Animal Earth Human

WASHINGTON (AFP) — Steaks out of a test-tube? The animal rights group PETA is putting up a million dollar reward for anyone who by 2012 can grow in-vitro meat that looks and tastes like the real thing.

“In-vitro meat production would use animal stem cells that would be placed in a medium to grow and reproduce. The result would mimic flesh and could be cooked and eaten,” People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) said in a statement.

The million-dollar reward will go to the participant who manages by 2012 to put test-tube chicken into commercial production and successful sell it in at least 10 US states at a competitive price.

Teams of researchers around the world are already working on producing meat in a laboratory, but it will be several years yet before in-vitro meat makes it onto the dinner table.

A team of 10 PETA jurors will taste the entries to make sure they match the texture and flavor of chicken, and they must score at least 80 out of 100 points to win the prize.

The New York Times revealed Monday that the scheme almost triggered a civil war within the headquarters of the organization dedicated to fighting for animal rights. But PETA argued the move would help avoid unnecessary suffering.

“More than 40 billion chickens, fish, pigs, and cows are killed every year for food in the United States in horrific ways,” it said in its statement.

“In-vitro meat would spare animals from this suffering. In addition, in vitro meat would dramatically reduce the devastating effects the meat industry has on the environment.”

And it added that while “humans don’t need to eat meat at all” since many people continued “to refuse to kick their meat addictions, PETA is willing to help them gain access to flesh that doesn’t cause suffering and death.”

A Papal Mercy
How the Vatican views animals, and why Christians should care
Published On Thursday, April 17, 2008  12:04 AM
By LEWIS E. BOLLARD

As 41,000 devout Catholics crowd the new Washington Nationals Stadium this morning for a Holy Mass led by Pope Benedict XVI, animal protection is not likely to be on their minds.  Amid the great questions of war, justice, and life, animals might also appear a humble concern for the leader of the world’s 1.2 billion Catholics. But the Pope himself has suggested that the issue of animal protection is far from irrelevant to the Catholic faith.

When a German journalist put the issue to the then Cardinal Ratzinger in 2002, he received a surprising answer. The Pontiff-to-be called the issue “very serious,” detailing his theological belief that animals are God’s creatures, deserving of merciful treatment by man.

Ratzinger specifically attacked the practice of factory farming, which affects 10 billion animals in America each year. “Certainly, a sort of industrial use of creatures, so that geese are fed in such a way as to produce as large a liver as possible, or hens live so packed together that they become just caricatures of birds, this degrading of living creatures to a commodity seems to me in fact to contradict the relationship of mutuality that comes across in the Bible,” he said.

Yet the average American church is strangely out of tune with the Pope’s sentiment.  American preachers seldom mention animal rights, except as evidence of the excesses of secular radicalism. National polls show an inverse correlation between church attendance and support for animal rights.  Churches celebrate the blessing of the animals on the feast day of Saint Francis of Assisi, and then largely ignore animal ethics for the rest of the year.

This is partly because the animal rights movement has proven so uninviting to Christians. Peter Singer, whose 1975 book “Animal Liberation” began the modern movement, is an outspoken atheist and proponent of euthanasia. And People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals’ traveling trailer featuring a model of a vegetarian Jesus seated at the last supper with notable vegetarian “disciples” Paul McCartney and Cesar Chavez didn’t make a great impression when it pulled up at the Southern Baptist Convention last June.

But Paul Waldau, the director of the Tufts Veterinary School Center for Animals and Public Policy and an expert on animals and religion, argues that it can also come from a misunderstanding of religious traditions. He notes that many preachers point to the passage in Genesis where God grants man “dominion” over the beasts of the wild as a blank check to treat animals at our will.  He argues that the Hebrew word for “dominion” in is the same word that the Bible uses to refer to a King’s rule over his subjects. He says that “stewardship” is a better translation.

Pope John Paul II had a similar view. He believed that “animals possess a soul” and are “as near to God as men are.” Nor is this sentiment new: Pope Leo XIII (1878-1903) was the patron of the French Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (SPCA) and Pope John XXIII (1958-63) declared that “man must never hurt animals, must never ill-treat them, nor torture them physically.” In Saint Thomas Moore’s Utopia, the slaughtering of animals is left to slaves for fear that when citizens do it, “the practice of mercy, the finest feeling of our human nature, is gradually killed off.”

Indeed, the modern animal protection movement began with Christian reformers in 19th century England. After attacking the abuses of slavery and child labor, reformers like William Wilberforce, Cardinal Henry Edward Manning, and Anglican Priest Arthur Broome turned their efforts to man’s sins against animals, co-founding the SPCA in 1824. In part, they were responding to the concerns of John Wesley, the founder of Methodism, who had found “a plausible objection against the justice of God, in suffering numberless creatures that had never sinned to be so severely punished.”

Belatedly, the animal protection movement is remembering this noble legacy. In 2002, Matthew Scully, a devout Catholic and senior speech writer to President Bush, published Dominion: The Power of Man, the Suffering of Animals, and the Call to Mercy, an elegant moral tome against animal abuse. Today, volunteers of the Christian Vegetarian Association hand out leaflets entitled “Are We Good Stewards of God’s Creation?” at mega-churches and Christian rock concerts across the nation.

With “creation care” a growing environmental movement in American congregations, animal protection will hopefully gain religious notice. In the meantime, Catholic priests can look to the words of Pope Benedict XV, the current Pontiff’s namesake, who in 1915 enjoined priests to support the Italian SPCA, “that they may offer to the animals refuge from every suspicion of roughness, cruelty, or barbarism, and lead men to understand from the beauty of creation something of the infinite perfection of their Creator.”

Lewis E. Bollard ’09 is a social studies concentrator in Kirkland House.  His column appears on alternate Thursdays.

http://www.thecrimson.com/article.aspx?ref=523093

Submitted by Che on Apr 01, 2008 Advocacy Strategies | General Animal Protection

As a social scientist, I’m often in the position of providing fellow animal advocates with what I call a “reality check.” An objective description of public opinion can seem harsh, because public opinion itself can be harsh. The same is true of the current state of animal use and abuse, both institutional (e.g., factory farming) and episodic (e.g., an individual cruel act). But I think we can all agree that to get where you want to go, you must first know where you’re starting from. Unfortunately, in the case of animal advocacy – the impulsive teenager of social justice movements – where we’re at is not far from where we began.

Consider these reality checks:

* Companion Animals: Despite significant declines in U.S. shelter euthanasia from 1970 to the mid 1990s, progress over the past decade appears to have slowed. In 2005, on average more than eight shelter animals were euthanized every minute.

* Farmed Animals: In 1970, an estimated 3.2 billion animals were raised for food in the U.S. In 2007 that number was 9.5 billion. Additionally, a much larger proportion of farmed animals today are raised in closely confined environments.

* Research Animals: Since the law was created in 1966, the Animal Welfare Act has excluded rats, mice, and birds, thus leaving out about 95% of the animals currently used in research. Not even basic legal protections are mandated for these animals.

* Furbearing Animals: Fur is back in fashion thanks to the admittedly brilliant work of the industry to convince consumers that fur trim is less audacious and more ethical. A majority of U.S. adults still believes that buying clothes made of animal fur is “morally acceptable.”

* Vegetarianism: Actual vegetarians and vegans in the U.S. are a roughly 2-3% minority among adults, and this percentage has remained essentially unchanged for 20 or more years despite an active vegetarian advocacy community.

So isn’t it time for animal advocates to think beyond the same old tactics and the tired messages that we’ve been using for the past 30 years? Isn’t it time to be more thoughtful in our approach and more demanding of ourselves to achieve tangible results? Of course, there is some excellent work happening right now that’s producing solid results for animals. But much of what I see in the animal protection movement involves rehashing old campaigns and relying on the same core messages of opposing cruelty and appealing to compassion. Sadly, it isn’t working, and animal advocates must break out of their existing paradigms if they intend to achieve significant results.

A Lesson from Environmentalists

Recently a couple of prominent activists came to a similar conclusion about the current state of environmental advocacy. Michael Shellenberger and Ted Nordhaus, authors of “The Death of Environmentalism,” argue that the environmental movement is rapidly becoming obsolete because it focuses on narrow policies that are easily ignored or overturned depending on the politics of the current administration in Washington, DC. Shellenberger and Nordhaus are also dismayed by the apparent lack of concern that environmentalists have for their slow progress.

The environmental community’s narrow definition of its self-interest leads to a kind of policy literalism that undermines its power… it is hard not to conclude that the environmental movement’s approach to problems and policies hasn’t worked particularly well. And yet there is nothing about the behavior of environmental groups that indicates that we as a community are ready to think differently about our work.

Shellenberger and Nordhaus make an interesting point about the self-defeatism inherent in limiting concern for the environment to a “special interest.” Animal advocacy, on the other hand, has only a fraction of the public attention and policy interest that environmentalism has. It would be a pleasant surprise just to see animal protection on the same list as other “special interests!” But lessons from “The Death of Environmentalism” also apply to animal advocacy, including a need to closely examine the entrenched attitudes and approaches that we use to help animals.

One of the areas that I think should be examined is how we as animal advocates position our goals. Very few people support the idea of a “vegan world,” but nearly everyone agrees with a goal of eventually eliminating animal cruelty and suffering. Resolving that disconnect goes beyond explaining to people that “animal rights” does not mean we’re planning to issue drivers’ licenses to family pets. Frankly, animal advocates also need to soften their tone and limit their expectations. Except in very rare situations, people don’t make abrupt changes (and one could argue that most of the few who do make abrupt changes are already advocates), and effective persuasion requires being able to offer incremental steps.

The Not-So-Great Divide – Reform vs. Abolition

Given the reality of their situation, animals would probably scoff at the increasingly heated debate among some advocates regarding “welfare reforms” vs. “animal liberation.” A discussion of where to focus one’s limited resources is rarely a bad idea, but to suggest that any single approach to animal advocacy is right – or that others are wrong – is just naïve. The argument is moot, not least because advocating for animals will always be a diverse effort. But making gains for animals today is perfectly valid, even if those gains are minimal. And ensuring that we stay focused on the ultimate goal of abolishing animal cruelty (at least to the extent possible) is also a valid role for some advocates to play.

However, parsing advocates into “welfarist” and “abolitionist” camps is not just divisive; it’s also a waste of everyone’s limited time and, more importantly, a disservice to animals. The only advocates who have it “wrong” are the ones who believe that their approach is the only one that’s “right.” On the other hand, those who respect the broad range of tactics that comprises the animal protection movement also recognize that small changes can lead to big long-term results. If I were to guess, I’d say that animals appreciate both the incremental changes as well as the long-term focus on liberation. So a good first step for advocates would be to end the debates and start focusing on effective advocacy.

Risking Obsolescence

But what is effective? There have certainly been some successful campaigns for animals over the past few decades — how did those successes happen? Why are other approaches not getting enough traction to change hearts and minds or pass more animal-friendly policies? Unfortunately, I don’t have answers to these questions, just some personal observations based on the research that HRC has conducted. First and foremost, animal protection is just not relevant for many people, except perhaps when it comes to the care and wellbeing of their companion animals. But animal abuse is something that usually happens behind closed doors; so when people see it, they think it’s an exception.

Partly as a result of this phenomenon, some animal advocates have fallen for the belief that they just have to scream louder to be heard. They denounce animal cruelty with vehement rhetoric and graphic images plastered on billboards and then they wonder why people aren’t changing en masse in response to the truth. But sometimes the louder you are the less people hear you; it’s kind of like when people mute the TV as soon as the obnoxiously loud commercials come on. Similarly, most people tune out “angry” rhetoric and “extreme” tactics. They might provide a momentary distraction or a media spectacle, but the extra attention is quickly lost.

Contrast this with the other end of the spectrum, which might be considered the local nonprofit shelter community, which in most areas has very high favorability among the public. This is testament to the hard work of companion animal advocates, but it also reflects a polarization of public perception regarding animal people: the benevolent shelter volunteer vs. the angry vegan protester, if you will. As a result, there is a rather large void in public opinion where moderate, but resolute animal advocates could claim space and provide more access to the movement’s ideas. People really do love animals, this we know to be true, but advocates need to give these people a community and a set of ideas with which they can more easily identify.

How to Avoid Premature Demise

Borrowing again from Shellenberger and Nordhaus:

If environmentalists hope to become more than a special interest we must start framing our proposals around core American values. We must start seeing our own values as central to what motivates and guides our politics.

During the past 40 years, animal advocates have mostly emphasized our reasons when trying to persuade people, governments, and corporations to eliminate (or at least mitigate) animal cruelty. Appeals to personal compassion and “doing the right thing” can certainly work for some people and institutions, but don’t think that compassion is a panacea. It is just one of the many core values held by people in the U.S., as well as other countries throughout the world. Per the quote above, animal advocates (like environmentalists) would be well-served to meet people halfway, by framing our messages and policy goals around these shared values.

For a fascinating treatise on core values in the U.S. as they relate to perceptions of ecology, see “Road Map for an Ecological Majority” (PDF file, 2006), by American Environics (a company started by Shellenberger and Nordhaus). In that report, the following are identified as “core values” of the ecological base, a constituency that I believe would overlap significantly with the animal protection base.

• Ecological Concern
• Personal Control
• Civic Engagement
• Religion à la Carte
• Introspection & Empathy
• Flexible Families
• Skepticism Towards Advertising
• Culture Sampling
• Global Consciousness
• Brand Apathy
• Ethical Consumerism
• Rejection of Authority
• More Power for Media
• Importance of Spontaneity
• Personal Creativity
• Everyday Ethics
• Discriminating Consumerism
• Meaningful Moments
• Flexible Gender Identity
• Deconsumption
• Rejection of Order
• Strategic Consumption
• Racial Fusion
• Largesse Oblige
• Social Responsibility

Each of these values has a specific meaning according to the American Environics taxonomy, but one thing that is immediately evident from the list above is that modern value systems are complex. People hold very diverse worldviews and they arrive at those beliefs in various ways, which makes understanding human nature a difficult task. But understand it we must, if we intend to effect real change for non-human animals. Moreover, advocates should realize that it’s neither wise nor tenable to try to change human nature. Rather, our goal should be to create messages and policies that appeal to the values most deeply held by our target audiences.

“Target audience” is a phrase that comes up frequently in these posts. Depending on what animal issues you work on, your target audience might be very narrow, but more likely it’s fairly broad (e.g., pet owners, meat consumers, etc.). Whichever the case, advocates must work hard to understand their audience and tailor their appeals based on the audience’s current values and behavior. If the audience is very large, segment it into smaller groups based on shared values, current behavior, and/or the means by which you plan to reach them. Remember: it’s not a “one size fits all” kind of world and your messages don’t have the same appeal everyone.

One final thought: The animal advocacy community will always have its pragmatists, purists, and pundits (myself included, most likely), and in general the diversity is probably a good thing. But let’s try to limit the internal dialogue to what’s most effective and, more importantly, stay focused on our target audiences. I’m sure we can all agree that our foremost obligation is to animals, which means our energy is better spent understanding and persuading the population at large (our “target audience”) rather than debating each other.

Thanks for reading and listening to my opinion.

http://www.humanespot.org/node/2790