Deep Roots: Animal Rights Blog

via Queering Animal Liberation:

Coming Out for Animals: Queering Animal Liberation

What do queer liberation and animal liberation have to do with each other? How does the construction of homosexuality as both “unnatural” and “bestial” hurt both people and animals? How are speciesism and heterosexism interrelated and how do they fit into the matrix of race-sex-class oppression? Why have both homosexuality and veganism been dismissed as “white things” beside the point of real liberation struggles? What are we going to do about homophobia among straight-edge vegans? About those dreadful gay rodeos? Should we be arguing for pleather or against sexual practices that mimic the subjugation of animals? What’s so sexy about whips, chains, and choke collars anyway? What do hip hop “video vixens” and activist “vegan vixens” have in common beyond the performance of animality for the heterosexual male gaze? How does vivisection hurt people with AIDS? Why, within the USA, are both the queer and animal liberation movements less diverse than they should be but portrayed as more white than they are? Why do queer activists in Uganda but animal activists in the USA bear the brunt of police suppression in their respective countries? Are they similarly subversive of “cultural” practices that turn out to be critical to the maintenance of state power? What keeps many gay men in the animal liberation movement from coming out? Why are so many lesbian potlucks vegetarian and what does this mean in the era of FBI infiltration of the vegan potluck?

In the hopes of answering these and similar questions, we are seeking proposals for a new anthology to be entitled Coming Out for Animals: Queering Animal Liberation. (”We” are Kim Stallwood, pattrice jones, and Olivia Lane. Our bios are here.) The anthology will include thought-provoking essays on theoretical and practical topics as well as personal narratives by queer animal advocates , vegan queer activists, and queer vegans who are active in other struggles.

Proposals should include a summary or abstract of the proposed chapter along with information about the author. If you have previous publications, please list at least some of them. If you don’t have previous publications, don’t despair but please do include a writing sample — perhaps a page or two of the piece you want to write for us. All of the editors are skilled at working with first-time writers and we are particularly committed to publishing activists who have not yet had a voice in their respective movements.

We do have a number of chapters and promises in hand as well as a list of topics we really hope somebody will cover (some of which are suggested by the questions above). If you fear that your proposed topic might be already covered or if you might like to help us out by covering one of the topics on our wish list, please write to us before preparing your proposal. If you have any questions at all, please feel free to write to us before putting any time into a proposal.

Address all proposals and inquiries to: pattrice (at) pattricejones.info or pattrice jones c/o Eastern Shore Sanctuary; 13981 Reading Ferry; Princess Anne, MD 21853; USA.

Proposal Deadline: 30 August, 2008

Deadline for Accepted Chapters: 31 December, 2008

Please forward or re-post freely!

hat tip to Vegan Soapbox

No excuses, the Carnival is simply late. Despite the fact that I’ve been collecting blog post links for the past few months, I’m only going to include items from June. Enjoy! And remember to send your submissions for the 9th edition to chris [at] deeprootssanctuary.org or at blogcarnival.com.

I decided not to break the posts into categories this edition because there were a lot of posts that didn’t easily fit into a box. I guess that’s a downside to seeing the interconnectedness of everything:)

Animal Rights 101 [An Animal-Friendly Life]
Eric Prescott has started a series of posts to introduce people to the fundamentals of the abolitionist approach to animal rights. The series now consists of three parts. Part One: The Need talks about why we need to clearly define animal rights. The second part, Rights, breaks down the differences and connections between legal and moral rights. And part three, Animal Rights, delves into the notion of sentience and the basis of equal consideration.

With greater clarity, precision, and stronger claims-making, our movement will be more coherent as it strikes at the roots of animal exploitation, rather than spending vast resources on efforts for nonhuman beings that on the surface seem good, but which ultimately do very little for them individually and may well further entrench their status as property for humans to use for the foreseeable future.

Veganism, Privilege and Liberation [The Vegan Ideal]
Dani, at The Vegan Ideal, writes about veganism as an ideology of liberation that renounces human privilege.

Theory and practice are one; you can’t “renounce absolutely … the right to use” without, at the same time, renouncing the actual use and the benefits of that use.

Full Frontal Factory Farming [Elaine Vigneault]
Many of us radicals and progressives have challenged PETA’s use of women in their campaigns. This is an excellent post from Elaine that challenges us to take a closer look at what is going on with these demonstrations and to open our minds to the idea that perhaps PETA may have a feminist perspective after all.

Speciesism: It’s Only Human [The Vegan Ideal]
The thing I like most about this post is that you could easily substitute some words and be talking about ableism, classism, racism, sexism, sizism or any other systematic oppression. Dani wrote a good follow-up, too, called Challenging the Structure of Nonhuman Oppression.

PPS Calls for Change in Direction of Vegan Advocacy [Animal Person]
Mary Martin, of Animal Person, toots the horn of the Peaceful Prairie Sanctuary and breaks down why the change in vegan advocacy is essential. Be sure to check out the original article from PPS, too.

if you believe there’s no such thing as humane farming, you do your own message a disservice by using “factory farming” as your descriptor because that creates an opening for the acceptance of an alternative.

On Speciesism, the ALF and the Media [Animal Person]
Mary sets a great example with this post. She opens her mind to the possibility of expanding definitions and encouraging new tactics in the name of strengthening strategies for an end goal: animal liberation. She also does a great job at address the concern of “negative media image” of ALF actions hurting the animal rights cause. And if that post wasn’t enough, she has a great follow-up responding to the backlash.

When one claims to be against speciesism, but would use certain tactics in the service of humans but not nonhumans, I have no choice but to say that’s a profound contradiction (a.k.a., hypocrisy).

Robot Monkeys [The PETA Files]
Grace gives us a perfect example of unnecessary animal testing. While the implications of a prosthetic limb can prove to be helpful to amputees, the argument for using monkeys in the experiment becomes morally bankrupt when it is leaked that the study has already been conducted… with humans.

The electrodes in the monkeys’ brains were attached to a computer, and the computer was attached to a robotic arm. The vivisectors restrained the monkeys’ arms and had the animals use their thoughts to move the robotic arm to their mouths so that they could get the food.

Earth Balance, palm oil, rainforests and RAN [Invisible Voices]
Deb over at Invisible Voices openly shares her struggle with coming to terms about the fact that the beloved vegan butter, Earth Balance, kills animals by destroying habitat, not to mention displacing communities, exploiting workers, and killing other species. Not that palm oil is particularly insidious (as Deb admits in the comments), environmental destruction is a part of industrial farming, but there is an active campaign to stop the deforestation caused by palm oil.

Every time I turn around, I’m reminded about how intertwined these issues are. Social justice, environmental protection, animal rights. Palm oil is a hat trick of issues, and it is something we all need to pay attention to.

Some good news for seals this week (they could really use it). The entire European Union has expanded its ban on pelts from baby seals to include all seal fur. Stavros Dimas, the EU’s environment commissioner, stated that an import embargo will be drafted within weeks.

If you don’t follow the campaign to stop the Canadian seal hunt, over 200,000 seals have been killed in Canada this year – 98 percent of them are pups between two weeks and three months old.

Source: Mail Online
Hat tip: Food Fight!

I’m excited to announce that I am going on tour with Microcosom Publishing. I will be promoting my new mini-comic, “The Ice Cream Man Cometh,” and talking about creative resistance. The comic, as some of you may have guessed, is based on Good Clean Fun’s song by the same name. It is about a group of young people who get creative and convince an ice cream vendor to sell only vegan goods. I will also be promoting two new zines from Deep Roots; one about the necessity of predator species and the other about why start an animal sanctuary. The comic and zines will be available on this website very soon.

Here is the information about the Tall Tales Tour. If you live in or near one of these cities, stop by the table and let me know you found out about the event through this blog. I’ll hook you up with something special. Hope to see you soon!

Dave Roche, Joe Biel, Sparky Taylor, and Chris Lynch will be on the “tall tales” tour:

July 11 – Madison, WI – Rainbow Books
July 12-13 – Minneapolis, MN – Twin Cities Zine Fest
July 14 – Chicago – Quimby’s
July 15 – Ann Arbor, MI – Vault of Midnight
July 16 – Columbus, OH – Wholly Craft
July 17 – Indianapolis, IN – Hidden Noise Artspace
July 18-20 Milwaukee, WI – Milwaukee Zine Fest

Download and print out the poster!

I just read over at The PETA Files that the small nation of San Marino has become the first independent state to ban the practice of animal experimentation. The citizen-supported bill was introduced in February of this year and was recently signed into law.

This is great! Sure, San Marino may be a small nation with little-to-no international influence, but they are a prime example of what can be accomplished when compassionate citizens take action. Although the media has paid no attention to this story, I predict that one day San Marino will be remembered and honored as the nation that first banned the morally corrupt and scientifically bankrupt practice of animal testing.

All that is left to say is thanks, San Marino, you’ve given hope to the world.