Sharing my view that cows should also have personhood rights - this attracted an oddly hateful comment on Post -

it's funny how so many other topics are acceptable for people to persuade others about -

but if it involves someone changing what they eat, DEAR LORD START SCREAMING, right?

Some people aren't trying to be hypocrites, they just have so little self-awareness.

I thanked them for taking the time to read and comment on the post.

#personhood #selfawareness #highereducation #illusions #ideology #diet #nutrition #vegan #animalLives

Climate justice = animal justice.

#vegan #govegan #animalrights #animalLives #AnimalMinds #AnimalRescue #climate #climatejustice #climateEmergency

CUTE-WASHING

What is "cute-washing"?

"Cute-washing" is a term I came up with to describe the typical way humans project onto animals in an effort to cover up or deny the way we actually treat them.

The tweets from humans having a hard day that ask: "Please send me your pet photos," or the memes gone viral when someone has dressed their cat or dog up in some costume; or the more apparently-benign sharing of videos of animals appearing to be living their own lives, but humans caption the video with a snippet that serves to confirm or validate or center some pre-existing human bias.

In none of these cases are the nonhuman animals themselves centered. It's rare to see (we do see it sometimes, in the videos shared from sanctuaries, for example).

But it's still common to see lingering elements of cute-washing in posts and stories from some shelters and sanctuaries (I'm not calling you out, we are on the same side!). To be fair, part of this is obviously because so many animals are adorable.

Our problem lies with a majority of people who can only see or actively extend that to certain animals (dogs and cats, pets).

Take a look at mainstream movies. We have an annual industry of family-centric films featuring live-action dogs. Hachi is probably my favourite, here (that Richard Gere film). There was a recent Turkish documentary honouring the lives of feral cats.

But for most of the animals we don't extend compassion to? The ones humans exploit or hunt and kill - we turn these into cartoons, Disney and Pixar characters, and the "cute-washing" begins.

Bambi, Winnie, Mickey, Curious George, Bugs, Paddington...

As for the recent award-winning EO (which I have yet to see, so I can't say much) - I'll have to see what type of critical line they draw (or fail to draw). If it's not imbued with a radical self-awareness of the donkey's place and the various human roles which create these conditions, including the conditions of perception that frame the film and its widespread appeal - it might be a lingering, abstract form of cute-washing.

Ultimately, anything less than honouring animals in their full dignity as persons wanting their own lives, with their own interests and desires - anything less than that is not enough, and denigrates our own humanity in the process.

#cutewashing #AnimalLives #AnimalMinds #AnimalLaw #AnimalRights #AnimalJustice #AnimalCognition

Nussbaum argues for "increased legal standing for animals as well as an ethical framework in which animals’ right to pursue flourishing lives is not subordinate to our own" - #animalethics #animallives #animalrights

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2022/12/05/magazine/martha-nussbaum-interview.html

Glad to see so many calling out Elon Musk's Neuralink practices, especially as I'm assuming these are not necessarily vegans or full-time animal rights advocates.

It's good to normalize caring about how others are treated, full stop.

#neuralink #musk #animalrights #animalethics #animallives