Archive for category: Blog

Most of the large groups focus on “factory farming.” This is absurd for at least three reasons.

First, these groups claim to be eliminating the “worst abuses” of the system. That is false. The entire system is one big “worst abuse” and the animal groups are merely focusing on (i.e., doing fundraising campaigns on) a few practices that are, for the most part, economically vulnerable anyway. These groups pretend that “factory farming” will be history if the gestation crate is eliminated or if conventional battery cages give way to “cage-free” barns, But that is just wrong. The pigs and chickens will still be tortured and killed.

Second, these groups promote the idea that there is a difference between “factory farm” exploitation and “family farm” exploitation. There is still an enormous amount of suffering and distress on any farm. This fantasy of the idyllic “family farm” is just that–a fantasy. And the animals all end up in the same slaughterhouse much of the time. They are, in any event, all slaughtered.

These groups all promote or support some sort of “happy exploitation” scheme. But these schemes still involve animals being tortured and killed. Their primary impact is to reassure consumers that they can be “conscientious omnivores” and keep contributing to animal groups as they feel good about continuing to eat and wear animals.

Third, if animals matter morally, we should not be eating, wearing, or using them whether they are from “factory farms” or from “family farms” or have a “happy exploitation” label slapped on their corpses. We cannot justify inflicting any level of pain and suffering on another sentient being when the only justification is palate pleasure or fashion. We don’t even need a theory of animal rights for that; it follows simply from the position that animals are not things and that they have moral value.

The problem is not “factory farming.” The problem is all animal farming; the problem is all animal use.

These “factory farming” campaigns have nothing to do with animals. They are fundraising vehicles for the large groups. If you care about animals and think that they have any moral value, you go vegan. It’s that simple.

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If you are not vegan, please go vegan. Veganism is about nonviolence. First and foremost, it’s about nonviolence to other sentient beings. But it’s also about nonviolence to the earth and nonviolence to your body.

The World is Vegan! If you want it.

Gary L. Francione
Board of Governors Distinguished Professor, Rutgers University

©2014 Gary L. Francione

The 2012 audio interview I did on Philosophy Bites at the University of London has been published by Oxford University Press in Philosophy Bites Again.

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If you are not vegan, please go vegan. Veganism is about nonviolence. First and foremost, it’s about nonviolence to other sentient beings. But it’s also about nonviolence to the earth and nonviolence to yourself.

The World is Vegan! If you want it.

Gary L. Francione
Board of Governors Distinguished Professor, Rutgers University

©2014 Gary L. Francione

For decades, I have been writing that the anti-fur campaign (among others) is sexist. For example, various groups have been using this sort of imagery for years now:

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But fur is no different from wool, leather, or silk. In my book, Rain Without Thunder: The Ideology of the Animal Movement, published by Temple University in Press in 1996, I stated:

[T]he fur campaign has from the outset been tainted by sexism. The trapping or ranching of animals for fur is certainly barbaric and immoral, but fur is no more or less morally obnoxious than leather or wool. The primary difference is that furs are worn by women, and wool and leather, although also worn by women, are worn by virtually all men. Fur became an early target of the animal rights movement, and from the outset the imagery was, not unexpectedly, sexist. An early poster shows a pair of women’s legs (no torso, no head, just legs) clothed in black stockings and spiked high heels. The woman is dragging a fur coat, which is trailing blood. The caption reads: “It takes up to 40 dumb animals to make a fur coat. But only one to wear it.”

All animal clothing is morally objectionable. All animal exploitation is morally objectionable. Reject animal exploitation. Reject sexism. Go vegan. See the connections.

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If you are not vegan, please go vegan. Veganism is about nonviolence. First and foremost, it’s about nonviolence to other sentient beings. But it’s also about nonviolence to the earth and nonviolence to yourself.

And the Abolitionist Approach, as a foundational principle, rejects all discrimination, including sexism and any other form of discrimination (racism, heterosexism, classism, etc.).

The World is Vegan! If you want it.

Gary L. Francione
Board of Governors Distinguished Professor, Rutgers University

©2014 Gary L. Francione

I posted an essay from this site on Facebook concerning Andre Robinson, the man who kicked the cat named King, and who faces anticruelty charges in New York. The point was simple: What Andre Robinson did was terrible but was no different from what non-vegans support and participate directly in every single day.

I got comments which indicated that many people simply missed the whole point:

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These people apparently do not see the problem with maintaining that we can respect the fundamental rights of nonhumans at the same time we treat nonhumans and things and impose suffering and death on them to satisfy our palate pleasure or fashion sense.

I got dozens of comments (most of which I deleted) calling Robinson names, such as:

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I wonder if these people regard their non-vegan relatives or friends, or themselves, if they are not vegans, as “assholes,” “Knob Heads,” “cruel fucker[s],” “mother FUCKER[S],” “fucking pieces of shit,” “fucking cunts,” etc. or whether they refer to non-vegans in ableist terms, such as “retarded” morons.

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I wonder if she thinks that all her non-vegan friends and relatives (or she herself if she is not vegans) are all “pricks” who will get their “karma.”

There were dozens of these sorts of comments.

And I got many wishing him harm and expressing violence, such as:

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I wonder if these people think such things with respect to non-vegans.

And I got overtly racist comments–on, including:

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Please note that the last comment had a reference to the Ku Klux Klan. Absolutely shocking.

This overt racism has characterized other high visibility animal cases involving other people of color, including Michael Vick, Kisha Curtis, and the children who tortured the cat in Patterson, New Jersey.

We should all be upset by what Robinson did to King. But we should also remember that what he did was in no way morally different from what non-vegans directly support every single day. And however upset we are with anyone, we should never use racially charge language to voice our criticism.

And it is sad that so many people are so conceptually challenged that they cannot see that there is no morally significant difference between Andre Robinson and anyone who consumes nonhuman animals.

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If you are not vegan, please go vegan. Veganism is about nonviolence. First and foremost, it’s about nonviolence to other sentient beings. But it’s also about nonviolence to the earth and nonviolence to yourself.

The World is Vegan! If you want it.

Gary L. Francione
Board of Governors Distinguished Professor, Rutgers University

©2014 Gary L. Francione

ADDENDUM, November 9, 2014

I did another post on Robinson on November 8.

In addition to the endless parade of ignorant name calling and expressions of violence, there were more racist, homophobic, and misogynistic comments, such as:

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Here is an essay I wrote on the Andre Robinson that was published on October 10, 2014 in the New York Daily News.

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If you are not vegan, please go vegan. Veganism is about nonviolence. First and foremost, it’s about nonviolence to other sentient beings. But it’s also about nonviolence to the earth and nonviolence to yourself.

The World is Vegan! If you want it.

Gary L. Francione
Board of Governors Distinguished Professor, Rutgers University

©2014 Gary L. Francione

ADDENDUM:

Here is my New York times essay on the subject.

Here is a brief CNN interview I did on the Robinson matter.

ADDENDUM, October 17, 2014

Unfortunately, some animal advocates continue to use unfortunate and racially charged language to criticize Robinson. For example, on a Facebook page devoted to the King matter, someone commented on Robinson’s “pimpish ‘I’m the man’ attitude”.

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That is shocking.

When I pointed it out, another animal advocate responded that she disagreed that the comment was racist, stating: “perhaps the person shouldn’t have used the word ‘pimpish’ but you did not see his demeanor nor his mother’s in court.”

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“[P]erhaps” the person should not have used “pimpish”?

Sorry, there’s no “perhaps” about it. The use of “pimpish” is unquestionably racist in this context and should be condemned clearly as such.

And how is Robinson’s demeanor–or his mother’s conduct– in court relevant to the propriety of calling him “pimpish”? That is a rhetorical question. It isn’t.

We should all be upset by what Robinson did to King. But we should also remember that what he did was in no way different from the violence that we support every single day if we consume animal products. And however upset we are with anyone, we should never use racially charge language to voice our criticism.