Trauma 1

When nonhumans are forcibly subjected to trauma, it does produce trauma, but translates into a problematic that a biologistic approach to nonhumans won’t be able to unravel. Trauma occurs in context with all fine tunings of psyche and mind – can’t ever be understood by violence.

Too much reformism

Animal rights advocates who take reformism for fundamental change:

Don’t fall into the biologistically argumenting trap of discussing nonhuman animals needs to “live out natural instincts”, when as an animal rights advocate we ought to speak about fighting injustice, and when we ought to analyze, criticize and oppose the ways in which oppressive systems function – if we want to inspire a fundamental change in society.

The systemic injustice towards nonhumanity gets legitimized on the theoretical levels, primarily like reducing animality to instincts/biologically explicable behaviour.

You would never want to discuss human rights on this level by seeing everything through a biological lens, but you don’t have a problem to use this speciesistically reductive lens on animality by conveying the message that nonhumanity and instincts would go hand in hand.

The stunning thing is, you even believe it’s a charitable deed to do so … you expect the world to change, yet you cling to old speciesist frameworks.

When you discuss nonhuman animal rights and interests, please apply the biologistic frame just to yourself!

Ecocide summits

The format of having one big (failing) un climate conference where nations meet is not enough facing the ecocidal catastrophe. It needs a 365 days a year global action committee by all nations to face the situation adequately. It’s a global crisis.

But of course, we don’t face ecocide adequately, because we don’t want to face the angle of the zoocide taking place on all levels, which is inseparable.

Antispeciesist Animal Sociology

Not every perspective is provable to everyone

Not every perspective is provable to everyone, attitudes are influenced by positions

People don’t see themselves under primarily biological terms, they say their culture and their social life is a proof of being more than just driven by instinctual biologically explainable factors. They say the have their mind, their spirit, their thinking.

A perspectival shift to not see nonhumanity under biological terms primarily, does not need a proof, it needs the will to take another stance towards our environment. Seeing nonhumanity non-biologically and as individuations of Life in its own merits, seems to be unwanted and is treated almost like a form of “blasphemy” against an almighty scientifical system of categorization in our current societies and their Zeitgeists. Stances, positions are however not a matter of proof so much, but much more of choosing a specific perhaps differing standpoint and a perhaps fundamentally different angle of perspective – and that might be one that can’t be proven to the other side, since their outlook is so much predetermined by their own interest.

In the case of evaluating the own interest and the interest of others, operating with proof to privilege one side while disadvantaging the other, forces us to think in one direction only. We assume that it is objectively proven or probable that for instance nonhumans lose less if they die compared to humans, or that it is objectively provable that the reasoning of nonhumans can be behaviouristically determined and would not be autonomous. Proof selects a supposedly objective framework of reference, if you chose another framework of reference you come to a different kind of conclusion: an example, the starkest one perhaps is the different perspective an ecocentric person choses versus a humancentric one at a given moment.

Ecosocial bonding

Most nonhuman animals face the threat of being potentially defined as “meat” or otherwise as any kind of “usable source” made from their bodies. Inseparably their agency and in fact all aspects of their lives are systematically being reductively objectified.

The nonhuman animal body is categorically oppressed in a form of exploitable objectification, which implies the permanent imminent danger of > being subdued to unbearable emotional and physical pain and of > being subdued to the most complete possible form of negation of the individual selfness of the victim.

The dominating human societal constructs function with an inbuilt demand for systemic violence and destruction towards animality.

A change of this zoocidal system is an ongoing struggle on all kinds of planes and here we find the reason of ecosocial bonding and understanding.

Gruppe Messel, Tierautonomie

Speciesist narcissism

In context with my fragment: Many forms of speciesism.

Speciesist narcissism

A question of identity (human vs. animal) –
in which a human hides his/her factual individuality (i.e. human collectivism as a shield)
beneath the psychological and/or physical violence against animal dignity.

Fragments on species-derogation, previous list: Speciesism an animal hatred.

The animal oppression and veganism discrepancy (fragment)

antispeciesism_1a

antispeciesism_1e

The animal oppression and veganism discrepancy (fragment):

If you look at the way in which meat is marketed and if you see the type of demand for meat [1], you clearly see the roles types of speciesism [2, 3] play.

People who reject veganism act that way due to their speciesist convictions. Meat, dairy, eggs … are manifestations of speciesism, and thus primarily issues of antispeciesism.

Health and lifestyle might be a driver for some people to become vegan. But the injustice towards nonhuman animals (including their intricate relation to the natural environment), which takes place on all levels of societies globally, won’t change because of the person-centered health- and lifestyle reasons of some people.

There is hardly any other system of structural injustice where as little public outcry is expected as in speciesism: health- and lifestyle-vegans mention the animal rights issue in general on a rather superficial level and usually avoid to speak of systemic animal oppression in a way in which they might speak about forms of oppression that affect human beings as victims.

[1] “Being food” is a specific of speciesism. The demand for “meat” implies an entire speciesist traditional background. To assume though that “meat”-consumption is a natural evolutionary rationale, is to imply a biologist view on human cultures by assuming their predatorship would align with that of (what we’d call) ‘nonhuman predatory cultures’. Also, there may well always been groups of humans, human individuals and human civilizations who have avoided animal oppression. Even if this type of consciousness would only exist without any historical precedence it would still be equally valid.

[2] We assume that there are > many forms of speciesism.

[3] See > forms of animal degradation and animal hatred.

Links:

Fragments that we wrote about specifics of speciesism so far:

“Homo sapiens” – systems of speciesism

“Homo sapiens” – systems of speciesism

systems_of_speciesism_2c

What is it in people that makes zoocide and ecocide possible?

The assumption that only the “homo” is “sapient” (knowing) – as in the taxonomical classification of the Homo sapiens as the crown of creation by Carl von Linné / Carolus Linnaeus – expresses that nonhuman animal knowledge and the nonhuman living world is considered to be of lesser or no (relevant) type of knowledge (from a human perspective).

The human is assumed to be knowing, the nonhuman to be not knowing.
This type of thought enabled argumentations for massmurder on the biologistical basis.

Political and sociological concepts should replace biologist views of animality

antispe_pamphlets_01102018

How much “animal-machine” (Descartes) is entailed in instinct-based ethological approaches; after all if you differentiate further you come to see that ethology should be rather sociology. Again political and sociological concepts should replace biologist views of animality … .

Gruppe Messel, Tierautonomie / Animal Autonomy

The mild speciesism continuum

 
mild_speciesism_1e conscious

Conscious about speciesism
And yet you study nonhuman animals
Through indirect, abstract, theory-driven lenses
Not through the uniquely and ultimately
emancipated channels
of perception
your antispeciesist views would take.

– Palang LY

See also thought: Defining Nonhumans as ‘INSTINCTUAL’ is species-derogative and biologistic