84 lines
4.4 KiB
Plaintext
84 lines
4.4 KiB
Plaintext
Anarcha-feminism and Animal Liberation
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"Meat is like pornography - before it was someone's' fun, it was someone's
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life" Melinda Vales
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Lots of anarchists find the idea of animal rights quite dodgy.
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Quaranteeing "legal" rights to animals sounds pretty useless given the
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amount of notice the state takes of human rights. Intellectual dudes like
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Peter Singer focus more on allowing moral considerations to animals, based
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on their similarity to humans. But what about the bigger picture?
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Anarcha-feminists who are into animal liberation link male domination and
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exploitation of animals with the male domination and exploitation of women.
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It's about breaking down the divisions - male/female, rich/poor,
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black/white ... animal/human. We want the self-determination of both
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animals and humans.
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Hunting and eating animals is traditionally done by the boys. Dead animals
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and women are objectified in similar ways. TV, magazines, and video fames
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sell us funky fantasy images of happy cartoon chickens (like the one at Big
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Fresh) and airbrushed anorexic women, targeted at male consumers. Women are
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called cows, chicks, birds, vixen - domestic and game animals. If men are
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compared to animals they are wolves, bears or stallions. Lots of women
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are kept in suburban homes like battery hens or pigs - continually
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pregnant, bored, depressed.
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As well as being a massive torture industry, vivisection is another way of
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objectifying animals. Lots of experiments, such as the Draize test destroy
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the animals' eyes, turning them into objects who can't return the male
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gaze. Women and animals are experimented on without their consent by male
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doctors. Caesarean section is the standard way lab animals give birth, as
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it used to be for women.
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Lots of pornography portrays women as animals. Look at "Adult
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Entertainment" (ironically next to "Pets and Livestock") in the Evening
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Post - ads like "Cuddly bunny especially for you". Meat-based recipes are
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also advertised in sexual terms "Hot Stuff". The whips and chains of
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bondage imagery is based on gear for breaking in horses. Lots of men who
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abuse women start off abusing pet animals.
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Is there a problem in supporting both animal rights and pro-choice? I feel
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these movements have a lot in common: 1) both focus on life and
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self-determination of the individual woman and animals 2) both women and
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farm animals are forced into unwanted pregnancies 3) the anti-abortion
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movement romanticises motherhood in just the same way that the meat
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industry romanticises farm animals. Abortion in early pregnancy isn't
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murder in the same case killing animals is - medical evidence suggests
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foetuses can't feel pain before the seventh month of gestation.
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Does animal liberation ignore race and class issues? It's true that most
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of the Animal Rights movement is a whiter shade of pale. However,
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indigenous peoples tend to be objectified as animals to be consumed in just
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the same way women are. People of col our and animals are both overworked,
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marginalised, and economically exploited. The same power structures
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oppress both. Defending animals and fighting racism is part of the same
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struggle.
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I want to mention possums because they cause a lot of damage in Aotearoa.
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Do we need to murder possums to save indigenous trees and birds? This has
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worried me quiet a lot. However, Pakeha bought possums into Aotearoa -
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this is a Pakeha problem, not a possum problem. It is up to pakeha to find
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a solution that doesn't oppress possums. The destruction of bush by
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possums is minimal compared to that destroyed by Pakeha for farmland or
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timber. Rather than murdering possums, we need to focus on stopping
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further bush being cleared for profit, and on keeping existing possum-free
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areas of bush possum-free.
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It's interesting that both anarcha-feminism and the animal rights movement
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are based around direct action tactics. Both aim to destroy the existing
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systems and practices rather than reform them -ie. no veal calves rather
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than better conditions for veal calves - no laws rather than better laws.
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The liberation and self-determination of animals and people is thus
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inseparable -"Merely by ceasing to eat meat, merely by practising restraint
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we have the power to end a painful industry"- Roberta Katechofsky
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I'd really recommend the following books:
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(i)Carol J Adams "Neither man nor Beast: feminism and the defense of
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animals"
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(ii)Vandana Shiva and Maria Miles "Ecofeminism"
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