Animal Person

Last Call for Greyhound Calendar Photos

Today at 5pm EST is the deadline for entries for the 14-month calendar "dedicated to the thousands of greyhounds who have been rescued from racetracks nationwide" according to GREY2K USA.

Submission Rules:

• One photo entry per dog
• Include your greyhound’s name, tattoo numbers, adoption group and history of 150 words or less
• Photo must be in color and of 300 dpi quality or greater at 8.75" high x 11.25" wide (file size will generally be greater than 500 KB)
• Photos must be horizontal (wide/landscape) format, not vertical (tall/portrait) orientation
• E-mail entries to calendardog@grey2kusa.org
• Photos cannot have been published in other calendars
• Be sure to include your name and address
• Deadline to submit photos is 5:00 p.m. Eastern Time, Monday August 31, 2009

Fourteen dogs will be selected, one to represent each month. Unfortunately, entries that do not meet all of the criteria above will be disqualified. Winners will be asked to sign a release granting use of the photo to GREY2K USA.

Of course, I have hundreds of photos of Violet Rays and Charles Hobson Booger, III, few of which I've ever actually printed. I have one in mind that fits the requirements, of Violet mid-roll on the grass in sheer delight. No idea where it is so I've got to start looking!

Have a greyt day!

Kofa Mountain Lion Update

Though I wrote about the mountain lions of the Kofa National Wildlife Refuge a couple of times, it was never with the breadth and depth that Deb Durant of Invisible Voices has. She posted an important update that those of you who participated in the commenting period (regarding the killing of the Kofa lions) may know something about. Deb and I have both relied on Retired Wildlife Biologist Ron Kearns as our expert, and he has a lot to say about the situation, including a recommendation for those interested in commenting on the Draft Environmental Assessment (DEA): No Action Alternative A (which Ron adds in the comments section of the post). Though many of us commented in the original scoping period that killing the lions isn't acceptable at all, Ron suggests we "[s]imply stipulate—in [our] own words—that if the Service refuses to consider public comment- based Alternatives that prevent all GPS-collaring that could lead to lion killings, that [we]—without much choice except through possible litigation—support Alternative A: No Action Alternative."

This is a surreal situation in my opinion because, as Ron writes, "all 3 Alternatives in the DEA allow for the killing of Kofa lions, just at different rates and at different geographic locations."

I'm always fascinated by the procedure for determining what the public wants and then what actually occurs as a result.

Check it out!

Animal Person on Animal Voices

Animal Person reader stevetshirt wrote to say that my interview is available on Animal Voices.

Here's to shameless self-promotion! Check it out at http://www.animalvoices.ca/shows/mary_martin and thanks to Karol Orzechowski for interviewing me.

On the Land Grant University Meat Problem

Just like property status isn't something I write about often and I would never have thought of, the same is true for the relationship between land-grant-universities and why some of us eat what/whom we eat. Today's message and call to action is from David Cantor of Responsible Policies for Animals (thanks, Mike!).
 

Responsible Policies for Animals Members & Friends!

Here is Responsible Policies for Animals' letter in the September-October 2009 Utne Reader -- responding to an article about questionable business-school teachings:

As business schools teach harmful financial practices, our land-grant universities' college of agriculture teach harmful food practices, driving chronic disease, soaring medical and insurance costs, global warming, food and water waste, and inhumane treatment of animals "Animal science" sounds erudite, but it's really meat, dairy, fish, egg, and animal-feed technology -- not knowledge  of animals, which is zoology.  Given the abundant literature on conflict of interest in the academy, and given that knowledge is routinely used to promote special interests and popular interests over the public interest, maybe we should monitor our educational institutions at least as much as governmental ones.

Utne has a circulation of about 100,000 -- a senior editor I spoke to assures me it is not exaggerated as with some publications.

If you might wish to thank Utne for helping inform about the land-grant-university (LGU) meat problem and ask them to do more on it, send a brief note to editor@utne.com or Editors, Utne Reader, 12 North 12th Street, Suite 400, Minneapolis, MN 55403 -- or ring them up at 612-338-5040 (editors actually answer the phone, but don't take advantage!).

 A key reason RPA's 10,000 Years Is Enough campaign to get our universities out of the meat industry "exemplifies animal rights advocacy" -- as scholar & author Joan Dunayer put it her important book Speciesism -- is that people cannot understand basic autonomy rights applied to nonhuman animals without a critical perceptual shift, and it is universities' responsibility to provide the knowledge that makes basic change possible.  Instead, our LGUs teach the false ancient beliefs that maintain meat -- including dairy, fish, eggs, and feed crops -- as an institution.  

Our most insidious institution -- as my talk in Miami in 10 days (August 29th) will explain!  I look forward to meeting RPA's Florida members who are able to attend!  

If you know anyone in Miami and vicinity who might enjoy an eye-opening evening among eye-opening evenings, let me know and I'll e-mail or mail you a flier to give them -- or will send it straight to them if you give me the information.

Meanwhile, donate when you can, get friends to become Responsible Policies for Animals members --and thank you for your support!  

Best wishes,
 
David Cantor
Founder & Director
Responsible Policies for Animals, Inc.
P.O. Box 891
Glenside, PA 19038
215-886-RPA1
RPA4all@aol.com
www.RPAforAll.org
www.ExpertsOfConscience.org
www.EatForSports.org

On Food for the Soul

The New York Times' Nicholas D. Kristof frustrates me. His passion and compassion for humans is immense, but he appears to have some kind of mental block with nonhuman animals. He comes so close to grasping the concept of justice based on sentience, but his thinking is all muddled by tradition and culture. The result is that on one level he knows that hurting sentient nonhumans isn't right, but if it's done in a certain respectful way (oxymoron, anyone?) it's not so bad.

I suppose speciesism/human exceptionalism is at the heart of the matter. He just doesn't believe that other beings lives might have a purpose all their own that is entirely unrelated to humans. He romanticizes his childhood usage of animals as if that was the right way to do it, and he longs for those days. He is mere steps away from wondering whether there is a right way to use another, but those steps are a chasm for him.

In "Food for the Soul," Kristof once again yearns for the farm of his childhood which, for him, had "soul." What that means is that it wasn't a factory-farm operation. The animals were still bred and raised for slaughter, but evidently in some kind of soulful way we don't really hear about. Essentially, industrialized farming=soulless, small family farm=soulful. I wish Kristof would remove his soul-colored glasses and take a gander at The Humane Myth or read about animals who are rescued from small family farms, many of whom end up at places like Poplar Spring Animal Sanctuary, Maple Farm Animal Sanctuary, Eastern Shore Sanctuary and Peaceful Prairie Sanctuary.

Kristof writes of the "decent and varied lives" that small farms provide animals with. I'm not sure how that equals soul. Food for my soul involves nutrient-rich plants and grains and legumes that provide me with just about everything I need to be in fantastic health (let's not have the B12 discussion). Food for my soul does not involve grilled greyhound any more than it involves grilled chicken. It doesn't involve taking the life of someone who'd much rather not have her life taken. It doesn't involve forcing any sentient being to do anything or go anywhere or eat anything . . . or die . . . on my schedule and for my palate.

I don't know how any person's soul can be considered fed at the expense of another sentient being.

You can comment, along with the people who thought Kristof's sentiments were "beautiful," here. I'm on my way.

On Helping Individuals and Utilitarianism

I'm not a utilitarian.

And when it comes to doing the math regarding the way I help individuals, though I never regret the decision to help, I understand that some might say, for instance, that for the amount of money I spent on Violet in one year (I think $15,000 was her most expensive year), I could have paid for the surgeries for several broken-leg greyhounds. Or paid for food for a year at a rescue kennel. Or printed thousands of copies of vegan leaflets.

Of course, I have an emotional attachment to that one individual, Violet Rays.

I've never met Bella, the orange tabby pictured above whose people abused her and tried to declaw her with pliers. She needs $8,000 worth of surgery, as her wrists are broken. Hers is a horrible story and I'm going to contribute to her care.

Helping individuals, financially-speaking, isn't a great use of money. And as a donor, you want your contributions to do the most possible. The average person doesn't fund programs that cost $8,000 per cat. But then again, funding a program is different from helping an individual. It's okay to require bang-for-the-buck when you are giving to a program. But such utilitarian thinking has no place when it comes to the individual.

It's quite paradoxical, as the programs you fund are helping individuals! And you wouldn't fund a program that was very expensive per unit (human or nonhuman animal) yet you often don't think about that when you're dealing with an individual.

And then there's the argument against direct actions such as breaking into a lab and liberating animals. Part of the argument is that the animals will simply be replaced by other animals, and you're not really making a net difference. But that's utilitarian thinking. What about the individuals right there in the laboratory? Don't those individuals matter?

I find that though utilitarians like Peter Singer do have a certain consistency that lulls me into thinking all is well and fair and just, the flip side of that is a startling neglect of the individual.

Considering the needs of an individual, and putting your money behind that individual could very well be considered fiscally irresponsible. But that's fine with me, as though the business of which individual is helped and why and by whom (and not by others) is messy and far from perfect theoretically, it's part of what makes us as individuals who we are. It's an expression of what's important to us and what resonates with us. 

The Function of Art is to Disturb

Modest Mouse's "King Rat," directed by Heath Ledger

"The function of art is to disturb."

--George Braque

What do you think?

On Teaching Children

It just so happens that after I read Bea's comment from yesterday about reaching kids with our message I saw a New York Times article from today called "Where Little Chefs Learn the Art of Slicing and Dicing," by Ann Farmer. Farmer writes about the Creative Cooks Culinary Center in Brooklyn, where kids 5 to 11-years old are taught cooking in a place "that treats the culinary arts as an anthropological adventure."

Let's deconstruct:

• "Anthropological adventure" is an interesting choice of words. For me, the focus on culture and tradition is basically an excuse for "anything goes" when it comes to animals. But I bet anything doesn't go. Are the kids cooking monkey, cat, dog, alligator or turtle? I wonder how much they learn about the animals other cultures eat. (In the slide show there is a photo of one of the kids poking a live crab--I wonder what kind of discussion was encouraged around that.)
• The students learn to debone a chicken and slice cheese. I wonder how much the students learn about the chicken and where the carcass came from and what happens during the life of a chicken. And what about cheese? Cheese is made from something, isn't it? I wonder if the kids are given any pieces of the cheese puzzle.
• The kids prepared Buddhist delight that "conformed to Buddhist dietary restrictions." Something about the word "restrictions" annoys me. Would I ever say I restrict my diet to food that wasn't made from the parts of creatures as sentient as the greyhounds I share my home with? I don't think of that as a restriction.
• The kids made tortillas from scratch and then went to a factory to see how professionals do it. Any other factories on the agenda? (The site says food production factories are included, but I doubt that means those involving the slaughter of animals.)
• Removing skin and bones from a chicken breast was "slimy and gushy and . . . fun" said one (female) child. I wonder how much fun it would be if she knew the chicken and saw how the chicken died and was dismembered.

How about an ethical adventure? I wonder how long it would take parents to complain if the Creative Cooks Culinary Center filled in the blanks for the kids and educated them about the lives of the animals they eat that some might not even realize were ever even animals? If you're going to call something an anthropological adventure, it would make sense to teach the kids about the other animals humans eat and give the kids the opportunity to prepare and eat dog, cat and monkey, no?

Perhaps they are taught that other cultures eat animals other than cows, chickens, fish and pigs, I don't know. What I do know is that if you're going to teach children about the standard American diet, there will be a certain amount of lies of omission or spin or other nuances of dishonesty that will be necessary in order to keep them on track with learning what they're supposed to learn: that it's okay to eat beings as sentient as the family dog.

. . .

PS-The slide show includes children in aprons. One is male. I don't even know where to start. There are more professional male chefs than females, yet women do and are taught to do most of the cooking.

On Betrayal and Abolition

First let me say that if you are a regular reader, thank you, and I apologize for not posting regularly for the past couple of weeks. I . . . . (gasp) . . . . have a job outside of my home for the first time in a long, long time. I've worked from home, almost exclusively, for about two decades (if you count teaching and tutoring for The Princeton Review, which was evenings and weekends and I decided when I would work).

It has been a humbling 17 days as I walk the dogs early, shower, and get gussied up to sit in traffic for 1.5 hours on I-95 (we here in South Florida are known for our very limited public transportation options--boy do I miss NYC). I have to pay people to do things I used to do because I was available to do them and I'm not around anymore. It's comical. It's absurd.

I am the Interim Executive Director of two organizations that help former foster youth (the same orgs I chaired for a couple of years, but resigned from the boards to take this position), and it's only for a couple of months and as I always say, I can do just about anything for a couple of months. I am reinventing myself and this is a goodbye of sorts to--or at least a dramatic decrease in involvement in--something I have been deeply involved with for about eight years.

While spending hours in the car I've been thinking about various issues related to sentient nonhumans, animal rights and veganism. I haven't had time to blog--or even to work out daily like I used to--but that doesn't mean I don't read all my e-mails and go to every link everyone sends me.

Two links in particular struck me recently. One was about 4-H (from Bea maybe? I cannot locate the article), and one was a post about abolitionists.

I won't be able to write as much as I'd like, but here are my brief thoughts about the two:

• 4-H. I don't recall 4-H from my childhood on suburban Long Island. But I read two types of articles about 4-H: either about how the kids are proud of what they've done, or about how upset they are that the animal they have come to love is going to his or her death. In my mind, 4-H and programs like it in schools, cultivate betrayal disguised as "necessity," "tradition," or "culture," and I think that's child abuse. Trying to program kids to accept the killing of someone they love is cruel. Imagine if kids in 4-H were taught how to raise dogs for dogfighting (not a perfect analogy, I know).

When you deconstruct what 4-H does it essentially teaches respect for others (or so they say), but then teaches that it's okay, particularly if there's profit to be made, to sell the life of someone you respect. What kind of lesson is that? And vegans are accused of imposing our belief systems and brainwashing kids? Why is it always open season on children as long as you're teaching them about mainstream beliefs, regardless of how ethically contradictory they may be? Why is the vegan message the harmful one that can get one fired from teaching?

Part of being an abolitionist, for me, is about not actively participating in betrayal. I don't tell anyone it's okay to take the milk that was meant for someone's child, and I don't tell a hen I love her and want her to roam free as long as she produces eggs for me. I don't cultivate relationships, tell the world of those allegedly loving relationships, and then end the lives of those I claim to care about, on my own time. And I don't pay someone else to do any of that, either. If you want to teach kids to respect animals, you can't teach them that it's okay to use and kill them if you like the taste of their flesh. Those messages aren't aligned.

• When I was interviewed for Animal Voices I was asked about language, and in particular "direct action." I didn't actually answer the question because what was more important for me at that moment was the word "abolition," which I had more or less stopped using because it became too much of a headache. I don't need other vegans--whom I am thrilled are vegans--coming to my blog to bully me about how I am really not an abolitionist. That's not interesting to me. I may not be a Francione-style abolitionist, but that doesn't mean I don't advocate for the abolition of the use of animals.

It's been a long time since my blog has been interesting to Francione-style abolitionists, but I want to say, for the record for those who are reading, that it's okay to read someone's work and change some of your beliefs as a result. That's why we're all here. We are all teachers and we are all students. No one has to change their beliefs to match those of another 100%. We take what makes sense to us and what resonates with us, and we leave the rest. That's not an insult, it's not incorrect, and it's not problematic. It's called independent, critical thinking, and I encourage everyone to do it. It might exclude you from membership in certain clubs, but membership shouldn't be your goal.

I want humans to stop using sentient nonhumans for their own gain. I want humans to stop trying to "manage" any and everyone whom they deem is a "nuisance." I want humans to realize that animals have lives and interests of their own, and their own freedom is one of those interests. I want humans to stop viewing animals as means to an end of some sort. Just as women don't exist for men, sentient nonhumans don't exist for humans. I am an abolitionist.

On Google, HSUS and Fur

Many bloggers who are pro-animal rights have either not used Google's AdSense or stopped because they discovered that, for instance, their anti-fur post was surrounded by ads for fur. We all know that the ads are generated by computer based on the content. It's not as if the people at Google intentionally set out to make us look foolish or ambivalent about our message or . . . pro creating-animals-to-skin-them-for-their-fur.

That may be true, but not taking a stand by not removing the ads from their inventory (as they have done with other categories) is effectively taking a stand against the animals and for the exploiters.

(I used to support the Animal Rights Zone until I discovered that my posts were often surrounded by fur ads. I wrote to the site's creator, who was initially shocked, but who has yet to respond to my queries thereafter.)

If you haven't seen the latest discussion about the perils of using AdSense, check out HSUS' Michael Markarian's Blog on Huffington Post is Advertising Fur, and its comments, which include a defense by HSUS. The comments also include a suggestion that HuffPo (and presumably HSUS) develop an ethics policy that governs what may show up on their blogs if Google isn't willing to filter out fur ads.

Here's the letter from Chris of Furisevil to HSUS:

Dear HSUS,

Like the raccoon dogs just a few miles from me, in cages awaiting to be killed, I cannot afford to wait for HSUS to do something.

Nothing personal, but I have to blog about this.

http://furisevil.org/?p=1137

If Markarian cares about the fur animals of China, he could easily demand that HP stop selling fur on his blog.

He could ask Wayne to  say something to the Huffington Post.

The animals in Hebei Province need HSUS to be smarter than this.

The horrors of fur farming in China will never end until we in America stop advertising and buying it.

So, why not take the fight to the American media and demand that liberals at Huffington Post, NYT and LA Times stop selling fur.

Better yet, HSUS could start a campaign targeting at Google's DOG AND CAT SKIN Trade.

(All the evidence you need is on http://furisevil.org -- there is no investigation required. 99% of those photos are from Google's own paying clients. They're not hiding anything.)

Google is selling dog and cat skin -- HSUS has known about this for almost six months now and done nothing.

I don't see why Huffington Post is any different from the fur farmer skinning an animal alive.

They're both making money off this act of violence.

And, if perchance, Markarian or the HSUS gets paid anything from the HP for blogging there, then HSUS is now in the fur trade too!

Chris

The HSUS, no matter what you think of it, has power. Fur should be low-hanging fruit (but that's another topic for another day), and particularly dog and cat fur. I'm not easily stunned by the behavior of humans, particularly when they are motivated by economic concerns, but I'm stunned by the reluctance of powerful people backed by a lot of money to advocate for . . . what they're supposed to be advocating for.

Check out today's challenge to HSUS at: http://furisevil.org/?p=1140

On the Vegan "Diet"

My dogs eat vegan dog food. They don't have collars made from animals. But they also haven't made a moral choice to not use animals. To say they are vegans is odd to me, though I have done that as the distinction is lost on most people and for the sake of a swift message it does the job.

When I first saw PCRM's "Kickstart Your Health With a Vegan Diet" campaign, I let out a bit of a sigh. At least they didn't say "vegan cleanse." But still . . . diet.

However, there's a context here, and that context is that the message is coming from an organization that focuses on the science angle of our use of sentient nonhumans (i.e., animals in research, in schools or as food). And they concentrate on the health aspects of removing animals from your diet. And they reach a lot of people who don't have animal rights on their radar but might stop using animals for food if they had something to gain (assuming a clearer conscience isn't something to gain).

Also, PCRM doesn't advocate for veganism per se, as veganism does in fact involve so much more than diet. In that sense, they're being honest. They're not saying, "try veganism for 21 days." If they did that, they'd most certainly get pounced on.

If PCRM can get more people to try a "vegan diet" for 21 days as suggested, which is what in my experience used to be called "strict vegetarianism" (and which is no better), that's an actual decrease in animal use for those people. And there is support during the 21 days, which may or may not steer participants toward other areas of animal use (we'll see . . . I've signed up).

If more people stop eating animals and still wear leather or wool, they haven't done nothing. They shouldn't call themselves vegans, but they have opted out of a significant part of our usage of sentient nonhumans. And one would think that a vegan diet is the gateway to veganism if there is adequate support and education regarding other connections that might not be immediately obvious to someone concentrating on health and diet. After all, how many of us stopped eating animals, and then realized food is just one piece of the puzzle?

Though the health argument isn't ironclad and I wouldn't want to make it the center of my advocacy, I have to remember who the messenger is here and what the context is. And if this campaign increases the number of people who decrease their animal usage in their diets, that's a great step.

Dogs as Smart as 2-yr-old Kids

When I saw the Live Science article about dogs being as smart as 2-year-old kids I knew that if there were any talk of ranking, my beloved greyhounds would be at the less-desirable end of the list (not from personal experience, but from reputation), and I also knew that there would be a whiff of speciesism. Why? Because when you compare two species, or rather a nonhuman animal species to the human animal, the humans almost always come out on top. The point is to show how much another species is like us, but of course never as good as we are, at whatever the measurement is. And of course, the definition of whatever is being measured--in this case intelligence--is our version of intelligence. We define intelligence as what we have, and then compare other species, to see how much they are like us. It's a no-win for the other species, but it's also a compliment as they have some of the great stuff we've got that makes us . . . us.

First we define intelligence in terms of language and the number of words someone knows. Then we go to math, and then we go to socializing and problem solving.

"While dogs ranked with the 2-year-olds in language, they would trump a 3- or 4-year-old in basic arithmetic . . . In terms of social smarts, our drooling furballs fare even better. . . . The social life of dogs is much more complex, much more like human teenagers at that stage, interested in who is moving up in the pack and who is sleeping with who and that sort of thing. . . . We all want insight into how our furry companions think, and we want to understand [their] silly, quirky and apparently irrational behaviors . . . . Their stunning flashes of brilliance and creativity are reminders that they may not be Einsteins but are sure closer to humans than we thought."

The upshot is that the "smartest" dogs are the most recently-developed breeds as we bred them to be responsive to us, unlike the older breeds, such as greyhounds and other hounds whose skills are said to be the result of "instinctive intelligence." That last part is interesting. The way greyhounds, for instance, have been bred and trained takes advantage of their natural talent and instinct, but you could say the same thing about the border collie (number one on the list). One has just been bred and trained to be around people (socially), while the other hasn't.

So we train dogs to be around us and responsive to us and then label that smart (because they have become more like us in ways we can understand), while the behaviors we understand less/cannot decode because they are less like behaviors we exhibit get overlooked and/or called "instinct." 

Now, I'm just unpacking what has occurred here. If the assessment that dogs have a certain level of intelligence or are like us results in them being treated better as pets or people wanting to profit from them less, great.

Do you think this helps dogs? It certainly might cause a spike in orders for border collies and the other dogs on top of the list, but does it help dogs?

 

Emme Loves Ami!

Finally, it arrived--a medium-size bag (4.4lb for $22.95 + shipping) of Ami vegan cat food (via Vegan Essentials). It was with some trepidation that I opened the bag and offered chunky Emily some of the animal-free tasty morsels. And to my surprise, she picked them out of her Whole Foods brand canned food loaded with animal products.

What a relief!

The only problem now is that my original plan was to use half of each food (one meal of the kibble, one of the canned) and I don't know if she'll eat the canned. Perhaps considering she won't be in a position to choose (either one or the other will be in the bowl), I won't have this problem. We'll see.

The taurine issue is supposedly resolved with Ami (not to mention Emily is female, and most problems I have read about not only didn't involve Ami, but also didn't involve female cats), but I'm still wary. If she didn't like Ami I wouldn't be writing this as I don't feed the animals in my care food they don't like. I'm not going to leave it in the bowl until "they're hungry enough to eat it."

Of course, I have to be on the lookout for any changes in Emily anyway, as she's an FIP kitty and has a bloated belly but at this point no other symptoms. And now that she's not eating as much canned food, she'll probably drink more water (either from a scotch glass or the dogs' bowls), but that's to be expected.

My only complaint so far is that Ami was backordered and I was told it would arrive in two weeks but it took a month, and concerns about availability are common when you research the product. Hopefully, with increased demand, Ami will be easier to obtain.

Feeding the system that exploits sentient nonhumans by feeding Emily sentient nonhumans has never sat well with me, though neither has feeding a carnivore a non-carnivorous diet. I know that it's the nutrients she needs, not the actual flesh, and there are other ways to get those nutrients, but I'm not 100% comfortable.

When I start seeing results/changes of some sort, I'll let you know. Perhaps I will change my mind.

We Interrupt Regularly Scheduled . . .

We interrupt regularly scheduled deconstructing, editorializing, commenting and ranting to bring you a letter from John Perkins:

Dear Friends

Speaking of Democracy, Honduras, and President Obama. . .

In writing my new book Hoodwinked (Random House, Nov 2009 publication date), I recently visited Central America. Everyone I talked with there was convinced that the military coup that had overthrown the democratically-elected president of Honduras, Manuel Zelaya, had been engineered by two US companies, with CIA support. And that the US and its new president were not standing up for democracy.

Earlier in the year Chiquita Brands International Inc. (formerly United Fruit) and Dole Food Co had severely criticized Zelaya for advocating an increase of 60% in Honduras’s minimum wage, claiming that the policy would cut into corporate profits. They were joined by a coalition of textile manufacturers and exporters, companies that rely on cheap labor to work in their sweatshops.

Memories are short in the US, but not in Central America. I kept hearing people who claimed that it was a matter of record that Chiquita (United Fruit) and the CIA had toppled Guatemala’s democratically-elected president Jacobo Arbenz in 1954 and that International Telephone & Telegraph (ITT), Henry Kissinger, and the CIA had  brought down Chile’s Salvador Allende in 1973. These people were certain that Haiti’s president Jean-Bertrand Aristide had been ousted by the CIA in 2004 because he proposed a minimum wage increase, like Zelaya’s.

I was told by a Panamanian bank vice president, “Every multinational knows that if Honduras raises its hourly rate, the rest of Latin America and the Caribbean will have to follow. Haiti and Honduras have always set the bottom line for minimum wages. The big companies are determined to stop what they call a ‘leftist revolt’ in this hemisphere. In throwing out Zelaya they are sending frightening messages to all the other presidents who are trying to raise the living standards of their people.”

It did not take much imagination to envision the turmoil sweeping through every Latin American capital. There had been a collective sign of relief at Barack Obama’s election in the U.S., a sense of hope that the empire in the North would finally exhibit compassion toward its southern neighbors, that the unfair trade agreements, privatizations, draconian IMF Structural Adjustment Programs, and threats of military intervention would slow down and perhaps even fade away. Now, that optimism was turning sour.

The cozy relationship between Honduras’s military coup leaders and the corporatocracy were confirmed a couple of days after my arrival in Panama. England’s The Guardian ran an article announcing that “two of the Honduran coup government's top advisers have close ties to the US secretary of state. One is Lanny Davis, an influential lobbyist who was a personal lawyer for President Bill Clinton and also campaigned for Hillary. . . The other hired gun for the coup government that has deep Clinton ties is (lobbyist) Bennett Ratcliff.” (1)

DemocracyNow! broke the news that Chiquita was represented by a powerful Washington law firm, Covington & Burling LLP, and its consultant, McLarty Associates (2). President Obama’s Attorney General Eric Holder had been a Covington partner and a defender of Chiquita when the company was accused of hiring “assassination squads” in Colombia (Chiquita was found guilty, admitting that it had paid organizations listed by the US government as terrorist groups “for protection” and agreeing in 2004 to a $25 million fine). (3)  George W. Bush’s UN Ambassador, John Bolton, a former Covington lawyer, had fiercely opposed Latin American leaders who fought for their peoples’ rights to larger shares of the profits derived from their resources; after leaving the government in 2006, Bolton became involved with the Project for the New American Century, the Council for National Policy, and a number of other programs that promote corporate hegemony in Honduras and elsewhere.  McLarty Vice Chairman John Negroponte was U.S. Ambassador to Honduras from 1981-1985, former Deputy Secretary of State, Director of National Intelligence, and U.S. Representative to the United Nations; he played a major role in the U.S.-backed Contra’s secret war against Nicaragua’s Sandinista  government and has consistently opposed the policies of the  democratically-elected pro-reform Latin American presidents. (4) These three men symbolize the insidious power of the corporatocracy, its bipartisan composition, and the fact that the Obama Administration has been sucked in.

The Los Angeles Times went to the heart of this matter when it concluded:

What happened in Honduras is a classic Latin American coup in another sense: Gen. Romeo Vasquez, who led it, is an alumnus of the United States' School of the Americas (renamed the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation). The school is best known for producing Latin American officers who have committed major human rights abuses, including military coups. (5)

All of this leads us once again to the inevitable conclusion: you and I must change the system. The president – whether Democrat or Republican – needs us to speak out.

Chiquita, Dole and all your representatives need to hear from you. Zelaya must be reinstated.

 FOOTNOTES

(1) “Who's in charge of US foreign policy? The coup in Honduras has exposed divisions between Barack Obama and his secretary of state, Hillary Clinton” by Mark Weisbrot

 http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/cifamerica/2009/jul/16/honduras-coup-obama-clinton (July 23, 2009)

(2) http://www.democracynow.org/2009/7/21/from_arbenz_to_zelaya_chiquita_in (July 23, 2009)

(3) “Chiquita admits to paying Colombia terrorists: Banana company agrees to $25 million fine for paying AUC for protection” MSNBC March 15, 2007 http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17615143/ (July 24, 2009)

(4) Fore more information:  http://aconstantineblacklist.blogspot.com/2009/07/eric-holder-and-chaquita-covington.html (July 23, 2009)

(5) “The high-powered hidden support for Honduras' coup: The country's rightful president was ousted by a military leadership that takes many of its cues from Washington insiders.” by Mark Weisbrot, Los Angeles Times, July 23, 2009

http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/commentary/la-oe-weisbrot23-2009jul23,0,7566740.story (July 23, 2009)

On "The Wild"

Twice in the past 24 hours (once here and once on Stephanie's blog, in the comments)I have come across the following statement: "[insert animal here] are safe from predators, get fed regularly, and are better off on farms than if they were in 'the wild.'" The problem with that statement is it's not as if farmers are searching "the wild" for cows, pigs, chicken and fish, plucking them from their homes, and plopping them on a farm to live out their (shortened) lives prior to slaughter. The choice isn't the wild or the farm.

The animals on farms are created for the sole purpose of human consumption. They are created to be slaughtered. And their lives of exploitation, torment, torture and slaughter cannot be compared to an animal's life in the wild.

The next argument is usually something along the lines of: But animals in the wild might starve to death, and get injured, maimed or killed by predators! Yes, that's true. And animal rights isn't focused on what happens in the world outside of us that we aren't directly profiting from and that isn't happening because of us (that last one is nearly impossible, as you can trace many problems other animals experience back to something human animals have done to them or their habitat or their food). And before any hunter can blurt out "Have you ever seen a deer die of starvation in the woods? It's not pretty. We hunters are helping the deer," remember that hunters aren't in the woods looking for exhausted, starving, sickly deer to put out of their misery. They are looking for healthy, large ones.

Finally, people who object to our moral stance jump species and say we should object to the lion killing the gazelle. I don't know if these people are serious or not, but though we are not unique in the animal world in demonstrating morality, we vegans and animal rights advocates do not concern ourselves with the moral codes of other species. Besides, we have choices. We can choose not to kill and eat someone we do not need to eat in order to survive. Whether lions can do that or not is not something I think about. I do not pass judgment on other species, whose motives I cannot comprehend. I can, however, question the motives of a human who has no need to kill a sentient being or have someone kill for him, yet does so anyway.

On Letting Your Emotions Rule the Day

Bea directed me to the Animal Welfare Special Report at TheHill.com, in which Rep. David Scott (D-Ga), who is the chairman of the Livestock, Dairy and Poultry Subcommittee of the House Committee on Agriculture draws a line in the sand regarding the animals we use and how we use them.

Once you know what his title is, there is little to be surprised about regarding his rhetoric, but it's still interesting to see how he spins his topic, and particularly how authoritative he tries to sound when it's clear that his agenda either doesn't allow for him to educate himself or doesn't allow for him to admit that his agenda trumps the facts.

Let's deconstruct:

• Paragraph #1: Americans don't know where their food comes from and what it takes to produce it. True.
• Paragraph #2: Ditto.
• Paragraph #3: Food safety scares have caused us to look more closely at our food supply. True. But the end of the paragraph is where it gets interesting. "However, many of our concerns about modern food production stem from purely emotional concerns, in which we try to overlay our social mores onto sectors where they traditionally haven’t been applied. A prime example of this is our concern for the welfare of animals in agriculture."

Translation? We "traditionally" have applied our social mores in some places and not others, and we should go back to "tradition," which I bet has something to do with continuing to care about our dogs while continuing to feign care for "farm animals," as they're value is as food only.

• Let the games begin . . . Paragraph #4 starts with: "Undeniably, neither I nor anyone I know advocates or even tolerates the inhumane treatment of farm animals." The veracity of this statement hinges on Scott's definition of "inhumane," and that definition must be very, very restricted, and clearly unrelated to the realities of our modern factory farm system. But his real agenda comes out later in the graph:

"However it is imperative that we allow the most up-to-date scientific data on animal agriculture practices to drive the policy decisions we make, and extract emotion from the equation as much as possible. We have a tendency as a society to anthropomorphize our animals, especially our pets. We give them human names and provide them with the same amenities we enjoy as humans. None of this is objectionable; our pets provide us with a tremendous amount of love, companionship and joy and deserve the best care we can give them. However, a problem with this view arises when we consider animals in agriculture."

The "problem with this view" that arises is that it is entirely logical to broaden one's circle of compassion beyond "pets" and to other sentient nonhumans, and Scott doesn't like that logic because it conflicts with his profit motive and his palate.

• Paragraph #5 begins: "Unfortunately when combined with our love for companion animals our lack of knowledge about agriculture leads us to view farm animals the same as we do our pets. We think about what type of living conditions we want for our pets (often the same as those we want for ourselves), and try to apply that to every animal when in reality this may not be the best course of action."

It is not "our lack of knowledge about agriculture" that "leads us to view farm animals the same as we do our pets," it's the reality that in every way that is important, farm animals are in fact exactly the same as our pets. We have simply decided that certain animals are pets (and we have domesticated them) and certain animals are food. "Lack of knowledge about agriculture" might be irrelevant, but it's also untrue, as most vegans I know know far more than non-vegans about animal agriculture, and it's that knowledge that makes them want to be vegans.

Scott then attempts the often-read, nature-is-cruel argument, which is supposed to lead to the conclusion that animals on "farms" are better off than those in the wild. The only problem with that is that's not what's going on. It isn't true that animals on farms would be in the wild otherwise. They are created to be on the farms; they wouldn't exist otherwise.

• In paragraph #6 Scott separates himself from farmers, who are businessmen and care about profit margin and "view animals in a utilitarian light and define their wellness based on productivity." At this point of course I'm waiting to hear how he views "farm" animals differently.
• We don't really get an answer for that one, but we do get to the real question, which Scott alludes to in graph #3: "So how do we bridge the gap between maximizing profit at the expense of an animal’s expression of its natural tendencies and treating livestock as we would the family cat?" The problem, then, is the question Scott is asking and the assumptions he is making. I don't think anyone is campaigning for "farm" animals to become pets, as many of us don't even think the family cat should be the family cat. Scott's assumption is that we profit from certain animals. But he need not make that assumption; it's a choice.
• Finally, Scott writes that "we have the responsibility to set aside emotion as much as possible and make rational, science-based decisions on policy in an effort to balance the concerns of all involved."

What's all this about emotion, anyway? All we do as vegans is take a reality--the reality of the sentience of cats, dogs, horses, chickens, sheep, cows, etc... and "make rational, science-based" and logic-based decisions "in an effort to balance the [genuine, life or death] concerns of all involved" (surely Scott cannot claim to be doing that).

Methinks it is Scott who is letting his emotions get the best of him. He is letting his attachment to eating animals and his attachment to his constituents profiting from their slaughter cloud his decision making. If he were truly making decisions based on science, he would know that the cow whose parts he eats is just as sentient as family cat, and that arbitrarily drawing a line in the sand for who is free from torture isn't "rational" or "science-based."

On Bob Herbert and Direct Action

Something interesting happened when I read New York Times columnist Bob Herbert's article about the arrest of Harvard professor Henry Louis Gates Jr., called "Anger Has Its Place." Allow me to jump down to the paragraph that startled me into forced contemplation for several reasons:

Black people need to roar out their anger at such treatment, lift up their voices and demand change. Anyone counseling a less militant approach is counseling self-defeat. As of mid-2008, there were 4,777 black men imprisoned in America for every 100,000 black men in the population. By comparison, there were only 727 white male inmates per 100,000 white men.

While whites use illegal drugs at substantially higher percentages than blacks, black men are sent to prison on drug charges at 13 times the rate of white men.

Most whites do not want to hear about racial problems, and President Obama would rather walk through fire than spend his time dealing with them. We’re never going to have a serious national conversation about race. So that leaves it up to ordinary black Americans to rant and to rave, to demonstrate and to lobby, to march and confront and to sue and generally do whatever is necessary to stop a continuing and deeply racist criminal justice outrage.

I don't disagree with Herbert, but what if I wrote:

Most people don't want to hear about the capacity of nonhumans to experience pain, pleasure, boredom or frustration, and President Obama would rather walk through fire than do anything other than acquire a pure breed puppy or pardon a turkey on Thanksgiving (though that one remains to be seen). We're never going to have a serious national conversation about the rights of sentient nonhumans. So that leaves it up to ordinary Americans to rant and to rave, to demonstrate and to lobby, to march and confront and to sue and generally do whatever is necessary to stop a continuing and deeply speciesist social justice outrage.

Again, I don't agree with Herbert, but I also think that his sentiments apply to another struggle that isn't as different or separate as many would like to believe. What Herbert wrote is about justice that is long overdue and I doubt anyone will call him a terrorist.

I look forward to the day the paragraph I wrote can be published in the New York Times, and not result in accusations of terrorism, fanaticism, extremism or inciting people to violence.