Missing is the Context
Why Activism in a Vacuum Will Not Resonate
Maybe you’ve been there. The person you’re sitting with, holding perhaps a greased, featherless wing of some bird in their hands, tearing flesh off bone with their teeth strip by strip, hardly stopping to swallow the last morsel before going again for another bite, will say to you, lips smeared with sauce, jaws still pumping away, “So, why is it you’re vegan again?”
Once I believed in the sincerity of such questions asked in such contexts. I took them as stemming from genuine curiosity or a response to a sudden pang of self-doubt—in either case signaling a willingness to reevaluate certain assumptions, entrenched habits, personal failings; so, I’d share with them something of my own story, my own reasons, my overall perspective. And, of course, I’d try very hard not to make explicit my disapproval of their decision to order precisely the item on the menu that they did. Instead, I saw myself as opening up a new possibility for them that perhaps they had not considered before this conversation, at least not in the exact terms in which I was presenting it.
Invariably, after having opened myself up to my dining companion in this way, thus making myself vulnerable before them, offering them some piece of me that I treasure, they’d most likely respond with a joke. Jerking the wing as if it were attempting a desperate flight, they might begin to cry out, “Please don’t eat me! Don’t eat me, please!” before bringing it back into their mouth with a self-satisfied grin.
Once I believed in the sincerity of such questions asked in such contexts; now I no longer do. Now, I see them for what they are: an expression of insecurity, an attempt at self-consolation, and ultimately a deflection of a consideration of the wrongness of what they do. By soliciting from me what is implicitly a critique of their actions, they become thereby able to diffuse that critique, render it innocuous. And what, in turn, makes it possible for them to do this? It is precisely the material context which forms the backdrop to our conversation: the animal turned to meat; the meat in their hands.
I have found that when sitting at a table upon which animals are being served and eaten, it is senseless, at best perfunctory, for me to share my reasons for my convictions. Before the question “Is it wrong to eat animals?” can even be asked, the answer has already been given to us by the context, is taken for granted, and thus cannot be given up, placed back on the table for serious consideration.
It is my view that the context in which one speaks, while seldom discussed, is nevertheless a crucial factor determining just how persuasive the vision of human-animal relations that we share with another will be—either it will expound on and corroborate a vision, or else render it shallow and puerile.
Ostensibly, most effective activists already possess an intuitive grasp of this principle (as evidenced in their tactics and campaigns). Perhaps the clearest example I can think of is that of Anonymous for the Voiceless (AV), in which slaughterhouse footage broadcast on television screens on public sidewalks is made into the backdrop for structured conversations on the wrongness of eating meat. Here, to accept the invitation to attend to the suffering of animals is to enter a space within which the prevailing dogma dictating to us the terms of our relationships to animals can be called into question. This approach, in turn, has its roots in Singer’s Animal Liberation. There too we see an argument brought to life by the details that surround it—in this case, the unflinching exposition of the cruelties that daily we inflict upon animals.
But though it may provide a valid critique, I cannot help but find this sort of context—found not only in Singer and AV, but also characteristic of all vegan outreach—both impoverished and uninspiring. At most, it can ground a vision in which animals are depicted as little more than passive victims of human misdeeds, and humans as feckless gluttons in need of discipline and restraint. It is my experience that if images of that sort do elicit any response at all (and usually they do not), at best it might take shape as feelings of guilt and remorse, coupled perhaps with a vague expression of concern.
While not in itself inappropriate, I have my doubts as to whether that in itself could serve as the impetus for a thoroughgoing transformation of one’s soul. It doesn’t seem likely, in other words, that it would be sufficient to spark in another a deep yearning for change. On the contrary, if the imagination is called on to contemplate the tribulations of the victims of our brutality, wouldn’t the more natural response be to recoil, to turn away, and to attempt to comfort oneself?1
And while I can grant that the pressure of critique and condemnation, if tenaciously applied, can perhaps push one into conformity with a more principled way of life, still there is always the risk that when the pressure lets up, the mind unsupervised will soon manufacture an escape: some excuse for why previous and more convenient patterns must be reverted to. This is why I think that lasting change instead requires more than just a push, but more importantly a deeply felt pull towards something understood as valuable. What we need is a stirring of desire by a positive articulation of what the human-animal relationship could amount to.
Though to be fair, I should acknowledge here that there is some positive vision, however slight, that corresponds to the depiction of animal suffering given to us by AV and the others in this tradition. In renouncing the practices that contribute to such evils, they can be taken also as implying that it is desirable to be (and thus one ought to strive to become) the sort of person who governs themselves according to a set of rationally derived principles—meaning both logically consistent and a proponent of equality. However, in practice, I wager that this element in fact contributes little to the persuasiveness of the strategy as a whole. First, their positive vision resides dimly in the background, encounterable only if and then afterone assents to the critique. Relatedly (second), it does not really suggest to us modes of engagement with animals that can replace those which are critiqued. That I consider one ‘equal’ says little about the sort of life I may then go on to lead with them.
Have we then a better alternative? I think we do. Here I want to briefly sketch three:
AV’s approach to outreach has a lot to recommend it. Supplying images to accompany discussions on our obligations to animals is itself a smart and often effective tactic. Its primary limitation lies not in the use of images as such, but in what those images are about. By presenting animals almost exclusively as the victims of human wrongdoing, the context AV creates can sustain only a narrow range of visions while foreclosing other potentially more compelling ways of imagining human-animal relations. What if, instead, such depictions of suffering were juxtaposed with images of animals who have been liberated, perhaps being cared for? Might this not ground richer and more varied conversations about the kinds of lives we may lead with them?
At the risk of stating the obvious, I think there is no better context than that which is found in animal sanctuaries. Here, we encounter a positive vision of human-animal relations already embedded into the material surroundings: in the relationships that hold between the animals and those who care for them, in the practices through which their stories are kept and shared with visitors, and in the trust and affection they may come to display towards humans (no small thing, given their often horrifying pasts). When visitors are invited to feed, groom, or otherwise care for the animals, they are given the opportunity not merely to better understand this vision, but momentarily to inhabit it, to imagine themselves as already participating in the form of life being offered.
Perhaps most provocatively, a positive context is created by those who liberate animals from lives of confinement. Such actions implicitly assign to animal life a value far exceeding what convention allows for. That a person would risk their own freedom for the sake of a few mink itself disrupts our unexamined and habitual ways of thinking. Yes, they may be branded cranks or criminals, but at the same time the fact of their courage commands respect, is not easily dismissed without some examination—examination both of their character and of the object of their sacrifice. If publicized along with the right messaging, I think these kinds of liberatory acts are able to shock a complacent population into the serious consideration of a new and radical vision for animals.
And if you were wondering, now, when I’m sitting at a dinner table where meat is being served and am asked, “So why is it that you’re vegan again?” my answer simply is this: “Come with me to a protest, to a vigil, to a feedlot, a slaughterhouse, or even to potluck, a gathering of like-minds—then maybe you will begin to understand.”2
Perhaps by the strategic deployment of self-protective irony.
I think there are two important takeaways here: That what we are inclined to regard as exclusively ‘vegan spaces’ should strive to become more welcoming to those with whom we disagree (they are, after all,“pending vegans,” to use Jonathan Lenthem’s term), and that we ought to strive to make spaces which we typically regard as hostile to us more vegan friendly. There is much more to be said here. Perhaps this is a thread I will pick up in a later post.