COMMENTARY/ADVOCACY
Robert Grillo
Don’t accept exploitation in advocacy
I RECENTLY CAME
across Jacob Maxwell’s
article in Mother Earth
News titled “Boycotting
Factory Farming Is
Not the Only Solution
to Animal Suffering.” Maxwell is a
self-described “student and animal
scientist-in-training.” The narrative he
makes about so-called humane animal
agriculture is all too familiar to me as
someone who has written extensively on
the subject. My purpose for addressing
Maxwell’s particular article is not to
single him out. Instead, I hope offering
a different perspective might lead him
and others to question what humane
means in an industry based on exploiting
and killing adolescent-age animals
and in a time when we can get all of our
nutrients from plant-based foods.
Maxwell begins his article lamenting
the criticisms of animal agriculture,
claiming they “fail to paint the full picture
and, more importantly, they fail to offer
real solutions.” His main assertion is
that improved animal welfare, not vegan
advocacy, is the best we can do for animals
while billions of them are still being
exploited for food. It would be impossible
to do justice to this topic in my short
piece, so I will offer four ways this argument
will never deliver on its promise.
First, how would this logic of reform
play out if applied to any social justice
issue other than animal exploitation?
When we see an increase in injustice to
an oppressed group, what is an appropriate
response? Do we back off, soften
up or advocate for ways to make the
exploitative practices or systems more
acceptable? Of course not. We step up
our opposition against it instead. And
we don’t expect that 100% of society will
completely denounce that injustice right
away, a fact that does not deter us from
our goal of ending the injustice.
Second, who decides what is humane?
All too often, it is the industry
funded veterinarians or other
animal industry spokespeople — the
same deranged people who will look you
in the eye and tell you that grinding up
chicks and sexually assaulting cows to
impregnate them is humane. Nonsense.
We need to define humane for ourselves.
To define the humane treatment
of farmed animals, we should use the
same ethical standards we use for cats
and dogs and other animals we claim to
value. Even the most allegedly humane
farming practices would be considered
abusive, torturous and cruel by
this standard. You don’t get away with
calling it humane to shoot an unwanted
dairy calf point-blank in the head over
a glass of milk that you could easily
replace with any number of plant milks.
Third, why would we continue to
advocate for the continued commodification
of animals in an age when
plant-based alternatives are plentiful
for many of us? And where those options
don’t exist, instead of promoting
animal products or advocating that
those underserved populations raise
animals, why would we not invest our
efforts to encourage wider availability
of plant-based foods? In what other
cause would it be acceptable to support
a kinder, gentler form of oppression?
All too often, the people I see posing as
animal advocates who also advocate for
their exploitation are those who have
a vested interest in the exploitation
industries. They don’t want to see it fail
and don’t believe that animals should
have a right to their own lives; they
want to reform exploitation into something
they imagine is more ethical.
Fourth, another practical consideration.
Even if we were to believe that
there is a humane way to exploit and kill
animals for profit (there isn’t), it’s mathematically
impossible to raise animals
on pasture and in settings many would
consider natural or humane. Animals
bred in such environments require far
more land, feed and water. We only
raise a small percentage of animals this
way and are already using 45% of the
planet’s landmass to keep the animals
we eat in an intensive farming system.
We would need something like five
planet Earths to raise all of the animals
on pasture that we consume today. It’s
an impossible fantasy.
So, Mr. Maxwell, I’m afraid your fixation
on humane animal farming will do
nothing to fundamentally change the
food system or the hearts and minds of
the people who run it or consume its
products. It doesn’t challenge our most
fundamental assumptions and prejudices.
But you know who does and in
quite a powerfully honest way? Former
pig farmer and writer Bob Comis.
“Livestock farmers, no matter what
kind — from the largest, most cynical
and inhumane factory farmers to the
smallest, seemingly most ethical pasture
based farmers — traffic in death.
It is death that is our aim, our purpose.
Death is the end. Life is the means.
Money the reward,” writes Comis in a
2014 Huffington Post article.
Comis’s words point to the inherent
conflict of interest between treating
animals with respect and bringing them
into this world for the sole purpose of
slaughtering them and turning them
into cheap commodities. What Comis
presents here is “the full picture” Maxwell
lamented in his article. Comis’s
version requires a level of honesty with
ourselves and others — the ability to
question the very cultural assumptions
upon which farming is based. The big
challenge for animal advocates today is
moving society in that direction.
Robert Grillo is an activist, author
and speaker. He is the founder and
director of Free from Harm, a nonprofit
dedicated to helping end animal exploitation,
and Slaughter Free Chicago.
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