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Instrumental Reason: Viewing Others as Things and Commodities

12/26/2015

[Content Warning: mention of paedophilia and animal abuse]

In courses on Critical Theory and the Frankfurt School, one lecture I used to give was about “instrumental reason” (or instrumental rationality).

Like many academic concepts, the work on instrumental reason can become complex and involved. The aspect of instrumental reason that I focused on was, however, concisely summed up by Jürgen Habermas, who suggested in 1968 that it meant, partly at least, something to do with “manipulating living and dead nature.”

The medical historian and scientific anti-vivisectionist Hans Ruesch, writing in his famous book Slaughter of the Innocent (1979), gave this vivid example of thinking instrumentally

When a young man who was joining together rats was asked, “What on earth can be the use of this experiment to humanity?”, he answered: “I don’t know what good it is going to do humanity, but I know what good it is going to do me: it is going to get my degree.”

In my courses, I would relate this rather abstract consequence of instrumental reason: it means taking a tree and seeing “timber,” or, while viewing a tree, seeing reams of paper rather than the tree’s beauty: seeing the pages of a book in the limbs of a tree.

Being concerned with ruthless practicalities, one effect of instrumental reason is the separation of fact and value. Thus, it becomes concerned with how to do things and not with questions of WHAT SHOULD be done.

In 1994, Stephen Bronner stated that Critical Theorist Herbert Marcuse felt that the growth of a society in which “the alienating logic of instrumental rationality” prevailed meant that “the ethical element” in society was threatened with eradication.

Indeed, members of the Frankfurt School argued that instrumental rationality needed to be replaced by another form of reason, which they called Critical Theory. For them, thinking critically revealed existing society to be irrational and oppressive, while the glittering consumer “goodies” in prevailing society, governed by instrumental reason, help to destroy humanity’s ability to make rational choices collectively.

So, while keeping in mind the idea that instrumental reason is to do with manipulating living and dead nature, while a society based on instrumental reason is a threat to its ethical dimension, what examples are there that are relevant to animal rights advocacy, and what examples are there that underline the importance of an intersectional approach to thinking about what David Nibert calls the entanglements of oppression and liberation?

First is the way some human beings look at living other animals, particularly “livestock,” horses, and dogs. Obviously, in a speciesist society, they do not look at such others as rights bearers; more in terms of bloodlines, speed, and the money that may be made through gambling.

I have known a rescued greyhound (Zami) for a good long time now and it is a frequent occurrence that men in particular comment about what they assume should be her uses: racing, hunting, and breeding for racing and hunting. Often men will ask if Zami is “for sale.”

I was once stood with Zami outside of a charity shop waiting for her human to return when a man approached asking if “it” was a racer. I said she was a rescued greyhound. He then asked if I was willing to breed “it” as “its” puppies would be valuable. When I said that she was not able to have children and, anyway, there is no way we would seek to use her in this manner, the man seemed genuinely puzzled. What else are greyhounds “for?”

At a “livestock” market a farmer’s social status is enhanced if he (it is an overwhelming male environment) is able to demonstrate that he has “an eye” for good “stock.” What’s less known is the phenomenon of some men (and women) who regard some humans as “livestock” in modern forms of slavery and human trafficking.

Feminists have long talked about woman and girls being subject to a generalised “male gaze,” but the instrumental rationality of those who regard human females as “breeding stock” is more particular.

In September 2015, members of a paedophile ring were jailed in England. There are very many violent pornography films, many of which feature children and babies. Millions of pictures and films have been found of children being horrifically abused. What has emerged in recent cases is the fact that trafficked victims of the sex trade may be deliberately made pregnant, then their children, just like in the case of “cattle,” are removed to be used and abused. The children, who are never allowed to go to school, or socialise with other children apart from others being abused, may in turn be made pregnant from the age of, for example, eleven, so their offspring become available for use too.

All these are examples of instrumental reason.

A society based on instrumental rationality promotes the viewing of others as things and as objects to be utilised. A general Left view may suggest that the capitalist mode of production inevitably leads to people and other things being regarded as commodities and a means to securing profit. Similarly, feminist insights suggest that women and girls will be seen instrumentally in patriarchal cultures.

This means that, just as we may meet people – men overwhelmingly – eyeing up a greyhound for the uses he or she may be put, so too will there be some looking at young women, young girls, and even babies thinking about the “porn” films and the scenes in which they may “star” in.

Thinking instrumentally is indeed a destroyer of ethics and a means to the gross manipulation of others.

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Censorship the Norm in the Reducetarian Camp?

12/16/2015

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On World Vegan Day (November 1st 2015), when grassroots Irish vegans were blow away by the numbers of people who attended the inaugural Dublin VegFest, Teagan Kuruna recorded her first "Teagan Goes Vegan" podcast.

In quick succession, great podcasts followed, with Aph Ko, the anti-racist feminist vegan writer and activist, (episode 2), and lauren Ornelas of the Food Empowerment Project (episode 3), both of which I highly recommend, especially lauren's one.

By episode 6 and 7, the podcast, sadly, had hit the buffers in my view.

Episode 6 features two men known as the "Vegan Bros" despite that neither seems clear about what veganism is, and episode 7 features Tobias Leenaert, a vegetarian activist [possibly] who opposes veganism as a pro-justice philosophy.

So, I wrote a comment on the website under episode 7.

Within 24 hours, the comment was deleted and, as far as I can see, no-one can comment on any of the episodes now.

Of course, we could think that Teagan Kuruna is merely in the business of interviewing movers and shakers in the contemporary vegan movement in order to let listeners decide for themselves. This could be true, but there are no challenging questions in this podcast, and Ms. Kuruna does say she's a "fan" of Leenaert, which seems to mitigate against that possibility.

This is the comment I made.

Dear Teagan,

What happened? I really enjoyed your early podcasts (way back in November 2015) - number three especially. Listeners can hear your shock but then utter determination upon learning about child slavery in the production of chocolate. You are clearly open to intersectionality, even with a guest confused about PeTA and their juvenile antics.

You clearly understand the importance of language in terms of challenging oppressive systems. There is a distressing amount of ableist language in your podcasts I'm sorry to say, especially the last but one.

Boy, though, have you decided to drop the bar? Bury it even? Those early principled intersectional guests and now the "Vegan Bros" and Mr. Leenaert, proud flesh consumer. Why, oh, why?

Lauren Ornelas said "we're not going to compromise on our ethics," talking about a refused meal, to which you reply, "right, right." You seem to agree with the idea of boycotting some unethical chocolate brands and see the links between human rights and the rights of other animals.

All this Leenaert spits on. He would have taken the dish filled with animal products and eaten with relish.

Defending his (present-day) consumption of non-vegan wines, Leenaert scoffed at the idea of just checking the internet app first to make sure one was not conniving with the violation of fishes' rights. So, don't tell him about your chocolate boycott.
Perhaps you can say how and why you have bought into the stereotypes about consistent veganism?

You seemed all in favour of consistency in podcasts two and three. For example, who do you have in mind when you say some vegans are mostly interested in "being right" - and saying to people that they are "wrong" and "bad." I have been doing street stalls, talking directly to the public, since the 1980s and I have never heard a vegan educators say this. You going from FB and the admittedly low level of discourse that seems to encourage? On World Vegan Day, the day of your first podcast, there was the first ever Dublin VegFest with some 3,000 visitors on the day. I dare say that no-one - not one - attending was told by any vegan there that they are "wrong" and "bad."

What is a "very aggressive vegan activist"? From what place do these stereotypes arise?

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A Modern View: Rights as Social Constructs

12/16/2015

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There has often been some talk in the animal advocacy movement about rights - moral and legal - their origins, and whether or not they are "granted" to others.

I've tried to tackle the thorny issue of where rights come from in some of my research work, and I reproduce that part of the work below with minor updates and new references.

However, let's begin by reminding ourselves that Professor Tom Regan, the author of The Case for Animal Rights, grounds the notion of animal rights in the tradition of "natural rights"...

As we'll see, this natural rights view is criticised in the work cited below.

Rights and Animal Rights.

Tom Regan and Gary Francione are acknowledged as the major theoreticians of perspectives that seek to build on established rights formulations, and apply - or extent - to them to nonhuman animals. Regan is a Kantian deontologist who argues that many nonhumans are "subjects-of-a-life," a factor demanding that humans respect their inherent rights. Francione is a law professor particularly critical of the property status of other animals. His rights-based formulation is thought less complicated than Regan’s; he claims basic rights for all sentient beings.

Reganite and Francionian positions on nonhuman-human relations can be regarded as attempts to bring genuine rights views to bear on the issue of the human use of other animals. Such approaches are different in nature to traditional or classical welfarist stances; and different also from Peter Singer’s version of utilitarianism which...Francione claims as the philosophical grounding of modern day "new welfarism." Neither Regan nor Francione use rights concepts, or the language of rights, in a rhetorical manner as many other animal activists do, and both believe that protective rights formulations can be plausibly extended to prevent current large-scale institutionalised human exploitation of certain species of other animals. Regan’s and particularly Francione’s works are effectively marginalised even within the animal advocacy movement. This section, therefore, acknowledges and highlights a paradoxical situation in which the so-called "animal rights movement" virtually rejects genuine rights theories while embracing a non-rights animal liberation position as its main philosophical stance.

As implied above, however, it may be recognised that even the phrase "philosophical stance" can be quite misleading in relation to the majority of current animal advocacy in which "philosophising" per se is actively frowned upon, and/or seen as a very poor second to "doing things" (doing any thing) "for the animals." The modern animal protection movement, as well as its counter-movement mobilisations, frequently (and correctly) presents the book Animal Liberation as the origins of second wave nonhuman advocacy, along with an implicit and often explicit (and incorrect) claim that the book, and therefore the movement, is based on Peter Singer’s "animal rights perspective."

The frequent characterisation of his utilitarian perspective as an animal rights position, and presumably the number of times Animal Liberation has been described as "the animal rights bible,"[1] has seemingly led its author to regret ever having used rights language, even rhetorically and, according to Regan (2001: 83-4), Singer remains committed to his claim that attributing rights to nonhumans is not possible.[9]

[...] some of the misrepresentation of Singer’s work as rights-based theorising, especially by pro-use countermovements, appears on the face of it to be deliberately ideological in intent. However, in relation to what Singer says about his own position, Francione fully accepts that Singer is entirely consistent to the extent that he rejects the notion of moral right holding in the case of human and nonhuman animals. Moreover, his consistent utilitarian principles have led Singer to accept that "there might be circumstances" in which human and animal exploitation…could be justified in light of consequences (Francione 1995: 259).

Francione suggests, however, that rights concepts are always likely to be important and invoked as resources in human affairs and therefore utilitarian "balancing" of human and nonhuman interests are extremely dangerous in terms of nonhuman interests. Dangerous precisely because protective rights considerations are not conceptually available "to limit the results of the balancing process" (ibid.) Francione attempts to clarify the point by putting it in a different way, while at the same time revealing how authentic animal rights theorists attempt to build on already established ways of thinking about the protection afforded by bearing rights:

the utilitarian notion of “consequences” cannot be interpreted in a way that does not prejudice the issue of animal protection. Even if we do accept that animals have interests, it is simply difficult to make determinations of those interests from a humanocentric perspective; it is because we systematically devalue and underestimate the interests of disempowered populations that rights concepts are necessary in the first place. Although rights theory rests ultimately upon a consideration of animal interests, rights theory does not permit the sacrifice of animal interests simply because human interests would be served. Rather, rights theory assumes that at least some animal interests are entitled to prima facie protection and that the sacrifice of those interests require a justification not dissimilar to that required when we seek to override human interests protected by rights (ibid.)

The questions, "where do rights come from?" and "how are 'rights' used in animal rights thinking?" are, of course, pertinent [...]. Perhaps the first thing to be said about matters concerning any formulation of rights, following Steve Kangas (www.huppi.com/ kangaroo/L-rights.htm) [this reference is now broken, however, THIS is essentially the same essay as originally cited], is that "the origin of rights is a messy and complex debate."

Kangas suggests that the understanding of the first question of where rights "come from" can be aided by separating out three types of thinking about rights: conservative, liberal and libertarian; and also by thinking about four initial bases put forward for the creation of rights: that rights are "natural" (following Locke), "inalienable," "God-given," and "self-evident." Kangas states that until a few hundred years ago, most philosophers believed that rights could be defined in these four ways. However, "today, most philosophers agree that rights are social constructs, open to change." He says that this view accords well with the "liberal" stance, since, "Liberals believe that rights are social constructions, defended by force and open to change and improvement."

Kangas is almost certainly correct to state that rights cannot be regarded as self-evident because, as he notes, "philosophers have been vigorously arguing about them for thousands of years" (ibid.) Kangas also finds support in his assertion that debates about rights can be messy and complex. For example, Carl Cohen, in his 1986 article, "Why Animals Have No Rights," [the original is again broken, so THIS replaces it] states that, "The differing targets, contents, and sources of rights, and their inevitable conflict, together weave a tangled web." Cohen’s title itself indicates philosophical controversy over recent rights claims. He has published a number of works addressing human rights concepts and the whole idea of nonhumans being right holders. Whereas theorists such as Cohen argue that nonhuman animals, as a matter of logic, cannot ever be said to bear rights, Regan and Francione disagree and have put forward differing ways by which they argue that rights formulations can and should protect sentient nonhuman interests. While Regan’s position has been described as a liberal rights perspective (Fiddes 1991: 196), Regan characterise Cohen, like Singer, as a utilitarian theorist, at least "when reasoning in support of continued widespread and possible expanded reliance on nonhuman animals in biomedical research" (Regan 2001: 70).[2] The difference between Cohen and Singer is that Singer argues that no animal, human or nonhuman, can hold rights, while Cohen argues that all humans do and nonhumans do not.

Regan claims to adhere seriously to a commitment to develop an "informed, thoughtful moral outlook" (2001: 101). According to Benton & Redfearn, strength within Regan’s strategy accrues from the "benefit of latching on to the currently near-universal moral priority attached to human rights" (1996: 51, emphasis in original). Although it may be rather unkind of them to label Regan’s approach "a strategy," as if his commitment to human rights was only for the following reason, Benton & Redfearn acknowledge that, "Regan was the first theorist to get 'rights' across the species barrier" (ibid.: 50). Therefore, Regan can be credited with breaching that hitherto solid defensive ethical barrier based exclusively on species membership, of which the construction, maintenance, and usage of featured prominently in Part One of the current work.

Benton & Redfearn state that, as a matter of historical record, "the ethics of the 'rights' tradition has been markedly anthropocentric. To 'qualify' as an inherently valuable being one had to possess 'reason,' 'autonomy,' 'moral agency' or some other capacity generally restricted to humans" (ibid.) Regan, they go on, gets morality over the species barrier by concentrating on the criteria of right holding, a familiar notion in rights discourse addressing the question of the expansion of rights bearing. Clearly, many human beings do not have the characteristics listed by Benton & Redfearn above, neither do many have language use, another favoured way of deciding who holds rights. There is therefore a philosophical puzzle to be solved here. Either human beings without the above capacities are themselves not right holders or, if they remain so, on what basis are nonhumans, with similar capacities, to be denied at least basic or negative rights?

In general rights discourse, the notion that rights have been converted from shields to swords is seriously contested by various theorists: however, in this formulation, the idea of animal rights is clearly about rights as protective shields for individuals. Regan’s "subjects-of-a-life" are not necessarily moral agents; and logically nonhuman animals are placed into the category of right holding moral patients along with certain "marginal" humans (as they have became known in rights discourse) (DeGrazia 1996). Using a post-Darwinian understanding of the psychological complexity of many nonhumans, Benton & Redfearn claim that Regan shows that, "though animals are not moral agents in the full sense, they have enough sense of self as persisting through time, ability to express preferences and so on to be said to have 'interests,' which may be harmed or favoured by human agents" (1996: 50) Benton & Redfearn investigate the "lesser-than" aspect of "moral marginals," and conclude that not only are they not denied protective rights, "On the contrary, it might well be argued that it is just because of their lack of these attributes that they are in special need of the protection offered by the attribution of rights" (ibid.: 50-1).

For these commentators, Regan’s concentration on the rights of the individual strengthens the rights approach over what they describe as the more moderate "linkage of utilitarianism and animal welfare reform" (ibid.: 51). The one advantage of utilitarianism, they claim, is its reliance on "mere sentience" as the ethically relevant criteria. The strength of that, they say, is due to the fact that hardly anyone in the modern world would dispute that many nonhumans are sentient beings. A further "strategic limitation" of Regan’s position, Benton & Redfearn argue, stems from the huge social and personal changes implied by respect for the rights of many nonhuman animals.[3] This would require, "both social transformation and lifestyle changes of very fundamental kinds." How many, they ask, will be prepared to adopt a vegan diet and avoid all animal products? Surely, only those who could adhere to veganism can remain consistent with the logic of animal rights? This question greatly interests animal advocates, many of whom suggest that a strict advocacy of the vegan diet can be "divisive" and "elitist," whereas others simply see it as a logical consequence of accepting the rights view about human-nonhuman relations (Francione 1996: 43-44, 239).

Francione’s position is free of the first "limitation" in Regan – but clearly not of the second. In other words, Francione’s basic right theory argues that a being’s sentiency alone is enough to demand that humans respect their rights. Francione also firmly declares that respect for nonhuman rights does indeed require the personal adoption of veganism as a lifestyle choice. Francione begins his outline of animal rights with a familiar warning common in accounts of rights discourse: "There is a great deal of confusion surrounding the concept of rights" (2000: xxvi). His focus is on one aspect of rights, the protection they may offer, and argues that this is common feature of virtually every theory about rights: in other words, "a right is a particular way of protecting interests":

To say that an interest is protected by a right is to say that the interest is protected against being ignored or violated simply because this will benefit someone else. We can think of a right of any sort as a fence or a wall that surrounds an interest and upon which hangs a “no trespass” sign that forbids entry, even if it would be beneficial to the person seeking that entry (ibid.)

A feature of rights formulation associated with other animals often clash with the views of environmental ethicists such as "deep ecologists" (see Regan 2001: 19-21 and David Orton’s discussion paper about Deep Ecology and Animal Rights). Dispute may arise due to the concentration in rights thinking of protecting individuals rather than emphasising, say, "species conservation." However, citing Rollin’s "The Legal and Moral Bases of Animal Rights," Francione (2000: xxvii) notes that rights were deliberately constructed as ethical ideas about respecting individuals.[15] Rights protect individuals even in cases in which the general welfare of society would be improved by the right being ignored or not respected. Francione provides a detailed account of the concept of rights and rights theory in the context of animal law in Animals, Property, and the Law (Francione 1995) in which he distinguishes respect-based rights from policy-based rights. He argues for a basic right for sentient nonhuman animals: the right not to be treated as a "thing." For Francione, this basic right is not only a respect-based right but it is a special respect-based right, "in that it is necessary in order to have any rights or moral significance at all, irrespective of the political system and whatever other respect-based rights are protected. The basic right not to be treated as a thing recognises that the right holder is a person" (2000: 191, emphasis in original).

Moving toward his conception of animal rights, while accepting that no rights are absolute, "in the sense that their protection has no exception" (ibid.: xxvii), Francione builds on the notion that all humans "who are not brain dead or otherwise nonsentient" (and presumably who are not masochistic) have an interest in avoiding suffering and pain (ibid.) This interest is tied to the importance of being a legal person:

Although we do not protect humans from all suffering, and although we may not even agree about which human interests should be protected by rights, we generally agree that all humans should be protected from suffering that results from being used as the property or commodity of another human…in a world deeply divided on many moral issues, one of the few norms endorsed by the international community is the prohibition of human slavery. Nor is it a matter of whether the particular form of slavery is “humane” or not; we condemn all human slavery (ibid.)

Resisting a critical critique of this statement, if only by regarding it as an ideal type formulation, Francione’s point is fairly straightforward. In fact, he does himself acknowledge that human slavery still persists in the modern world, even though "the institution is universally regarded as morally odious and is legally prohibited" (ibid.) Returning to his theme about basic rights, Francione argues that all and any "further" rights are dependent on basic ones, in particular, "they must have the basic right not to be treated as a thing" (ibid.) By examining the principle of "equal consideration," which says that similar interests should be treated in a similar way, Francione makes the case for animal rights, at least the case for the basic right that concerns him the most:

If we apply the principle of equal consideration to animals, then we must extend to animals the one basic right that we extent to all human beings: the basic right not to be treated as things (ibid.: xxix).

As a matter of logic, then, Francione claims that, "if we mean what we say" about nonhumans being morally significant, as even traditional animal welfare does, "then we really have no choice": if social attitudes to human slavery desire its abolition rather than its regulation, "we are similarly committed to the abolition of animal exploitation, and not merely to its regulation" (ibid.) As for what "sort" of right is being claimed within his formulation of basic animal rights, Francione continues to rely on notions of basic or "innate" rights, distinctions about ideas of "natural rights," and the thoughts of, among others, Kant, Locke, and modern political theorist Henry Shue. Francione continues to attempt to build on the widely accepted "value" of basic human rights. He argues that, "there is certainly a great deal of disagreement about precisely what rights human beings have," however it is clear that all humans are seen as right holders which prevents them being, "treated exclusively as a means to the end of another" (ibid.: 93). In pointing out that this basic right is different from "all other rights," Francione claims it as a pre-legal right; and a necessary pre-requisite for other important rights. What is the use, Francione asks, of thinking about rights appropriate to human beings, such as the right to free speech, voting rights, etc., if their basic right not to be a thing is not respected? This sense of "basic right," he argues, is different from what many claim to be "natural rights" (although the discourse about "natural" - or any - rights is complex and often contradictory).

[1] Throughout Animal Liberation Professor Singer is careful to talk about the "Animal Liberation movement" and never speaks of a clash between human and nonhuman rights, rather human and animal interests. In the 2nd edition ofAnimal Liberation, Singer was motivated to say something about rights formulations: "The language of rights is a convenient political shorthand. It is even more valuable in the era of thirty-second TVA news clips" (Singer 1990, cited by Francione 1996: 49, 240).

[2] If Kangas is correct that talking about the origins of rights is messy, the same may be said of the claimed position adopted by this or that theorist. For example, while Regan suggests that Cohen takes a utilitarian line, Nathan Nobis (2002, in a review of Cohen and Regan) states that, "Cohen and Regan give high regard to moral rights… Both are decidedly anti-utilitarian."

[3] Benton & Redfearn (1996) also note that Regan’s rights approach will find opposition in some perspectives based on "ecological morality." For example, the rights view implies that only animals that resemble humans in relevant ways "qualify" as right bearers. Animal rights theory, they note, "offers nothing at all to animals not conforming to the 'subject of a life' criterion" (1996: 51).

Benton, T. & Redfearn, S. (1996) ‘The Politics of Animal Rights - Where is the Left?’ New Left Review, Jan/Feb: 43-58.
DeGrazia, D. (1996) Taking Animals Seriously: Mental life and moral status. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Fiddes, N. (1991) Meat: A natural symbol. London: Routledge.
Francione, G.L. (1995) Animals, Property, and the Law. Philadelphia: Temple University Press.
Francione, G. L. (1996) ‘Ecofeminism and Animal Rights’ - a book review and commentary - review of “Beyond Animal Rights: A feminist caring ethic for the treatment of animals”, edited by C. Adams & J. Donovan’, Women’s Rights Law Reporter, Fall (email version supplied by Lee Hall in April 2002).
Francione, G.L. (2000) Introduction to Animal Rights: Your child or the dog? Philadelphia: Temple University Press.
Nobis, N. (2002) ‘Review of Carl Cohen & Tom Regan’s The Animal Rights Debate (2001), Jornal of Value Inquiry, Vol 36(4): 579-83.
Regan, T. (2001) Defending Animal Rights. Urbana & Chicago: University of Illinois Press.

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The Rationality of Becoming Vegan

12/3/2015

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An article by Barbara McDonald on becoming vegan, first published in the 1990s, has recently been featured in a new reader on human-nonhuman relations. Although the piece is now a little dated (the original research being conducted in June 1996), and the sample of 12 vegans interviewed is very small, it seems to contain some points of interests for rights-based abolitionists.

Although McDonald is critical of Jack Mezirow’s "transformation theory," ideas embedded within it seem relevant to a study of how people become vegans, especially when certain critical elements on, for example, power relations are added to the original formulation. Mezirow's perspective is certainly overly psychological and in need of sociological elements for balance and context. McDonald is undoubtedly an expert on Mezirow since her doctoral thesis was about his work. She states that the transformation theory “does not explain the process of learning to become vegan.”

However, some of her discussion in this paper seems to contradict that conclusion, at least to the extent to which McDonald claims the theory has no explanatory value. For example, in a 2000 book, Mezirow builds on 20 years of his theory and outlines the basic ideas about how people change in a 10-point process of "transformative learning"

1. Experience a disorienting dilemma
2. Undergo self-examination
3. Conduct a deep assessment of personal role assumptions and alienation created by new roles
4. Share and analyze personal discontent and similar experiences with others
5. Explore options for new ways of acting
6. Build competence and self-confidence in new roles
7. Plan a course of action
8. Acquire knowledge and skills for action
9. Try new roles and assess feedback
10. Reintegrate into society with a new perspective
One of the main thrusts in the theory, borrowing heavily from Habermas, is the power of rational discourse and a level of cognitive functioning which critics of Mezirow say most adults never achieve. For her part, McDonald focuses on the theory’s need for individuals to be critically reflexive about assumptions. She says her study of vegans failed to identify such critical reflection in their talk. Again, other parts of her piece seems to contradict that claim too.

However, let’s stick with Mezirow a little longer, and via Nancy Franz’s discussion of Stephan Brookfield’s definition of "critical reflection theory," which may well serve to correct some of the shortcomings in Mezirow’s approach. Critical reflection requires persons being self-aware, making sense of experiences, deconstructing and reconstructing meanings , the critiquing of premises and ideologies, and "principled thinking," all of which can be defined, according to Brookfield, as "reflecting on the assumptions underlying ours and other’s ideas and actions, and contemplating alternative ways of thinking and living."

These ideas may be expressed in this way - and by means of the following "phases"

1. Trigger event
2. Appraisal of assumptions
3. Exploration of alternatives to current assumptions
4. Developing alternative perspectives
5. Integration of new perspectives into daily life
At this point we have a basic understanding of some of the ideas that interest McDonald in her study of vegans. Perhaps we can see how these 10 points and 5 phases inform an appreciation of the changes people go through when they become vegan?

McDonald works with a process which begins with the notion of "Who was I?" (meaning, who was the person before learning about veganism and animal cruelty). This is followed by what some have called "a moral shock" but McDonald uses the term "catalytic experience" instead (meaning a person’s learning of some aspect of cruelty). At this point, two things are likely to occur. The information about animal cruelty can be acted upon, and therefore the person "becomes oriented" towards learning more and maybe making a decision (for example, to stop eating other animals' flesh), or there can be repression of the information (when people put what they know to the back of their minds). In the latter case, another catalytic experience or event may be required to, in some sense, re-engage a recall of the repressed knowledge of animal cruelty.

After this there is a process of learning about animal abuse and how to be a vegan (i.e., start reading the damn labels!! [1]) A decision is made to live as a vegan (or a vegetarian). Finally, the person’s general world view has changed. With a new perspective she or he begins to face the world as a vegan. This process can take a long time: some of McDonald’s interviewees took years to become vegan.

We can now follow some of the study’s participants through some of these stages. The first thing that would register with animal rights abolitionists is the number of McDonald’s respondents who acknowledged being in a state of what Francione unfortunately characterises as "moral schizophrenia." McDonald writes that the majority of those in the study had a prior love for nature and of pets. However, they did not see the connection between their pets and "food animals." McDonald says they had "compartmentalised their compassion." Moreover, many of them "expressed amazement that they had not seen the connection."

This notion of prior "love" for pets is interesting from an abolitionist point of view. I think it is fair to say that the "pet issue" is one reason why many animal advocates reject the rights view of human-nonhuman relations. Just like the pet breeders and pet lovers in countermovements, they cannot imagine a future with no living ornaments/toys, or a future without their child substitute "fur babies."

Many animal advocates suggest, then, that pet keeping is a necessary or at least widespread means by which humans come to have some ethical regard for nonhuman animals. Without their "prior love" for pets, they believe, they may never have seriously considered being an animal advocate. McDonald’s findings seem to support this view – but not fully by any means. For example, not every respondent had a strong affection for nonhuman animals when young and, as one person pointed out, most kids are dotty about their pets; most are upset when pets die, but that does not prompt further thinking about human-nonhuman relations. Most, it seems, can be quite comfortable in their "morally schizophrenic" state and no amount of "companion animals" pegging out on them seems to cure them.

When it comes to the catalytic experiences, one respondent seems to have had a "Paul and Linda McCartney moment." The McCartney's are said that have awoken to reality looking out of their Scottish farmyard window at gambolling lambs when cooking "lamb," while this respondent looked up "and exchanged a long and pensive gaze with a buck standing on the hill above him." At that moment, he decided to not eat meat again. Others in the study went vegan after watching videos.

At this point, McDonald discusses the issues of emotions and cognition. McDonald reports that her respondents’ catalytic experience was often but not necessarily emotional and often, it seems, a blend of emotion and rational thought goes into the process by which people turn vegan. If anything, there is a hint that going vegetarian is an emotional reaction while the decision to go vegan is based on a cognitive interpretation of learning. Often the one followed the other.

Thus, while people spoke of videos "breaking their hearts" and their reaction being, "My God, I just didn’t realise what things went on," McDonald says that, "Emotions seem to have been one of the major defining characteristics of the more memorable catalytic experiences. The decision to become vegan following a period of vegetarianism was more often rational." McDonald says it was typical that the decision to go vegan followed a period of learning, particular about the issue of "being in favour of animal rights" while "continuing to eat animal products."

Here the logical inconsistencies of vegetarianism often finally sunk in. By thinking, talking, reading and becoming active, people realised their actions may not match their beliefs. McDonald cites one respondent who admits that he had drawn the line in the wrong place by being a vegetarian. Through reflection he realised that "using milk and putting cheese in stuff" was not good enough.

Following catalytic experiences, respondents were "becoming oriented" to learning and then they learned about animal abuse. They learned about cruelty and how to be vegetarian or vegan. McDonald says that, at this stage, people are "guided by an ethical praxis of compassion." They learned by thinking, talking, becoming involved in activities and, most importantly, by reading. Reading "was the primary way of learning for every participant."[2] All at once, they were trying to learn, teach and cope - but often their families proved to be a problem. Many respondents reported that family members argued with them, or trivialised their beliefs, and some even rejected them. Understandably, they found these experiences hurtful. One said she lost a friend of 20 years standing by going vegan.

What’s interesting at this point in McDonald’s paper is that, although she talks of the vegans’ new "transformed world views," it is not entirely vegan and it certainly is not all about animal rights. Therefore, even at the end of this process, vegetarianism and animal welfarism are mentioned. It is as though the paper echoes "the movement at this point." While there is talk of recognising the "moral rightness of veganism," there is also talk of "experiencing the world as a vegetarian and vegan," along with the advocacy of both animal welfare and animal rights. McDonald states that a central part of the new worldview is a generalised agreement that "animals were no longer viewed as food," which is hardly true of vegetarians.

I think what’s being reflected in McDonald’s work is the apparently widely-held view that veganism is rather difficult and we should expect a period of vegetarianism beforehand, despite the fact that it makes little sense. This may explain the current habit in animal advocacy literature of using the terms"'vegetarian" and "vegan" interchangeably as though they mean the same thing, often expressed by the horrible word, "veg*n."

I recently had recourse to revisit Victoria Moran’s 1997 book, Compassion the Ultimate Ethic: An Exploration of Veganism, in which she notes (p. 53) that some people turned vegan overnight, but most were vegetarian for a year or two first. This appears to be the expected pattern: it "makes sense" that people will drop one thing at a time. Moran cites Singer’s Animal Liberation in which the author quite reasonably is concerned about the firm grip speciesism has on the social agent. He writes, "In our present speciesist world, it is not easy to keep so strictly to what is morally right."

Perhaps, thinks Singer, since people have difficulty just giving up meat, the thought of eschewing milk and cheese as well may ultimately prevent them doing anything at all. It seems to me that this perspective is fairly reasonable since it was originally written in the early to mid 1970s. However, it seems that Singer’s views on this issue remain largely the same in the 21st century.

This marks a real difference for the abolitionist approach to animal rights. In an age when being vegan is very much easier in many places and for many people and groups than it was in the 1970s, our new movement should not expect – and certainly need not encourage – this pattern of "vegetarian first." What it means is that the young animal rights movement must prioritise making veganism as easy as possible, something that Neil Lea was a pioneer in with his "Is It Vegan?" and "Vegan Buddies" initiatives.

Since veganism is direct action for nonhuman animals, getting people to embrace ethical veganism is the best thing advocates can do at the present time: this activity also has the advantage over some others in that, presently at least, vegan advocacy and vegan education does not lead to anyone being chucked in jail for a decade or more.

[1] Joking apart, this was another interesting aspect of the research. Via both Mezirow and Habermas, McDonald looks at communicative and instrumental learning in vegans. The former ‘has to do with ideas, such as the idea of instrumentalised animal cruelty, animal rights, and veganism,’ while the latter "concerns the skills needed to live a vegan lifestyle, such as how to cook, order food in restaurants, and read ingredient labels."

[2] Peter Singer and John Robbins' texts were cited in this context.

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AUDIO: The Poverty of Ambition in the Context of Social Change

12/3/2015

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This blog entry is a repost from the archives. The podcast associated with it was recorded in 2009.

In this podcast (scroll down for the media player), I talk about my views on "banning" fur farms which often create a few waves in the animal advocacy movement.

anyway - here it is...

Social change is happening but social change is slow.

This social fact may not particularly comfort us when we think of the thousands of nonhuman individuals who are killed every second but, nevertheless, it does represent the reality of the situation we face as animal advocates in deeply speciesist societies.

In this podcast, I discuss the apparent 'need' we have to clearly see positive change before our eyes but I suggest this may lead us to make the wrong advocacy choices. Who are we to do that, since we are not the ones in 'farms,' in laboratories, and such like? Also, on this point, I argue that we should distinguish between psychological requirements of animal advocates and economic ones of animal advocacy organisations.

I suggest the a useful mindset to adopt is one that recognises that we are pioneers of a recent idea, an idea that is just making its first impacts on 'the social': in other words, the vegan-based animal rights movement is new.

Since there are always complaints when the above point is made, let me clarify what I mean. The mass social movement that is informed by animal rights philosophy and which has veganism as its unequivocal moral baseline is a recent social phenomenon.

If you respond to such a claim by thinking of Peter Singer and Animal Liberation and PeTA and the like, then that is not animal rights in the sense that Singer is not a rightist and his books and the organisations that base their advocacy on his position do not reflect animal rights thinking.

These may be "close enough" for some, and I'm sure many animal advocates feel that, but it remains the case that this advocacy is not rights-based as it is grounded in a philosophy that rejects moral rights as the basis of an argument about human-nonhuman relations, and in advocacy that often willingly overrides human animal rights, especially women's rights, to make its point.

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Instrumental Reason: Viewing Others as Things and Commodities

Censorship the Norm in the Reducetarian Camp?

A Modern View: Rights as Social Constructs

The Rationality of Becoming Vegan

AUDIO: The Poverty of Ambition in the Context of Social Change

Roger Yates

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Instrumental Reason: Viewing Others as Things and Commodities

Censorship the Norm in the Reducetarian Camp?

A Modern View: Rights as Social Constructs

The Ration﻿ality of Becoming Vegan

AUDIO: The Pove﻿rty of Ambition in the Context of Social Change

Roger Yates

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The Rationality of Becoming Vegan

AUDIO: The Poverty of Ambition in the Context of Social Change