HSUS acts directly: or why non-systemic approaches and economism are not radical

I've blogged a great deal recently about both direct action and economism, and I return to this topic, but with an unusual focus: the Humane Society of the United States (HSUS). There is a misunderstanding among some advocates that helping alleviate the suffering of some nonhuman animals while leaving the systemic slavery of other animals intact is radical. 

There is also a sense among some advocates that harming exploiters by limiting their profits is a 'radical' critique of capitalism. There is also a sense that economism is somehow morally meaningful. This is all very deeply misguided, and HSUS' campaign against Westland/Hallmark is a good example of why.




Economism promotes the view that if we can only just shift the market or the general economics of a given situation, that this will produce meaningful moral change by magic. It is often expressed as �we can buy our way to radical social change!� or "if we just start scaring some CEOs...". 

In short, however, advocates should understand: it's not the tactics that make one radical; it's one's objective and strategy.  It's not exclusively or even particularly the means by which we promote change, it's the change we seek actively and sincerely that defines us as radicals.

For example, what is HSUS' objective with its legal complaint against Westland/Hallmark? HSUS does not call on us all to take the rights of cows seriously, to go vegan and to promote the abolition of their property status. They do not even explain the moral reality of the situation as it is: the mass and unnecessary murder of cows because they taste good. They do not even apply or encourage us to apply the same moral reasoning that they often apply to cats and dogs: that they are beings who needs love and care. Instead, HSUS argues instead that:

"The new 65-page complaint filed by the Department of Justice not only confirms everything our investigation found, but also alleges that the systematic abuse of cows, and the resulting use of downer cow meat in the school lunch program, may have gone on for as long as four years. The complaint also alleges that Mr. Mendell and other executives knew full well the plant was putting downer cows into the food supply, and willfully tried to conceal this from federal officials."

http://hsus.typepad.com/wayne/2009/09/hallmark-downer-cows.html

Let's look carefully at what's actually written here. The real concern of the DOJ is the 'abuse' and the use of downer cows in a school lunch program. But what's posed as the serious moral problem? Not that anyone would violate a cow's basic right not to be used as property, but rather that Westland/Hallmark executives were putting downer cows into the public food supply and covering it up. The focus here is not specifically on any of the moral problems posed by nonhuman animal use, not even exclusively on nonhuman animal mistreatment, but on what is perceived to be a human health and safety issue.

Further, HSUS commends the DOJ, but for what? 

"I commend the U.S. Department of Justice for joining The HSUS in seeking to ensure that unscrupulous federal meat suppliers do not profit from the gross and systematic mistreatment of animals in violation of federal law. But the larger question is, how widespread are these abuses throughout the transport and slaughter industries?"

As far as even the feel good statements of animal welfare organizations go, this is remarkably vague. What about scrupulous federal meat suppliers? What about meat suppliers who don't supply the federal government? What if the mistreatment isn't gross? What if it isn't systematic? And what if mistreatment is not in violation of the federal law? There is no significant protection posed in this statement for any nonhuman animal. Moreover, this argument puts the focus on harming exploiters financially (preventing them from profiting) not on the moral rights of cows not to be used as property. It confuses ends with means and focuses on the means as morally meaningful. That is one definition of economism, and anyone who knows anything about anticapitalism rejects economism.

Rhetorically, what this suggests is that, so long as we murder someone gently, it's not a moral problem. This poses nonhuman animals not as persons with rights, but as machines with feelings. It does not pose any meaningful change in the nature of social relations between human and nonhuman animals insofar as they would remain our slaves and property, we would remain their owners and users. The moral problem posed by animal use is animal use, not how we treat them, and HSUS fundamentally disagrees.

But even if we look past the rhetoric, what has this achieved for cows themselves in this work? Nothing of any substance. They will continue to be exploited. Who has been educated about why animal use is morally wrong? No one. There's not a single mention in this article that anyone should stop eating any meat of any kind, let alone that anyone has a moral obligation to go vegan in light of anything Westland/Hallmark has done, in light of what any agribusiness does, or in light of the fact that animals have a right not to be used as property. In fact, this article gives a full and lasting sense that animal use is entirely fine.

Most reasonable people in the animal advocacy movement would see that this is a mostly pointless, feel good exercise that does nothing for nonhuman animals, and instead, harms their interests by promoting animal use that does not violate the law as being morally acceptable. Most of us would understand that the objective, the strategy and the tactics here are not radical in any meaningful sense.

And yet, SHAC has advocated a similar objective and strategy in its campaign against Huntingdon Life Sciences: not to call on anyone to end animal use or to promote veganism, but to force a particular agribusiness (HLS) to comply with the law regarding animal treatment or face financial repercussions. It is the same basic objective and strategy that Sea Shepherd takes in dealing with whaling: not to end whaling per se or to promote an end to the demand for whale use, but to interfere with whalers who do not comply with national or international agreements with respect to whaling in an effort to harm them financially. The tactics are marginally different, but that doesn't change the nature of the strategy or the objective.

Vague rhetoric about anti-vivisection or our duties to all marine life aside, the kind of change that SHAC, Sea Shepherd and other self-appointed 'radical' direct action groups promote is often meaningfully indistinguishable from the kind of change that HSUS and other animal welfare organizations promote. Their objective is essentially the same. Their strategy is essentially the same. Whether those objectives or strategies are achieved by lawsuits, asking nicely or threats of violence does not change the lukewarm nature of the strategy and objectives.

And any rational person should agree that this 'change' is really no meaningful change at all. Yet, by the misunderstandings of radical anticapitalism of much of the animal advocacy movement, seeking to cause 'the exploiter' financial damage, whether it is successful or not, unless they comply with the law, is the way to make change for nonhuman animals. It's hard to think of a more basic misunderstanding of what radicalism and anticapitalism are. In fact, these reproduce Capital's basic ideology: that everything is a matter of economics and that all beings are merely economic instruments.

In short, though, this kind of work is not radical and it is not anticapitalist. It is a pointless (at best) exercise in wheel-spinning and donation driving that achieves nothing substantial for those who live in slavery. It reflects a strategy and an objective with which even the arch-conservative of all animal welfare organizations agrees. Abolitionist veganism, and the radical change in demand that it embodies: not a demand for plant-based products, but for an end to animal slavery and a widespread acknowledgement of the rights of nonhuman animals not to be used as property, is remarkably more radical.

In sum, radicalism does not begin with arcane lawsuits or with violent threats that agribusinesses obey the laws and regulations for which they themselves lobby and over which they have the most sway or face a loss of profits. It starts with you taking the rights of nonhuman animals seriously and going vegan and educating others to do the same. That's radical.

The objective is radical, insofar as it poses a change in social relations that is unmatched in human history. The strategy is radical, insofar as it poses a creative, nonviolent and mass public movement that is remarkably different from the violent and conspiratorial complex of interests embodied in the corporatist alliance between agribusiness and the state. The tactics are radical, insofar as they rely on the most radical tactic of all social justice movements: education and the transformation of 'the oppressor' into an agent of change. They are all radical because they pose a serious and meaningful moral change to the status quo.

If you're not vegan today, you should go vegan. If you are vegan, but not an abolitionist, head over to www.abolitionistapproach.com to learn more.