flop 2
In April I posted a very inspiring speech by Nicoal Renee Sheen. I loved it and hoped she would be able to grace us with her words again. And now she has! Sit back and enjoy as Nicoal keeps it real…
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by Nicoal Renee Sheen
Just a few days ago, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger passed legislation that many animal welfarists are calling a “victory” for factory-farmed hens. By January 2015, every single egg sold in California must come from hens who are granted a more comfortable enslavement.
As someone who affirms animals are equals and fights for their right to live freely, this piece of sh – I mean – legislation is what I call a pseudo-victory or a mass distraction. First of all, this law does not stop the slaughter. When I speak of moral consideration for animals, their rights and liberation, faster killing methods or bigger cages is not the future I envision – more importantly, neither do they. So-called “free-range” or “cage-free” farms result in many thousands of chickens crammed into a shed with no real or practical access to the outdoors. In addition, all male chicks are ground up alive right after they are born regardless of a “cage-free” environment.
And does this law really matter to the chickens? Are they thinking of the few extra inches of room given to them when their beaks are sheared off with a hot saw? Does one seriously think chickens will reflect on the “pleasant” and “humane” experience before their throats are slit and their whole family is next in line to be murdered?
The answer is an obvious no. This law distracts us from real change that we can bring about for chickens– their liberation. We begin to compromise and negotiate for a few more inches of space instead of considering what we would want if we were in their position. Its easy to constantly reassure ourselves that bigger cages will ease some of the agony and suffering hens experience everyday. However, I am not fighting for what is easy. I fight to see them liberated from the sadistic places of their torture. No one said freeing animals would be easy in such a speciesist society, but I am not willing to fool myself in believing this law actually betters the lives of chickens.
We should reject such laws as “victories” since they are far from being victorious. At the end of each day, approximately 20 million chickens are slaughtered in North America alone . In addition, what welfarists want to believe helps chickens is actually contributing to more suffering and enslavement. More eggs are purchased because people can excuse themselves with a “humane alternative” and do not have to feel guilty about buying eggs.
Instead of spending millions of dollars bettering the egg industry’s image, animal activists should encourage others to adopt a vegan diet and/or fund rescuing animals from factory farms. We do not have time to be distracted. I know the chickens cannot afford to accept such a law, so neither will I.
a rant about freedom
The 4th of July is here! Today is the day when we come together to commemorate our liberation from oppression. We celebrate by hanging out with the people we love, eating a lot of food and watching the sky explode with fireworks. But while we celebrate there are billions in this country who are not free.
Many are imprisoned physically and often unjustly. The prison industrial complex is big business and it is a growing business that leaves countless victims trapped without their freedom.
Since 1991 the rate of violent crime in the United States has fallen by about 20 percent, while the number of people in prison or jail has risen by 50 percent…[This increase is largely] because of imprisonment of people who have committed nonviolent offenses. Instead of community service, fines, or drug treatment [nonviolent offenders are sentenced] to a prison term, by far the most expensive form of punishment.
Others are imprisoned by a sense of fear because our society is sexist and homophobic; in 2008 the FBI recorded over 1,600 hate crimes against people based on their sexual orientation (likely a gross underestimate) and transgender individuals are so discriminated against that the Southern Poverty Law Center suspects that they have highest rates of being murdered compared with other hate crime targets. Still others are imprisoned by an unjust social system that perpetuates discrimination based on race, ethnicity and national origin and that allows for our citizens to live in poverty and without access to adequate education, health care or housing. There are grave wage, income, health and educational disparities based on race, ethnicity and gender with those who are white and male faring better than their non-white and female counterparts, respectively. And in one of the richest countries in the world about 3.5 million people will be homeless in an average year and 13% of our country’s population lives in poverty (the rate is over 30% for black and Hispanics).
The lack of freedom does not stop with our human compatriots. Among the most oppressed, the most tortured, the most imprisoned and most disenfranchised of our society are non-human animals. As a society we exploit their labor, abuse their bodies, steal their children and murder them for vanity. Animals that have every right to live lives free of pain and full of love are being caged by the billions. Mothers have their right to love, nourish and nurture their offspring taken from them so that we can have dairy and eggs. Pet animals, that were originally bred by humans to live symbiotically with us have been slighted; in exchange for their love and companionship we are supposed to provide them food, shelter and to return love but companion animals are being euthanized to the rate of 3-4 million per year because we haven’t held up our end of the bargain by spaying, neutering and housing them. The most grotesque thing we do as a society is to consume animals as food by the billions. In the single second it takes you to read this sentence 363 land and marine animals were killed in the United States.
We have allowed our freedom to make us gluttonous and selfish and it is coming at a great expense within our borders as well as on a global and environmental level. As Americans bask in our freedom we forget the impact we have on the rest of the world so that our freedom ends up coming at an extreme cost to others. As a nation we have the privilege to determine world markets and our desire for an excessive amount of inexpensive goods has led to the proliferation of human rights abuses around the world, including unfair and inhumane labor practices, smuggling, human trafficking and market manipulation (think blood diamonds). We also perpetuate animal and environmental atrocities around the world such as clear-cutting of forests, “over fishing” of seas, the imprisonment and torture of animals for skins (leather and fur), “exotic animal” hunts and trading, kidnapping animals for use in the entertainment industry and the list goes on.
Today I will celebrate my privilege and my relative position of freedom, but I will do this with the understanding that none of us is truly free until we eradicate oppression from our lives. In the movie Bold Native, Charlie Cranehill reminds us that as long as we allow others to be imprisoned we are not free.
What is freedom? Are we born free or do we earn it? And if you deny freedom to the quiet ones, those that have no voice, can you be free yourself, or are you caged by your own lack of compassion? …They say freedom isn’t free. Absolutely Goddamn right. We spend our lives saying no. Not me, not my fight, not my problem, not tonight. What’s the difference between you and me? A few years ago I became someone who said yes. Me, my fight, my problem, tonight.
One of my favorite chants at demonstrations is: “Human freedom, animal rights!” This is a necessary call to action that speaks to me with a particular clarity today. If we hope to be free we need to buckle down, pick up the pace and get to work because there is already too much to do. Today I ask you to celebrate your freedom by fighting for the freedom of others. Pick up your signs, create your art, write your books, give your speeches, raise your voice, share your knowledge and, most importantly, break every cage that you find along the way. Do what you do best to liberate the oppressed and do not stop until there truly is freedom for everyone.
fish are friends
Laura Ashmore, an activist whom I have worked with and admire, recently tagged me in a Facebook note that I would like to share with you all. I think this is an important post for several reasons. First, it brings our attention to fish. Fish get the shit end of the stick when it comes to animal rights efforts. Their deaths are usually not even quoted in our counts of how many animals are murdered for food. This is likely because they are measured by weight, not counted as individuals. (If you are wondering, HSUS estimates that 363 animal die EVERY SECOND in the United States alone, fish included.)
The other great part of this post is that Laura highlights the fact that fish are individuals. One of the reasons it has become so easy to exploit animals is that as a society we refer to animals as species rather than as individuals. We assume that each individual within a species embodies all the same characteristics and so it becomes easy to injury one as if it is nothing more than a piece of the whole. This is what Carol J. Adams refers to as “false mass terms”:
Mass terms refer to things like water or colors; no matter how much of it there is or what type of container it is in, water is still water…Objects referred to by mass terms have no individuality, no uniqueness, no specificity, no particularity. (Adams, The War on Compassion)
When treated as objects that lack uniqueness fish become sushi. So let Laura’s note remind us that fish do matter and every single fish is an important, unique individual.
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Fish are friends, not food!
by Laura Ashmore
This weekend I was reminded of the atrocities fish are facing, not only as a group of organisms, not only as species, but as individuals as well. I walked on a pier this weekend where fish after fish were being taken from the water and killed. Then on father’s day my family and I went to a sushi restaurant where the table was covered with dead fish rolled up in rice and topped with another kind of dead fish.
Fortunately this weekend there was also some good news for 800 lucky Bluefin Tuna in the Mediterranean Sea. The Sea Shepherd Conservation Society freed 800 Bluefin Tuna from the floating cage they were imprisoned in. While I and a few others were ecstatic about this news, it seemed the news of their liberation was not met with much excitement from many people. If 800 innocent people were liberated from a death camp, the news would most likely be met with much excitement from many people than those few that were excited about the liberation of the tuna. So why do people have such apathy for fish?
Some people believe “fish are not intelligent.” Some believe “fish don’t have feelings, fish don’t feel pain.” This is not true!! A recent report written by…Humane Research Council provides information from studies that provide evidence that fish are capable of learning, memory, and are capable of suffering just like you and I.
I never eat anyone I know personally. I wouldn’t deliberately eat a grouper any more than I’d eat a cocker spaniel. They’re so good-natured, so curious. You know, fish are sensitive, they have personalities, they hurt when they’re wounded.
-Dr. Sylvia Earle (one of the world’s leading marine biologists).
I wrote this note to bring attention to the suffering fish go through for the food industry. Also I want to share with you a couple stories of personal experiences I have had with fish in the wild.
When I was a kid I started realizing fish feel pain. With my dad being a recreational fishermen I was around dying fish a lot. When my dad would catch a fish and throw it on board after hooking it in the mouth, he would then put it in a plastic bag to die slowly. I would hide inside the boat so I didn’t have to see the fish suffer but I would still hear it struggling up to an hour or two after being brought aboard.
In the past year I am so grateful to have had two experiences with fish in the wild that really let me see the personalities of individual fish. I would love to share these stories with you. (I know a lot of you that I tagged are already vegan or vegetarian, but I still tagged you because I thought you might enjoy my cute fish stories 🙂
The first experience was in Belize. I was snorkeling and came across a red plastic ball that had a hole in one side. I soon realized there was a fish stuck in this little red ball. It appeared to have passed away in the ball but I thought I would check anyway. I gently pulled on his/her tail and she/he moved! So I was eventually able to get the poor little fish unstuck. It was a queen triggerfish so it probably got scared and put up it’s triggers on it’s fins and got stuck in the ball. When I finally got him/her out we looked at each other for a few seconds and then she/he took shelter under my earlobe. She/he would not leave my side. She/he was also either unable to or scared to descend to deeper water when I tried to lead him/her down toward the coral. She/he would stay by my mom until I returned to the surface and then would return to me and go back underneath my earlobe. She/he must have recognized me because every time I came back to the surface he/she returned to me even though there were many people with us snorkeling. We became really attached to each other and I hated to leave him/her.
The second experience where I got to see the personality of fish was in Catalina. I was scuba diving in the kelp forest working on a research project for a class. I was counting the number and species of fish in the Marine Protected Area (area where no fishing was allowed) and counting the number of fish in the areas that were being fished pretty heavily. In the marine protected area there were many juvenile kelp bass. The kelp bass reminded me of cats because of their curiosity. I would be stationary trying to count fish and some of the kelp bass (especially the young ones) loved to come up to my mask and check me out. Some hung back at a distance but still came over probably to see who was visiting their kelp forest home. I’ll never forget their curiosity. The bigger, older kelp bass didn’t pay much attention to me, probably because they have seen humyn visitors before. This really illustrated for me the mental capacity of fish and their memory. The results of my short-term study did not surprise me; one result was that the population of targeted species of fish were significantly higher in Marine Protected Areas than highly fished areas.
I will fight for the freedom of fish, the same freedom I ask be given to all other animals. I hope that you too will choose to see fish as friends, not food!
You can have your own fish stories… there are amazing fish to visit off the coast of California in kelp forest areas or in rocky areas. And if you travel somewhere near the ocean where the water isn’t too cold, snorkeling is always a fun activity. A mask and a snorkel are all you need to explore a whole new world of underwater friends!
sick of the sexism
missed connections. part 3.
I was recently invited to the release party for the book Meat is for Pussies by John Joseph. I will not go for the simple fact that I cannot support the book’s use of sexism as a hook. I have not read the book (as it has not been released) and I am not in any way criticizing or supporting the content of the book as I don’t know what it says. I am, however, criticizing the title of this book.
Meat is for Pussies is trying to play off of and debunk the stereotype that vegan men often face: that their rejection of the carnage and murder which goes along with meat is also a rejection of manliness, virility and strength. This is certainly not true. Stereotypes are often off the mark and exist to devalue people and perspectives that threaten the status quo. In this case, protein is available in abundance from non-animal sources, and male vegan body builders like Robert Cheeke and Kenneth Williams demonstrate this clearly; vegan men are less likely to experience impotence as they age; and straight men who date in the vegan community are outnumbered about 3:1 by women so they have an opportunity for very raucous dating lives. And I am sure that Joseph goes into all this in his book.
But why did he have to do this by using the word pussy?
Here is where a lot of you refuse to challenge yourself and try to dismiss me by suggesting I am being to sensitive and that it is, after all, just a word. As I have said before, a word is never just a word:
Language is one of the most important tools we have. Language can liberate and language can oppress. The oppressive force of language is easily observed via the power of the pronoun. Pronouns are often neglected in language when referring to non-human animals, which serves to erase the individual identities of animals. Rather than acknowledging animals as individuals, as “he’s” and “she’s”, individuality is erased by calling each individual only by his or her species name…Language also creates and reinforces racism, sexism, homophobia, ageism and all of the other isms you can think of.
There is clearly an impulse in our movement to use easily recognizable, but nonetheless sexist, claims to promote and foster veganism and animal rights. Another popular book that bolsters itself on the exploitation of women is Skinny Bitch, by Rory Freedman and Kim Barnouin. I have read this book and think in some places it has a lot of great points about the health benefits of veganism. The authors did some killer research and writing to put that book together. Unfortunately, they also couched it between opening and closing chapters, as well as a cover image, that encourages the devaluation of women’s bodies, by making their bodies the only thing that matters, thereby perpetuating an eating disordered ethos.
And then there is PeTA. I think they might make the greatest number of vegans, which is great. But, unfortunately, they also do this:
How can a movement that so frequently bases claims of animals’ rights on the notion that speciesism is like racism or sexism turn around and embrace sexism? If we support oppression at any level we bolster it at every level and we damn the cause all together.
While the histories and specific experiences of oppression are extremely different for different minority groups, the way that oppression works is the same. One group claims or has been conferred power and they maintain it by engaging in actions and instituting policies and embracing ideas that force the other groups to remain without the resources to change their status.
I generally believe that animal activists should support each other. When activists disagree on tactics they should at least respect one another and not get in each other’s way. However, when an animal rights activist makes gains for animals by embracing the very system of oppression that created the horror of animal torture and slaughter in the first place, I am forced to speak out. So much of the work we are doing when we embrace a sexist animal rights movement or a speciesist women’s rights movement reinforces oppression. We may change or expand the notion of who “matters,” but we don’t change the system that causes the inequality in the first place. What we need to be fighting for is a world where we cease to draw lines at all between who matters and who doesn’t matter, rather than simply moving the line around so that groups occasionally renegotiate which side of the equation they are on.
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I live in one of the most free, safe and affluent countries in the world. But even here, I do not make as much money as a man for the same work, I know when I teach a college class ¼ of the women in my classroom have been sexually harassed or assaulted, I know that my male friends who are considered “pussies” for non-conformity to masculinity risk physical, psychological and sexual assault on a daily basis. None of this is okay with me. I also know that in the 10 minutes it took you to read this over 3,000 land animals were slaughtered for food, many thousands of animals suffered in laboratories and breeding facilities and hundreds of unwanted companion animals were euthenized. None of this is okay with me either. I want it all to stop but I will not make the world less safe for one group to save the other. If my friends who fight for animals join my friends who fight for women and we all fight against oppression, we can cease to be a minority. By fighting for one cause at the expense of another we do the work of the oppressors for them and we only make ourselves weaker.
[PS- I was very much inspired to write this post by a great Facebook note I read from a fellow feminist vegan rabblerouser. Thanks!]
good eats
The focus of this blog is not usually food, but we all have to eat, so let’s talk dinner. No one is better than veg foodie extraordinaire and Yelp!er, Kris Coulter, to put together a post of her favorite places to eat around the country. Read on and prepare to get hungry!
All of the restaurants noted in this post vegan, except for Chicago Diner which is veg–all food items listen in this post are vegan.
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Hi everyone, this is Kris, and I’m honored to guest blog for vegina. I LOVE food, and I’m very excited to share some of my favorite vegan restaurants with you. Some of these are in Southern California, but I’m going to tell you about some of my favorites in other cities in the United States. In no particular order:
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The Veggie Grill (locations in Southern California)
Veggie Grill's "The Stack" (Vegina's favorite)
I had my first vegan restaurant experience at the Veggie Grill, so it holds a special spot in my heart. I love the Veggie Grill because the food is great, but I also love it because it makes veganism accessible to everyone. With locations across from the University of California, Irvine and in the Irvine Spectrum (among others), not even the most enthusiastic carnivore can resist the Veggie Grill.
I have eaten every single sandwich on the menu, and you can’t go wrong with any of them. I don’t have a favorite per se, but I do find myself gravitating towards the Santa Fe Crispy Chickin,’ the Carne Asada, or the Chickin’ Caesar Wrap. The sandwiches are served with a red cabbage slaw or chili, or you can get sweetheart fries (sweet potato fries), the daily soup, kale, spring mix salad, or mac n’ cheese for a couple extra dollars. I usually get the sandwiches with the sweetheart fries, but sometimes I am in the mood for the red cabbage slaw. I usually go with wherever my mood takes me. If you’re in the mood for a salad, I like the Chop-Chop Chef. And don’t be fooled, these salads aren’t rabbit food. They are hefty and filling. If you have room for dessert, don’t leave without trying to carrot cake or the chocolate pudding.
Oh and as if the Veggie Grill couldn’t get any better, if you’re in the mood for a lighter meal, you can order off the kids’ menu.
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Native Foods (locations in Southern California)
I am a fan of Native Foods for the same reasons that I love the Veggie Grill. The food is awesome, and it makes veganism accessible to everyone. I don’t get to Native Foods as often as I make to the Veggie Grill, but only because it isn’t located right across the street from UCI.
Let’s start with an appetizer, shall we? The nachos are among the best I’ve ever eaten. (and I’ve eaten a lot of nachos) The Native Nachos are a huge platter of tortilla chips topped with loads of beans, meat, cheese, salsa, sour cream, guacamole, corn, green onions, and cilantro. You can’t go wrong with the nachos, but pace yourself or you’ll have little room for your meal.
I love the Baja Surf Tacos, which are Native Foods’ take on fish tacos. These aren’t wimpy tacos- they are stuffed with tempeh, cabbage, salsa, guacamole, and their homemade sauce. I’ve also been pleased with the Chicken Run Ranch Burger and the Portobello and Sausage Burger. Oh, and try the Oklahoma Bacon Cheeseburger if your appetite can handle it. The burgers are monstrous and are served with edamame. You can also add a salad, fries, sweet potato fries, kale, or soup for a couple extra dollars, but the sandwiches are pretty big so you might not need to.
Do not, under any circumstances, leave Native Foods without a cupcake. I don’t care if you’re stuffed; take one to go then. The cupcakes are moist and delicious, topped off with luscious swirls of frosting. Sometimes if I’m in the area, I stop in just to get a cupcake.
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Sticky Fingers (Washington, D.C.)
Speaking of cupcakes, if you’re in our nation’s capital, don’t leave without paying a visit to Sticky Fingers. I have frequented many, many bakeries and Sticky Fingers is by far my favorite (and I’m an avid baker, so I think I’m a good judge).
Sticky Fingers serves up a smorgasbord of cupcakes, cookies, sandwich cookies, brownies, sticky buns, muffins, and scones. They also make custom cakes and mail order their treats. The cupcakes are moist and the frosting is fluffy. I am a fan of the almond crème, the cookies n’ cake, the raspberry crème, and the coconut. As for the cookies, I am still trying to figure out how to replicate their lemon coconut. If you’re in the mood for a sandwich cookie (and when are we not?), then try the phenomenal Little Devils.
This place is more than a bakery. It’s also a cute coffeeshop (with free wifi!) that also serves up sandwiches and such.
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Java Green (Washington, D.C.)
In the words of my boyfriend, go here for the “bangin’ boolgogi.” Java Green is a cozy café that serves up sandwiches, noodles, wraps, soups, salads, and raw foods. As you may have guessed, I am a fan of the boolgogi. You can get it on a sandwich or with noodles. If you’re not in the mood for that, try the chicken java sandwich or the veg max sandwich. Oh, and don’t leave without a cookie!
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Soul Vegetarian (Washington, D.C., Chicago, and Atlanta)
As long as you’re in D.C., hop on over to Soul Vegetarian, located near Howard University. It’s off the beaten path, but well worth the trip.
They serve up daily specials, which are already prepared and ready to serve from the buffet table. (don’t let that stop you; the turnover is quick and the food is fresh) You can also order off the menu. I hear that Soul Veg has a great brunch, and I don’t doubt that.
I love the macaroni and cheese. If I could, I would order loads of it and have it shipped to me. I don’t know how they get it so creamy and garlicky, but somehow they do. It is simply amazing. Soul Veg can do more than mac n’ cheese though; I am a fan of the BBQ tofu, the pepper steak, and the wheat loaf.
By the way, Soul Veg is also in Chicago and Atlanta. I’ve been to the Chicago location, and the menu is different than the D.C. location but just as good. It’s more of a sit down restaurant, without a buffet table. The fries are savory, and the sandwiches are good (try to the Jerusalem steak and the bbq twist). And of course, don’t leave without the mac n’ cheese.
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Chicago Diner (Chicago, IL)
Before we head back home to Southern California, let’s stop over at the Chicago Diner, shall we? You can go here for breakfast, lunch, or dinner, but the important thing is that you go.
What can I say? The Chicago Diner whips up excellent animal-friendly diner food. My boyfriend and I ate the Dagwood and the Radical Reuben. The Dagwood is a huge hoagie stuffed with seitan roast and corned beef, bacon, cheese, lettuce, tomato, onion, pepperoncini, and a spicy sauce. This sandwich is not for the faint of heart, so bring your appetite. The Radical Reuben was brimming with seitan, peppers, onion, sauerkraut, thousand island dressing, and cheese. Hmmm, it’s so intense, you just might have to eat it with a knife and fork. You get your choice of sides to go with your sandwich- sweet potato fries, mac n’ cheese, cole slaw, greens, soup, salad, and many more. We opted for the sweet potato fries, mac n’ cheese, and some cole slaw.
Somehow, we saved room for dessert. We split the lemon coconut cake, and it was super yummy. I hear that the Chicago Diner also serves up some great shakes, but sadly, we didn’t have room to try one. Oh well, next time.
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Pure Luck (Los Angeles)
All right, we’re almost home now. Pure Luck serves up a variety of salads, tacos, sandwiches and wraps. If you miss out on Mexican food or BBQ at non-vegan restaurants, then head on over to Pure Luck.
We started off with the fried pickle chips, and then moved on to Todd’s BBQ sandwich and Jack’s Super Burrito Wrap. Both were made with amazing jackfruit “carnitas.” Apparently, when you cook up jackfruit, it takes on the consistency of shredded pork and takes on the flavor of anything you add to it. (I guess it’s kind of like tofu in that respect) The BBQ sandwich had jackfruit, bbq sauce, pickles, onion, and mayo on a homemade rustic roll. It was hearty and savory. Jack’s Super Burrito Wrap had jackfruit, sweet potato fries, pinto beans, bbq sauce, and cilantro. Mmmmm, it was so good and satisfying. We ate the sandwich with the rosemary french fries served with garlic aioli. The fries were crisp and yummy, and the aioli was so good I wish Pure Luck could inject it into my veins. We ate the wrap with the Caesar salad, which was really quite good. Also, the croutons were homemade! Bonus!
Fortunately, Pure Luck is close enough that I’ll go again and check out the rest of their menu. I can’t wait!
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Wheel of Life (Irvine, California)
This place is so close, I don’t know why I don’t eat here more often. The Wheel of Life is a cozy restaurant tucked into one of Irvine’s ubiquitous strip malls. Eating here is like going home for a good home cooked dinner (that is, if your parents are good cooks; mine really aren’t). But anyway, back to the Wheel of Life.
You might want to start off with an appetizer, just because they are so darn good. I’ve eaten the bbq chicken, the spring rolls, and the spare ribs, but I bet you also can’t go wrong with the fried tofu or the moo shu. There is a lot on the menu- noodles, curries, fried rice, soup, and salads. The sesame chicken is pretty good, and so are the fish n’ chips, which satisfy a craving for salty, fried food. I’ve also eaten the beef with broccoli and the orange chicken, and I’m a fan of both. Just be aware that the main dishes don’t come with rice, so you’ll have to order it on the side.
If you have room for dessert, try the donuts. Trust me, they are really good.
And there you have it! I hope you’ve enjoyed this vegan food tour as much as I’ve enjoyed telling you about it! Happy eating!
prop 2 hasn’t saved the chickens
In 2008 in California, Proposition 2 hit the ballot. It was a law that seems like it should already have been on the books, requiring that for the majority of the day farmed animals should have enough room to be able to stand up, turn around and lie down. Animal advocates everywhere dropped what they were doing, rerouted their donations, and fought for this measure. One hope of supporters of Prop 2 was that it would educate people to the horrors of factory farming, particularly in the egg industry. One argument of animal rights advocates who opposed Prop 2 was that it might increase demand for animal products since people will feel that the eggs, dairy and animal carcasses they buy came from happy animals, which in turn might lead to the greater consumption of these products.
Cage free hens. And this is the improvement?
The results are in, folks, and it doesn’t look good. A study by Jayson L. Lusk just released in the Journal of Agricultural & Food Industrial Organization compares the market share for cage-free, organic and conventionally produced eggs. (For a comparison of these types of eggs go here). Lusk finds that in the San Francisco area demand went up 120% for cage-free eggs and 20% for organic eggs while the demand for conventional eggs went down (amount unspecified). Unfortunately, Lusk doesn’t provide the raw numbers on total sales, so the whole story isn’t clear. What is clear is that Prop 2 has probably not encouraged people to stop buying eggs. According to Lusk:
Our results also suggest that total egg expenditures were either constant or slightly increasing in San Francisco/Oakland over the study period suggesting that while Prop 2 may have changed which eggs consumers chose to buy, the information contained in Prop 2 did not cause a decline in total egg expenditures…
The welfarist argument will be that Prop 2 was successful because at least the demand is shifting to “more humane” methods. The problem is that neither cage free nor organic are humane. Unless sales of eggs go down drastically, we have a problem because, regardless of whether eggs are conventional, cage free or organic, a number of horrific things happen in their production.
No matter what “type” of egg you buy, the egg industry imprisons hens in a space that is painfully small. Only hens that produce organic eggs have access to the outdoors. However, even then access may not be utilized by hens for reasons such as access doors may be small and daunting as the light coming in is extremely bright compared to the dark sheds in which they live, or the space may be too limited for all hens to use it.
No matter what “type” of egg you buy, the egg industry depends on hatching new laying hens. All male chicks that are born are useless to the money making goals of the industry since they can’t lay eggs. Because they can’t make the egg industry money, all male chicks are killed. This typically happens in one of two ways: they are thrown with hundreds of other chicks into plastic bags and suffocated or they are thrown alive into a grinder.
No matter what “type” of egg you buy, the egg industry will cut body parts off of live chickens without giving them any anesthesia. Caged, cage free and organic conditions all place hens in extremely overcrowded living spaces, which psychologically damages them and often makes them go insane. Hens often peck or fight in response. Rather than allow the chickens decent lives filled with sunshine, space and dust bathing, the industry removes the body parts that can cause a laying hen injury to herself or other hens should she happen to go stir crazy. This includes the ends of her beak and her toes. A hen’s beak is filled with nerve endings—having her beak cut off is akin to you having your fingers cut off.
No matter what “type” of egg you buy, hens are starved at regular intervals to put them in a state of panic that will force more frequent egg laying. No matter what “type” of egg you buy, hens are kept in extremely dark conditions to make them think it is nighttime so they will make less noise. No matter what “type” of egg you buy, the industry will kill all hens when they are between one and two years of age, when they stop producing eggs at a high rate. Hens can naturally live up to 10 years. This means they are robbed of, on average, 80% of their lives. No matter what “type” of egg you buy, you are buying the amniotic fluid of another animal.
The idea behind Prop 2 was to create more favorable conditions for animals while we wait for our society to wake up and recognize that imprisoning, torturing and murdering others is wrong. The idea behind Prop 2 was to create more favorable conditions for animals while we wait for our society to wake up and recognize that might doesn’t make right. The idea behind Prop 2 was to create more favorable conditions for animals while we wait for our society to wake up and recognize that eating meat and animal products are the root of all of the leading causes of death and disease in this country. But the facts are there and people choose willingly not to change. Though it is not what Lusk concludes (he thinks that Prop 2 helps animals), what his study on Prop 2 has proven for me is that given a choice people will do whatever eases their conscience, but only to the degree that they don’t actually have to make a real change in their lifestyle. Most people are too stubborn and confused to stop actually exploiting animals. People will spend a few extra cents to for the peace of mind that they can pretend like they do not support the cruelty toward or torture of animals. But in the end, humane “meat” is a myth. The only humane choice is to refuse to kill or imprison for food. Bigger cages are still cages and I am fighting for freedom.
sexism for seals?
Missed connections: part2
Vegina
In the last week a new Facebook page, Support for the Seals! has received almost 1,000 “Likes.” To get this sort of response in one week for anything animal rights related is exciting, until you look below the surface. This site does not have a single action item nor does it have any educational literature, save one video. What it does have is breasts. The point of this page is to get women to take pictures of their boobs (in t-shirts or bras) and post them to show their support for the seals. The reason? According to the page’s creator:
One year ago,a very creative Facebook user put a group together for breast cancer. “Show your bra for breast cancer support”…she wrote!
Well, there’s a cancer in Canada. It’s called Newfoundland. This cancer has been malignant for fifty years now, and has claimed the lives of a billion baby seals.
We are taking our clever Facebook sister’s campaign one step further for our furry little friends of the north who are brutalized each year by Newfoundlanders and asking you to show your “support” ladies.
What this person seems to miss is that breast cancer is actually somehow connected to breasts. I don’t know that this is a good campaign for breast cancer either, but at least there is some sort of connection there.
The blatant, “look at my boobies” gimmick on this page offends me as a woman concerned with sexism. The façade of helping seals while actually just visiting a page to show off or gawk at breasts offends me as an animal liberation activist.
Arian
The average response to my claim that this boob-fest is sexist will go something like this: “Women aren’t being exploited if they choose to do it.” I disagree. People are constrained by their culture. In a culture that values women for their bodies, women are often reduced to their bodies. In a society that values our boobs more than our brains, we can unintentionally reinforce or be victimized by sexism when we engage in non-liberating activities with our bodies. A perfect example is this Facebook page that encourages us to show our cup size under the guise of raising awareness for a cause on a webpage that doesn’t have a word of informational material about that cause. This perpetuates sexism while also doing nothing to alleviate animal exploitation. Animal rights activists should avoid sexism at all costs or they risk contributing to oppression in society. Remember folks: Racism= Sexism = Speciesism.
Nicoal
If showing my breasts could really help the seals I would do it, but it won’t. This Facebook page won’t either. In fact, I think this an example of just how distracting for the movement internet activism can be. The internet can be a great tool for disseminating information and galvanizing activists. But it can also be a void in which minutes, hours and days are lost to clicking on “causes” and “liking” groups, taking time away from actual activism. The possible disconnect between online fan groups and actual activism is exemplified by this post on the Support for the Seals! page:
This is brilliant and I am so pleased that you have created this page. It will help the seals so very much, and we do need to give them a hand because they cannot talk for themselves! 🙂
This page will not actually do a single thing to help a single seals. There is not even a word of educational material that might educate the random dude who goes to the page to stare at the boobies.
Dana
I tried to make the above points to Support for the Seals! by posting the picture at the top of this page. I was interested in encouraging real activism over sexism. Several others posted similar pictures. I think Jere’s (below) makes the best point—that there are “real” things that can be done to help seals. Our boobs are not included. (Not surprisingly, the page “unliked” all dissenters and deleted our photos :/).
Jere
It is true, as the woman above says, the seals can’t speak for themselves. But my boobs can’t help them either. I am frustrated, because in less than a week almost 1,000 people became fans of this Facebook page, but at any average demo or protest fewer than a dozen activists typically join me. I am frustrated because different movements don’t embrace each other to the degree they should; too many important connections are missed. In order to defeat a system of oppression that allows women, nonhuman animals, ethnic minorities, prisoners, sexual minorities, children, the elderly and disabled individuals to suffer discrimination and exploitation, we need to recognize that oppressions are tied so that we can join together.
Cameron
we logged of and hit the streets!
A few weeks ago I wrote encouraging people to log off of Facebook for three days during World Week for Laboratory Animal Liberation and to spend that time in the street helping animals. 240 people joined in and here is some of what they were up to…
CANADA
Ontario and Toronto
Brenda LaFleshe and her family we busy busy busy in Ontario and Toronto. Just reading her update had me a bit exhausted!
“Hey I got alot done! It was so good to take a break from FB, I realize really how much time I wasted online sometimes. I got much done for AR- I wrote letters to all the Canadian Senators asking them to allow discussion of Bill S-207 and to End the Commercial Seal Hunt. I finished getting new leaflets made and photocopied for the Seal Awareness demo I organized on the 22nd from 4pm 6pm, downtown Toronto. I also had a table for Earthday at a park here in Hamilton at the Treeplanting festival. I made new signs and booklets… I wrote out an advertisement for our monthly Vegan potluck to be published in a local paper. I took great care to the rescued mother cat and her kittens we are caring for and have arranged for them to be put up for adoption and have there vet care paid for by a local rescue called the Pride rescue, and have made plans to volunteer for their spay/neuter catch and release program.”
Here are some pictures from her work. Let’s all emulate Brenda and get out there and get busy.
Earth Day Education
Kitten Rescue!
ENGLAND
World Day for Animals in Laboratories was well attended! I wish I could get a big group like this together. This is amazing, check it out!
WDAIL in London
Also at the WDAIL event was Mizla Manandhar who worked on making posters to promote an animal rights club she starting at her university.
UNITED STATES
La Jolla
Anna NuthaThang organized her first protest! AMAZING! They protested the evil vivisectionists at Scripps. 28 people showed and 200 pamphlets were handed out to educate the public.
Scripps Vivisection Protest, La Jolla, CA
Los Angeles
This was a very busy week in the LA area. The week kicked off with a four day conference, the Animal Liberation Forum, put on by Cease Animal Toruture (CAT), an animal liberationist student group at California State University, Long Beach. Speakers included Peter Young, the Bold Native team, Bob Linden, Marti Kheel and Jason Miller, just to name a few of the inspiring minds that galvanized these activists into a week of protest.
Allan Yaxon, Jason Miller and Nicoal Sheen at the Animal Liberation Forum
Next up was the 5 hour demo outside of the JW Marriot which was housing a conference for Fortress Investment, the group currently propping up the scumbags, Huntington Life Sciences (HLS).
...
A few days later came a demo outside of the offices of UCLA vivisectors organized by Stop Animal Exploitation Now. Amazing costumes were made by Katia Kosir (the cat). The best part of the event was the ALF-style liberation at the end. Of course the UCLA cops gave citations to all the acting liberationists for covering their faces with bandannas. AR activists are repressed for having acting skills even in Hollywood! It’s definitely an uphill battle for those of us on the side of justice!
The week in LA ended with three neighborhood demonstrations organized by See You in the Streets.The demonstrations were in the neighborhoods of the horrible mad scientists Joaquin Fuster, David Jentsch and Edith London.
this is what war really looks like
War is nasty; imperialist hostile take-overs of other countries are despicable. When we sit and do nothing, we are culpable for murder. Our government has consistently ignored our voices and sacrificed its own citizens in the conquest for oil or whatever it is they claim to be doing. We have screamed and cried and pleaded and the only result is that the murder persists. Our government continues to wage a war on innocents. We have been given myriad excuses for the United States’ current role in this slaughter, but they are all bullshit. They tell us it is not a war, but that is a lie.
Some of you may have already seen this video, as it was on WikiLeaks and the Huffington Post covered it. It is not an easy video to watch. I am heartbroken and disgusted by what occurs here and it is clearly a common occurrence, judging by the way the soldiers eagerly request permission to shoot and laugh at a dead body being mulled over by a tank. Watching this video, and seeing what war actually is, provides a good lesson to those of us who sit comfortably distant from the atrocities our government commits.
In this video, men who are merely socializing are bombarded with bullets. A Good Samaritan who stops to help the wounded is also murdered, and his van is shot up though there are visibly children in the front seat. I can’t wholly fathom this horror. I see it, but know I don’t truly understand it.
dairy is a feminist issue.
part 1 of the dairy series. 
dairy is a feminist issue.
Feminism brought me to a place where I could begin to think about embracing veganism as a necessary part of an ethic of social justice. Feminist ideology, a reading of Carol Adams’ The Sexual Politics of Meat and visiting a small family dairy allowed me the pull I needed to abandon my “pescatarianism” for veganism. Veganism is an ethic of (non)consumption that most closely reflects my feminist ideology. It is one way in which I can make a simple choice every time I eat that is overtly political in its message. Veganism is a daily practice that reflects an ethic of care and compassion and equality that is often lacking among humans. Veganism has also allowed me the ability to acknowledge that the oppression of non-human animals and women are mutually reinforcing.
I see a lot of my feminist nightmares played out on female-bodied individuals who are exploited by the U.S. dairy industry. The bottom line when it comes to dairy is that milk is boob juice intended for growing infants, and someone was raped to make it. Then someone was kidnapped so that people can consume it. A woman buys into the exploitation of female bodies every time she purchases and consumes dairy. Female bodies are exploited to produce dairy, advertisers manipulate women to sell dairy and women buy in and drink up at the expense of their own health.
milk. it does your body bad!
The health myth perpetuated by big business in the name of profit comes at the expense of women’s physical and psychological health.
All of the milk campaigns that I can think of are targeted at women. “Milk. It does a body good!” touts that milk = lots of calcium = strong bones. This is aimed particularly at women and parents (and most often mothers do the shopping). This campaign plays off of the notion that milk gives people strong bones—of particular concern to children whose bodies are still growing and women who need to build up bone density before menopause.
We are being lied to and manipulated. As I will discuss in my next post, government subsidies to agriculture create a monster of government buy-ins, buy-ups and byproducts. One of these byproducts is dairy. And who better to exploit in a patriarchal society to sell off this byproduct than women? A person can get more calcium from a cup of Total Cereal or collard greens than from a glass of milk. What women should actually be doing to improve bone density is exercising, reducing consumption of animal proteins and reducing sodium in their diets. Milk doesn’t increase the bone density in children either. Kids need exercise and healthy veggie filled meals to keep up their bone health, not the mother’s milk of another animal species. In fact, dairy consumption is linked to numerous health problems including, constipation, obesity, asthma, irritable bowel syndrome, Crohn’s disease, joint pain, arthritis pain and sinus issues.
To solidify the sale of mothers’ milk, the fallacy that it helps women lose weight is advertised. Unintelligent commercials, encouraging women to count calories, check out their bodies in the mirror everyday and set body goals based on the clothing they dream of wearing tell women that milk helps them loose weight. This is a big load of carnivore shit! Notice how they also mention that it needs to be non-fat versions. Milk is intended to allow infants to double or triple or quadruple their weight in the matter of months. For this reason, it is calorie dense. Only once it has had the fat taken out, been pasteurized, preserved and fortified is it a product that MIGHT help someone control weight by satiating hunger (duh, eating will do that) and providing digestive enzymes (often added after the fact). Of course, there is a plethora of other ways to help people digest food. And not consuming dairy, which gives you the shits if you are lactose intolerant and constipates you if you are not, is a good start.
can you say wet nurse?
The dairy (and egg) industry are profiting off of the forced reproductive labor of female-bodied animals. Women with power have always objectified women without power for their convenience. There is a long history of affluent women hiring or indenturing or enslaving other women as “wet nurses.” Denying her own offspring nourishment to give it to the children of more affluent women is something few mothers would choose unless strained by economic necessity or force. It disgusts us to think of the past abuses of affluent American women using European indentured servants and immigrants or African American slaves to breast feed so that they might spend more time socializing. At least they had a reason, albeit a super shitty one. But what is our excuse for drinking cows’ milk? There is formula for babies that more adequately reflects actual human mothers milk. And adults certainly have no business drinking something produced solely for infants. Except for the peculiar cases in which an animal chooses to be a surrogate mother for an infant of another species that has been abandoned or orphaned, there is no other species that drinks the breast milk of another species.
milk is rape. and kidnapping. and torture. and murder.
Dairy production directly targets female-bodied individuals in a sexually violent manner as well. Female cows are raped by machines and humans and unwillingly impregnated, they have their infants stolen from them (and they care A LOT when this happens), their bodies are violated daily in the extraction of their milk, they are pumped full of hormones to overproduce breast milk, and their bodies become so depleted that they die or are sent to be slaughtered 15-20 years before they would naturally die.
Outside of the context of dairy production, individual acts of sexual violence or forced sexual activity enacted on animals disgusts most people. It is seen as a horrifying exploitation of non-consenting bodies. The only time these acts are glorified is in pornography when human women are degraded alongside male non-human animals. Somehow there is pleasure in watching the simultaneous degradation of women and animals. These images reflect a pathological degradation of “the other” in an attempt to assert male heterosexual dominance and can only be pleasurable or permissible under an exploitative system of patriarchal domination.
In a society in which the exploitation of human women is normalized, the daily degradation, exploitation and violation of female-bodied animals and their children goes unnoticed. These issues need to enter feminist consciousness. Women and feminists need to assert their intolerance for such abuses by refusing the breast milk of raped and imprisoned individuals.
Vegina 