Animal Rights: The Abolitionist Approach » Blog

Replacing One Cage With Another

Gary L. Francione — Sat, 14 Jan 2012 20:55:30 +0000

In 2007, Peter Singer, as part of a campaign to promote cage-free eggs, praised the Europeans for supposedly phasing out battery cages: “Battery cages are being phased out in Europe – why are we lagging behind?”

As I noted at the time, Singer’s connecting the European effort with cage-free egg farming was misleading:

[A]lthough the European Union has banned the traditional battery cage as of 2012 . . . . egg producers are free under the European ban to use “enriched cages,” which even conservative animal welfare organizations, such as Compassion in World Farming, maintain “fail to overcome many of the welfare problems inherent in the battery cage system.”

I wrote a subsequent essay on the EU “ban,” and, in 2010, I discussed it in my book, The Animal Rights Debate: Abolition or Regulation?, which I co-authored with Professor Robert Garner. It’s not a “ban” at all.

Well, the supposed “ban” on battery cages supposedly came into force on January 1, 2012.

And Peter Singer is excited about it.

In a CNN article entitled, “Singer: Europe’s ethical eggs,” Singer offers profuse praise:

The start of this year is a moment to celebrate a major advance in animal welfare, and, therefore, for Europe, a step towards becoming a more civilized and humane society – one that shows its concern for all beings capable of suffering. It is also an occasion for celebrating the effectiveness of democracy, and the power of an ethical idea.

Wow. Those Europeans have struck a significant blow for animals and for civilization as a general matter.

Or have they?

Put aside that, despite the supposed “ban,” there are about 84 million hens still in the traditional battery cage, with about 300,000 in Britain. Put aside also that cage-free egg production also involves torture and animal exploitation: cage-free eggs involve cramming thousands of birds into one big cage where they live a miserably hideous life that ends in the same miserably hideous slaughterhouse. The “gold standard” of hen exploitation is the “free-range” system, and that also involves the torture (and, of course, killing) of animals.

But, although Singer refers to the EU measure as a “ban on battery cages,” the EU “ban” does not ban battery cages. Yes, producers can use cage-free or free-range systems (which still involve torture, death, and exploitation), but they are not required to do so. What are they required to do?

Replace one cage with another cage: the “enriched” cage. Battery hens are still battery hens. The cage is larger, with nesting boxes and a scratching post.

According to an article in Ecologist: “Battery egg hens still face hell as ‘enriched’ cages phased in”. And here is a video of “enriched cages” that was provided in the Ecologist article:

(Note: This video is from an organization many of whose other campaigns and positions I disagree with.)

Look at the video. “Europe’s ethical eggs,” eh?

It is interesting to note that, in 2002, Compassion in World Farming issued a report, “LAID BARE…The Case Against Enriched cages in Europe” about how terrible “enriched” cages are and who they fail to address the welfare issues raised by the traditional battery cage. But that was then and now is now and big animal groups like CIWF need to be able to declare a victory even when there isn’t one. And so, CIWF is joining with Singer declaring victory and praising the EU “ban” that is not a ban.

I have in my writing cautioned against the use of the word “ban” to apply to welfare reforms, using as an example that a requirement of a larger cage could be characterized, very wrongly in my view, as a “ban” on the smaller cage. On that interpretation, anything could be construed as a “ban.” The EU “ban” on battery cages is a dramatic example of the problem I identified.

But what is so terribly tragic about all of this is that the so-called “father of the animal rights movement” regards the products of tortured animals to be “ethical eggs.” Even if, like Singer, you think that chickens do not have a morally significant interest in living and that killing them for human purposes is not itself morally wrong (a key point of disagreement between me and Singer), how could you possibly regard the EU “ban” that is not a ban as an indication that Europe has stuck a blow for civilization?

The EU “ban” is not doing anything to make our culture more civilized. It is, however, furthering the very dangerous idea that there are “compassionate” ways to torture and exploit nonhuman animals. The “ban” is furthering the idea that continuing to consume eggs is morally defensible as long as we eat “ethical eggs” that have been laid by hens who are in an “enriched” cage or who are otherwise being tortured.

The egg industry is, I am sure, very grateful to Singer and to all of those welfarists who are cheerleading for the idea that we can be “ethical” while we consume eggs, just as the meat and dairy industries are delighted about the endorsement and active promotion of the “happy” meat and animal products movement. This is an example of what I refer to as the “partnership” that animal advocates have with institutionalized animal exploiters. There need not be an explicit agreement of partnership, although in many cases exploiters and animal advocates conduct joint campaigns; animal advocates give “awards” to institutionalized users, promote “happy” meat/dairy labels, etc. All that is necessary is that animal advocates promote what is ultimately best for industry and what will perpetuate, as a social matter, the consumption and exploitation of nonhuman animals.

If anyone thinks that measures such as the EU “ban,” and the fact that animal advocates are campaigning for and praising such measures, are doing anything but making the public more comfortable about consuming animals and animal products, I disagree. No one can credibly deny that Singer’s comments are not an explicit endorsement for “Europe’s ethical eggs.” No one can deny that such an endorsement will matter to those who care about the issue of animal exploitation and are looking for a way to continue to exploit animals “compassionately.” Singer and other supporters of this “ban” and similar measures have just provided the moral license.

There are no “ethical” eggs (or meat or cheese or dairy or whatever) just as there was no “ethical” slavery and just as there is no “ethical” discrimination of any sort.

The EU “ban” that is not a ban is the result of what welfarists acknowledge as “decades of campaigning”. Think of all the time and labor and money that have gone into this one campaign. Now imagine what would have happened if, during those same decades, animal advocates had been promoting a clear, unequivocal vegan message. Would the world be vegan? No, of course not. But there would be many more vegans and the social discourse on this issue would necessarily have been focused on the use of animals as a cultural practice, rather than on the ways in which we can “compassionately” torture and kill sentient nonhumans.

I leave you with a brief poem written by British satirist Spike Milligan (1918-2002):

Rage in Heaven

If a robin redbreast in a cage
Puts all heaven in a rage
How feels heaven when
Dies the millionth battery hen?

******

If you are not vegan, please consider going vegan. It’s a matter of nonviolence. Being vegan is your statement that you reject violence to other sentient beings, to yourself, and to the environment, on which all sentient beings depend.

The World is Vegan! If you want it.

Gary L. Francione
Professor, Rutgers University

A “Bright Spot”?

The Paradigm Shift Requires Clarity About the Moral Baseline: Veganism

Gary L. Francione — Mon, 09 Jan 2012 14:03:54 +0000

If we are ever going to see a paradigm shift, we have to be clear about how we want the present paradigm to shift.

We must be clear that veganism is the unequivocal baseline of anything that deserves to be called an “animal rights” movement. If “animal rights” means anything, it means that we cannot morally justify any animal exploitation; we cannot justify treating animals as human resources, however “humane” that treatment may be.

We must stop thinking that people will find veganism “daunting” and that we have to promote something less than veganism. If we explain the moral ideas and the arguments in favor of veganism clearly, people will understand. They may not all go vegan immediately; in fact, most won’t. But we should always be clear about the moral baseline. If someone wants to do less as an incremental matter, let that be her/his decision, and not something that we advise to do. The baseline should always be clear. We should never be promoting “happy” or “humane” exploitation as morally acceptable.

The notion that we should promote “happy” or “humane” exploitation as “baby steps” ignores that welfare reforms do not result in providing significantly greater protection for animal interests; in fact, most of the time, animal welfare reforms do nothing more than make animal exploitation more economically productive by focusing on practices, such as gestation crates, the electrical stunning of chickens, or veal crates, that are economically inefficient in any event. Welfare reforms make animal exploitation more profitable by eliminating practices that are economically vulnerable. For the most part, those changes would happen anyway and in the absence of animal welfare campaigns precisely because they do rectify inefficiencies in the production process. And welfare reforms make the public more comfortable about animal exploitation. The “happy” meat/animal products movement is clear proof of that.

We would never advocate for “humane” or “happy” human slavery, rape, genocide, etc. So, if we believe that animals matter morally and that they have an interest not only in not suffering but in continuing to exist, we should not be putting our time and energy into advocating for “humane” or “happy” animal exploitation.

Welfare reforms and the whole “happy” exploitation movement are not “baby steps.” They are big steps–in a seriously backward direction.

There are some animal advocates who say that to maintain that veganism is the moral baseline is objectionable because it is “judgmental,” or constitutes a judgment that veganism is morally preferable to vegetarianism and a condemnation that vegetarians (or other consumers of animal products) are “bad” people. Yes to the first part; no to the second. There is no coherent distinction between flesh and other animal products. They are all the same and we cannot justify consuming any of them. To say that you do not eat flesh but that you eat dairy or eggs or whatever, or that you don’t wear fur but you wear leather or wool, is like saying that you eat the meat from spotted cows but not from brown cows; it makers no sense whatsoever. The supposed “line” between meat and everything else is just a fantasy–an arbitrary distinction that is made to enable some exploitation to be segmented off and regarded as “better” or as morally acceptable. This is not a condemnation of vegetarians who are not vegans; it is, however, a plea to those people to recognize their actions do not conform with a moral principle that they claim to accept and that all animal products are the result of imposing suffering and death on sentient beings. It is not a matter of judging individuals; it is, however, a matter of judging practices and institutions. And that is a necessary component of ethical living.

If we take the position that an assessment that veganism is morally preferable to vegetarianism is not possible because we are all “on our own journey,” then moral assessment becomes completely impossible or is speciesist. It is impossible because if we are all “on our own journey,” then there is nothing to say to the racist, sexist, anti-semite, homophobe, etc. If we say that those forms of discrimination are morally bad, but, with respect to animals, we are all “on our own journey” and we cannot make moral assessments about, for instance, dairy consumption, then we are simply being speciesist and not applying the same moral analysis to nonhumans that we apply to the human context.

When we discuss veganism with vegetarians or other consumers of animal products, we should never convey the message that we think that they are “bad” people. We should instead focus on how any form of animal exploitation is inconsistent with the moral principle that they themselves claim to hold: namely, that animals are members of the moral community and that the imposition of suffering and death on any member of that community–human or nonhuman–requires a compelling justification. And whatever constitutes a compelling justification, taste preferences, conveneience, fashion sense, etc., do not.

Finally, we should always be clear that animal exploitation is wrong because it involves speciesism. And speciesism is wrong because, like racism, sexism, homophobia, antisemitism, classism, and all other forms of human discrimination, speciesism involves violence inflicted on members of the moral community where that infliction of violence cannot be morally justified. But that means that those of us who oppose speciesism necessarily oppose discrimination against humans. It makes no sense to say that speciesism is wrong because it is like racism (or any other form of discrimination) but that we do not have a position about racism. We do. We should be opposed to it and we should always be clear about that.

Veganism is about nonviolence. It is about not engaging in harm to other sentient beings; to oneself; and to the environment upon which all beings depend for life. In my view, the animal rights movement is, at its core, a movement about ending violence to all sentient beings. It is a movement that seeks fundamental justice for all. It is an emerging peace movement that does not stop at the arbitrary line that separates humans from nonhumans. Changing a hierarchical paradigm of pervasive exploitation that has dominated for millenia requires a great deal of hard work. And that hard work requires clarity.

******

The World is Vegan! If you want it.

Gary L. Francione
Professor, Rutgers University

Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall: Right About British Rose Veal

Gary L. Francione — Sun, 08 Jan 2012 21:39:44 +0000

British celebrity chef Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall, promotes “happy” British Rose Veal. He’s not alone. Large animal welfare groups, such as the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals and Compassion in World Farming, ever eager to make the public feel better about continuing to exploit animals, are also promoting “happy” veal.

Fearnley-Whittingstall says: “To be honest, if you drink milk or eat cheese, it’s crueller not to eat it.”

He is completely correct.

The distinction between meat and other animal products is total nonsense. Vegetarianism is a morally incoherent position. If you regard animals as members of the moral community, you really don’t have a choice but to go vegan.

******

The World is Vegan! If you want it.

Gary L. Francione
Professor, Rutgers University

No related posts.

Animal Rights, Animal Welfare, and the Slavery Analogy

Gary L. Francione — Wed, 04 Jan 2012 16:02:45 +0000

Many vegans become irritated with non-vegans who claim to care morally about animals but who continue to consume them. The former will often invoke an analogy to human slavery. It goes like this: we all agree that the use of humans exclusively as resources—the condition known as human slavery—is morally abhorrent. Similarly, if people think that animals are members of the moral community, then we ought not to be treating them exclusively as resources either and we ought to oppose animal slavery. And if one opposes animal slavery, one adopts and promotes veganism.

Does the analogy work?

Yes and no. The slavery analogy, which I have been using for two decades now, is not particularly compelling if one maintains that nonhumans, unlike human slaves, only have an interest in not suffering and do not have an interest in continued life or in autonomy. And that is a core belief of the welfarist position going back to Bentham—that animals can suffer and have interests in not suffering but are cognitively different from us in that they are not self-aware and do not have an interest in continued existence. To put the matter another way: welfarists maintain that animals do not have an interest in not being slaves per se; they just have an interest in being “happy” slaves. That is the position promoted by Peter Singer, whose neo- or new-welfarist views are derived directly from Bentham. Therefore, it does not matter morally that we use animals but only how we use them. The moral issue is not use but treatment.

Add to this that most welfarists are utilitarians—they maintain that what is right or wrong is determined by what maximizes pleasure or happiness or interest satisfaction for all of those affected—and you end up with the view that as long as an animal does not suffer “too much,” and given that the animal does not have an interest in her life, her having lived a reasonably pleasant life and ended up on human plates is better than her not having lived at all. If we provide a reasonably pleasant life and relatively painless death for animals, we actually confer a benefit on them by bringing them into existence and using them as our resources.

Therefore, it is understandable that, if one is a welfarist, one does not accept the slavery analogy. “Happy” slavery is not only not a problem; it is a good thing. The problem with human slavery is that even “humane” forms of slavery violate fundamental human rights in continued existence, autonomy, etc. But if animals do not have those interests, then “humane” slavery may be just what is needed. And that is precisely the thinking that motivates the “happy” meat/animal products movement and the entire welfarist enterprise of trying to make animal use more “humane,” more “compassionate,” etc.

I have argued that this sort of thinking is problematic in at least two regards:

First, the notion that nonhuman animals do not have an interest in continued existence—that they do not have an interest in their lives—involves relying on a speciesist concept of what sort of self-awareness matters morally. I have argued that every sentient being necessarily has an interest in continued existence—every sentient being values her or his life—and that to say that only those animals (human animals) who have a particular sort of self-awareness have an interest in not being treated as commodities begs the fundamental moral question. Even if, as some maintain, nonhuman animals live in an “eternal present”—and I think that is empirically not the case at the very least for most of the nonhumans we routinely exploit who do have memories of the past and a sense of the future—they have, in each moment, an interest in continuing to exist. To say that this does not count morally is simply speciesist.

Second, even if animals do not have an interest in continuing to live and only have interests in not suffering, the notion that, as a practical matter, we will ever be able to accord those interests the morally required weight is simply fantasy. The notion that we property owners are ever going to accord any sort of significant weight to the interests of property in not suffering is simply unrealistic. Is it possible in theory? Yes. Is it possible as a matter of practicality in the real world. Absolutely not. Welfarists often talk about treating “farmed animals” in the way that we treat dogs and cats whom we love and regard as members of our family. Does anyone really think that is practically possible? The fact that we would not think of eating our dogs and cats is some indication that it is not.

Moreover, a central thesis of my work has been that because animals are chattel property—they are economic commodities—we will generally protect animal interests only when we get an economic benefit from doing so. This means that the standard of animal welfare will always be very low (as it presently and despite all of the “happy” and “compassionate” exploitation nonsense) and welfare reforms will generally increase production efficiency; that is, we will protect animal interests in situations where treatment is economically inefficient and welfare reforms will, for the most part, do little more than correct those inefficiencies. For example, the use of gestation crates for sows is economically inefficient; there are supposedly more “humane” alternatives that actually increase production efficiency. Similarly, “gassing” chickens is more economically efficient than electrical stunning.

So I understand why welfarists have a problem with the slavery analogy. I think that they are wrong in multiple respects but they never really engage the arguments. Instead, they claim that I am “divisive” and “do not care about animals suffering now” because I make these arguments. Some get even more dramatic.

The rights paradigm, which, as I interpret it, morally requires the abolition of animal exploitation and requires veganism as a matter of fundamental justice, is radically different from the welfarist paradigm, which, in theory focuses on reducing suffering, and, in reality, focuses on tidying up animal exploitation at its economically inefficient edges. In science, those who subscribe to one paradigm are often unable to understand and engage those who subscribe to another paradigm precisely because the theoretical language that they use is not compatible.

I think that the situation is similar in the context of the debate between animal rights and animal welfare. And that is why welfarists simply cannot understand or accept the slavery analogy.

******

The World is Vegan! If you want it.

Gary L. Francione
Professor, Rutgers University

Celebrate Peace This Holiday Season

Gary L. Francione — Tue, 20 Dec 2011 13:52:42 +0000

I often hear from people that they feel overwhelmed by the poverty and violence of modern life.

We are certainly living in difficult and challenging times. But that does not mean that we cannot make a difference. We can.

Here are three suggestions to help you to celebrate peace this holiday season:

First, don’t consume. Take the money that you plan to spend on acquiring more junk that you don’t need and give that money to someone or to a family who needs help in these very difficult times. Or use that money to provide vegan food or non-wool blankets to those at a local Occupy site.

Second, if you are not vegan, go vegan and stop eating, wearing, or consuming animal products. There is no justification for it. And spend a portion of each day engaged in creative, non-violent vegan education. Educational efforts can take many different forms.

Third, adopt a homeless animal. There are so many who need you. If you do not have the room or resources for a dog or cat, adopt a hamster, rabbit, or fish. There is a nonhuman refugee out there who will fit with your life. And if you adopt one (or more), you will not only save the life of another, but you will enrich your own life immeasurably.

Gary L. Francione
Professor, Rutgers University

Commentary #22: The Peace Advocacy Network and the Vegan Pledge Campaign

Debate on Animal Rights with Libertarian Philosopher Tibor Machan

Gary L. Francione — Mon, 05 Dec 2011 05:07:59 +0000

On Thursday, January 12, 2012, the Rutgers Federalist Society is sponsoring a debate between me and libertarian philosopher Tibor Machan. Machan holds the R. C. Hoiles Chair of Business Ethics and Free Enterprise at the Argyros School of Business & Economics at Chapman University in Orange, California. He is a research fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University, and an adjunct scholar at the Cato Institute.

Machan is a prominent opponent of animal rights.

The debate will take place at Rutgers University School of Law in Newark, New Jersey.

I hope to be able to post a video of the debate here.

************

If you are not vegan, please consider going vegan. It’s easy to go vegan; it’s better for your health and for the planet; and, most important, it’s the morally right thing to do.

The World is Vegan! If you want it.

Gary L. Francione
Professor, Rutgers University

Killing Animals and Making Animals Suffer

Gary L. Francione — Tue, 22 Nov 2011 05:06:49 +0000

The basis of the animal welfare movement, stretching from its inception in the 19th century until the present day, is that animal use is itself acceptable because animals do not have an interest in continuing to live. According to welfarists, nonhuman animals are not self-aware and cognitively sophisticated in the way that humans are. This means that the lives of nonhumans are less valuable than the lives of humans. According to Peter Singer:

While self-awareness, the capacity to think ahead and have hopes and aspirations for the future, the capacity for meaningful relations with others and so on are not relevant to the question of inflicting pain . . . these capacities are relevant to the question of taking life. It is not arbitrary to hold that the life of a self-aware being, capable of abstract thought, of planning for the future, of complex acts of communication, and so on, is more valuable than the life of a being without these capacities.

Welfarists distinguish between killing, which is itself not morally objectionable, and the imposition of “unnecessary” suffering, which is morally objectionable. If we give animals a reasonably pleasant life and a relatively painless death, then our exploitation of animals may be morally acceptable. Again, according to Singer:

If it is the infliction of suffering that we are concerned about, rather than killing, then I can also imagine a world in which people mostly eat plant foods, but occasionally treat themselves to the luxury of free range eggs, or possibly even meat from animals who live good lives under conditions natural for their species, and are then humanely killed on the farm.

It is this sort of thinking that has given impetus to the “happy” meat/animal products movement that is promoted by Singer and virtually all of the large animal organizations in the U.S. and Europe. Using animals is not the problem; the problem is animal suffering. If we decrease suffering through welfare reforms, then we make animal exploitation less morally objectionable. The public can continue to consume animals and feel good about being “compassionate.”

We should not be surprised that more and more people feel comfortable about consuming animal products. After all, they are being assured by the “experts” that suffering is being decreased and they can buy “happy” meat, “free-range” eggs, etc.. These products even come with labels approved of by animal organizations. The animal welfare movement is actually encouraging the “compassionate” consumption of animal products.

Animal welfare reforms do very little to increase the protection given to animal interests because of the economics involved: animals are property. They are things that have no intrinsic or moral value. This means that welfare standards, whether for animals used as foods, in experiments, or for any other purpose, will be low and linked to the level of welfare needed to exploit the animal in an economically efficient way for the particular purpose. Put simply, we generally protect animal interests only to the extent we get an economic benefit from doing so. The concept of “unnecessary” suffering is understood as that level of suffering that will frustrate the particular use. And that can be a great deal of suffering.

But the animal welfare position that that it is the suffering of animals and not their killing per se that raises a moral question begs a very important question: it assumes that because animal minds are different from human minds, animals, unlike humans, do not have the sort of self-awareness that translates into having an interest in continuing to live. The welfare position necessarily assumes that animal life has a lesser moral value than does human life. And welfarists explicitly agree with this, as is clear in my book, The Animal Rights Debate: Abolition or Regulation?

A major focus of my work has been to challenge that welfarist assumption and to argue that the only non-speciesist position to take is that any sentient being–any being who is perceptually aware and has subjective states of awareness–has an interest in continuing to live. Any other view accords an arbitrary preference to human cognition. It is speciesist to maintain that animal life has a a lesser value than human life. This does not necessarily mean that we must treat nonhumans the way we treat humans for all purposes. It does, however, mean that for the purpose of being treated exclusively as a resource for others, all sentient beings are equal and we cannot justify treating any sentient being as a resource.

If animals have an interest in continuing to live, as I maintain they do simply by virtue of being sentient, and if that interest matters morally, which I argue that it must do, then there is only one plausible conclusion: any use–however “humane”–is unjust.

If you are not vegan, please consider going vegan. It’s easy to go vegan; it’s better for your health and for the planet; and, most important, it’s the morally right thing to do.

And please remember: Animal welfare reforms do little, if anything, to reduce animal suffering. But, in any event, the important point is that veganism is not just a matter of reducing suffering; it’s a matter of fundamental moral justice. It is what we owe to those who, like us, value their lives and who want to continue to live.

The World is Vegan! If you want it.

Gary L. Francione
Professor, Rutgers University

Got Faith (in Animal Welfare)?

Gary L. Francione — Sun, 02 Oct 2011 16:44:20 +0000

I reject animal welfare reform and single-issue campaigns because they are not only inconsistent with the claims of justice that we should be making if we really believe that animal exploitation is wrong, but because these approaches cannot work as a practical matter. Animals are property and it costs money to protect their interests; therefore, the level of protection accorded to animal interests will always be low and animals will, under the best of circumstances, still be treated in ways that would constitute torture if applied to humans.

By endorsing welfare reforms that supposedly make exploitation more “compassionate” or single-issue campaigns that falsely suggest that there is a coherent moral distinction between meat and dairy or between fur and wool or between steak and foie gras, we betray the principle of justice that says that all sentient beings are equal for purposes of not being used exclusively as human resources. And, on a practical level, we do nothing more than make people feel better about animal exploitation.

I maintain that those who believe that animals are members of the moral community should, instead, make clear that veganism, defined as not eating, wearing, or using animals, is the non-negotiable, unequivocal moral baseline and should put their labor and resources into grassroots vegan education that may take a myriad of creative forms but should never involve violence.

Those who are critical of my view argue that my position on the need for creative, nonviolent vegan advocacy requires some sort of faith that such an approach will work.

I find that criticism to be ironic in that it would seem that if any position requires faith, defined as a belief that is maintained in the face of all extant empirical evidence, it is that welfare reform and single-issue campaigns will lead anywhere but to more animal exploitation.

Animal Welfare: Why?

Why does anyone believe that welfare reform will lead to abolition? If we look at the history of animal welfare reform, we see that most reforms are minor, most are not even enforced, and most actually increase production efficiency and provide economic benefits to producers. We have had the animal welfare paradigm for 200 years now and we are exploiting more animals now in more horrific ways than at any time in human history.

Why does anyone believe that promoting “happy” exploitation is going to lead to the abolition of exploitation? Use your common sense. “Happy” exploitation won’t lead anywhere but to a public that feels better about particular forms of animal exploitation. If that were not the case, the animal exploitation industries, in partnership with the large animal welfare corporations, would not be investing all the resources that they are investing in “happy” exploitation campaigns and labels.

Why does anyone believe that by continuing to reinforce and strengthen the paradigm that treats animals as property, we will eventually abolish animal exploitation?

Why does anyone believe that single-issue campaigns will lead to the abolition of exploitation? Just take a look at long standing single-issue campaigns, such as the anti-fur campaign. That campaign has been going for decades and the fur industry is stronger than it has ever been. Why? Because there is no principled basis that can serve to distinguish fur from wool or leather, or to distinguish wearing animals from eating them. As long as people do not understand and accept the general moral principle, they will fail to see the problem of specific uses. And it is no answer to say, as many advocates do, that fur represents a gratuitous use of animals. So does eating animals. We eat animals because they taste good. And palate pleasure is no better a justification than is fashion.

As I have written elsewhere, supporters of welfare reform never address these questions; they just declare that any criticism is “divisive” or that any alternative is “too idealistic.” In other words, they have nothing to say.

Veganism as a Moral Baseline: Why Not?

The appeal of creative, nonviolent vegan advocacy is that it challenges people to apply a moral principle that most people already accept and claim to view as important: that it is morally wrong to inflict suffering and death on animals unless it is necessary, and pleasure, amusement, and convenience cannot suffice to demonstrate necessity. When people are confronted with the argument that criticizing Michael Vick for dog fighting does not make sense if we are eating animals or animal products, or with the similarity between the animals whom they love and those they eat or wear, they may not all become vegan immediately, but we have at least gotten them to start thinking about the general issue of animal use in moral terms. And to the extent that the argument resonates–and it will resonate for many–they will begin to assess matters of animal ethics in a different way.

If, as I maintain, we cannot justify the use, however “humane,” of animals, then we ought to be clear about that. We ought to be clear that we cannot justify eating, wearing, or using animals. Period. If those who are concerned about the issue are not yet willing to give up animal use and go vegan, they can take whatever incremental steps they want. But those incremental steps should never be characterized as normatively desirable if we really believe that animal use is unjust. Just as we would never say that “humane” or “happy” sexism or racism is acceptable, we should never characterize “humane” or “happy” meat or dairy or whatever as morally acceptable.

Finally, promoting veganism as a moral baseline is no more a matter of moral “purity” than is promoting justice where humans are concerned. We are told that even if we go vegan, we cannot avoid causing harm to nonhumans. That is true. Living in the world and engaging in any sort of action necessarily has adverse consequences for others, humans and nonhumans alike. We should, of course, endeavor to cause the least amount of harm that we can to all sentient beings. But the fact that we cannot avoid all harm does not mean that we should not at least stop all intentional harm that we inflict on sentient nonhumans just as the fact that we cannot eliminate all violence in the world means that it is morally acceptable for us to murder other humans.

If we are ever to abandon the property paradigm, we need to get people to recognize that animal use, however “humane,” cannot be justified morally. I am confident that creative, nonviolent vegan advocacy is not only consistent with the claim of justice that is entailed, in my view, by the animal rights position, but that it is the best way to achieve the goal of shifting away from the property paradigm and toward the notion of animals as moral persons.

Those grassroots advocates who are engaged in creative, nonviolent vegan education all report that the results are astounding; that people react and react positively.

And I am certain that any belief that welfare reform, single-issue campaigns, “happy” exploitation, etc. will take us anywhere but to a greater level of comfort about animal exploitation requires a particularly blind form of faith.

******

If you are not vegan, please consider going vegan. It’s easy to go vegan; it’s better for your health and for the planet; and, most important, it’s the morally right thing to do.

If you are vegan, educate everyone with whom you come in contact in a creative, nonviolent way about veganism. If we really do regard animals as members of the moral community; if we really believe that we cannot justify unnecessary animal suffering and death, then we cannot justify billions of animal death based on palate pleasure.

And please remember: veganism is not just a matter of reducing suffering; it’s a matter of fundamental moral justice. It is what we owe to those who, like us, value their lives and who want to continue to live.

The World is Vegan! If you want it.

Gary L. Francione
©2011 Gary L. Francione

A Note on Humanlike Intelligence and Moral Value

Gary L. Francione — Sun, 02 Oct 2011 14:48:59 +0000

We frequently see news stories reporting that scientists have determined that nonhuman animals have certain cognitive characteristics that we associate with human intelligence. The implication of this is that if nonhuman animals have humanlike intelligence, then they have greater moral value; the “smarter” they are, in human terms, the more morally valuable they are.

This approach is problematic for a number of reasons:

First, there is absolutely no logical relationship between the possession of humanlike intelligence and the morality of using animals as resources. Possession of humanlike intelligence may indicate that certain animals have interests that other animals may not have. Nonhuman great apes, who do possess humanlike intelligence in many respects, may have interests that dogs or fish do not have. But nonhuman great apes, dogs, and fish all have an interest in not being treated as resources simply by virtue of being sentient, or having subjective awareness. All sentient beings have an interest in not suffering and in continuing to live and these interests are necessarily defeated by their being treated as human resources.

We proclaim human intelligence to be morally valuable per se because we are human. If we were birds, we would proclaim the ability to fly as morally valuable per se. If we were fish, we would proclaim the ability to live underwater as morally valuable per se. But apart from our obviously self-interested proclamations, there is nothing morally valuable per se about human intelligence.

Second, to the extent that we claim that humanlike intelligence is morally relevant, then we are necessarily stuck with the idea that humans with greater intelligence are more morally valuable than humans with less intelligence. It is true; we may not treat all humans alike. We pay a brain surgeon more than a janitor because we value the former’s skill more. But even assuming that differential resource allocation is legitimate, would we say that the janitor is worth less than the surgeon for purposes of deciding who should be used as a forced organ donor or as an unwilling participant in a painful experiment? Of course not. For purposes of being used exclusively as a resource for others, both are equal.

And, unless we want to be speciesist, we must conclude that all sentients–human or nonhuman–are equal for purpose of not being treated as resources.

Third, the “smarts” game is one that nonhuman animals can never win. We have known for decades that nonhuman great apes have humanlike intelligence, which should come as no surprise given the genetic similarity between humans and nonhuman great apes. It is not likely that any other nonhuman animals will ever exhibit a greater degree of humanlike intelligence. And yet, we continue to exploit the nonhuman great apes (and many other nonhuman primates) in all sorts of ways.

The “smarts” game is just that–a game. It is yet another reason not to accord animals moral significance today in favor of more silly (and harmful) research to determine whether animals can solve human math puzzles and perform other tasks that have no moral relevance.

We already know everything we need to know to come to the conclusion that we cannot justify eating, wearing, or using animals–that, like us, animals are sentient. They are subjectively aware. They have interests in not suffering and continuing to live.

Nothing more is needed.

**********

If you are not vegan, please consider going vegan. It’s easy to do so; it’s better for your health and for the planet; and, most important, it’s the morally right thing to do.

If you are vegan, educate everyone with whom you come in contact in a creative, nonviolent way about veganism.

The World is Vegan! If you want it.

Gary L. Francione
©2011 Gary L. Francione

The HSUS-United Egg Producer Agreement: Two Reactions

Gary L. Francione — Tue, 12 Jul 2011 14:16:24 +0000

On July 7, 2011, the Humane Society of the United States and United Egg Producers announced that they would “work together to seek a federal law that would require larger cages and other improved conditions for the nation’s 280 million laying hens.”

The proposed legislation, if passed, will be phased in over the next 18 years and will require:

cages that give hens up to 144 square inches of space each, compared with the 67 square inches that most hens have today. They would also include so-called habitat enrichments, like perches, scratching areas and nesting areas, that allow the birds to express natural behavior.

What will HSUS give as its part of the compromise agreement? HSUS has

agreed to give up on a push to ban cages entirely in exchange for the opportunity to work toward a single, nationwide standard mandating better conditions. The group also said it would shelve efforts to get initiatives onto the ballot in Washington and Oregon, and would agree not to conduct undercover investigations at large egg farms unless it was aware of especially egregious practices.

HSUS calls this “historic”. There will, of course, be a big campaign to get the legislation passed and there will, of course, be all sorts of legal challenges. The “compassion show” will go on for years. The requests for donations “to help the animals” will be endless.

And the best case scenario is that the bill is introduced and passed quickly. What would the hens gain? They would get 124-144 square inches of space in an “enriched” cage, phased in over 18 years, and the “happy” eggs that they produce will have the stamp of approval of HSUS. This situation is analogous to those opposed to water boarding announcing that they had made an agreement to phase in padded water boards over an 18-year period.

There have been two very opposite reactions on the part of animal advocates to this HSUS-UEP agreement.

First, some advocates are criticizing HSUS, claiming that this agreement is a sell-out. They are correct that this is a disaster for animals but, in all fairness, what can one expect from the Humane Society?

HSUS explicitly denies that it endorses animal rights or the abolition of animal exploitation. On the contrary, HSUS supports the Humane Farm Animal Care’s Certified Humane Raised and Handled “happy meat” label and two high-level HSUS executives sit on the board of Humane Farm Animal Care.

Humane Society International (HSI), is an affiliate of HSUS and the CEO of HSI is an HSUS executive. One HSI branch in Australia, which describes itself as “the global arm of HSUS,” sponsors a “happy meat” label for which it charges a fee.

HSUS CEO Wayne Pacelle acknowledges that “the Humane Society is broad-minded when it comes to food. About 95 percent of our members are not vegetarian.” He adds:

But I believe eating is a moral act, and we can make choices to minimize the suffering of (food) animals. We can buy cage-free eggs, buy pork that doesn’t come from factory farms, and avoid eating veal and foie gras.

and

Our program is about responsible hunting and curbing the worst excesses and the most inhumane and unsporting practices.

Sportfishing is not an issue, unless someone did something horrible, like dynamiting fish. Most of the work we’ve done in the marine realm has been protecting marine mammals and seabirds.

Pacelle also states:

Our board of directors is a national volunteer board of directors. Very few of them are vegetarian. I have been since I’ve been a teenager. Whatever I do in my personal life does not necessarily reflect the policies of HSUS and we support certified humane programs, we support other farmers, we work with farmers, we think farming is a noble profession.

I don’t think anyone can reasonably claim that our work is moving in the direction of eliminating animal agriculture as some of the folks in the industry keep repeating.

So joining forces with the egg industry to produce and promote “happy” eggs fits comfortably with what HSUS has been doing for decades. The HSUS-UEP agreement merely confirms-again-that HSUS is all about making deals with industry and making their non-vegetarian members feel that they are engaging in morally acceptable behavior when they buy the “happy” meat and dairy and eggs approved by HSUS.

What HSUS is doing is applying the meaningless concept of “humane” exploitation as it has been applied for the past 200 years. The only difference between HSUS 50 years ago and HSUS now is that HSUS today is promoting its philosophy of “feel good” exploitation to farm animals whereas 50 years ago, they were focused primarily on the animals that we fetishize as a cultural matter: dogs and cats.

The second reaction on the part of animal advocates who claim to be more progressive than HSUS to agree with HSUS that this agreement is some sort of “historic” event; a “landmark” for animals; a “step” toward animal rights.

That is just plain silly. “Enriched” cages involve torturing hens. Period. The torture may be slightly “better,” just as padded water boards may be slightly “better.” But let’s be clear: the hens will continue to be tortured. And they will continue to end up in a slaughterhouse. The only difference is that these tortured eggs will be declared to be “humane” by HSUS. This agreement will be counterproductive in that it will encourage the belief that we can exploit animals in a “kind” or “compassionate” way.

Many animal advocates claim that people are going to continue to eat eggs so we have to do something for animals suffering now. But this agreement, like most of the “happy” exploitation arrangements promoted by HSUS and other organizations, including those who claim to be “animal rights” groups, does not take effect for many years-in this case, 18 years. To the extent that this agreement provides any benefit for animals, it will not occur for many, many years. And even if “enriched cages” provide some welfare benefit, this sort of “reform” makes the public more comfortable about consuming eggs and that guarantees continued consumption.

The problem is that although we should expect nothing more from the “Humane” Society, other organizations that claim to promote animal rights, and ostensibly to endorse the abolition of animal exploitation, also support these sorts of agreements. Virtually all of the large animal groups in the United States and Europe have come out in support of one or more “happy” labels and virtually all are busy making deals with institutional animal users. And supposedly more progressive organizations have already come out in favor of the HSUS-UEP. Indeed, Farm Sanctuary is trying to claim credit, along with HSUS, for the agreement.

The only way that the paradigm of animal exploitation will ever shift is if we educate people to stop demanding animal products based on the recognition that animals are members of the moral community. That goal is not as idealistic as it might appear: most people agree that it is wrong to inflict “unnecessary” suffering or death on animals. They understand that this moral principle excludes suffering or death for reasons of pleasure or convenience or habit. That is why there was such a strongly negative reaction to Michael Vick’s use of dogs for fighting. Vick’s pleasure in watching dogs fight did not justify his infliction of suffering and death on the dogs. The same reasoning applies to our eating animals. There is no difference between sitting around the pit watching dogs fight and sitting around a summer barbecue roasting the corpses of tortured animals or enjoying the dairy or eggs from tortured animals.

We need to educate people that our continued exploitation of animals for food, clothing, entertainment, etc., is unjust; that it is not merely a matter of how we treat animals, but that we use them at all. The reaction to Vick teaches us clearly that people, or at least many people, can understand this idea and accept it. We need to get them to apply it to animals beyond dogs or cats. That can be done through creative, nonviolent education.

The only way that things will ever change is if we build a movement of people who see veganism as a clear moral baseline and where that movement can serve as a catalyst to shift the paradigm away from thinking of nonhumans as commodities for us to use exclusively as means to our ends.

And that will never happen as long as we think that “happy” exploitation is any sort of answer. The belief that “happy” exploitation will result in significant welfare benefits for animals and that this will lead to abolition in the future is simply wrong on both counts.

In conclusion: those who criticize HSUS for making such an agreement should recognize that this sort of thing is exactly what HSUS has been doing forever. It is the “Humane” Society. And “humane” is a meaningless concept in a context in which animals are chattel property. HSUS exists to make people who exploit animals feel better about exploitation. And those who claim that this is a “landmark” agreement for animals and will lead to significant welfare benefits in the near term and reduced use or abolition in the future, should recognize that promoting the notion of “compassionate” exploitation will never-can never-lead to the rejection of animal use. It will only reinforce and perpetuate that use.

Please understand that I in no way question the sincerity of those who support these partnerships with industry or the welfare reforms that are involved. I do, however, believe sincerely that they are wrong.

******

If you are not vegan, please consider going vegan. It’s easy to go vegan; it’s better for your health and for the planet; and, most important, it’s the morally right thing to do.

The World is Vegan! If you want it.

Gary L. Francione
©2011 Gary L. Francione

The Absurdity of Competing “Humane” Labels: HSUS v. Perdue

Animal Care and Control: The Sad Failure of New York City’s Municipal Shelter System

Gary L. Francione — Thu, 19 May 2011 17:44:19 +0000

Dear Colleagues:

Animal Care and Control of New York City, which has operated New York’s municipal animal shelter system since 1995, is an institution plagued with problems. There are shocking allegations of animal abuse and neglect, including a recent report that ACC killed eight puppies who would have been taken and placed by rescue groups.

The behavioral assessment program, which includes taking away food or a toy from a hungry or stressed dog, or seeing how a stressed dog reacts when confronted by another dog, raises significant doubt about whether potential adopters are given anything like an accurate picture about how dogs will behave once they are adopted.

ACC provides a list of dogs and cats who are going to be destroyed between 5:00 p.m. and 6:00 p.m. on the eve of the day that they will be killed. ACC closes at 8:00 p.m. and re-opens in the morning at 8:00 a.m. but it is difficult, if not impossible, to get through on the phone. Killing starts at around 10 a.m. or 11:00 a.m. Rescue groups and adopters are given virtually no time to get animals out of the three shelters operated by ACC. Every night, there is a frantic attempt to save lives and although many animals are saved by rescue groups despite the restrictive and unreasonable policies of ACC, many healthy animals are killed.

A story that appeared on May 16, 2011 provides a troubling insight into the ACC. Emily Tanen was an employee with the ACC program that supposedly acts as a liason between the ACC and rescue groups:

Emily took it upon herself to photograph all of the dogs at the shelter facility – she had a special knack for capturing the inner beauty of her subjects.

Because of her touching, soulful photos, many otherwise “hard to place” or even “unadoptable” dogs were rescued.

But apparently, her beautiful photos of homeless dogs included something that the “powers that be” of the NY Animal Care and Control did not want – photos of dogs receiving human contact.

Her amazing images were often the difference between life and death – for dogs that have no ability to speak on their own behalf, the touching photos were frequently the key to a life-saving rescue….

Images that touched the heart – images that elicited enough feeling from those that viewed them that a life could literally be saved.

But now she is gone from the facility – a powerful advocate for the voiceless animals is no longer there to help.

Drab, dreary, emotionless photos are all that will remain.

I understand that running an animal shelter in a place like New York City is difficult for those with the very best of intentions. But it is becoming increasingly apparent that ACC has a number of policies and practices that appear to be counterproductive at best. And, if even a fraction of the allegations of neglect at ACC are true, then ACC is a hell hole for the animals who are unfortunate enough to find themselves there.

It is never morally justifiable to kill a healthy animal and one healthy animal killed at ACC or any animal shelter is one animal too many. ACC is not only killing hundreds of animals per month, but seems to be in a rush to do so and to do whatever it can to frustrate the efforts of rescue groups and committed people, such as Emily Tanen, to save these animals. Moreover, ACC places a terrible burden on rescue groups, forcing them to engage in a daily frantic rush to save whatever animals they can.

It is high time for there to be better control of New York’s Animal Care and Control. And it is time for New York City shift toward a progressive no-kill shelter situation. This can be achieved if New Yorkers have political will to make it happen.

**********
If you are not vegan, go vegan. It’s easy; it’s better for your health and for the planet. But, most important, it’s the morally right thing to do. If you are vegan, educate everyone you can about veganism.

And if you can, please adopt or foster a homeless animal. There are so many who need your help. If you do not have the room or resources for a dog or cat or rabbit, there are many smaller animals, such as mice, rats, turtles, and fish, who also need homes. If you have land, there are also many larger animals and farm animals, who need homes.

Caring for individual nonhuman animals is an important part of what animal rights is all about. And if you are involved in animal rescue, remember that there is no difference between the animal you save and the animal you eat.

If you have a companion animal, please make sure that the animal does not reproduce. We do not need any more domesticated animals coming into existence!

The World is Vegan! If you want it.

Gary L. Francione
©2011 Gary L. Francione

Added May 23:

New York Assemblyperson Micah Zellner has proposed legislation that would broaden the ability of rescue groups to get animals out of ACC. Here is a story about Mr. Zellner’s proposal.

New Interview from the Documentary Project, “I’m Vegan”

Gary L. Francione — Sat, 30 Apr 2011 19:37:56 +0000

Dear Colleagues:

In March of 2009, Eric Prescott of the Boston Vegan Association stopped by and spoke with me for about 2 hours. Eric quite skillfully edited the interview to about 20 minutes and he just made it available.

Also featured is my rescued friend, Katie Jane!

**********

If you are not vegan, go vegan. It’s easy; it’s better for your health and for the planet. But, most important, it’s the morally right thing to do. If you are vegan, educate everyone you can about veganism.

The World is Vegan! If you want it.

The Abolitionist Approach in a Nutshell

Gary L. Francione — Thu, 21 Apr 2011 12:26:53 +0000

Dear Colleagues:

As long as we think the issue is the treatment of animals, we will seek to make that treatment more “humane.” But because animals are property, that goal is unreachable as a practical matter. The treatment of animals will always constitute torture under the most “humane” circumstances. And the “treatment” (or welfarist) approach ignores that it is morally wrong to kill animals even if we treat them “humanely,” which we cannot do anyway. Welfare “reforms” not only fail to provide any significant protection for animals; such reforms actually make matters worse because they encourage the public to feel more comfortable about animal exploitation and to continue to consume animals and animal products. The problem is use, not treatment. The goal is to abolish animal use, not to regulate treatment. The means to the goal? Go vegan and educate others about veganism.

**********

The World is Vegan! If you want it.

Upcoming Debate: Abolition vs. Regulation

Gary L. Francione — Thu, 14 Apr 2011 17:11:09 +0000

Dear Colleagues:

This Sunday, April 17, I will debate Professor Robert Garner on Animals Today Radio. Robert and I will talk about abolition vs. regulation, the distinction between use and treatment, the moral value of animal life, the property status of animals, veganism and other topics that we discuss in our book, The Animal Rights Debate: Abolition or Regulation?, published by Columbia University Press. The show will air 5-6 p.m. (eastern) and will be archived.

If you are not vegan, go vegan. It’s easy; it’s better for your health and for the planet. But, most important, it’s the morally right thing to do.

The World is Vegan! If you want it.

What Michael Vick Taught Us

Gary L. Francione — Wed, 06 Apr 2011 14:09:02 +0000

What follows is an edited version of the text of my presentation at Hobart and William Smith Colleges on March 31, 2011 as the 2011 Foster P. Boswell Distinguished Lecturer in Philosophy:

WHAT MICHAL VICK TAUGHT US

Remember Michael Vick?

Do you remember all the commotion about Atlanta Falcons quarterback Michael Vick and his involvement in a dog fighting operation on some property he owned in Virginia?

Of course you do.

A better question would be to ask whether there is anyone on the planet who does not recall this matter, which was covered by the media nonstop for weeks when it first came to light in 2007 and, again, when Vick came out of prison in 2009 and signed with the Philadelphia Eagles. Vick continues to be in the news regularly. In March 2011, he was going to be recognized as a ‘hero’ by a local arts organization in Virginia and there was such controversy about the matter that Vick did not attend the ceremony. People really were furious with Vick and many still are. There are football fanatics who boycott the Eagles because of Vick.

Why?

The answer is simple: Because Vick did a barbaric thing; he caused dogs to suffer and die for no good reason. Vick may have enjoyed the ‘sport’ of dog fighting but that simply was not a good enough reason for what he did.

Why not?

Again, the answer is simple. Although there is a great deal of disagreement about moral issues, no one disagrees with the notion that it’s wrong to inflict unnecessary suffering or death on a human or an animal. We need a good reason to inflict suffering or death on a human or animal. We might disagree about whether necessity exists in any given situation and what constitutes a good reason, but we would all agree that enjoyment or pleasure cannot constitute necessity or serve as a good reason. This is part of our conventional moral wisdom.

Consider an example from the human context. If a person said that she believed that it was morally wrong to inflict unnecessary suffering on children but that beating children for pleasure was morally acceptable, we would understandably be confused. If enjoyment can suffice as a good reason to beat children, then there’s no bad reason to beat children. The principle that it’s wrong to inflict unnecessary suffering on children would be meaningless.

The same analysis would apply if we talked about someone beating a dog rather than beating a child. No one would disagree that beating a dog for pleasure was morally wrong. And this is precisely why we all objected to what Michael Vick did; he did not have a good reason for what he did.

Well, We’re All Michael Vick

The problem is that eating animals is, as a matter of moral analysis, no different from dog fighting.

We kill and eat more than 56 billion animals a year worldwide, not counting fish. No one doubts that using animals for food results in suffering, even under the best, most ‘humane’ circumstances, results in terrible suffering and death. So let’s apply the analysis that we all agreed was uncontroversial just a moment ago: have we got a good reason for this suffering and death? Is there anything that is plausibly considered as necessity involved?

The short answer is: no.

We don’t need to eat animals. No one maintains that it’s medically necessary to eat animal foods. The conservative American Dietetic Association acknowledges that

appropriately planned vegetarian diets, including total vegetarian or vegan diets, are healthful, nutritionally adequate and may provide health benefits in the prevention and treatment of certain diseases.

Mainstream medical people are, with increasing frequency, pointing out that animal products are detrimental to human health. But whether or not you agree with them, there is certainly no argument that animal foods are necessary for optimal health.

There is also consensus that animal agriculture is an ecological disaster. It takes 16 pounds of grain and soy to produce a pound of beef; 6 pounds to produce a pound of pork; 4 pounds to produce a pound of turkey; and 3 pounds to produce a pound of chicken or a pound of eggs. It takes between 20 and 50 gallons of water to produce a pound of vegetables or fruit; it takes 2,500 gallons to produce a pound of meat and almost 1,000 gallons of water to produce one gallon of milk. It takes 3.25 acres of land to produce animal-derived food for one person on a continuing basis. Only 1/6 acre is needed to provide food on a continuing basis for someone who only eats plants.

The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization maintains that animal agriculture contributes more greenhouse gas, which is linked to global warming, to the atmosphere than does burning fossil fuel for transportation. Animal agriculture is responsible for water pollution, deforestation, soil erosion, and all sorts of unhappy environmental consequences. Again, you may dispute all of this but not even the craziest global-warming denier would maintain that animal agriculture is doing anything good for the environment.

So, in the end, what’s the best justification that we have for imposing suffering and death on 56 billion animals a year for food?

The answer: they taste good. We enjoy the taste of animal flesh and animal products. We find eating animal foods to be convenient. There is nothing here that remotely resembles necessity.

How is that any different from Michael Vick?

The answer: it isn’t. Vick liked sitting around a pit watching animals fight. The rest of us like sitting around a barbecue pit roasting the corpses of animals who have been treated as badly, if not worse, than Vick’s dogs.

In 2009, when Vick signed with the Eagles, someone said to me that although he was a big Eagles fan and would continue to go to their games, he could never enjoy watching Vick play because of the dog fighting issue. I asked him whether he ate hot dogs and hamburgers when he attended football games. He replied that he did. I pointed out to him that the animals used to make the products he enjoyed had lives and deaths every bit as bad as Vick’s dogs.

He did not have an answer because there really isn’t anything to say.

It doesn’t work to claim that Vick participated directly in the dog fighting and we just buy animal products at the store; that we enjoy the results of animal suffering and death, but, unlike Vick, we don’t enjoy the actual process of suffering and death. As any first-law student will tell you, if Mike has an aversion to violence but wants Joe dead and hires Sally to pull the trigger, Mike is still guilty of murder. The fact that we pay others to impose the suffering and death on animals does not get us off the moral hook any more than it would get us off the legal one.

It also does not work to say that eating animals is a tradition. Animal fighting is a tradition as well. And, by the way, so are sexism, racism, and just about any other form of discrimination. Tradition, like pleasure, is an inadequate reason for imposing harm on anyone.

But We’re a ‘Humane’ Society, Aren’t We?

So what’s wrong? Why do we continue to participate in the infliction of suffering and death on billions of animals when we have no good reason to do so?

A good part of the answer is that because we want to continue consuming animal products, we delude ourselves into thinking that the solution to the moral problem does not require that we stop eating animals; it only requires that we treat and slaughter them in a ‘humane’ way.

This view goes back about 200 years when British social reformers, such as philosopher and lawyer Jeremy Bentham, made the argument that our moral obligations to animals did not depend on whether they were rational, could speak, or had other ‘special’ characteristics that we regard as exclusive to humans. Rather, the only thing that mattered was that animals could suffer and no one—with the possible exception of Descartes—doubted that animals were sentient, or perceptually aware, and could, indeed, suffer. Bentham argued that because animals could suffer, we had an obligation that we owed directly to animals to give moral weight to that suffering.

Bentham was no doubt aware that the animals we used for food suffered a great deal. He did not, however, advocate that we stop eating animals. Why not? Because, according to Bentham, animals are not self-aware; they do not care whether we kill them and eat them or use them for milk, eggs, etc. They just care about how we treat them while they are alive and how we kill them when the time comes and so it was not necessary to stop using animals; it was necessary only to treat them reasonably well.

And thus was born the animal welfare movement, the central premise of which is that it is morally acceptable for us to use animals as long as we treat them ‘humanely’ and do not impose ‘unnecessary’ suffering on them. This moral sentiment soon found expression in anti-cruelty laws on both sides of the Atlantic, and, eventually, much of the world.

And most of us are stuck in this 19th century paradigm: we recognize that our use of animals raises profound moral problems but we comfort ourselves with the thought that we treat animals ‘humanely,’ so our use of them is morally acceptable.

There are, however, at least two serious problems with this view.

‘Humane’ Treatment: Torturing Animals Nicely

The first problem is that the animal welfare approach simply does not work as a practical matter. Given economic realities, it cannot work.

Animals are property. They are things. And the whole point of being a thing is that you don’t have an inherent or intrinsic value. Animals are economic commodities; they have a market value. Animal property is, of course, different from the other things that we own in that animals, unlike cars, computers, machinery, or other commodities, are sentient and have interests. All sentient beings have interests in not suffering pain or other deprivations and in satisfying those interests that are peculiar to their species. But it costs money to protect animal interests. As a general matter, we spend money to protect animal interests only when it is justified as an economic matter—only when we derive an economic benefit from doing so.

Consider the Humane Slaughter Act in the United States, enacted originally in 1958, which requires that large animals slaughtered for food be stunned and not conscious when they are shackled, hoisted, and taken to the killing floor. This law protects the interests that animals have at the moment of slaughter, but does so in large part because it is economically beneficial to do so. Large animals who are conscious and hanging upside down and thrashing as they are slaughtered will cause injuries to slaughterhouse workers and will incur expensive carcass damage. Therefore, stunning large animals makes good economic sense. These animals have many other interests throughout their lives, including an interest in avoiding pain and suffering at many times other than at the moment of slaughter, but these interests are not protected because it is not economically efficient to do so.

Virtually all animal welfare laws fit this paradigm. They protect selected animal interests and the effect of protecting these interests is to make the production process more efficient.

Anti-cruelty laws supposedly require ‘humane’ treatment but these laws generally either explicitly exempt what are considered as the ‘normal’ or ‘customary’ practices of institutionalized animal use, or, if the practices are not exempt, courts interpret pain and suffering imposed pursuant to those practices as ‘necessary’ and ‘humane.’ That is, the law defers to industry to set the standard of ‘humane’ care. This deference is based on the assumption that those who produce animal products—from the breeders to the farmers to the slaughterhouse operators—will not impose more harm on animals than is required to produce the particular product just as the rational owner of a car would not take a hammer to her car and dent it for no reason.

The result is that the level of protection for animal interests is linked to what is required to exploit animals in an economically efficient way. Animal welfare standards generally increase production efficiency and do not decrease it in that we protect only those interests that produce economic benefits.

Animal welfare standards have actually fallen dramatically in recent decades. We are using more animals today and we are treating them worse than at any time in history. The idyllic family farm—where, by the way, there was a great deal of pain and suffering—has vanished and been replaced by intensive agriculture—’factory farms’—where cows, pigs, chicken, and fish are kept in crowded conditions, subjected to severe confinement and mutilation, and generally lead miserable lives from the moment they are born until the moment that they die.

But the ‘animal rights’ movement, rather than focusing on the plain moral fact that using animals for food at all is inconsistent with what we say we believe about our moral obligations to animals, has enthusiastically embraced Bentham’s position that animals do not care that we use them but only about how we use them and the solution is simply to make animal welfare standards better.

Australian philosopher Peter Singer, author of Animal Liberation and regarded by many as the ‘father of the animal rights movement’ is also the patriarch of another movement: the ‘happy’ meat and animal products movement. Singer, like Bentham, maintains that most animals do not have an interest in continuing to live and that it is morally acceptable to kill them as long as we do so in a relatively painless way. Singer criticizes factory farming and argues that we should improve welfare standards so that we raise animals in a reasonably pleasant way and kill them in a relatively painless way.

Popular writers such as Jonathan Safran Foer, Michael Pollan, and an endless parade of celebrities and environmentalists join Singer in condemning factory farming and in calling for larger cages, ‘free-range’ conditions, and what are, in the grand scheme of things, minor modifications of a most horrific process.

Large animal protection organizations promote various ‘happy’ meat labels, which supposedly guarantee that the animals whose corpses or products have the particular label were treated better. These animal organizations form partnerships with large institutional animal users and campaign for ballot initiatives that require that at some point in the distant future, animals will get an extra bit of space in their crowded prisons or get some other supposed welfare benefit that, in many cases, will actually result in an economic benefit for producers.

But no one is really kidding anyone here. The most ‘humanely’ raised animals are treated and killed in circumstances that would constitute torture were humans involved. The standards required to get ‘happy’ certifications are insignificant; they are analogous to requiring padding on water boards at Guantanamo Bay, or nicely painted walls or pleasing music in a torture chamber. There is precious little difference between conventional battery eggs and ‘cage-free’ eggs, where thousands of birds are, in effect, crammed into one large cage. And companies who are certified to use at least one ‘happy’ label have already been found to be violating even these minimal certification standards.

All of this talk about ‘happy’ animal products is about us; it’s about making us feel more comfortable about doing something that nags at us. It’s about keeping us from having to recognize that we are all Michael Vick. But it’s really got nothing to do with the animals. They continue to suffer horribly irrespective of what ‘happy’ label is slapped on their corpses or the products we make from them. Having Singer and other animal advocates claim that it is morally acceptable to consume ‘happy’ meat or eggs or dairy is the modern day equivalent of selling indulgences.

Sure, it’s possible in theory that we might all be willing to pay a great deal more for animal products and standards could improve in meaningful ways. But that’s just theory. Very few people could afford animal products that were produced in a way that provided significantly more protection to animal interests and anyone who would care enough to pay that significantly higher cost probably would probably care enough so as not to eat animal products at all.

Moreover, given economic realities and ‘free’ trade rules, even if welfare standards were raised significantly in one place, demand for lower-priced, lower-welfare products would force the higher-welfare producers out of business except, perhaps, to serve a very small and affluent niche market.

The reality is that as long as animals are property, welfare standards will necessarily stay very low. And as long as we continue our institutional use of animals for food, they must remain property.

Eating People With Amnesia

The second problem with the animal welfare position is that it rests on the notion, which we would all recognize immediately as completely crazy if we were not so invested in continuing to eat animals, that animals do not care about their lives; that they don’t have an interest in continuing to live but only have an interest in not suffering.

Why did Bentham think such a silly thing 200 years ago? Why does Singer and so many of us think that now?

Part of our conventional wisdom about animals is that they occupy an ‘eternal present,’ that they don’t have memories of the past or thoughts about the future. They don’t plan vacations or think about what movie to see this weekend or which restaurant they want to eat at (or be eaten at) tonight.

Any of us who have ever lived with animals surely recognize that position as factually wrong. My partner and I live with five rescued dogs and the notion that they are not self-aware and have memories and future desires is as absurd as the notion that they don’t have tails. All you need to do is watch them. There is simply no way to explain their behavior without attributing some sense of self-awareness to them.

But let’s not get stuck in the morass of trying to determine the nature of animal minds. Since we are the only animals who use symbolic communication, we will probably never really understand what it is like to be a bat or a chicken or a cow or any other animal. Let’s assume that Bentham, Singer, and everyone else is right: animals are perceptually aware and can suffer but live in an ‘eternal present.’

So what?

There are humans who have a form of amnesia in which they have a sense of self only in the present. They have no memories and they do not think about the future. Is such a condition morally relevant? It might be. We might not want to appoint such a person as a history professor. But would we say that such a person has no interest in continuing to live and that death is not a harm to that person? Surely not.

So why do we say that about animals? The short answer: because we want to continue to eat animal bodies and animal products and we don’t have any interest in eating humans with amnesia. We tell ourselves that death is not a harm and the trick is to do it all ‘humanely.’ But we can’t do it ‘humanely’ and, in any event, death is a harm that we should not impose—however ‘humane’ our treatment and method of execution—if we don’t have a good reason.

Pleasure is not a good reason. That is why we got upset with Michael Vick. And that is why it’s time to get beyond all the ‘free-range’ and ‘happy’ animal products propaganda and see that we simply cannot justify the use of animals for food.

On one hand, that’s a very radical conclusion. On the other hand, it isn’t radical at all; it flows from moral ideas that we all already claim to accept. What is remarkable is that a species that prides itself on its rationality has allowed the desire to eat animals and animal foods to cloud our judgment to the point where we can criticize—and even hate—Michael Vick, and not see that he is really no different from the rest of us.

The Vick matter does not, of course, answer questions about the morality of animal use when the reason for that use is not merely pleasure, amusement, or convenience. But the only thing that falls into that category is the use of animals in experiments designed to find cures for serious human illnesses. Although I reject completely any use of animals in vivisection, this issue at least presents a (slightly) more complicated question. But our other uses of animals, including for food, our most numerically significant use of animals, are all, like Vick’s use of dogs for fighting, transparently frivolous.

Gary L. Francione is Distinguished Professor of Law and Nicholas deB. Katzenbach Scholar of Law and Philosophy at Rutgers University School of Law in Newark, New Jersey. His books include The Animal Rights Debate: Abolition or Regulation? (2011) and Animals as Persons: Essays on the Abolition of Animal Exploitation (2008), both published by Columbia University Press.