Engineering freedom? A critique of biotechnological routes to animal liberation

Configurations

Volumn 21, Issue 2, 2013, Pages 201-229

  Cole, Matthew ^a   Morgan, Karen ^b  

^a OPEN UNIVERSITY   (United Kingdom)

^b UNIVERSITY OF BRISTOL   (United Kingdom)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 84888088370     PISSN: 10631801     EISSN: 10806520     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1353/con.2013.0015     Document Type: Article

References (107)

1. Hereafter we use the well-known phrase "animal liberation" for brevity, but here we use the alternative construction of "nonhuman animal liberation" in order to signal at the outset our recognition of our "animalness" as humans. There is a rich debate within critical animal studies, ecofeminism, and cognate literatures on the best way to avoid reinscribing a speciesist hierarchy that privileges humans from all other animals through the choice of language. While a discussion of that literature is beyond the scope of this essay, an informative analysis of the conscious deployment of anti-speciesist language can be found in Joan Dunayer's Animal Equality: Language and Liberation (Derwood, MD: Ryce Publishing, 2001). In that spirit, we use terms like "nonhuman animals" and "other animals" throughout in order to destabilize the taken-for-granted "nonanimalness" of humans. Except for their first appearances, the scare quotes around euphemisms used to obscure oppressive material practices-for instance, "meat" (a euphemism for muscle tissue) and "farms" (euphemisms for places of confinement)-or that deploy anti-euphemistic alternatives, such as "aquaprison" in place of "aquarium" or "vivisection" in places of "animal testing" or "animal research" have been eliminated throughout the text for ease of reading.
2. See Richard Twine's "Is Biotechnology Deconstructing Animal Domestication? Movements Toward Liberation" in this special issue of Configurations.
3. See Neil Stephens's "Growing Meat in Laboratories: The Promise, Ontology, and Ethical Boundary-Work of Using Muscle Cells to Make Food" in this special issue of Configurations.
4. See Jean Harrington's "A Predicament: Animal Models and Human Tissue in Medical Research" in this special issue of Configurations.
5. Kate Stewart and Matthew Cole, "The Conceptual Separation of Food and Animals in Childhood, " Food, Culture and Society 12:4 (2009): 457-476.
6. The "human" bubble in figure 1 is not intended to communicate homogeneity among humans, either in terms of obscuring hierarchical relations among humans or in terms of a unified human position in relation to other animals. We explore the former point by briefly considering the applicability of the figure to hierarchies of race and gender. See Matthew Cole and Karen Morgan, "Veganism contra Speciesism: Beyond Debate, " The Brock Review 12:1 (2011): 144-163. In this context, for instance, the place of humans might be taken by "white privilege" and "heteronormative masculinity, " respectively, which, in turn, are not intended to obscure the hierarchical relations that operate within whiteness or heteronormative masculinity.
7. The model is limited by being two-dimensional; that is, we are not making claims about the relative levels of objectification and visibility of the experiences of farmed and vivisected animals through their specific positions in figure 1.
8. Marti Kheel, "Communicating Care: An Ecofeminist Perspective, " Media Development (February 2009): 45-50, quote on p. 48.
9. Michel Foucault, "Truth and Juridical Forms, " in Power, trans. Robert Hurley et al., ed. James D. Faubion (London: Penguin, 1994), p. 9.
10. Michel Foucault, "Truth and Juridical Forms, " in Power, trans. Robert Hurley et al., ed. James D. Faubion (London: Penguin, 1994), p. 11.
11. See Richard Twine's "Is Biotechnology Deconstructing Animal Domestication? Movements Toward Liberation" in this special issue of Configurations.
12. For more on the notions of exploitation and oppression in the context of human/ nonhuman animal relations, see Erika Cudworth, Social Lives with Other Animals: Tales of Sex, Death and Love (Basingstoke, UK: Palgrave Macmillan, 2011).
13. See Richard Twine's "Is Biotechnology Deconstructing Animal Domestication? Movements Toward Liberation" in this special issue of Configurations.
14. Peter Rubin, "Guess Who's Coming As Dinner?" Good, February 3, 2008. http://www.good.is/post/guess-whos-coming-as-dinner/ (emphasis added). At the same time, this rhetoric justifies farrowing crates for the "inferior" pigs incarcerated in factory "farms."
15. See Richard Twine's "Is Biotechnology Deconstructing Animal Domestication? Movements Toward Liberation" in this special issue of Configurations.
16. Marti Kheel, "The Liberation of Nature: A Circular Affair, " in The Feminist Care Tradition in Animal Ethics: A Reader, ed. Josephine Donovan and Carol J. Adams (New York: Columbia University Press, 2007), pp. 39-57, quote on p. 41.
17. Mary Douglas, Purity and Danger: An Analysis of Concepts of Pollution and Taboo (1966; reprint, London: Routledge, 2003), quote on p. 44.
18. Andrew Linzey, Christianity and the Rights of Animals (London: SPCK, 1987), p. 132.
19. Karen Morgan and Matthew Cole, "The Discursive Representation of Nonhuman Animals in a Culture of Denial, " in Humans and Other Animals: Critical Perspectives, ed. Bob Carter and Nickie Charles (Basingstoke, UK: Palgrave Macmillan, 2011), pp. 112-132.
20. See Richard Twine's "Is Biotechnology Deconstructing Animal Domestication? Movements Toward Liberation" in this special issue of Configurations.
21. See Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson and Susan McCarthy, When Elephants Weep: The Emotional Lives of Animals (New York: Doubleday, 1995)
22. Moussaieff Masson, The Pig Who Sang to the Moon: The Emotional World of Farm Animals (London: Vintage Books, 2005).
23. See Neil Stephens's "Growing Meat in Laboratories: The Promise, Ontology, and Ethical Boundary-Work of Using Muscle Cells to Make Food" in this special issue of Configurations.
24. For example, see the website of the Vegan Society. http://www.vegansociety.com/.
25. Brian J. Ford, "Culturing Meat for the Future: Anti-Death versus Anti-Life, " in Death and Anti-Death, Volume 7: Nine Hundred Years After St. Anselm (1033-1109), ed. Charles Tandy (Palo Alto, CA: Ria University Press, 2009), pp. 55-80, quote on p. 58.
26. An important caveat is the extent to which IVM research to date has been dependent on slaughtered and/or confined nonhumans, such as the use of bovine foetal serum.
27. For an example of the human harm of slaughterhouse work, see Gail A. Eisnitz, Slaughterhouse: The Shocking Story of Greed, Neglect, and Inhumane Treatment Inside the U.S. Meat Industry (Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books, 2007).
28. Kate Stewart and Matthew Cole, "The Conceptual Separation of Food and Animals in Childhood, " Food, Culture and Society 12:4 (2009): 457-476.
29. Kate Stewart and Matthew Cole, "The Conceptual Separation of Food and Animals in Childhood, " Food, Culture and Society 12:4 (2009): 457-476.
30. And, presumably, with tragic irony, toxicological "animal testing. "
31. For more on this, see Nick Fiddes, Meat: A Natural Symbol (London: Routledge, 1991).
32. Julia Twigg, "Vegetarianism and the Meanings of Meat, " in The Sociology of Food and Eating: Essays on the Sociological Significance of Food, ed. Anne Murcott (Aldershot, UK: Gower, 1983), pp. 18-30.
33. For more on this, see Nick Fiddes, Meat: A Natural Symbol (London: Routledge, 1991).
34. Carol J. Adams, The Sexual Politics of Meat: A Feminist-Vegetarian Critical Theory (New York: Continuum, 2004)
35. Adams, The Pornography of Meat (New York: Continuum, 2004).
36. Carol J. Adams, The Sexual Politics of Meat: A Feminist-Vegetarian Critical Theory (New York: Continuum, 2004)
37. For an analysis of this negative construction of vegan diets, see Matthew Cole and Karen Morgan, "Vegaphobia: Derogatory Discourses of Veganism and the Reproduction of Speciesism in UK National Newspapers, " British Journal of Sociology 61:1 (2011): 134-153.
38. Patrick D. Hopkins and Austin Dacey, "Vegetarian Meat: Could Technology Save Animals and Satisfy Meat Eaters?" Journal of Agricultural and Environmental Ethics 21:6 (2008): 579-596.
39. Brian J. Ford, "Culturing Meat for the Future: Anti-Death versus Anti-Life, " in Death and Anti-Death, Volume 7: Nine Hundred Years After St. Anselm (1033-1109), ed. Charles Tandy (Palo Alto, CA: Ria University Press, 2009), pp. 55-80, quote on p. 58.
40. See Neil Stephens's "Growing Meat in Laboratories: The Promise, Ontology, and Ethical Boundary-Work of Using Muscle Cells to Make Food" in this special issue of Configurations.
41. Perhaps most famously exemplified in Pierre Bourdieu, Distinction: A Social Critique of the Judgement of Taste, trans. Richard Nice (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1984).
42. For example, see Carol J. Adams, Neither Man nor Beast: Feminism and the Defense of Animals (New York: Continuum, 1995).
43. See Neil Stephens's "Growing Meat in Laboratories: The Promise, Ontology, and Ethical Boundary-Work of Using Muscle Cells to Make Food" in this special issue of Configurations.
44. In Vitro Meat Consortium, "Preliminary Economics Study, " 2008. http://invitro meat.org/images/Papers/invitro%20meat%20economics%20study%20v5%20%20 march%2008.pdf.
45. Neil Stephens, "In Vitro Meat: Zombies on the Menu?, " SCRIPTed 7:2 (2010): 394-401, quote on p. 398.
46. See New Harvest, 2013. http://www.new-harvest.org/faq.htm#10.
47. Patrick D. Hopkins and Austin Dacey, "Vegetarian Meat: Could Technology Save Animals and Satisfy Meat Eaters?" Journal of Agricultural and Environmental Ethics 21:6 (2008): 579-596.
48. For an overview of these arguments, see Andrew Knight, The Costs and Benefits of Animal Experiments (Basingstoke, UK: Palgrave Macmillan, 2011).
49. See Jean Harrington's "A Predicament: Animal Models and Human Tissue in Medical Research" in this special issue of Configurations.
50. See also Kay Peggs, "Human Primacy Identity Politics, Nonhuman Animal Experiments and the Oppression of Nonhuman Animals, " in Humans and Other Animals, pp. 133-152.
51. See also Kay Peggs, "Human Primacy Identity Politics, Nonhuman Animal Experiments and the Oppression of Nonhuman Animals, " in Humans and Other Animals, pp. 133-152.
52. See Jean Harrington's "A Predicament: Animal Models and Human Tissue in Medical Research" in this special issue of Configurations.
53. Kate Stewart and Matthew Cole, "The Conceptual Separation of Food and Animals in Childhood, " Food, Culture and Society 12:4 (2009): 457-476.
54. This is also reminiscent of the self-justificatory discourses of hunters who claim to "respect" their nonhuman victims, as if that respect mattered to the dying animal or to the rest of its social group that is violently deprived of one of its members; see Marti Kheel, "The Killing Game: An Ecofeminist Critique of Hunting, " Journal of the Philosophy of Sport 23:1 (1996): 30-44.
55. Peter Singer, Animal Liberation, 2nd ed. (1975; reprint, London: Pimlico, 1995).
56. See also Kay Peggs, "Human Primacy Identity Politics, Nonhuman Animal Experiments and the Oppression of Nonhuman Animals, " in Humans and Other Animals, pp. 133-152.
57. Peter Singer, Animal Liberation, 2nd ed. (1975; reprint, London: Pimlico, 1995).
58. Aaron Stibbe, "Counter-Discourses and the Relationship between Humans and Other Animals, " Anthrozoös 18:1 (2005): 3-17, quote on p. 11 (emphasis added).
59. Brian Luke, Brutal: Manhood and the Exploitation of Animals (Champaign: University of Illinois Press, 2007), p. 6.
60. Aaron Stibbe, "Counter-Discourses and the Relationship between Humans and Other Animals, " Anthrozoös 18:1 (2005): 3-17, quote on p. 11 (emphasis added).
61. Aaron Stibbe, "Counter-Discourses and the Relationship between Humans and Other Animals, " Anthrozoös 18:1 (2005): 3-17, quote on p. 11 (emphasis added).
62. See S. F. Sapontzis, Morals, Reason, and Animals (Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1987).
63. Sara Mills, Discourse (London: Routledge, 1997), p. 19.
64. Janet Ransom, "Feminism, Difference and Discourse: The Limits of Discursive Analysis for Feminism, " in Up Against Foucault: Explorations of Some Tensions between Foucault and Feminism, ed. Caroline Ramazanoglu (London: Routledge, 1994), pp. 123-146, quote on p. 123.
65. Barry Kew, "Appropriating Liberation, " Society and Animals 11:1 (2003): 29-49.
66. Barry Kew, "Appropriating Liberation, " Society and Animals 11:1 (2003): 36.
67. Barry Kew, "Appropriating Liberation, " Society and Animals 11:1 (2003): 36.
68. Barry Kew, "Appropriating Liberation, " Society and Animals 11:1 (2003): 36.
69. Sunday Mirror, October 3, 2010
70. Daily Telegraph, December 24, 2008.
71. Dale Jamieson, "Animal Liberation is an Environmental Ethic, " Environmental Values 7 (1998): 41-57.
72. Dale Jamieson, "Animal Liberation is an Environmental Ethic, " Environmental Values 7 (1998): 52.
73. Marti Kheel, "The Liberation of Nature: A Circular Affair, " in The Feminist Care Tradition in Animal Ethics: A Reader, ed. Josephine Donovan and Carol J. Adams (New York: Columbia University Press, 2007), p. 44.
74. Marti Kheel, "The Liberation of Nature: A Circular Affair, " in The Feminist Care Tradition in Animal Ethics: A Reader, ed. Josephine Donovan and Carol J. Adams (New York: Columbia University Press, 2007), pp. 39-57, quote on p. 41.
75. Brian Luke, Brutal: Manhood and the Exploitation of Animals (Champaign: University of Illinois Press, 2007), p. 164.
76. Marti Kheel, "The Liberation of Nature: A Circular Affair, " in The Feminist Care Tradition in Animal Ethics: A Reader, ed. Josephine Donovan and Carol J. Adams (New York: Columbia University Press, 2007), p. 41.
77. Dale Jamieson, "Animal Liberation is an Environmental Ethic, " Environmental Values 7 (1998): 52.
78. Daily Telegraph, "Obituaries: Lawrence Anthony, " March 10, 2012 (emphasis added).
79. Marti Kheel, "The Liberation of Nature: A Circular Affair, " in The Feminist Care Tradition in Animal Ethics: A Reader, ed. Josephine Donovan and Carol J. Adams (New York: Columbia University Press, 2007), p. 41.
80. Marti Kheel, "The Liberation of Nature: A Circular Affair, " in The Feminist Care Tradition in Animal Ethics: A Reader, ed. Josephine Donovan and Carol J. Adams (New York: Columbia University Press, 2007), p. 41.
81. Marti Kheel, "The Liberation of Nature: A Circular Affair, " in The Feminist Care Tradition in Animal Ethics: A Reader, ed. Josephine Donovan and Carol J. Adams (New York: Columbia University Press, 2007), p. 41.
82. Marti Kheel, "The Liberation of Nature: A Circular Affair, " in The Feminist Care Tradition in Animal Ethics: A Reader, ed. Josephine Donovan and Carol J. Adams (New York: Columbia University Press, 2007), p. 41.
83. Paul Ricoeur, Hermeneutics and the Human Sciences (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1981).
84. Marti Kheel, "The Liberation of Nature: A Circular Affair, " in The Feminist Care Tradition in Animal Ethics: A Reader, ed. Josephine Donovan and Carol J. Adams (New York: Columbia University Press, 2007), p. 44.
85. Hoagland, qtd. in Marti Kheel, "From Heroic to Holistic Ethics: The Ecofeminist Challenge, " in Ecofeminism: Women, Animals, Nature, ed. Greta Gaard (Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1993), pp. 243-271, quote on p. 251.
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88. Marti Kheel, "The Liberation of Nature: A Circular Affair, " in The Feminist Care Tradition in Animal Ethics: A Reader, ed. Josephine Donovan and Carol J. Adams (New York: Columbia University Press, 2007), p. 44.
89. Marti Kheel, "The Liberation of Nature: A Circular Affair, " in The Feminist Care Tradition in Animal Ethics: A Reader, ed. Josephine Donovan and Carol J. Adams (New York: Columbia University Press, 2007), p. 44.
90. Brian Luke, Brutal: Manhood and the Exploitation of Animals (Champaign: University of Illinois Press, 2007), p. 164.
91. Brian Luke, Brutal: Manhood and the Exploitation of Animals (Champaign: University of Illinois Press, 2007), p. 164.
92. Brian Luke, Brutal: Manhood and the Exploitation of Animals (Champaign: University of Illinois Press, 2007), p. 164.
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97. Brian Luke, "Taming Ourselves or Going Feral? Toward a Nonpatriarchal Metaethic of Animal Liberation, " in Animals and Women: Feminist Theoretical Explorations, ed. Carol J. Adams and Josephine Donovan (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1995), pp. 290-319.
98. Brian Luke, Brutal: Manhood and the Exploitation of Animals (Champaign: University of Illinois Press, 2007), p. 164.
99. David Nibert, Animal Rights/Human Rights: Entanglements of Oppression and Liberation (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2002), p. 248.
100. Marti Kheel, "The Liberation of Nature: A Circular Affair, " in The Feminist Care Tradition in Animal Ethics: A Reader, ed. Josephine Donovan and Carol J. Adams (New York: Columbia University Press, 2007), p. 49.
101. Marti Kheel, "The Liberation of Nature: A Circular Affair, " in The Feminist Care Tradition in Animal Ethics: A Reader, ed. Josephine Donovan and Carol J. Adams (New York: Columbia University Press, 2007), p. 49.
102. Marti Kheel, "The Liberation of Nature: A Circular Affair, " in The Feminist Care Tradition in Animal Ethics: A Reader, ed. Josephine Donovan and Carol J. Adams (New York: Columbia University Press, 2007), p. 49.
103. Marti Kheel, "License to Kill: An Ecofeminist Critique of Hunters' Discourse, " in Animals and Women, pp. 85-125.
104. Marti Kheel, Nature Ethics: An Ecofeminist Perspective (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2008), p. 22.
105. Brian Luke, Brutal: Manhood and the Exploitation of Animals (Champaign: University of Illinois Press, 2007), p. 164.
106. Renzo Llorente, "Reflections on the Prospects for a Non-Speciesist Marxism, " in Critical Theory and Animal Liberation, ed. John Sanbonmatsu (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2010), pp. 121-135, quote on p. 129.
107. Marti Kheel, "License to Kill: An Ecofeminist Critique of Hunters' Discourse, " in Animals and Women, pp. 85-125.