Friday, July 13, 2012

No right or wrong

I want to write about one of the most troubling aspects on animal advocacy is the claim that everything helps, there is no wrong action, any type of advocacy helps. That begs the question if everything helps and under everything is nothing, does that mean that doing nothing helps. Does not being vegan help other sentient beings?

If everything helps there is no right or wrong. Moral truths don’t exist under that proposition. I know this is a crazy proposition, but if there is right or wrong that mean that some actions are wrong. We can and must say that some type of advocacy isn’t right. Being painted as elitists or divisive shouldn’t deter us from claiming that some actions are wrong, immoral and counter-productive.

What is at stake, fate of countless sentient beings outweighs the insults, name calling taken by supporters of one type of advocacy. Some will say with some many other animals beings used, tortured we must do whatever possible to help them. Not everything will help. There are wrong and right actions to be taken.

Wrong actions/advocacies have been taken for decades, centuries. You may say how I dare to claim that some action/advocacy is wrong. It’s easy; it’s called freedom of speech and critical thinking. You can try it sometimes; it’s good for the mind. If I accept your claim that there is no wrong actions that advocates can take, how I will paint an actions which hasn’t produce results or can’t produce it at all or is counter-productive like a claim that humans are cancer. By the way you also are saying that you are also a cancer.

Let’s take single issue campaigns that so many advocates are doing, for a long time. Have they, SICs brought us close to equality of sentient beings. No, more other animals are used than ever. Have they at least brought results in their narrow focus campaigns? No, people still wear fur. Ok, they are not wrong but they failed miserably. We have a different opinion about rightness or wrongness of an action. You opinion about those things is drowning in subjectivity.

Welfarists have a crazy claim that welfarism will bring us closer to rights of other animals. One little thing can interfere with that claim. And that is that welfarism is based on immoral notion that other sentient beings are ours to be used, but we shouldn’t impose suffering over what is required to produce animal products. Basing notion of welfarism can, but I don’t want to sound too much judgmental, create a problem if you accept the idea that other animals must have rights and advocate for that. Advocating for different methods of killing sentient beings, bigger cages will how bring us closer to rights, by magic. Don’t get me started with but we have no evidence that welfarism doesn’t work when comes to animal rights. You are serious. Welfarism is 2 century old. How many more years have to pass without results before you see it won’t and can’t bring rights?

If all types of advocacy help why there are no more vegans. There should be more vegans, if every action helps. But there are not. And I read that we cannot know that some actions won’t help. Actually we can. Telling someone that people who wear fur should be raped doesn’t help. “Every woman ensconced in fur should endure a rape so vicious that it scars them forever. While every man entrenched in fur should suffer an anal raping so horrific that they become disemboweled. ” ~ Gary Yourofsky.

Calling people names, insulting them, promotion of vegetarianism aren’t helping. I was told that every bit counts. If a non-vegan today eats less animal products or doesn’t wear leather or other animal products, is he helping other animals? Under immoral every bit counts approach he is. It doesn’t matter that by not being vegan he is hurting other animals. Being vegan is at least what we can do, if we claim that we care about other animals.


Monday, July 9, 2012

Progress of animal rights movement


Veganism movement is progressing extremely slowly, slower than it should. Culprit is prevailing method of educating people. People are said by animal activists to go vegan, but if they can’t, they can go vegetarian. And if they cannot be vegetarian, they are said that they can ʺhelpʺ other animals by not eating one animal product for one day. But if they cannot even do that they are said to donate to speciesist campaigns or organization that kill other animals like PETA.

They are basically watering down the message so they can declare victory when some business switch to more efficient way of killing other animals and that they can say how many people are ʺhelpingʺ other animals because of them.
Religion is being used in vegan education. That’s not very good tactic because animal rights movement resides on objectivity that other animals are sentient beings that shouldn’t be used at all. Bringing subjective things like religion in animal rights movement destroys movement’s objectivity and rationality and makes veganism about people not other animals. If you make veganism about the people, people will become the center point of veganism, not the other animals.
Why use religion to further the cause of animal rights when the religion is one of the most ferment defender of animal use. Beliefs not based on evidence are not very usefully when advocating for things which are based on evidence and those beliefs are dangerous. By presenting some with religious arguments for veganism like one interpretation of some verses from his religious book you are making his veganism reside on shaky grounds. Another interpretation of that versus can make move him away from veganism.
Presenting people with objective arguments like sentience of other animals or that we don’t need to use other animals followed by ethical or health reasons. With objectivity you make his veganism reside on firm grounds. By saying his veganism I am not saying that everybody has his own definition of veganism. That would render veganism meaningless.
Some of you will think again with the criticism. Why, is critical thinking a bad thing? If you think this criticism is unfair, how you explain extremely low numbers of vegans in the world. Something must be wrong. I am arguing that methods used by vegans are not bringing the good results. Those methods must be abandoned and vegans should advocate for veganism unequivocally.