this is why the welfare corporations should promote it, then this is refuted by the fact that veganism can also sustain in people's mind the idea that animals are members of the moral community. Moreover, if the welfarist corps just promoted veganism, then this would not just have the same effect: it would have a qualitatively better effect. The problem, therefore, does not lie with the abolitionist approach, in particular with its rejection of welfarism, but rather with new welfarist corps which refuse to make vegan outreach their primary mode of campaigning.

Fifth, not all animal welfare scientists are even prepared to say that CAK will reduce suffering. Also, there are other ways to reduce net animal suffering in the short term, ways which do not our illogically undermine our ideals and long term goals in the very act of announcing themselves, and also our capacity to reduce animal suffering in the future. Vegan education, for example, can reduce net animal suffering (by reducing demand) while also militating for long term abolition (by building up the constituency of vegans). But this obscures the most important point in the fight for justice for animals, which is that neither PeTA, nor anyone else, can morally justify promoting, or engaging in, any form of animal use.

Thus to call welfarism an opportunity cost would be to radically underdescribe its pointlessness to the abolitionist movement.

If the empirical effects of vegan education seem minimal to people, then this would only undermine the abolitionist approach if vegan outreach were the animal movement's primary mode of campaigning. But it isn’t. On the contrary, welfarism is. Ironically, therefore, the empirical evidence that is supposed to undermine abolitionism – that people are unreceptive to veganism; that it has had a minimal impact; etc. – and to recommend welfarism in fact undermines welfarism and leaves abolitionism untouched. For it strongly suggests, not that vegan education won’t work (how could any empirical evidence show that vegan education won’t work when, as an empirical matter, vegan education has never been made the animal movement’s primary mode of campaigning?), but rather that it won’t work while the animal movement concurrently promotes welfarist measures (“happy” animal products, welfare regulation etc.) that provide people with an almost endless number of elitist excuses to continue exploiting animals.

If the idea is that vegan advocacy will take too long to abolish animal use -- that the former needs to be supplemented with other forms of advocacy in order to expedite the latter, then this is refuted by (at least) two considerations. First, it relies on the idea that vegan education is not maximally conducive to abolition. Yet vegan education is the only thing that directly causes abolition, for it is the only thing that directly targets the source of animal oppression (as opposed to welfarism which merely aims to mitigate the worst exploitative practices), which is demand; and it is the most effective use of our limited time and resources (why talk to someone about eating "humane" animal products when you can talk to them about eating no animal products?). In any event, it is difficult to see how something could be more conducive to veganism than direct and unequivocal vegan education. Accordingly, it is difficult to understand what could seriously be meant by saying that we need a “plurality” of approaches, or a “multi-pronged” approach, when the other approaches, or “prongs,” are less conducive to abolition than vegan education

Moreover, the success of vegan advocacy is a precondition of the intelligible success of the other main advocacy option, namely, prohibiting animal use through legislation. A cultural paradigm shift is a precondition of a legal paradigm shift. Indeed, in the absence of politically and economically powerful constituency of vegans, there is no reason why the government should ban animal use.

Regarding militancy, the repressive anti-AR legislation, precipitated by and pretexted on militancy, and the public attitude toward AR "terrorists," is strong empirical evidence that militancy is incompatible with the form of advocacy that is maximally effective at militating for a reduction in demand in the short term and total animal liberation in the long term, namely, the ongoing attempts to normalize veganism through vegan education. If someone replies that the public reaction to militancy doesn't matter, that all that matters is that animals are liberated, then I would agree. All that matters is total animal liberation. But this will never happen -- it is no intelligible that it could happen -- without broad public support. No one who rejects militancy is selling animals short. They are simply thinking of what is a maximally effective strategy for all animals, including those animals who will be disadvantaged in the future if we focus on militancy and welfarism as opposed to potentially culturally transformative vegan education.

Welfarism is Not a Precondition of Abolition

Some welfarists claim that welfarism is conducive to abolition, not in the sense that it directly erodes animal exploitation (either by damaging industry economically or by causing people to go vegan), but in the sense that it is a precondition of that erosion. It sets the stage as it were, providing the conditions that are necessary if people are to find abolition intelligible. For welfarism (so this line of thinking goes) teaches people that they should treat animals "humanely." If people think they should treat animals "humanely," then they are more likely to accept the idea that they have more robust obligations to animals, such as the obligation to be vegan. Therefore, it is claimed, we must promote welfarism in order to foster the conditions without which people would find abolition at best unacceptable and unnecessary and at worst unintelligible.

There are several problems with this way of thinking, some of which I will discuss here.

First, it obviously doesn't follow, from the trivially true assumption that people need to find it intelligible that they have some obligations to animals in order to find it intelligible that they have rights-type obligations, that we should promote welfarism. For we can sustain the idea that people have obligations to animals by promoting veganism. Further, it is clear that it is easier to make veganism intelligible to people by engaging in vegan outreach rather than welfarist outreach; for the former is directly concerned with veganism -- what it is, what it entails, and so on -- whereas the latter is concerned only with trying to improve the treatment of the animals we use. The problem, therefore, lies not with the abolitionist approach, in particular with its rejection of welfarism, but rather with the welfarist groups which refuse to promote veganism as a moral baseline.

Second, if the welfarist idea is that we need welfarist regulations in order to protect animals in the interim (however long it may be) between now and abolition, then that is mooted by the fact that these regulations would exist anyway, that is, independently of the welfarist movement and of welfarist campaigns, since they are synergized with industry's efficiency and profitability. On the other hand, if the claim is that we should campaign for better, non-cost justified welfare regulations, then that should also be rejected, since it is empirically impossible to achieve: first, because animals' property status limits the protection animals receive to what is justified in light of that status (Francione); and second, because welfarism creates more socially acceptable animal use (by making people feel that they can discharge their moral obligations to animals by purchasing "humane" animal products).

Third, the welfare movement's understanding of the problem of animal exploitation, and of welfarism's place in it, is completely undialectical. From the frame of speciesist society's own self-image, welfarist (i.e. anti-rights) measures are given a positive interpretation and abolitionist measures are given a negative one. This should be obvious. But the new welfarist movement accepts at face value, and in fact champions, speciesist society's interpretations. For example, CAK, which is a more economically efficient method of killing chickens, is claimed by welfarists to be the best or only advocacy option, at least in the short term, and strict veganism is maligned as "fanatical." In this way the new welfarist movement as it were holds up a mirror to speciesist society and praises its reflection.

Accordingly, far from being a precondition of abolition, welfarism is in fact a a de facto acceptance of the condition in which the problem of animal exploitation itself arises. That is why welfarism never leads to any new and radical solutions. Even worse than this, however, is the fact that welfarism is promoted (by the new welfarist movement) at the expense of the inhibition of the real solution, which is abolitionist action.

Is Veganism Fanaticism? Only in the Light of New Welfarism

Gary Francione has written a blog essay on an article by an Austrian animal advocate called Martin Balluch. I would like to comment briefly on something that Francione says:

[V]eganism is portrayed by leading animal advocates, such as Peter Singer, as "fanatical." Singer talks about the occasional eating of animal products as a "luxury" and argues that we may even have an obligation not to be vegan if it would upset others.

The stance of the official animal rights movement is taken by the public to be the most radical position on human-nonhuman relations.
This means that that "movement's" policy will, even if not explicitly or even consciously, be used by the public as a yardstick against which to assess other positions on human-nonhuman relations: if they are less radical than new welfarism, then they will be considered to be at least intelligible, or, in other words, to be within the bounds of the thinkable; if they are more radical, then they will almost certainly be considered to be unintelligible and outside of the bounds of the thinkable.

Now, as Francione points out, the new welfarist movement characterizes strict veganism as being "fanatical" and "fundamentalist." In the light of this characterization by a self-proclaimed "radical" movement, the public cannot but find the abolitionist position on veganism, i.e. that it is a moral imperative prescribing duties and obligations binding on everyone, to be unnecessary and unacceptable, or, at the very best, a commitment for the "chosen few." Yet the new welfarist movement claims that it must promote welfarism because the public is unreceptive to strict vegansim, and that this anti-abolition attitude is not conditioned by its tactics and campaigns. But far from not being conditioned by new welfarism and contra the new welfarists, I think it is clear that the latter's stance on veganism is in fact internal to the public's sense of the unintelligibility of the idea of total abolition.

"Two Track" Activism

The welfarist Norm Phelps claimed that "two track" activism (i.e. welfarist advocacy and vegan advocacy) was better than "one track" activism (i.e. only vegan advocacy). The claim that a combination of welfarist advocacy and vegan advocacy is better than only vegan advocacy must rest on the assumption that the former is more effective at making incremental progress toward abolition than the latter. For if it is not, then it is difficult see what could intelligibly be meant by claiming that welfarist advocacy adds something to vegan advocacy.

But in the light of the following considerations it cannot be claimed that welfarism adds something to vegan advocacy. First: only clear and unequivocal vegan advocacy can intelligibly be claimed to be maximally conducive to abolition. That is, it is the only thing that directly causes abolition, it is the most effective use of our limited time and resources (why talk to someone about eating "humane" animal products when you can talk to them about eating no animal products?), and it directly targets the source of animal oppression (as opposed to welfarism which merely aims to mitigate the worst exploitative practices), which is the demand for animal products.

Second: welfarism has no abolitionistic function. That is, because exploiters have property rights in animals which invariably prevail over animals' welfare interests, it can empirically secure only a minimalistic level of "protection" for animals, the level, basically, that is necessary to exploit them efficiently.

Third: since the public generally does not yet find the idea of abolition fully intelligible, it is idle to claim that welfarist campaigns have an abolitionistic effect. Indeed, since the public generally views the problem of animal exploitation in the light of welfarist ideology -- in the light of the idea that animal use is acceptable as long as it is done "humanely" and without "unnecessary" suffering -- welfarist campaigns, which are ideologically portrayed (by welfarist corporations) as regulating animal exploitation to make it more "humane," can only be understood in our deeply and pervasively speciesist societies as making animal use (more) acceptable.

Thus, far from adding something to animal rights advocacy, the second, welfarist track in fact diminishes its efficacy by diverting time and resources away from the form of advocacy that is maximally conducive to abolition to a form of advocacy that simply further enmeshes animals in the animals-as-property paradigm.

"'Animal rights' has become a pretty meaningless term..."

In a recent forum debate Gary Francione observed that

'animal rights' has become a pretty meaningless term that is used to describe any regulatory measure that is thought to reduce suffering or any person who has some concern about animals.

The concept of animal rights has indeed been eviscerated by the new welfarist movement. This performs several functions, I think:

(1) The new welfarist movement limits access to animal rights ideas (e.g. it does not promote Francione's books; and PeTA promotes Peter Singer, who is a utilitarian animal welfarist, as an animal rights theorist) in order to prevent advocates from thinking and acting outside of the welfarist framework it imposes.

(2) The new welfarist movement stabilizes its welfarist strategy by characterizing anything that conflicts with it, such as abolitionism, as "extreme" and "fanatical", thus ensuring that welfarism is taken to be the normal, default position on animal advocacy. It also promotes campaigns that do not meaningfully challenge anyone, even consumers of animal products. This maximizes donations for corporate welfarist groups. So, for example, the new welfarist movement tells "consumers" that they can eat animal products and still be morally good people. (Just think of "conscientious omnivorism" and Vegan Outreach's "Even If You Like Meat..." pamphlet.) The new welfarist movement also ideologically recasts debate of its policies in pejorative terms: it says that debate is "divisive," or that it is an opportunity cost which doesn't help the animals.

(3) The new welfarist movement identifies the maximal satisfaction of its short term interests with the satisfaction of animal interests. That is, it promotes single issue regulatory welfarist campaigns, supposedly in order to help animals in the "short term"; yet -- in reality -- these campaigns are needed in order to provide corporate welfarist groups with a constant stream of "victories" for fundraising purposes.

(4) New welfarism appears rational within the framework imposed by new welfarists. When advocates are told that the public is unreceptive to veganism and that welfarism is the only way to help animals in the short term, it seems reasonable to support new welfarism. But like a self-help book, the new welfarist movement fosters the problem and then proffers itself as the solution. That is, it characterizes strict veganism in pejorative terms and then claims that it must promote welfarism in the short term because the public is unreceptive to animal rights.

(5) Industry, aided by new welfarists, portrays itself as being concerned about animal rights. This enables industry to exploit the moral appeal of the ideals that are being demolished.

(6) The new welfarist movement paints a dire picture of what will happen if we reject welfarism. So, for example, we are told that 60 billion animals will be locked up until the day of liberation. The purpose of this is to try to scare people into supporting reactionary welfarist policies.

"Humane" Animal Products

Some animal advocates claim that people are probably always going to eat animal products (at least for the foreseeable future) so it is better that they at least eat "humane" animal products, which we should promote. That is, if people are going to do terrible things then we should spend our time and resources promoting slightly less terrible things (even though they are economically efficient and profitable for exploiters and even though they are still so terrible that they make nonsense of the idea that it is justified to do them because they are the lesser of two evils) so that (some of) the people who do terrible things do slightly less terrible things.

Compellingly plausible, isn't it?

What If Welfarism Were Conducive to Abolition?

A constitutive part of welfarist ideology is the claim that welfarism is conducive (a "step on the road") to abolition in that it supposedly fosters conditions of kindness toward animals, which in turn dispose people to take animals seriously. However, it doesn't follow, from the fact that something may be conducive to abolition, that we should therefore promote it. For example, someone once told me that, prior to going vegan, she had a nightmare about factory farming, a nightmare that played some part in convincing her to go vegan. In a sense, then, this nightmare was conducive to her going vegan. But someone could only jokingly say that the animal rights movement should spend its time and resources trying to induce nightmares about factory farming in people because they might in some peripheral sense be conducive to veganism.

Moreover, there are things that can be conducive to abolition, but which we should never support because they are positively anti-animal rights. For example, some people go vegan after visiting slaughterhouses [1]. But clearly, only a crank could claim that we should support slaughterhouses because visits to them can be conducive to getting people to go vegan.

The general point is that, even if it were true, the claim that welfarism is (or can be) conducive to abolition is too thin to do the work that welfarists wish of it -- it cannot, of itself, justify support for welfarism. We need further criteria to enable use to responsibly decide whether we should support something that is claimed to be a "step on the road" to animals rights. More specifically, we need to determine how conducive to abolition our various advocacy options are, or are likely to be. Then, after we have determined how conducive to abolition they are, it makes rational sense to engage in those forms of advocacy that are maximally conducive to abolition. At least it is difficult to understand what could seriously be meant by saying that we should support welfarist initiatives because they are conducive to abolition, even though they are less conducive to abolition than other forms of advocacy. And what is maximally conducive to abolition? Abolitionist vegan advocacy.

[1] This example is taken from a comment made by Vincent J. Guihan on the Vegan Freak forum.

Is The Abolitionist Focus on Animals' Property Status Misguided? No!

Some people claim that the abolitionist focus on eroding animals' property status is misguided. Specifically, they claim that it does not matter that welfarism makes animal exploitation more efficient as long as some animal suffering is thereby reduced.

I have a simple answer to this. In not challenging animals' property status, you are condemning animals to being exploited indefinitely, for the animal exploitation industries will survive for as long as they can use animals as property and commodities. And in promoting welfare regulation predicated on increased exploitative efficiency for institutional exploiters, you are laying the foundation for more and exacerbated animal exploitation in the future.

PeTA Petition - take two

It has been pointed out that some people may not have access to the first petition which requires registration. Roger Yates has therefore come up with a second PeTA petition designed to replace the first. The petition can be found here: http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/PETAPET/index.html

Can those who signed the first please sign this one too. Thanks.

PeTA Petition

The abolitionist Roger Yates has started an online petition to send to PeTA concerning their claims about Peter Singer's Animal Liberation. Despite the fact that Singer himself has clarified on several occasions that he is a utilitarian animal welfarist and not an animal rights theorist, PeTA nonetheless promote him as a rights theorist and his work as an -- indeed the -- animal rights philosophy. For example:

Animal Liberation by Peter Singer. Referred to as the animal rights 'bible,' this book includes in-depth examinations of factory farming, animal experimentation, vegetarianism, and animal rights philosophy. If you read only one animal rights book, it has to be this one. 204 pages, paperback."

It is important that the public is not exposed to misleading information about what animal rights is and who stands for it. (Roger has written a more extensive rationale for the petition.) If you agree that this is not a trivial matter in terms of the evolution of the animal movement, then please visit the petition blog and sign your name, using the "comments" feature. Thank you.

United Poultry Concerns' 8th Annual Conference

United Poultry Concerns' 8th Annual Conference is being held next year. At the conference the speakers, who are mostly welfarist, will be discussing, among other things, the following question:

"Should activists work to reduce the suffering of billions of chickens and other animals who will never live to see a vegan world, or is such work counterproductive -- a moral betrayal of animals?"

They want to say that the abolition / welfare debate is between those who want to reduce suffering while also working for abolition on the one hand, and those who think it is counterproductive to reduce suffering and who want to work only for abolition on the other. That is a misrepresentation of the situation. The abolitionist rejection of welfarism is not based on the idea that it is "counterproductive" to reduce animal suffering, or that doing so impedes abolition. On the contrary, we reject welfarism, not because we do not want to reduce animal suffering, but because we do not think it can meaningfully reduce animal suffering. For welfarism is structurally impeded by animals' property status. Basically, because animals are property, and because exploiters have the right to maximally exploit their animal property, animal welfare is kept at a very low level, the level, basically, which is necessary to exploit animals in a maximally (economically) efficient way. A welfare law that sought to accord animals protection that went beyond this minimal level would invariably be "trumped" by exploiters' property rights. And this analysis is, of course, backed up by the empirical evidence. Welfarism has not managed to achieve significant protection for animals -- it has not, for example, led to the gradual erosion of animal agriculture and vivisection through the imposition of constraints on what exploiters can do to animals in recognition that animals have inherent value.

Secondly, we have limited time and resources. Moreover, time and money spent on welfarism necessarily is not spent on abolition. Given that there is no evidence to suggest that welfarism can provide significant protection for animals, and given that welfarism is empirically unable to lead to abolition, we think that our time and money can be more profitably spent on clear and unequivocal vegan outreach. Now this does not mean that we will be unable to reduce animal suffering in the short term. Vegan outreach reduces net animal suffering by reducing demand -- by stopping animals from entering the factory farms and slaughterhouses -- while also building up the essential political and economic base necessary in order to meaningfully challenge the animal exploitation industries.

Thirdly, we object to presenting animal exploitation, like cage-free eggs and "happy" meat, under descriptions such as "humane" and "compassionate." This does nothing but make people feel more comfortable about animal exploitation (by sanitizing it) and, therefore, prolongs animal suffering.

So, because we reject welfarism, it does not follow, and it is not true, that we do not want to reduce animal suffering, or that we think that reducing suffering is "counterproductive." We simply think that we can reduce suffering more effectively, while at the same time making better progress toward abolition, if we invest all our resources in vegan outreach.

(Gary Francione has written an excellent essay on the upcoming UPC Conference, which can be found here.)

Are Abolitionists Insulting?

Welfarists claim to feel insulted by our claims about welfarism. But our claims are not of the kind that should make anyone feel insulted. Our claim is that welfarism is logically incompatible with abolition because abolition requires that we abolish animals' property status and welfarism is empirically unable to challenge that status. Clearly, if I claim that welfarism is logically incompatible with abolition, then I am not being arrogant or insulting. I could of course be wrong. But if I am wrong, I am wrong about logic and evidence -- and nothing else. No one is arrogant and insulting for acknowledging logic and evidence.

The Paradigm Shift

I would sum up the paradigm shift with respect to welfarism as precisely this:

The welfarist paradigm as such is (1) partly responsible for what is allegedly suited to justify its existence (i.e., the fact that we can't abolish animal exploitation immediately), and (2) de facto conditions unresponsiveness to what it is allegedly conducive to (i.e., animal liberation).

I think it will be instructive to apply this way of thinking to a constitutive part of welfarist ideology, which is encapsulated in the following question:

"Why shouldn't we support welfarism, given that we can't abolish animal exploitation immediately?"

I admit that this way of thinking does have some initial plausibility, which is why so many people are convinced by it. If you have a range of advocacy options, call them X, Y, and Z, and in the short term Z seems to be the best option for animals, what could be the problem with choosing Z? The problem could be that you have assumed that the range of options is legitimate. That is, out of X, Y, and Z, you have assumed that one of them must be acceptable, when in fact they are all problematic.

More concretely, when speciesist society presents us with a limited range of options, we should not automatically rationalize them, making do with what seems to be the best option, given the options available. Rather we should try to understand why our present options are so limited, and then, based on this understanding, create other options, options that are more consistent with our ideals. Take CAK as an example. The welfare movement rationalizes that we should support CAK because it is supposedly the best we can do for animals, given the options available. But it is not our job to rationalize existing society. It is our job to change it.

Returning to the question, "Why shouldn't we support welfarism, given that we can't abolish animal exploitation immediately?," the problem is that the welfare movement begs the question from the outset by implicitly assuming what needs to be shown, namely that welfarism is not responsible for the fact that people are unreceptive to animal rights. Rather it slides from the fact that people are unreceptive to animal rights, to the conclusion that welfarism is justified, without actually asking itself the question: Why are people unreceptive to animal rights?

But if we ask this question, then there is an obvious answer, which is that people are unreceptive to animal rights because the welfare movement does not promote -- and never has promoted -- veganism as a nonnegotiable baseline. On the contrary, it has always marginalized veganism in favor of regulatory welfarist campaigns.

The welfare movement's reply is that its welfarist (as opposed to rights) agenda is merely a reaction to problems which are created independently of its tactics and campaigns. And it tries to make this seem more plausible by framing animal advocacy as an emergency or a dilemma engendered by the fact that people are unreceptive to animal rights. If we can't abolish animal exploitation immediately, so this line of thinking goes, then we have to support welfarism, for welfarism is the best we can do for animals given the options available.

However when the welfare movement endorses and promotes everything but strict veganism (cage-free eggs, "happy" meat, animal "compassion" labels, reforms short of abolition, etc.), and in fact calls strict veganism "fanatical," and moreover when most of its institutional resources are invested in welfarist campaigns which further enmesh animals in the property paradigm (by making exploitation more efficient and profitable for institutional exploiters), it should not expect people to be receptive to animal rights.

The upshot of this is that the welfare movement conditions the problem (i.e. unreceptivity to animal rights) it claims is suited to justify its own existence; it then frames this self-created problem in such a way as to yield a situation (i.e. the emergency or dilemma) in whose light welfarism appears as the best or only advocacy option. But the welfare movement takes the problem of unreceptivity to animal rights, which is created by welfarist tactics, to be a justification for its promotion of welfarism. This creates a vicious cycle whereby unreceptivity to animal rights supposedly justifies welfarism which in turn conditions (as opposed to erodes) unreceptivity to animal rights which in turn supposedly justifies welfarism -- and so on ad infinitum.

This way of looking at things, combined with the fact that we are here to change existing society not rationalize its options, should make us think twice about any argument of the form: "Welfarism is the best or only option, given the options available..."

What If Property Owners Treated Their Animal Property "Nicely"?

An objection to the abolitionist position is that animals' property status does not necessarily imply institutionalized exploitation, for property owners can treat their animal property "nicely" or as though it had rights. Hence (this objection goes) we do not necessarily need to abolish animals' property status. This position is unsound.

First, it assumes that the abolitionist position is that animals' property status should be abolished because it necessarily implies institutionalized exploitation. That is false. The abolitionist position is that animals' property status is inherently wrong -- speciesist -- irrespective of treatment, for it deprives animals of equal consideration; but that the institutionalized exploitation that does exist is also wrong because it is made possible only because animals are property.

Secondly, even if one takes the position that we do not need to abolish animals' property status, for it is possible to treat animal property "nicely" or as though it had rights, it still does not follow that it is acceptable for them to be property. For it is irrational not to treat property, which is legally defined exclusively as a means to an end, instrumentally. Hence it is irrational not to treat animal property instrumentally. Moreover, the empirical evidence is clear: property owners treat their animal property rationally, which is the preeminent reason why we have factory farming. Thus people who do not think that animals' property status is inherently wrong, for it is possible to treat animal property "nicely" or as though it had rights, are in the absurd position of claiming that, instead of campaigning for animal rights, we should campaign for property owners to treat their property irrationally.

Thirdly, since it is irrational for property owners not to treat their property instrumentally, it follows that institutionalized exploitation is, after all, rationally implied by animals' property status.

Notice: ARCO

The ARCO forums are down at the moment because of problems with the server. Hopefully they will be up and running again in a few days, although apparently the abolitionist forum will be completely new. On behalf of the people who use these forums, I would like to thank Ricardo and Susan for all their hard work in getting the forums up and running again.

Animal Liberation Is About Us

Animal liberation is about human animals. For animals' freedom will not merely be enhanced by certain moral relations between humans and animals: it will be constituted by them. In the absence of a concern for animals' welfare transformed by respect for their dignity and inherent worth, animal liberation cannot exist: if we are unconcerned about animals' welfare, we will use them as commodities; and if we do not respect their dignity and inherent worth, our response to animal exploitation will be welfarism not veganism. This means that we are the locus of abolition.

Excellent New Abolitionist Blog

I'd like to draw attention to an excellent new abolitionist blog by Dan Cudahy called Unpopular Vegan Essays

A Commentary by Karin Hilpisch on Gary Francione's Blog Entry entitled "A Comment on Violence."

Gary Francione: "Violence treats others as means to ends rather than as ends in themselves. When we engage in violence against others -- whether they are human or nonhuman -- we ignore their inherent value. We treat them only as things that have no value except that which we decide to give them. This is what leads people to engage in crimes of violence against people of color, women, and gays and lesbians."
www.abolitionistapproach.com/2007/08/13/a-comment-on-violence/

Homophobia is that manifestation of morally unjustifiable discrimination which is regularly omitted in the antispeciesist discourse, as far as I know, in the German and in the English one. The fact that Gary explicitly and constantly considers homophobia as on the same level as sexism and racism cannot be esteemed highly enough in a societal context which is not only entirely entrenched in speciesism but in which even many of those who claim to be opposed to the latter see -- or are inclined to see -- heterosexism as different from other forms of discrimination, that is as not being one at all. Gary has recently examined this variation of moral schizophrenia more closely: "Is Heterosexism Different?"
www.abolitionistapproach.com/2007/08/02/is-hetereosexism-different/

Gary Francione: "Anyone who has ever used violence claims to regret having to resort to it, but argues that some desirable goal supposedly justified its use. The problem is that this facilitates an endless cycle of violence where anyone who feels strongly about something can embrace violence toward others as a means to achieving the greater good and those who are the targets of that violence may find a justification for their violent response. So on and on it goes. This is consequentialist moral thinking and it is destroying the world..." [...]

[F]or those who advocate violence, exactly against whom is this violence to be directed? The farmer raises animals because the overwhelming number of humans demand to eat meat and animal products. The farmer raises those animals in intensive conditions because consumers want meat and animal products to be as inexpensive as possible. But is the farmer the only culprit here? Or is the responsibility shared by the rest of us who eat animal products, including all of those conscientious omnivores, the non-vegan 'animal people' who consume 'cage-free eggs' and 'happy' meat, who create the demand but for which the farmer would be doing something else with her life? I suppose that it is easier to characterize farmers as the 'enemy,' but that ignores the reality of the situation.[...]

In other words, in a world in which eating animal products is considered by most people as 'natural or 'normal' as drinking water or breathing air, violence is quite likely to be seen as nothing more than an act of lunacy and will do nothing to further progressive thinking about the issue of animal exploitation." ("A Comment on Violence," see above)

The keyword "violence" stands in the centre of a highly controversially considered subject which is part of the welfarism vs abolitionism debate and, therefore, allegedly about strategy whereas in fact conditioned by a deep ideological division, the unbridgeable gap between consequentialist and deontological thinking.

The controversy about violence starts off with the question what violence is resp. what it is not; a vast area which requires far more consideration than I'm prepared to spend on it, at least in this post. Just one note: as far as violence, by whichever actions constituted, is linked with violating the law, and doing so in a significant manner to which the legislative response is the Animal Rights Terrorism Act, this response is certainly suited to achieve one thing: to impede or to complicate legal activism, the most effective form of which is abolitionist education.

I used to see animal rights activism in more than metaphorical terms of being at war -- with everyone taking part in the killing of animals, primarily in the slaughterhouse. This concept of warfare led me to sympathize with most of those actions which are the subject matter of the AETA but also to regard acts of violence in an uncontroversial sense of causing physical harm as a morally -- if not strategically -- perfectly sound way of fighting animal exploitation, and any objection on moral grounds against this activism on the side of supposed allies as expressing a serious lack of moral judgement, of solidarity with the nonhuman victims of the oppressors; as a poverty of ambition in any case.

It was by learning more about the ideological division mentioned above that I realized how deeply rooted in consequentialist thinking and, therefore, ethically unsound the approval of a kind of action is which appears as legitimate only under conditions where moral standards are suspended: war. This suspension of moral standards -- of what goes beyond the Old Testament's an eye for an eye ethics -- is the fertile ground on which war never ends. Simply realizing the ideological nature of what I considered sound moral intuitions made me question them, since I'd like to think of myself as being opposed to consequentialism.

What among other things caught me on this ideological redefinition of myself was a section of the debate between Gary and Erik Marcus where the latter quotes the retired president of the United Egg Producers as commenting on the detrimental impact the HSUS’s anti-battery/pro cage-free egg campaign allegedly has on the egg inustry’s profits, resulting in the statement: "We are at war." Whereas Marcus seeks to use this quote as proof of the effectiveness of cage-free egg campaigns in terms of a significant decrease of the demand for eggs, Gary points out to him and the listeners the fact that such proclamations are to be seen rather as a well-considered part of public relations than as a critical evaluation of the situation. [1]

A situation which pro animal activists tend to frame exactly the same way as does the head of one of the exploiting industries: "We are at war." Why do animal exploiters obviously like the idea of being at war with animal liberators? Because if this IS a war, given the common mindset of the opponents and the extremely disproportional distribution of resources, it can never be won for the animals.

The only thing that can be won for the animals is a revolution, a revolution ot the mind, against war, by shifting the paradigm to the idea of the abolition of animal exploitation. However long it will take this idea to prevail, there is no other way to go.

[1] See the transcript on http://www.gary-francione.com/francione-marcus-debate.html (The Unofficial Gary Francione Website in whole is a great source), drawn up by two volunteers; thanks to them for the fabulous job they did.

An inspiring article,"Exclusive Non-Violent Action: Its Absolute Necessity for Building a Genuine Animal Rights Movement" by Jeff Perz is to be found here: http://www.abolitionist-online.com/article-issue05_exclusive.non.violent.jeff-perz.shtml

Moral Schizophrenia and Complicity, by Karin Hilpisch

The following text, written by fellow abolitionist Karin Hilpisch, is a very eloquent account of the problems with focusing on any issue other than veganism:

If there is anything to get things moving concerning speciesism, it is pointing out the bizarre division between animals who are institutionally used as companions and therefore granted a higher value in being kept alive than in being killed, and those whose value is realized in their being transformed into what is considered food as quickly as possible. A division which Gary Francione has defined as moral schizophrenia. The emotional surplus value that dogs and cats are accorded -- in the Western world -- causes them to be made objects of anitcruelty laws and protected from being used in ways which are regarded as illegitimate and morally reprehensible by the majority of society: dogfighting, for example.

What this form of animal exploitation has in common with bullfighting, hunting, fur-farming, circuses, and zoos, as well as with vivisection, is that it is practiced by relatively small groups in society, and that the number of animals affected amount to a fraction of those exploited by 99 percent of the population who consume meat, dairy, eggs.

Activism on behalf of animals that focuses on any issue other than food derived from animals IN GENERAL -- not on special prducts, supposedly produced more cruelly than others (foie gras, crated veal) -- serves political purposes (see Gary L. Francione. Introduction to Animal Rights, 2000: 163/164) and a collective psychological function that is inherent to speciesism: to give oneself an alibi, an indulgence for participating in the prevailing form of animal exploitation by diverting the attention to not generally accepted forms of it; to ease one's conscience about what is unjustifiable but pervasive by condemning, campaigning against, and banning what is not any more wrong but practiced by relatively few people. The latter stabilizes the former; by doing something "for the animals" -- who are not the subject matter of one’s own interests -- killing others by consuming their bodies and bodily secretions makes oneself feel much less uncomfortable.

Focusing on any issue other than food derived from animals helps to sustain moral schizophrenia -- the pschological basis of speciesism -- instead of challenging it; campaigning against animal fighting (as in the case of Michael Vick) is a meat eater's cause, furthered by vegans who engage in it -- who thereby become accomplices to the slaughterhouse.

Why Can't Animal Welfare Lead to Animal Rights?

Why is the history of animal welfare an incessant procession of incalculable defeats? Why does every welfarist "victory" demonstrate nothing but impotence? Why, even though we recognized that we have direct moral obligations to animals two hundred years ago, are nonhumans held captive in spaces so small that they cannot move? Why, after 200 hundreds of years of welfarism (the first welfare law was enacted in 1641, and welfarists have been trying to implement their ideology for the past couple of hundred years), is humans' hegemony over other animals still absolute? Why do we have gestation crates and battery cages; drug addiction and burn experiments? In short, why has animal welfare not negated institutionalized animal exploitation at all?

In Animals, Property, and the Law and Rain Without Thunder, Gary Francione provides the answer. Because of the way the human-nonhuman conflict is conceptualized in Anglo-US legal systems, animal welfare is inherently biased against animal interests -- "structurally defective," as Francione puts it. Humans are legal persons who have rights. Animals, on the other hand, are property; they have only extrinsic or conditional value. Animals therefore are completely rightless beings (i.e., they are entitled to nothing).

Now a presupposition of Anglo-American legal systems is that rights have special normative force. Rights are (to use Ronald Dworkin’s metaphor) "trumps": "they give [powerful] reasons to treat their holders in certain ways or permit them to act in certain ways, even if some social aim would be served by doing otherwise." That is, rights invariably trump competing (non-right) considerations.

The implications of conceptualizing the human-nonhuman conflict in this way are clear. Animal interests are protected by welfare laws; whereas exploiters' property interests are protected by rights. Thus, when human and animal interests conflict we have a pseudo-conflict between a right and a non-right consideration -- between exploiters' property interests in animals and animals' interest in not being used as property. The entailment here is obvious:

Exploiters' right-protected property interests always prevail over animals' welfare-law/non-right protected welfare interests.

This pseudo-balancing process ensures that any welfare law that sought to accord animals protection that impinged on exploiters' property rights -- a law, that is, that was in the best interests of animals but wasn't also in the economic interests of exploiters -- would invariably be rejected outright by the framework of the system. As such, the framework of oppression of animals' property status/exploiters' property rights ensures that the system of welfare reform serves no more than the interests of property owners/animal exploiters to maximally exploit their animal property -- instituting reforms that militate for, and rejecting those that militate against, exploiters' efficiency and profitability.

Paradoxically, then, animal welfare protects the interests exploiters have in animals rather than the interests of animals (Francione) -- in other words, it protects exploiters not animals.

Francione's property analysis refutes the idea that there is a causal relationship between animal welfare in the short term and animal rights in the long term. The argument can be summarized as follows:

Argument 1:

1) Exploiters' property interests in animals are protected by right. Animals' welfare interests are protected by welfare laws (a non-right consideration)
2) In Anglo-US legal systems, rights "trump" non-right considerations

Conclusion: exploiters' property interests in animals always trump animals’ welfare interests.

Argument 2:

(1) A welfare law could theoretically be in the interests of animals but not also in the interests of the exploiters
(2) Exploiters' property interests in animals always trump animals' welfare interests (the conclusion of argument 1)

Conclusion: a welfare law that was in the interests of animals but wasn't also in the interests of the exploiters would be rejected outright by the framework of the system.

Overall conclusion: animal welfare serves no more than the right of exploiters to maximally exploit their animal property. Because animal welfare is a non-right consideration that is automatically trumped by exploiters' property rights, any welfare law that was in the interests of animals but wasn't also in the interests of the exploiters would be trumped by the latter's property rights. Therefore, animal welfare does not -- it cannot -- challenge or incrementally abolish animal exploitation. Rather it serves the framework of oppression of animals' property status/exploiters' property rights in animals.

The contradiction between the property rights exploiters have in animals and the societal desire to afford animals some measure of protection is resolved by having welfare laws that protect only institutional animal interests -- a minimalistic form of "protection" that is necessary to ensure that animals are exploited in a maximally (economically) efficient way. For example, there are welfare regulations which stipulate that animals imprisoned in vivisection laboratories must be given food and water; but that is only because if they weren't given food and water they would die and so wouldn't yield (what is taken to be) valid data for vivisectors. Again, because animals are legally regarded exclusively as means to human ends, the welfare regulations protect the interests the vivisection industry has in animals rather than the interests of the animals.

Accordingly, welfare laws and regulations do not represent a partial negation of animals' property status or legal "thinghood" and a corresponding concession that they have nonextrinsic, nonconditional value and morally significant interests. Rather, because welfare laws afford animals only institutional protection, they merely represent a codification of animals' property status.

In short: animal welfare laws are slave laws.

The special normative force of property rights within Anglo-American legal systems leads to a system of animal welfare that is virulently anti-animal: in order to protect exploiters’ property rights, it allows animals to be treated in the most horrendous ways imaginable (gestation crates, veal crates, battery-cages) so long as this treatment is economically efficient. This means that animals' property status and animal suffering are inextricably enmeshed; the latter cannot be reduced without eroding the former. Specifically, animals' property status prevents animals from receiving non-consequential protection -- protection irrespective of the (economic) consequences of doing so -- and instead entails that they receive only consequential protection -- protection only in so far as some third party (i.e. property owners/exploiters) benefits from the protection. On the other hand, in order for animals to receive non-consequential protection (from being treated as property), their property status must be eroded, which entails putting limits on what exploiters may do to them, in explicit recognition of their inherent value. But because the system of welfare reform is constrained by the legal assumption that animals are property, it can reduce animal suffering only if the framework of oppression of animals' property status/exploiters' property rights is not thereby infringed.

In short: animal welfare serves the oppressive framework under which nonhumans are enslaved.

A first principle of the abolitionist movement, then, must be the rejection of animal welfare and the recognition that, to effect a paradigm shift in attitudes toward the human-nonhuman relationship, we must use qualitatively different means from the (welfare) means utilized by what has hitherto passed as the animal rights movement. We must recognize that radicalism mediated through reactionary institutions is a contradiction in terms; the former is nullified by the latter. We must reject industries that seek to neutralize radicalism with meretricious and illusory offers of progress. We must recognize that animal welfare leads to cooptation; it harmonizes advocates with the status quo and reconciles them to animal exploitation. We must reject hypocrisy and inconsistency.

Instead, we must make veganism a nonnegotiable baseline and engage directly with the real locus of abolition -- people themselves -- since abolition means: abolishing exploitation in our own lives -- and going vegan