Animal Person

Hal Herzog's "Some We Love, Some We Hate, Some We Eat"

Hal Herzog’s “Some We Love, Some We Hate, Some We Eat” (Harper 2011), though fascinating, is ultimately depressing for vegans and animal rights activists. Over at Animal Rights and AntiOppression, we’ve been discussing tactics and sharing our thoughts and experiences about what works and doesn’t work when it comes to advocacy. In a manner that’s Malcolm Gladwell meets Freakonomics, which is the fascinating part, Herzog investigates our beliefs and actions regarding nonhuman animals (anthrozoology). He pairs conventional wisdom with actual research on such wisdom and speaks to experts who’ve been pondering the issues from the perspectives of their various disciplines. The research, much of the time, doesn’t support the conventional wisdom (which is not to say the case is closed on any issue). For instance, dolphins don’t actually have the curative powers some claim they have (22); there’s no evidence that pet owners have different personalities than non pet owners (28); having to kill and cut up an animal does not stop one from eating meat (189); the majority of people who abused animals as children do not grow up to be violent (30); and 80% of serial killers do not have a known history of cruelty to animals (31). Herzog states, “The awkward fact is that most wanton animal cruelty is not perpetrated by inherently bad kids but by normal children who will eventually grow up to be good citizens” (34).

 

Most interesting for me was the mental lock most people have that we vegans are always looking to break or find the key to: Why do good people who understand what happens to animals for unnecessary products such as “steak” or eggs, continue to consume such things? The answer, throughout the entire 300 pages, essentially is: Because they do. People believe one thing and do another. All day long. If slaughterhouses had glass walls? Well, as it turns out neither a trip to a slaughterhouse nor killing an animal yourself is powerful enough to make people go vegan. “The bottom line is that there are many reasons why human-animal interactions are so often inconsistent and paradoxical. Thousands of studies have demonstrated that human thinking about nearly everything is surprisingly irrational” (65).

 

Much of the book deals with topics vegans have likely pondered, likely frequently. We understand the importance of being cute for other animals, we’ve realized that the decision who to eat or wear or value is largely based on culture. Many of us have difficulty with the idea of keeping “pets.” On that topic and a few others, Herzog doesn’t include what for lack of a better term is “vegan thinking.” When it comes to pets, the only reasons he considers for keeping pets have to do with the enrichment of the lives of people. He doesn’t seem to have met anyone who considers keeping pets to not be ideal, yet necessary out of a feeling of responsibility or obligation due to our part in their plight. And by the way, he debunks the idea of dogs and unconditional love, as well as the idea that pet owners are less lonely than people who don’t own pets. At least his research on pit bull-types of dogs demonstrates the injustice they face.

 

Herzog, unsurprisingly, uses “it” to refer to animals, eats and wears them, and “[does] not feel particularly guilty about it” (P.S., page 6). He is an unabashed speciesist, putting humans on “a different moral plane from that of other animals” (11) due to various reasons, such as our “vastly greater capacity for symbolic language, culture, and ethical judgment” (11). He watched cockfighting and killed and skinned animals, but won’t eat veal. And this is partly what’s so disappointing about the message of this book: Herzog amasses the research, and sees and does things that involve tremendous suffering and injustice. And yet he’s perfectly content to lump himself in with the vast majority of people who claim to care about animals but act like they don’t. My frustration is evident in the comments I’ve carved across the pages that make it impossible for me to now donate the book to my local library.

 

On page 172, when Herzog writes, “I am conflicted over many moral issues involving animals,” I respond, “No kidding!” When he spends what seems like an eternity discussing cockfighting and the people who participate, mostly to set up the comparison to how the chickens we eat are treated and the lack of outrage over that, I respond, “What is wrong with you? You’re right, it is horrible! So why the hell do you continue to participate in the killing of chickens for food, yet cockfighting is no longer on your list?” But I’m merely making his point. People are irrational and conflicted and make a show of taking a stand but manage to still do whatever they want in the end. When Staci, an ex-vegetarian who now eats raw meat, writes to Herzog that she thinks it takes bravery to kill animals (she says “butcher) and talks about “reverence” and “completing the cycle” and that “taking responsibility is somehow the balm that soothes the horror,” I wonder why Herzog isn’t disgusted by that and doesn’t want to call her out for her ridiculous verbiage that means nothing to the animals she kills. What about their horror?  In response, I can only underline these phrases with seven-page deep gashes.

 

Most informative for a discussion about vegan advocacy is the section about the animal rights movement (and unfortunately he alternately calls it “animal protection” and also refers to welfare, perhaps because of the Humane Research Council’s study that people prefer the word “protection”). “The campaign to moralize meat has largely been a failure. . . . Ironically, the efforts by animal protectionists to improve the well-being of farm animals have made the consumption of flesh more, rather than less, morally palatable” (191).

 

Finally, regarding actual animal rights, Herzog is aware of Singer and Regan and appears to have respect for them despite the fact that he says they “[take] moral consistency too seriously” (259). (Yes, you read that right.) Joan Dunayer is a different story, however, as Herzog thinks she “lives in a moral universe that should cause even hardcore animal activists to shudder” (255). He evidently has no idea that abolitionists exist and thinks Dunayer is an outlier. Of course I was appalled, but out there in the mainstream world, she is an outlier. He merely reminds me of how little I have in common with the average person who claims to care about animals. Meanwhile, throughout the book he does describe people who would likely call themselves abolitionists. They are vegans, and he has the utmost respect for them. They are superheroes for being able to think about all of these issues so thoroughly and have the will power to do something about them. They are extraordinary. But him? He prefers to take the stance that because moral consistency is impossible (i.e., no one is 100% vegan), you “do what you can do.” If that means volunteering at a dog rescue or giving money to PETA, all while eating and using animals, at least you’re doing something. Of course that can be debated. But also, it’s such a low, low bar—such a disappointing expectation. We should demand more.

 

On Fighting for "Animal Rights"

Being featured on ARZone's worldwide Live Guest Chat has reinvigorated my thinking about a couple of topics (here's the transcript). And then I read the "OMG!!!!!OED!!!!!LOL!!!!!" in today's New York Times, and I couldn't resist posting.

A couple of years ago I wrote about whether it's a good use of my time to be a purist about the term "animal rights" when most of the world doesn't have the same understanding of the term as I do. (I'll look for the post and link to it later, but while Baby Sky's not up yet I want to at least post something.) Likewise for "abolitionist."

Regarding the additions of OMG and LOL, the editorial says that they:

bring to mind the words of William Safire, The Times’s former master wordsmith, who climbed down from the conservative ramparts in the culture wars 25 years ago to accept that “words come to mean what most people think they mean, not what we say they ought to mean.”

I spent several years writing, daily, and often with shock, about how, for instance, the NYT--the New York Times (OMG!!!!!)--would call HSUS an animal rights group (after all, HSUS doesn't even do that). Or how a paragraph would refer to animal rights and animal welfare as if they're interchangeable.

Of course, I say to myself, language is worth fighting for. But is it? Won't the battle always be won by common usage/the majority? Isn't my time better spent fighting for actual animal rights than the term "animal rights?"

I think of the time I spent writing about or talking about "Francione-style abolition," and "abolition." Francione has defined abolition in a certain way and if you don't adhere strictly to his definition, you are not a Francione-style abolitionist. The rest of the animal advocacy community, which is the vast majority, who call themselves abolitionists, are abolitionists. They don't satisfy all of the requirements of Francione, but their goal is the abolition of the use of sentient nonhumans by humans. They are abolitionists, just not Francione-style abolitionists.

It would be wonderfully dramatic to be able to say: I'm going to fight for animals rather than for language, but it's not that clear cut. Fighting to maintain the integrity of the words humane, love, euthanasia or compassion, is also fighting for animals. And it usually involves exchanges with non-vegans. It helps them focus on what's really being done to animals. But fighting for the term animal rights or about the term abolition ends up, in the real world, being about fighting with other vegans (and I don't know if fighting is the proper term--it very likely isn't--but I'm out of time to get into that).

I could debate about language all day, with vegans and non-vegans. But I have to think about which words I focus on, and whether they're going to help me in my quest to get more people to stop killing nonhuman animals/having them killed when they don't need to.

Finally, I think that there are a variety of reasons you might want to talk about language or use language that the average person isn't accustomed to. But for the average discussion with the average dog and cat person, I say stick with the language they use ("I love animals," "I only buy meat that was humanely raised"), and use those opportunities to educate them and point out the inconsistency in their claims. I say don't start talking about terms that mean nothing to them or using language that might alienate them.

But that's me . . .

Is Charles with Lars Axl Fokker?

Charles died a week ago today, and if you haven't seen Deb's tribute, it's a must-see and we're very grateful and humbled by her post as well as all of the e-mails and cards and calls we've received.

In all of the lovely messages we've been getting, I've noticed two trends:

1) Death is a communal experience as well as an individual one. One being dies, but the memories of death and the stories of life are brought to the fore for those who learn of the passing. Charles' untimely death brings to mind everyone's past pain and joy. We share each other's grief, triggered by the most recent death. We aren't alone in missing our beloved companions deeply.

2) Charles is somewhere, or part of him is somewhere, or his essence or his soul is in some place, or some other creature, or maybe even everywhere. Death brings up all of the stories we tell ourselves that help us understand and move through the grief. Charles is looking down on me, Charles' soul is running, Charles is with Lars Axl Fokker (Emily's son, to whom she passed her Feline Infectious Peritonitis, which he suffered from before we euthanized him nearly a decade ago). Charles and Lars had a similar, playful energy, and I must say I like the idea that they're playing together somewhere.

Some people seem to think that animals' souls are different from those of humans, while others think they're the same. Some speak of a collective consciousness, and others speak of reincarnation. There's talk of a spirit, which I'm not sure is different from a soul. Charles is definitely with me in spirit, but I don't know if there is a spirit . . . somewhere.

As an agnostic atheist, I certainly cannot claim to have any idea of what really happened to Charles, other than that he is no longer lying at my feet on the bamboo carpet, and never will again. I would love to think that his soul is lying at my feet, or on my shoulder, or just about anywhere, frankly. I'd love to think that I'll encounter a greyhound in a couple of years who will have a familiar look in his eye and I'll adopt him and care for him until the day he dies, as I did with Charles.

And I would love to think that Charles is now a guardian angel of mine.

I'd love to think that he will come to me in a dream and forgive me for whatever part I might have played in his death.

The idea that he will have a more favorable rebirth is a nice one, though I also like to think that being an animal in my house is about as favorable as you can get.

What do you believe about what occurs after death for our sentient nonhuman companions?

 

--Photo: After an evening of playing with paper and toys on my birthday last year, Charles and I fell asleep.

 

My New Favorite RSA Animate

Lessons Learned From 4 Years of Animal Person

I've officially been blogging for four years (1,329 posts and 5,441 comments) today, and as I (re)ponder whether I will continue, I'd like to present some lessons I've learned about blogging, veganism, people, "the movement," language and . . . I'll also take requests.

Today I'll address blogging.

Lesson #1

Know your audience.

If you want to facilitate change in the hearts, minds and actions of others, you should know your audience. Now, you might be intentionally seeking a certain audience and therefore writing in a style specifically designed for it. That audience and style might be very logical. It might be full of rage. Just know that the way you present yourself largely dictates who is going to visit your blog. Your blog is like a mirror for you and it will attract like-minded people, for the most part.

You'll get visitors who are open to changing if you make your blog or site welcoming to them.

And you'll get unwanted visitors, as well . . .

Operation Nix-the-Petting-Zoo

After my long weekend up North I returned to a message from our neighborhood association announcing a picnic on April 11 on the Village Green. We paid a heap of extra money to live on the Village Green, so anything that happens there is basically happening in our front yard. Like a "BBQ, pony rides and a petting zoo!" Naturally, upon reading such words, my stomach turned and I immediately thought of making plans to be away from the house that day so I wouldn't have to see any of the festivities or try to negotiate walking the dogs around them.

When I started thinking about trying to get the association to cancel the pony rides and petting zoo (which are often part of one business as a quick Google search of "traveling petting zoo" will demonstrate), my several-year vegan husband said, "What's the use? It's not like these people care about animals. It's a barbeque for heaven's sake. Their kids are probably gonna be petting the animals they're eating and they might not even know it." Though I don't disagree, I guess my thinking was to at least take some business from the places that use living animals for profit because trying to affect the ones that have already killed the animals is not as urgent at that point, not to mention there's no way that would work. I might be able to nix the petting zoo, and maybe even the pony rides, but the "BBQ" will remain untouched. (Here's a factsheet about petting zoos, which at least in Florida have been a public health threat, to say nothing of the exploitation and suffering of the animals.)

I'm fairly confident that I don't know anyone who won't say that they don't approve of animal cruelty. Everyone claims to like animals and want the best for them and be against cruelty. Many will say they "love" animals. Meanwhile, most eat them, wear them and "love" the Kentucky Derby, yet don't approve of dog racing. It boggles the mind. Actually, it boggles my mind. But it shouldn't because it makes perfect sense. Their values are simply a reflection of the dominant culture, which they have either consciously or otherwise chosen not to challenge.

What would you do? Is it silly to go after the petting zoo when the event will likely require hundreds of pig, cow and chicken corpses?

I'm thinking leave town is the best answer.

SHAC7 Trailer

SHAC 7 Trailer from Sparrow Media on Vimeo.

I credit Will Potter as the catalyst for shifting my focus away from critiques of other activists and activist groups (particularly his post, "While the Government Continues Attacks on Activists, Animal Rights Groups Protest Each Other" back in 2008). I'm not saying that criticism of PETA, or any other group, isn't warranted. And there certainly are some loud voices doing that criticizing. But when our First Amendment rights have been diminished as an activist group and we're being unfairly targeted and called "terrorists" and not afforded equal protection, it feels strange to protest against other vegans. Despite the fact that I don't necessarily disagree with some of the criticism, I simply can't get behind the endless vegan versus vegan debates when we are all the same to the government.

But that's me.

If you're in NYC on March 23, support "Muzzling A Movement" at my alma mater, New York University at 7pm (presented by the NYU Student Animal Legal Defense Fund).

Roger Cohen Realizes Dogs=Pigs, Sort Of

"Dog Days in China" is a small piece with no gruesome slideshow. But it's also remarkable in that Roger Cohen, a 50-something man who writes for the New York Times, wonders:

But do pigs have any more or less of a soul than dogs? Are they any more or less sentient? Do they suffer any more or less in death? Are they any more or less part of the mysterious unity of life? I think not.

There is a rational, and for some people a spiritual, case for being a vegetarian: Killing animals is wrong. However I cannot see a rational argument for saying eating dogs or cats is barbaric while eating pork or beef is fine. If you eat meat you cannot logically find it morally or ethically repugnant to eat a particular meat (I’m setting cannibalism aside here.).

I repeat: If you eat meat (I'd say: products that come from animals), you cannot logically find it morally or ethically repugnant to eat a particular meat (i.e., product that comes from an animal).

The theory is sound. There's no way out.

But as Cohen experiences, humans don't live "in theory." The theory that the mind finds inescapably well-formulated is often overwhelmed and overturned by human emotions.

I must confess I’ve been having a hard time. My bout of anguish began a few weeks back on a wintry night in central China, in the restless megalopolis of Chongqing. I was cold, wet and seeking refuge.

His "anguish" leads him to a dog restaurant where he dines on dog. His "refuge" could easily taken the form of the Sichuan noodles he likes, sans dog. Or pig, or duck, or fish. "Dog was not easy for me," he writes. "The memory has proved hard to digest."

When it comes to the legislation (which may or may not mean anything for dogs and cats), Cohen sides with the people who recognize that cats and dogs are no different from chickens and geese. He writes, "I’m not happy that I ate dog. But I’m happy China eats dog."

This is a good news/bad news story. It's great that someone realizes that there is no real difference between dogs and cows. However, remember that he understands that emotion ("the heart") is what ultimately governs what most of us do, and certainly what he does, so he won't be eating any more dogs.

And, presumably, he will continue to eat other animals. And that's the bad news.

Stay tuned tomorrow as I question setting aside cannibalism.

On Wearable "Roadkill"

Angus sent me a link to "Animal Parts: High Style of Just Plain Beastly" wherein Zosia Bielski reports that "hipsters are going whole hog, donning road kill as accessories and cow hooves on their feet."

Several designers, one of whom is a vegetarian, are using parts of dead animals they found on the side of the road to make everything from shoes to hats to cufflinks, which evidently are difficult to produce because "[f]inding two animals who have little heads roughly the same size is just a nightmare.”

The underlying philosophy is that the dead animals "should be used in their entirety." (Used in their entirety by humans, thereby ignoring the reality that the carcasses play in the lives of other creatures, such as scavengers.) The garments and accessories are considered ethically sourced because no one was intentionally killed for them (although sources include "critters fallen victim to pest control," which sounds pretty intentional to me). However the designers also use discarded parts of animals killed by butchers, to "give new life to something that would normally be thrown away." A significant amount of mental acrobatics is involved in convincing yourself that you are not in some way an accomplice to the killing of sentient beings and then profiting from them when you take their parts after they've been slaughtered and you use and profit from them.

There's a lot of talk of whether or not this is morbid, yet no acknowledgment that every animal part we wear comes from an animal who died. This isn't about what's morbid or what's not, and what's art and what's not. This is about using animals and presenting yet another variation on the theme of humans believing they have a right to make food, clothing or art from the bodies of other animals.

The final paragraph of the article is perhaps the most cringe-worthy. Sarah Jay, the fashion director of Fashion Takes Action, an organization that promotes green methods and materials, says:

 “To wear the life of another animal is a very special thing and it's a very sacred thing.

It's giving the animal purpose after life. We should all be so lucky.”

Meanwhile, it's death they're wearing--not life. And making it into some kind of spiritual experience is offensive. Nonhuman animals are not here to be purposeful to humans.

On Talking With Veterinarians About Vegan Food

We have a request, and it's an issue I've written about a handful of times but never had this particular question answered by readers: How do you talk with your vet--who is against feeding your dog vegan food--about your choice to do so? What do you say?

I'm fortunate to have a regular (non-specialist) vet who has no problem at all with a vegan diet for dogs. I've never discussed that Emily the kitty eats one meal of Ami vegan kibble on most days (and one of canned, animal-based food). She is doing fine with that. No change in anything about her, though I do think she's a bit perkier.

Violet the diabetic greyhound does very well as a vegan as her recent blood work demonstrated. Charles the lame greyhound doesn't process grains well at all. He never has. He fares best (as evidenced by poop, energy, licking, scratching, and severity of limping) on food with no grains whatsoever and very high animal protein--almost carnivore level.

Home cooking for Violet was difficult because her carb/protein/fat ratios need to be consistent in order for her blood sugar to be predictable. I had to make exactly the same meal for her every day, so I moved to using Natural Balance Vegetarian kibble (note that the canned version is not vegan due to the animal source of Vitamin D3). I did try other vegan dog foods, but I like the ingredients in Natural Balance best. There are plenty of vegan treats on the market, but my hounds prefer bananas, strawberries, blueberries or broccoli.

Because Violet and Charles are chock full of medical issues, they have a handful of specialists. There's the acupuncturist/chiropractor, opthamologist, orthopedist, neurologist, physical therapist and the trainer. None of those approve of a vegan diet and all it took was one conversation, and me hearing that "they have to eat meat" from people who believe people "have to eat meat" to know that the issue wasn't ever going to be resolved.

My regular vet is a curious guy who doesn't think he knows everything and when something happens that he hasn't encountered (e.g., Charles had a corn on his pad), he's happy for me to bring him some research and for us to tackle the issue together (we did this with the corn and removed it together--and no charge, by the way). If he didn't know about feeding dogs vegan food, I might have brought him some of these articles and I would have referred him to Vegan Dogs: Compassionate Nutrition or to VegetarianDogs.com.

I'd question whether the vet needs to know what my dogs are eating or is in a position to judge as long as they are healthy. I recently told my osteopath that I'm a vegan and got all kinds of grief. Then she saw my fantastic blood work and vitals and didn't say another word.

Meanwhile, my husband, who has been vegan for less than 2 years (straight from omni), takes supplements sporadically, and had very low B12. I take fewer supplements and my B12 was high. The message here, like the message with the dogs, is that everyone is different and we don't respond uniformly to the same food or supplements. The ideal scenario is to establish a baseline, whether it's your blood work or your dog's, or other observables such as behavior, scratching, poop, breath, energy level, and then make the change (supplements, food, whatever) and retest in three months and six months to see the direction and progress. For all we know, my husband was B12 deficient as an omnivore. His levels are fine now, but if we didn't check them (and those of the creatures), we wouldn't have figured all of this out.

Back to the questions: Do you arm yourself with research and go to the vet to educate him/her? Do you not say anything at all or lie when they ask you what the animal eats? (My vet asks every time I go.) Do you politely say that you've done the research and are convinced that a vegan diet is perfectly appropriate for most dogs and has the added bonus of not putting you in a position where you're supporting the needless slaughter of other animals?

On Food/Lifestyle Disputes At Home

In "Therapists Report Increase in Green Disputes" in the Environment section of today's New York Times, Leslie Kaufman reports that American households have become a battleground for beliefs about the environment.

While no study has documented how frequent these clashes have become, therapists agree that the green issue can quickly become poisonous because it is so morally charged. Friends or family members who are not devoted to the environmental cause can become irritated by life choices they view as ostentatiously self-denying or politically correct.

Problems arise when the individuals in the family (or couple) are at different points in their awareness of actions and purchases that affect the environment.

Changing the family diet because of environmental concerns can be particularly loaded, Ms. Buzzell [a therapist] added. She warns wives and mothers not to move a family toward vegetarianism before everyone is ready.

When I read that last sentence, I cringed. Not because of the "wives and mothers" bit, as we learn that women tend to pay more attention to these issues, so change/desire to change the family does more often begin with them. And it wasn't "vegetarianism" rather than "veganism," as though my husband went from omnivore to vegan overnight, I do understand that most people stop eating flesh first.

What made me cringe was that everyone had to be "ready" before making a change that the planet needs so desperately. Does Planet Earth have the time for everyone to decide they're "ready" to give it a break?

But then I remembered that, as a vegan, I purchased and prepared the flesh of cows and chickens for my husband for nearly six years because I knew that if the change didn't come from him he would likely end up resenting me, plus he might even go back to eating and using animals. I didn't have the same urgency in my environmentalism back then, or more accurately it wasn't related to animals. It was all about other things we could do to tread more lightly on the earth.

I do think the adult-adult relationship is different from the adult-child relationship, particularly with young children who are formulating their values based on what is said and done in the home. My adult-adult experience was that it was actually painful at times to live with someone who ate animals and I wondered how long I could deal with it. What I had going for me was that early on my husband said, "I feel the same way you do, but I'm just not ready yet." If he had said, "I'm never giving up my steak" I don't know if I would have lasted that long. We didn't go to therapy for this issue, because I knew that talking about it wouldn't help, not to mention the likelihood of a therapist in South Florida understanding my position was nearly nil.

Let's face it, the longer you've done something, the more attached you are to it and to the rationalization you employ to keep the behavior going. But here's my question: For those of you with significant others who are not vegan, do you have a time line with benchmarks in your head? Is it purely a matter of months or years for you? Do you discuss veganism or environmentalism frequently? Are you in one of the American households where disputes are common?

How Do You Deal With Shopping?

There's an interesting discussion about the frustrations of shopping ("On the Perils of Purchasing") over at Animal Rights & AntiOppression. If you haven't stopped by, please do and let me know what your priorities are when shopping, and how you deal with the various issues you must confront when buying new stuff.

On Dolphins as a Gateway to Animal Rights

My life-as-a-tweeter is less and less significant these days. It's just not all that interesting to me. Something about jockeying for position in 140 characters or less, rather than interacting and sharing, I guess.

I did tweet about "Scientists Say Dolphins Should Be Treated As 'Non-human Persons'" yesterday, as I think this is a Gray Matter for a lot of people and might be interesting to explore.

The way I see it, there are three camps on this one:

1. People who think that dolphins or Great Apes or chimps could function as a gateway to other animals getting rights. You could be for or against animal rights and believe the gateway theory.
2. People who think that dolphins or some other animals--and only those animals--really should have rights because they are legitimately special;
3. People who think it's speciesist to go in this direction and don't support it at all (as opposed to the people in the first camp, who might also think it's speciesist but who might also look at it as a step in the right direction).

Riddle me this: If you're in camp #3, do you think it's bad to pursue personhood for individual species, or is it just something you're not going to spend your time on because of the various problems with the process (e.g., which animals and why, what characteristic/s and whose definition of them, just to name a few)? Would you actually actively campaign against rights for some species?

As for the deconstructing the article, I'm afraid there aren't any surprises:

• "Dolphins have been declared the world's second most intelligent creatures" are the first ten words of the article. Dolphins are so smart that scientists think they should be treated as "non-human persons" and as such it is "morally unacceptable" to use or kill them. This all sounds very suspect to me, and without reading another word I worry that intelligence is somehow based on what we humans have defined as intelligence and is a quality that we probably have in great quantity. The entire discussion, I fear, will be about comparing dolphins to humans and the more human-like they are, the more intelligent they are, and the more worthy of moral consideration they are. We'll see . . .
• "Many dolphin brains are larger than our own and second in mass only to the human brain when corrected for body size." Of course, the size of a brain isn't what's important. The important measurement is the ratio to the body size. And there we win, and whoever comes in second (dolphins) should therefore be almost as worthy as we are of . . . having their lives to themselves.
• Dolphins used to be positioned below chimps, but recent studies have shown the bottlenose to be more intelligent. They also have distinct personalities (and chimps don't? and dogs don't? and chickens don't?) a strong sense of self (you just know a mirror study is coming) and can think about the future. Just as an aside about that last one, "spiritual," religious, and self-help leaders have for over a decade been trying to get people to not think about the future, and being "in the moment" is perhaps one of the more difficult things for many humans to do. What does that say? (I bet something like: We're so smart that our intelligence gets in the way.)
• Finally, dolphins got culcha, meaning "new types of behaviour can quickly be picked up by one dolphin from another." I'd like to know what behaviors constitute plain old learning, or adaptation even, and which constitute culture. 
• Enter the inevitable mirror study, demonstrating bottlenose dolphins can recognize themselves. They have learned some symbol-based language, and they solve problems, cooperate, and learn tricks. They can also learn how "to hold sponges over their snouts to protect themselves when searching for spiny fish on the ocean floor." And when Charles wants to eat some cat poop that is covered with fire ants, he'll either try to wipe it with a leaf or he'll wipe them off with a very quick, choppy motion because he has learned how fast they can jump onto him and bite him. And he has learned that all cat poop is worth the effort. 
• Dolphins cooperate to round up fish (kind of like the way the Japanese cooperate to round up the dolphins). But if you live on a lake in South Florida, you know that anhingas, who swim as well as they fly and run (is there a hierarchy for triathletes in the natural world? Where are we on that one, I wonder?), drive fish to one end of a lake, and when you see it happen though there's a beauty in it, and certainly efficiency and effectiveness, it also seems barbaric when the fish, who are panicking and have nowhere to go, get killed and eaten by the graceful, athletic, intelligent anhingas.
• The brains of dolphins have similar folds, like the ones we have and are linked with human intelligence.

There are currently 112 comments on this article. What do you think?

On "That's Why We Don't Eat Animals"

"That's Why We Don't Eat Animals: A Book About Vegans, Vegetarians, and All Living Things," written and illustrated by Ruby Roth, has gorgeous and haunting illustrations. And it gently tells the story of why we shouldn't eat factory farmed animals. And there is a prominent pro-environment theme as well, in addition to the notion of choosing respect.

Its target audience is children 4-10, which I never understood as a category because 4-year olds are nothing like 10-year olds cognitively.

The significant problem with this book is that the solution to the problems posed (which begin with "On factory farms . . . ") could easily be some Farm Forward-endorsed small operation where many of the horrors of factory farming don't exist. There is no mention of that solution, but I worry.

Is a 4- or 10-year old going to say, "Oh these places sure are terrible, but is there any place where babies get to stay with their mamas and walk around? Because if there's one of those places, can we eat those animals?" Who knows. Okay, a 4-year old's probably not going to say that. But a 10-year old might.

And then what?

It is true that the vast majority of animals raised for their parts are factory farmed. But it would seem to me that, especially when it comes to children, a consistent message of respect and justice, emphasizing it's not okay to eat animals because it's not okay to eat animals, factory farmed or not, would have been a better angle.

Interestingly, the book begins with "Pets," explaining that "All animals deserve the care and protection we give our pets," which is a promising notion for the start of this type of children's book. I think I would have felt much better if Roth had developed that angle, helping the kids see that pigs and cows aren't that much different from dogs and cats, thereby providing logical building blocks for their thinking to develop.

But instead, we go in the treatment direction and develop a negative emotional connection to factory farming that can probably be ameliorated, if not extinguished, if we remove the factory. And I'd prefer a different message.

Kermie

Kermie

One of the reasons my marriage to a carnivorous Republican worked so well, at least for the first four years, was that he traveled a lot. He unwittingly afforded me the luxury of many weekends spent hanging out with subversives of all kinds to support their causes and quietly planning the overthrow of the government. And of course, shuttling wildlife to and fro, and contemplating their place in our lives and our place in theirs.

On a very quiet night during a lull in the drama of the ducks, I was researching the Greyhound racing industry, and seething over its treatment of dogs as well as the support it often gets, through subsidies, to help it survive. South Florida is home to the most racetracks and Greyhound farms and trainers in the country, and you can’t turn on the radio or the television without encountering a commercial for the tracks. And you can’t drive on the Interstate without seeing signs telling you when to exit for the “Dog Track.” If you’re from a less draconian state that doesn’t allow dog racing, the first time you see one of those signs it’s bizarre. It just doesn’t seem real that Americans, who claim to love their dogs so much, would use and abuse them for their own gain. It seemed odd to me that the people here simply accept, as a fact, that dog racing is a legitimate sport. I was deep in thought, trying to figure out how I was going to stop the racing of dogs, when I heard a faint ribbit.

Being home alone for the weekend made me particularly susceptible to being startled by strange noises. My imagination conjured a frog desperate to return to his home and family, but trapped in a surreal world of artificially-cold air, very little dirt, ostensibly no available water, and precious few bugs to eat.

I followed his call, but so did Emily The Hunter. The race was on; I had to find the frog, whom I named Kermie, before my vicious feline was able to sink her claws into him. Though she hadn’t managed to kill anyone yet, I wasn’t about to roll the dice on whether she really did have some kind of predator instinct.

The problem with finding Kermie was that Emily had an edge; she had some kind of sense that was working for her other than hearing. When Kermie wasn’t making a peep, Emily was still on the move, sniffing him out, I guess. She had quite a system, slinking down low and moving swiftly from one plant to the next, one bookcase to the next. Every now and then, she stopped moving, craned her neck, and sniffed in all directions. Based on whatever data she collected, she’d alter her course and continue her search. Her routine was so impressive that for a moment I thought if she ever went outside she might actually survive for ten minutes.

Just then, I was startled by a shrill sound: the telephone. Dave was calling to say goodnight. It was only 8:30, but anyone who knows me knows that after 8:00 pm I begin my lightning-fast descent into incoherence, and can easily be asleep by 9:15 if nobody stops me. When I answered the phone, I inadvertently pressed the “speakerphone” button, and as soon as Emily heard her daddy’s voice, she trotted over to the phone to rub her face on it. So much for the predator instinct. When I informed Dave of what Emily and I were doing, he reminded me that some frogs are fatally poisonous to cats. She was already terminally ill and didn’t need any help getting closer to death. I had to find Kermie before Emily, and relocate him for the good of all. Translation? I wasn’t allowed to go to sleep until I knew everyone was safe.

Fortunately, Kermie didn’t make a sound and Emily fell asleep between my knees. Several hours of uninterrupted slumber passed and I forgot all about Kermie, Emily, and everything else, and was deep in a dream where I was driving to Brooklyn via the Brooklyn Bridge, and I was in a rush but there was so much traffic that I got out of my car to check out what was holding me up. And what was holding me up—what was holding us all up—literally, were billions of frogs weaved together.

That was enough to wake me up, and when I opened my eyes and realized I wasn’t going to Brooklyn, I saw Kermie, five inches from my face, on my pillow. Before I could even process his presence and figure out what to do, I heard the scrapes of Emily’s paws on her litter box in the guest room bathroom. Lucky for Kermie, she was otherwise occupied. Emily’s scraping scared Kermie though, and he took off, out of the bedroom and down the stairs, with me in hot pursuit. I was convinced he jumped into the pot of Skip, our Dieffenbachia, so I put Skip outside and declared myself victorious.

I went back to sleep, thinking I hadn’t a care. Emily returned to the space between my knees, and we both fell back asleep. I couldn’t have been sleeping for more than a couple of minutes when I inexplicably awoke to find Emily wasn’t between my knees—or anywhere in the bedroom. I instantly developed a tension-filled knot in my gut that meant only one thing: Kermie was still in the house and he was in mortal danger. It was almost sunrise, and he was probably waking, stretching, and preparing for his day, and his movements caused some kind of rustling that alerted Emily to his hiding place.

As I skulked around my own house, all I could picture was Emily tearing Kermie limb from limb, then suffering a grisly death from ingesting the poison that ran through Kermie’s froggy veins. When I reached the living room I was aghast to see Emily, lying on her side, relaxing and licking her paws. It’s too late, I thought, she’s already had her way with poor Kermie, and now she too is not long for this world.

Ribbit. Ribbit.

There is a God, I thought. Now all I have to do is find Kermie and bring him outside to live the rest of his life in peace. He started frolicking with abandon in the dried green moss at the base of Bob, our resident Spathophylum. Clearly, he had complete disregard for his life.

Emily leaped to the rim of the pot, about two feet from the floor, and promptly fell back down because she had nothing to hold on to. I caught her on the way back toward Bob, and I confess, tossed her into the bathroom, all while keeping an eye on Bob. I grabbed a Tupperware container, and as the first ray of sun pierced our bamboo blinds, I captured Kermie.

Outside he went, transported in plastic, back to his home in the wilds of suburban West Palm Beach. I carried him toward the lake and released him under some shrubbery. Just then, Wilbur the Muscovy duck came waddling out from the bushes, where he had apparently spent the night very well camouflaged (he’s mostly white and I didn’t see an inch of him). I greeted Wilbur and wished him a good day, and began walking back to the house.

I couldn’t turn around fast enough when I heard the shrieks of Kermie, whom Wilbur had in his mouth. And right before my eyes, I discovered that Muscovy ducks eat frogs.

On Altruism and Compassion in Economic Systems

Next year's Mind and Life Conference is called "Altruism and Compassion in Economic Systems: A Dialogue Between Economics, Neuroscience and Contemplative Sciences." Here's a quote from the homepage of the conference's site, CompassionEconomics.org:

"The ongoing global financial crisis shows clearly just how vulnerable economic systems are to human behavior, particularly to corruption and greed. This strongly suggests that other qualities, such as empathy, pro-social motivation, altruism and compassion may play an essential role in our increasingly competitive global economic system.

But can we really imagine an economic system that delivers prosperity and welfare, or is competition an unavoidable consequence of the human race? How can we, as individuals, help form a society that is both productive and resolves actual societal and environmental problems? What have the sciences to contribute - if anything at all?"

As an atheist as well as one who once considered herself a quasi-Buddhist, but found Buddhism to be not the un-religion it is touted to be, I find Mind and Life to be helpful because their dialogue has largely been about something I know to be true, yet something that many atheists scoff at: the benefits of meditation.

I don't appreciate when meditation is lumped in with New Age and "spiritual" practices and rituals and retreats with a goal of "bliss" or "enlightenment" or "total consciousness" (whatever that is). What I do appreciate, and what Mind and Life does, is when meditation is discussed in relation to actual emotional, physical and mental benefits. This has nothing to do with god or transcending spiritually; it's about calming and clearing the mind and the emotions so that you're less crazy. There . . . I said it.

As for altruism and compassion in economic systems, I'd rather see a basis in social justice. But maybe that's just semantics for the folks at CompassionEconomics and maybe that's the direction they're going.

I look forward to hearing about the findings of the conference, and what, if any, solutions the group develops to what they believe are the ills of the global economy.

Emme Loves Ami!

Finally, it arrived--a medium-size bag (4.4lb for $22.95 + shipping) of Ami vegan cat food (via Vegan Essentials). It was with some trepidation that I opened the bag and offered chunky Emily some of the animal-free tasty morsels. And to my surprise, she picked them out of her Whole Foods brand canned food loaded with animal products.

What a relief!

The only problem now is that my original plan was to use half of each food (one meal of the kibble, one of the canned) and I don't know if she'll eat the canned. Perhaps considering she won't be in a position to choose (either one or the other will be in the bowl), I won't have this problem. We'll see.

The taurine issue is supposedly resolved with Ami (not to mention Emily is female, and most problems I have read about not only didn't involve Ami, but also didn't involve female cats), but I'm still wary. If she didn't like Ami I wouldn't be writing this as I don't feed the animals in my care food they don't like. I'm not going to leave it in the bowl until "they're hungry enough to eat it."

Of course, I have to be on the lookout for any changes in Emily anyway, as she's an FIP kitty and has a bloated belly but at this point no other symptoms. And now that she's not eating as much canned food, she'll probably drink more water (either from a scotch glass or the dogs' bowls), but that's to be expected.

My only complaint so far is that Ami was backordered and I was told it would arrive in two weeks but it took a month, and concerns about availability are common when you research the product. Hopefully, with increased demand, Ami will be easier to obtain.

Feeding the system that exploits sentient nonhumans by feeding Emily sentient nonhumans has never sat well with me, though neither has feeding a carnivore a non-carnivorous diet. I know that it's the nutrients she needs, not the actual flesh, and there are other ways to get those nutrients, but I'm not 100% comfortable.

When I start seeing results/changes of some sort, I'll let you know. Perhaps I will change my mind.

On Discounts on Adoptions

Here's a Gray Matter for you (or maybe not): A humane society near me is doing a cat- and dog-adoption promotion this month. You can adopt a dog for $75 rather than $100, and if you adopt a cat for $50 you can get a second one for half the price.

With record numbers of animals being abandoned due to foreclosures and the economy, and let's face it, adopting a dog or cats isn't going to save you any money, do you think it is irresponsible to offer discounts? If someone is going to adopt because of the lower price, how on Earth are they going to be able to provide for the animal(s)?

This sounds like a short-term savings, and it is, but in the case of two cats, you've just doubled your monthly expenses. And I admit to having very expensive (care-wise) dogs, but I imagine that the average dog must cost at least $1,000/year, right?

Two questions:

1.    What do you think about discounted adoptions (or even giveaways)?

2.    If you don't mind sharing, on average, what are your "pet"-related expenses?

Does Vick Deserve a Second Chance?

Do you agree with the New York Times' William C. Rhoden in "The Case for a Second Chance for Michael Vick?" And I'm not just referring to Vick here.

Let's deconstruct the concept:

• Do you think that people who have spent their lives harming animals by eating them, just like I did and much of my family still does, deserve a second chance?
• Is fighting and killing dogs the same thing?
• Is Vick a special kind of creep for what he did?
• Is what he did like hunting?
• Like skinning a mink?
• Like clubbing a seal to death?
• Like "producing" foie gras?
• Like eating foie gras?
• Is it the dogs that are at issue? If they were pigs, would anyone care?

Do you have a personal spectrum of use and abuse or some kind of line in the sand that makes a certain use really deplorable? Do you distinguish at all among the various uses, or are they all as bad as the next in your mind?

On Surreal Lobster Advocacy

My self-appointed job in this blog is to think critically about how our human lives intersect with those of sentient nonhumans, in action and thought.

Yesterday I received an e-mail alert from the Animal Rights Foundation of Florida (ARFF) regarding "a coin operated game that uses live lobsters at the Royal Palm Ale House in Royal Palm Beach. In this game, the object is to pluck live lobsters out of the water with a joystick-controlled crane."

The e-mail continues:

"ARFF contends that lobsters suffer tremendously when they are relegated to tiny tanks and subjected to loud noises, prodding and pulling by a mechanical claw, and prolonged starvation. Supported by scientific evidence that confirms that lobsters feel pain—just as all other animals with sophisticated nervous systems do—ARFF has requested that the Royal Palm Ale House remove this atrocity from its otherwise reputable business immediately."

In the Palm Beach Post's article, "Animal rights activists appalled by Ale House's lobster game," the restaurant's owner says he has no plans to remove the game and says the patrons love the novelty.

"The restaurant doesn't offer lobster otherwise, so the game is a fun way to strive for a meal that would otherwise cost at least $15, said Jorge Cruz, 33, who has tried it a dozen times."

The final sentence of the article is: "It's no different than a lobster tank in a restaurant," said Palm Beach Ale House owner Jay Starr.

The ARFF want us to write letters to the editor of the Post.

Here's my concern: Though I think the game is disgusting and cruel, it sort of pales in comparison to what comes next for the lobsters. I don't agree that the game is "no different than a lobster tank" (at least conceptually--I haven't seen it), but "animal rights activists" should be campaigning for the cessation of the slaughter and consumption of lobsters, shouldn't they? If there is to be a demonstration on the 22nd (that's the threat), and if I am reading this correctly, those opposed to the situation are objecting to the game, and that seems a bit weak to me. If they want what's best for lobsters, they should be advocating for not killing and eating them at any restaurant (and then I guess the question becomes: why stop at lobsters). The message I hear is: tormenting animals before you brutally torture and slaughter them is wrong, but brutally torturing and slaughtering them without the preceding torment is okay.

What do you think of this campaign?