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In the fourth and final part of my interview with Professor Gary Francione, whose abolitionist approach to animal rights rejects welfare reforms of the animal industry demanding instead the complete abolition of animals, Gary discusses one of my favorite subjects of animal rights: activism.
You can also find this and the preceding interviews on the difference between animal rights and welfare and vegan education at the abolitionist approach website, AbolitionistApproach.com. These interviews will also be provided for free to subscribers of The Vegan News.
I welcome you to embed these players on your own blog via these Links: [1 2 3 4] embedding options are available in the dropdown menu to the right of each file. Enjoy.
On animal inferiority and creative non-violent vegan education
Francione discusses the topic of animal inferiority. Because of the ideological consideration of non-human animals, questions are often asked of animal rights advocates whether or not they believe animals are superior to humans.
Francione also goes on to talk about promoting "creative non-violent vegan education" as a primary means of activism. Hear the interview with the embeddable player below as well as the preceding interviews farther down.
It may seem logical to respond to a crisis of the suffering of farm animals by supporting legislation to ban certain practices which purport to better the treatment of animals. However, these reforms often strengthen the property status of animals and make the public feel better about exploiting them. Conversely, a campaign to abolish the use of animals starting with vegan education actually fights for animal rights rather than animal welfare.
On the incremental reform of animal treatment
This has raised a lot of questions about the effectiveness of the abolitionist campaign for animal rights. In order to better respond to these questions, I interviewed none other than the pioneer of the abolitionist approach of animal rights, Professor Gary Francione whose numerous works argue the case for abolishing the use of animals altogether coupled with vegan education over the mere regulation of the treatment of animals thereof.
On animal rights vs. welfare
Recently, I've been writing about the abolition of animal use and why the more popular movement for animal welfare is fundamentally flawed. Understandably, this position has been met with a lot of criticism and questions as to how a movement to remedy the suffering of farm animals would be anything but a good idea.
In this first part in a heavily spliced interview (use the player above,) Francione answers some of the most often asked questions from my articles or just from people to whom I discuss the abolitionist approach.
Comments
Interesting and sad that so many of our fellow mankind are convinced that simply because animals are "lesser" (in their minds" than humans, they don't deserve decency, respect or protection - and that they are simply yet another resource to exploit, abuse, overuse and endanger.
I love how non-vegans overcomplicate something that is so simple to grasp. If we were to remove the politics and all those other reasons, seeking justice for nonhuman animals trumps all. Honestly, if a non-vegan cannot respect life, how can they expect respect in the first place?
Chastity, what color is the sky on your planet? If it is so simple to grasp, why do you continue to eat foods from farms that use pesticides, then use the 'vegans are not perfect' excuse to justify it?
One steer yields about seven hundred pounds of meat. One acre of vegetable farmland sprayed with pesticides may cost millions of sentient insects their lives.
Don't you want to minimize the harm?
Over 98% of sprayed insecticides and 95% of herbicides reach a destination other than their target species. The World Health Organization and the UN Environment Programme estimate that each year, 3 million workers severe poisoning from pesticides, about 18,000 of whom die.
Make sense, not excuses.
My comment cannot contain links or URLs. I wonder why. If you wonder too, check out "Mother's milk" on Neil Young's Living with War today website. That's probably not going to be easy to find either....
How is it disrespectful to animals, to kill them for food?
Is it disrespectful when, say, a chimp kills something and eats it? How about a bear or a pig? Tigers? Wolves?
Say you don't want to eat meat. That works, why not? But why shouldn't you eat eggs and dairy, and wear wool and silk? You are keeping those chickens and sheep and milk cows in what is for them the lap of luxury. But I do realize that that isn't the point.
I think that if people were better acquainted in real life terms about where their food comes from, and how it is produced, we wouldn't be having these silly arguments. As things stand, all the information comes to them via the entertainment industry, including those AR pimps, the media. They get nothing but warm fuzziness on the one hand, and nightmarish horrors on the other. Neither is a good representation of real life animals. Animals aren't either the perfectly behaved and mannered animated stuffed toys in the movies and sitcoms, or cute and lovable cartoon models you see in entertainment. Nor is the abuse model marketed by the AR machine and in the media the norm.
On the other hand, I'm glad somebody on the other side of the fence is willing to be up-front honest. That's a very nice change from HSUS' smoke and mirrors.
What does the abolitionist philosophy do about seed cleaning? In order to eat grains and vegetables you are supporting a large corporation that does not allow farmers to grow their own grains anymore. There will only be one type and it will not be the one nature designed. Does the movement take a stand on eating grains that are sustainably raised or from local farmers? Just wondering.
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