By Steve Best: Another Vegan “Victory”: Potential TEN-FOLD RISE In Beef Consumption Will Drive Indonesian Growth

[Carolyn Bailey]

Another Vegan “Victory”: Potential TEN-FOLD RISE In Beef Consumptio...

Once again, the puny gains, mendacious progress, and tendentious “victories” of vegangelicists are belied and crushed as soon as we turn from the sole US and its recent decline in meat consumption to look at the overall world picture, and what is happening in the most populated nations in the world. This recent decrease in the US has far more to do with wheat shortages. economics, temporary market fluctuations, and a shift from beef to chicken and fish than with (1) the trumpeted “successes” of vegan “outreach” (still confined to a miniscule white privileged enclave) and (2) “paradigm shifts” in “moral concern” for animals (the result, we are asked to believe, of mainstream welfarist organizations that actually reinforce speciesism and legitimate agribusiness with their collaborationist campaigns for “humane slaughter,” “cruelty-free” meat, and “cage-free” eggs).

The few non-conformists who don’t buy the slick Madison-Avenue advertising propaganda of the vegan-capitalist complex, the handful of critical thinkers and political vegans who question the religious groupthink of the global vegan movement, and who look beyond the parochial boundaries of the US to analyze the GLOBAL picture will find the same pattern in country after country.

This pattern reveals the metastasizing growth of corporate domination, neoliberal capitalism, and state-military power; the burgeoning human population (now topping 7 billion), species extinction, ecological devastation in every natural system; and expanding middle classes with rapacioius consumer appetites. These dynamics inevitably involve a HUGE SPIKE in worldwide meat production accompanied by the universalization of agribusiness. The magnitude of th eglobal animal-industrial complex completely dwarfs the relatively infinitesmal and insignificant decline in meat conswmption one now finds in the US, and at any rate could easily climb to record proportions in years to come.

Indonesia is the world’s forth most populous nation. After Brazil, it contains the world’s highest level of biodiversity, but this is not greatly imperiled, along with the thick forest cover that once carpeted 60 percent of the nation. It is, of course, is the same country burning down its dense forests and decimating its orangutans and other wildlife to havervest palm oil.

Apparently, for the powers that dominate Indonesia, setting forests aflame and bulldozing its biodiversity into oblivion is not senseless destruction or profitable enough. For on the shouldering ruins of torched rainforests and orangutan bodies they want to move in cattle as the ecological coup de grace, although most of these tortured and doomed souls will live in factory farms.

The projected TEN FOLD INCREASE in beef consumption for Indonesia’s rapidly expanding middle class is made possible with an ominous partnership with Australia to exponentially increase the supply of beef through breeder cattle. This omnicidal insanity is all couched in terms of progress and innovative “market trade” and — as if not perverse enough — Indonesian “self-sufficiency, and “food security.”

It is these type of global developments that belies vegan triumphalism and shows veganangelicistst o be among the greatest prevarications, denialists, and obstructions in the world. The incredibly reactionary nature of deliberate falsification and distortion of global reality, in order to claim the most fantastic illusory “victories,” is made clear in the classic work of Sun Tzu (544-496 BCE),  Art of War:

“To secure ourselves against defeat lies in our own hands, but the opportunity of defeating our enemy is provided by the enemy itself. If we know the enemy and know our self we need not fear the result of a hundred battles. If we know our self, but not the enemy, for every victory gained we will also suffer a defeat. If we know neither the enemy nor our self, we will succumb in every battle.”

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Stock and Land

Colin Bettles

30 Mar, 2012

INDONESIA’S moves towards greater beef self-sufficiency will be countered by opportunities linked to a potential 10-fold increase in beef consumption driven by an exploding middle class population, according to Cattle Council of Australia CEO David Inall.

 

Mr Inall was part of a high level trade delegation that visited Indonesia for two days last week headed by Trade Minister Dr Craig Emerson and Federal Agriculture Minister, Joe Ludwig, for talks with their Indonesian government and industry counterparts.

Speaking to media during the visit, Dr Emerson dismissed suggestions the trade delegation was only looking to address issues with Indonesia’s steep reductions in cattle import numbers from Australia in recent months.

Import permit numbers dropped from 745,000 head in 2009 to 520,000 in 2010 but hit 400,000 last year, in the wake of the Labor government’s snap live export suspension.

Last year’s permits were issued at an even 125,000 a quarter but this year the estimated number is 283,000 – with 60,000 issued in the first quarter and 125,000 last week, for the second stanza.

In announcing the reduced numbers late last year, it was also revealed Indonesia’s Agriculture Department had handed over responsibility for issuing the import permits, to the Trade Ministry.

Mr Inall said that made discussions with Indonesia’s Trade Minister Gita Wirjawan – who he praised and compared to US President Barack Obama in terms of his articulate and charismatic nature – more important, on last week’s visit.

He said the 125,000 permit number announced last week, meant more than half the projected import numbers had been announced for 2012 – but the outlook for the rest of the year remains relatively positive.

“We just have to take each quarter as it comes and work on the expectation of 283,000 head for the year,” he said.

“The Indonesians are feeling comfortable with the fact they can change those volumes each quarter but there are certainly positive signs around.

“We’re not sure what the numbers will be for the final two quarters but Ramadan is coming up in four months time so unsurprisingly the Indonesians will want healthy feeder cattle numbers leading up to that period.”

Dr Emerson praised Gita Wirjawan’s “aspiration” to increase Indonesian beef consumption from two kilos to 20 kilos.

He said that represented a 10-fold increase in the industry, “which is almost beyond the imagination of both Indonesia and Australia”.

“We’re really here to talk about those dimensions and how to open up those opportunities and to work with our friends in Indonesia on capacity-building and to create this sense that this is a big, rapidly expanding market,” he said.

“And…as important as next quarter’s quota is, we really want to develop those sorts of understandings and chart a course so that we can be in a position to meet those increases in demand.”

Mr Inall said he asked the Indonesian Trade Minister what his country wanted from Australia and where the trade relationship was heading, with beef and cattle.

He said the Minister’s response was that breeding cattle will be the “game changer” for Indonesia, while adding that feeder cattle imported from Australia, had previously been seen as relatively unlimited.

Mr Inall said it was “very clear” that the relationship between Australia and Indonesia as now going to change and “as the customer we have to understand that”.

However, he said his view was one off a strong future that existed for a blend of breeder and feeder cattle supplies, along with boxed beef.

But breeding cattle will play an increasing role and importance in the trade relationship, he said.

“Exactly how that transpires in terms of Indonesian government policies is yet to be played out,” he said.

“But we need to be at the table having the discussion with the Indonesians which is what we have now.

“We made some excellent contacts on this trip – developed some new ones and reaffirmed old ones.

“For the Australian cattle industry to be standing along side senior government ministers like Dr Emerson and Senator Ludwig really delivered a message to the Indonesians that we are committed to doing business with them.”

Mr Inall said it may be a shock but not a surprise for the Australian cattle industry to hear about Indonesia’s plans to decrease its feeder cattle import numbers and increase breeder cattle.

He said Indonesia has had a long-standing ambition and policies around breeding cattle while moving towards greater beef self-sufficiency.

Mr Inall said the combined trade relationship around feeder and breeder cattle had been around for a long time, despite recent changes.

But recent moves like adopting 350kgs weight limits and lowering projected import permit numbers meant the Indonesians were now making “very clear” communications about the priorities of their self-sufficiency drive.

“We understand they have an ambition around beef self-sufficiency to increase their food security ambitions and meet these targets,” he said.

“But I still believe there’s a future around feeder cattle exports to Indonesia from Australia in a food security context [!], for that country, while building a stronger relationship in breeder cattle.”

Mr Inall said the Indonesian government understood a key constraint around higher breeding cattle volumes was the lack of availability in large tracts of land, to breed, feed and run the cattle numbers required, to feed 240 million people; especially if beef consumption increases 10-fold.

“The most important thing for Australia is that we are at the table having this debate with Indonesia and involved in important trade discussions like this,” he said.

Mr Inall said Dr Emerson and Senator Ludwig acquitted themselves well during trade discussions last week, making positive moves on behalf of Australian cattle producers and the industry.

He said in each meeting, he saw no residual hang-ups from the past 12-months, with any ongoing tensions over the snap trade suspension, seemingly dissolved.

“It was all very, very positive and I can’t stress that enough,” he said.

“There’s no doubt Indonesia presents a great trade opportunity for Australia and vice versa and they are looking to work with Australia to deliver quality cattle as their near northern neighbour.

“As always, there was a lot of mention, in discussions everywhere we went, about the high quality of our cattle, which is still a big priority in our relationship with Indonesia.

“We are neighbours; hence we’re not going anywhere and neither are they.

“They understand we need a strong relationship around cattle trade and that our producers need to be viable and require stable market signals to run their businesses efficiently.

“They are certainly saying the right things – I’ve been to Indonesia many times working on cattle issues in the past 10 years and this was one of the best visits I’ve had and the most constructive.”

Mr Inall said the Indonesians had expressed a high degree of support and clarity around the new closed loop, supply chain regulations implemented by the Australian government after last year’s trade suspension, to make animal welfare a priority, particularly at the point of slaughter.

He said there was a positive response to, and management of, the recent batch of video footage obtained in Indonesian abattoirs of alleged animal cruelty, that’s currently under investigation by the Federal Agriculture Department to identify if any breaches occurred within the new supply chain system.

The video footage was discussed informally on last week’s trip, he said, with praise given for how both countries handled the issue, showing the new system was working and helping to safeguard animal welfare.

Overall, Mr Inall said the relationship with Indonesia was “not strained and has only strengthened”.

“They understand our concerns over the reduced import permits numbers but Indonesia is an important customer of ours and they are at an important growth phase in their future,” he said.

“If we’re constructive and work with them there will be opportunities ahead which is better than making demands to increase permit numbers; that’s not the way we do business.”

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Further Resources

Indonesian demand for beef high

COLIN BETTLES

31 Mar, 2012

NATIONAL Farmers Federation President Jock Laurie says Indonesia – with its bustling and developing population of 240 million people – is expected to maintain high demand for Australian agricultural exports in years ahead, especially the nation’s expanding hunger for beef-fed protein. …

He acknowledged there had been ongoing concerns – and more rebuilding was required – following the Australian government’s abrupt suspension of the live cattle trade to Indonesia last June.

But the two countries are now looking to work together constructively to explore future trade opportunities and bolster potential market capacity, he said. …

Mr Laurie said the trade mission proved to be a successful relationship building exercise between the two neighbouring countries.

“There is enormous untapped potential,” he said.

“Indonesia is a large part of the Asian success story.

“Its economy has grown at 5 percent per annum for a decade.

“And if Indonesia continues to grow at the rate used in the IMF’s latest five-year forecast, its economy will roughly double in size over the next decade.

“This means that from half the size of Australia’s economy just three years ago, Indonesia’s economy will match Australia’s by around 2025.

“By 2030, Indonesia could very well have a place in the Top 10 economies in the world.

“If you are contemplating investing in Indonesia, you are making the right decision.

“It is a giant of an economy, with the fourth-largest population on earth.

“Australia’s nearest neighbour; right here on our doorstep.

“And how exciting is that for our two countries, the two biggest economies in the Southeast Asian region?

“Australia has no better friend or partner in the Asian region than Indonesia.

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Indonesian beef gift an act of ‘contempt’

COLIN BETTLES

30 Mar, 2012

SHADOW Federal Agriculture Minister John Cobb says the Gillard government’s gift of $20 million to improve beef production in Indonesia goes against the interests of Australian cattle producers and treats the nation’s farmers with “utter contempt”.

The $20 million was announced while senior government ministers visited Jakarta last week for critical trade talks around Indonesia’s moves to import more breeder cattle and less feeder cattle numbers, amid a drive towards greater beef self-sufficiency.

Mr Cobb said with Australia’s northern cattle producers reeling from the social, economic, environmental and animal welfare crisis cause by Labor’s knee-jerk over-reaction in banning live cattle exports to Indonesia last June, the $20m announcement “comes as a kick in the guts while they are on their knees”.

“That $20 million could be going to help our cattle producers; instead this mob is sending big dollars to Jakarta to bolster Indonesia’s domestic beef production to the detriment of our exporters,” he said. ….

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Beef on the rise into Asia

BY BRAD COOPER

28 Mar, 2012

RABOBANK’S head of food and agribusiness research in Asia will tell Northern Territory cattlemen this week that the live export trade has a long and secure future in Indonesia despite the challenges of the last 12 months.

Singapore based John Baker was in Brisbane on Tuesday ahead of his appearance at the Northern Territory Cattlemen’s Association annual conference in Darwin on Friday, where he will feature as the keynote speaker.

Acknowledging in an exclusive with Fairfax Agricultural Media the difficulties northern beef producers have faced in recent times, Mr Baker said the industry deserved to hear a message that was upbeat.

“When you look at Australia’s competitive standing in the world from a cost standpoint, we do extremely well globally as one of the lowest cost producers into Asia. Northern Australia has a lot to be proud of and they do it well,” he said.

“We’re right on the doorstep of Indonesia, they know we are a cost competitive and reliable supplier and that we are a logical trading partner. From the people I talk to it is a sustainable trade and it will endure.” …..

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Rising Indonesia beef market must remain open

Peter Alford, Jakarta correspondent, The Australian

June 14, 2011

INDIAN buffaloes are one reason why the Australian cattle industry should fear its biggest offshore market will not fully recover after the Gillard government lifts its ban on live exports to Indonesia. Although India is little-recognised as a beef producer outside the trade, partly because of its Hindu majority’s aversion to eating cows, its buffalo meat exports are a large and growing cheap supply of meat for South-East Asia. …….

[Tim Gier]

Hi Roger,

I live in North America and I don't think that North America is the center of the universe. To think that would be silly. Everyone knows that it is the United States of America that is the center of the universe!! (Canada? Are you kidding?)  ;-)

Anyway, I believe that Best is correct, even if I agree with you somewhat about his writing style (I actually quite like the way Steve writes, but I like the way most people who write in the Continental philosophy sort of way write). 

In my view, the vegan movement, while for the most part being earnest, having the best intentions and therefore being not without real value, it will never bring about the sort of change that functions as its goal. The world doesn't change because people change their moral views, people change their moral views only after the world has changed.  

For example, I believe that it is the case that insofar as we can speak meaningfully about human slavery ending in the Atlantic region in the 1800's, whatever change came about, it came about as a result of the convergence of social, political and economic pressures growing out of and in response to the industrial revolution and the expansion of capitalism. While it is certainly true that moral arguments about and the social movement for the abolition of slavery had some role to play in that history, I believe that neither the moral argument nor the social movement was necessary or sufficient to bring about a change in the conditions of human slavery.

Unfortunately, I also don't, as of now, see what kinds of changes will come about in the world that will force most people to re-orient themselves with respect to other animals.

If I am right about all this, then it appears to be self-evident that since, by themselves, moral arguments and social movements for the emancipation of human beings have been ineffective, then moral arguments and social movements for the emancipation of other animals are bound to be ineffective as well. 

[Tim Gier]

Hi Roger,

I take it that Steve is trying to show us that "the movement" is off track. A sociologist I read earlier this year (I don't remember his name at the moment) noted that, when one observes quite clearly that another is using the wrong map to guide their journey, one need not have the correct map ready to hand in order to be justified in pointing out to another that their map is wrong. I'd say more than that, and that is that if one knows that another is using the wrong map then one is obliged to point out that fact, regardless of whether one has a better map or not. I think we really have no other choice. I realize that many people might think that's incorrect, after all, doing something is often thought to be better than doing nothing, and even with the wrong map people are still going somewhere. But I believe that that's not true. Sometimes, when one is headed down the wrong road, the best course of action is to stop the car. None of this is to say that Steve Best hasn't got a solution, but only that it makes sense for him to be asking us to think about the map we're using, whether he has a better map or not. I do think he is offering a solution though, and it's connected to who his targets are.

Whether his piece has something to do with Francione, I don't know, but, myself, as someone who is often thought only to be responding or reacting to Francione, I suppose that it just comes with the territory. The "Abolitionist Approach" is so appealing because it is ultimately so vacuous and in that, it seems to be all things to so many people. Therefore, it seems like any statement opposed to "vegangelicals" is opposed to Francione, and maybe there's some truth in that, but I suspect that Francione isn't in the front of Steve Best's mind. Who are his targets then? I guess it is the people who think that they are actually accomplishing something significant by eating vegan "burgers" instead of eating the ones that are made from the bodies of dead cows. I mean, it's just a fact that, given the number of vegans in the world, and given the increasing size of the global market, being vegan does absolutely nothing to reduce or eliminate the use and killing of other animals. Any vegan who thinks that it does probably also thinks that they are acting towards a solution, but they aren't, not in an actual material way. (Ugly truths are still true.) So, I take it that Best is trying to shake these "vegan-by-non-consumption" vegans by their shoulders, to wake them up to the fact that, while it's not bad that they are vegan, and that in some sense it is, of course, better that they are, unless and until we create new (or exploit existing) conditions on the ground that compel the rest of the world to change, the carnage will go on unabated.

I don't know for sure, but I would guess that Steve thinks that ARZone is performing a vital service within our movement, in that ARZone encourages exactly the kind of critical thinking and global perspective that he things the movement is sorely lacking. ARZone's Vegan Buddies initiative isn't any part of any problem as far as I can tell. Whatever else we know, supporting people who become vegan isn't a bad thing, especially if we can do it in a way that helps them connect their personal beliefs with political action. It may be that the conditions that make eating and otherwise consuming other animals are already such that we ought to be forced by them to change our ways. I was reading yesterday about what happens when a population exceeds the carrying capacity of its environment. When the carrying capacity has been artificially inflated (like when a farmer overtaxes his land with chemical fertilizers), it is often the case that most people don't realize that that capacity has been overreached until after the system collapses. Maybe our global system is so overtaxed? If our Vegan Buddies initiative can help people realize the scope of this global problem, and then help them teach others about it too, what could be wrong with that? 

I guess that is what Steve's solution is, and that is, for us, as vegans, to wake up to the size and scope of the actual problem, as it is interconnected with global economic expansion and the accompanying exploitation of natural resources, human beings and nonhuman beings the world over. His solution, I take it, is that we can't fix this problem with vegan potlucks and vegan tabling, but that we must organize, get active, and demonstrate as if the life of the planet depended on it. As long as people keep being lulled into complacency by the vegan narcotic "The world is vegan if you want it", then they will see no need to start taking action. But all that conscious beings are is action. We ought to remember that before it's too late.

(Is that really Steve Best's solution? I don't know, I read the same things you do. If it is his solution, is it a good and workable one? I don't know that either, but if he's right that so far we've been using the wrong map, then for goodness sake we ought to at least pull over to the curb and think about where we're headed.)

[Carolyn Bailey]

Roger, thanks for noting that some forms of direct action are forms of vegan education. I too have always thought that to be the case. Vegan education is anything that educates about veganism, be it an open rescue, a street protest, an ALF action, or passing out leaflets.

[Tim Gier]

Hi Roger,

There has been a sustained, passionate and sometimes violent debate ongoing in the United States for more that 50 years over the legal and moral status on human fetuses and the rights of women. The country appears to be no more united on the issue today than it was before the US Supreme Court ruled on some of the core issues almost 40 years ago. We are as polarized as ever and it seems that the best we are able to do is live with some uneasy tension where the majority of people hold a position that is inconsistent and almost impossible to articulate. The conversation about this topic has about as high a profile in the public and political discourse as there can be in this country; no person seeking high office can even mount a successful campaign without a carefully formulated stance on it, without responding to the powerful special interest groups on all sides.

We can't, in this country, agree on what is the moral status of human fetuses or on what are the rights of women, and it isn't for lack of advocacy, education, and outreach. Why then anyone should expect that we will ever achieve, through advocacy, education, and outreach, a general consensus on the moral status and rights of other animals is no longer within my ability to comprehend.

[Tim Gier]

Hi Roger, 

I know that my view appears to be bleak, but as I see it, we can't make progress when we haven't really identified the challenges. Of course, I could be wrong - either partially, mostly or completely - so I could appreciate that others would want to continue what they think is best, even though I might think their efforts not as productive as what other efforts might be.

What you say about how an understanding of "the animal question" would help us to better understand other aspects of our moral thinking would probably be true for most people, I believe. However, the problem is how to get people to take seriously "the animal question" in the first place. That's the part that I think of as a practical impossibility without a prior change in the conditions on the ground. 

I would hope that, if other committed activists, advocates, thinkers, writers and theorists agree with the general position that I have come to accept, then lots of people can begin to work on the "now what" part of the solution. I believe that there are many people who have understood for a while what I have just recently come to accept, so I will be seeking them out in order to try to learn from them. Perhaps you and all the other good people on ARZone can come up with some ideas about how we can change things such that most people find the use and consumption of other animals too costly and too inconvenient to sustain? Even if I am wrong, and such things would only be some part of another, larger solution, it seems as though such things would be worthwhile in any case.

[Carolyn Bailey]

I thought this was an important essay because I believe that it's important for advocates to understand that veganism isn't becoming more widespread simply because we want it to. 

I think Dr. Best makes some important points, particularly about China and India, and I believe that, as was said in an ARZone podcast, it's important to understand what the real problem is. Until we do that, it seems unlikely we'd be able to work toward resolving it. 

I think, also, this work, from Dr. Best, might be useful in understanding his overall position. Following are four different places where he clarifies his theory, politics, tactics and solutions. 

I'd like to be clear that I don't necessarily support these tactics and solutions, but I think it's helpful to understand what Dr. Best is advocating for. 

“Rethinking Revolution: Animal Liberation, Human Liberation, and the Future of the Left,” The International Journal of Inclusive Democracy, Volume 2, Issue #3, June 2006 (http://www.inclusivedemocracy.org/journal/vol2/vol2_no3_Best_rethin...).

 

“The Killing Fields of South Africa: Eco Wars, Species Apartheid, and Total Liberation,” Fast Capitalism, Issue 2, Volume 2, 2007

(http://www.uta.edu/huma/agger/fastcapitalism/2_2/home.html).

 

Manifesto for Radical Abolitionism: Total Liberation By Any Means Necessary

http://www.animalliberationfront.com/ALFront/Manifesto-TotalLib.htm

 

“!3 Ways to Promote Alliance Politics and Total Liberation”

http://carmen4thepets.wordpress.com/13-ways-to-promote-alliance-pol...

[Billy L]

“!3 Ways to Promote Alliance Politics and Total Liberation”
http://carmen4thepets.wordpress.com/13-ways-to-promote-alliance-pol...


We established that this insular, complacent, and pretentious lifestyle narcissism exacerbates the isolation of veganism and animal rights from other movements.  It reinforces the dominant image of a movement of privileged white liberals indifferent to the social, political, and economic realities that devastate and destroy billions of people throughout the world.

Who are *these* folks then (aside from Dr. Best)?

    •    The total liberation resource page on either Thomas Paine’s Corner (TPC)[4] or Negotiation is Over (NIO)[5] blogs
    •    Explore total liberation sites such as The Vegan Ideal,[6] Humans, Earth, and Animals Living Together Harmoniously (HEALTH),[7] Superweed,[8]and the Canadian Animal Liberation Movement (CALM)[9]
    •    Terrorists or Freedom Fighters? Reflections on the Liberation of Animals (edited by Steven Best  and Anthony J. Nocella II)
    •    Igniting a Revolution: Voices in Defense of The Earth(edited by Steven Best and Anthony J. Nocella II)[10]
    •    An Unnatural Order: Why We Are Destroying The Planet and Each Other (by Jim Mason)
    •    The Dreaded Comparison:  Human and Animal Slavery (by Marjorie Spiegel)
    •    Eternal Treblinka: Our Treatment of Animals and the Holocaust (by Charles Patterson)
    •    A Tale of Two Holocausts (by Karen Davis )
    •    Animal Rights/Human Rights: Entanglements of Oppression and Liberation (by David Nibert)

Where are:

• http://animalrightsafrica.org
• http://animalrightsindia.blogspot.com/
• http://sistahvegan.wordpress.com/
• http://vegansofcolor.wordpress.com/
• http://www.animalsasia.org/
• etc. etc.

and why are their voices not heard in this piece?

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Move beyond trendy cafes, upscale malls, and uptown and suburban comfort zones, into areas completely neglected by the vegan and animal rights communities. Veganism needs to be demystified and made accessible to the entire socio-economic spectrum, not just the white privileged elite. It must be repackaged as a cost-effective diet, as well as the healthiest, most ethical, and best path toward ecological regeneration and sustainability. It’s time to engage the other 99% of the population that our communities have blatantly ignored. Teach, but don’t preach; talk, but listen; instruct, and be instructed; support, and you just might be supported in turn. The process of learning about and sensitizing oneself to other causes, histories, cultures, identities, and experiences with oppression not only is instrumental to alliance formation, it expands one’s intellectual and moral horizons. The hard work of alliance politics can then be seen as a process of growth and fulfillment rather than a monumental obstacle or burdensome task.

I noticed Dr. Best said the same thing at a vegan brunch (was it in Germany?), hardly an economically marginalized community (at least it didn't look similar to the one I live in) http://bit.ly/HreT6u.

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Organize a vegan food drive for the poor and underprivileged in your community. Or, feed people at the homeless shelter or hangout with large batches of vegan chili, cornbread, and ice tea. Send press releases about the event to local media and highlight the connections between poverty and class, various oppressions and speciesism, and the homelessness of human and nonhuman animals alike. 

Show the world that the dominant image of vegans and animal rights advocates as misanthropes unconcerned with human tragedy is untrue always true and never consistent with our principles and ethics. [?]

Demonstrate by example and concrete actions that our social and ethical framework addresses human and nonhuman exploitation alike, and that alliance politics and bridge-building are vital tools for the liberation of one and all.[12]

http://www.foodnotbombs.net/menu.html

==============================================

Moving from the local to the global, research, publish, and educate on the profound changes unfolding in China and India, two crucial flashpoints of change. Indicative of their bourgeois mindset and complete withdrawal from ongoing global crisis for cookie baking in the kitchen, vegan abolitionists utterly fail to discuss the monumental social transformations in China and India (as the world’s most populous nations shift to a consumer and carnivorous society) and the biological and ecological breakdown of  mass extinction and global climate change. Initiate the most urgent form of “vegan outreach” yet by locating and working with vegan groups in these countries.

So are we supposed to make food, like the last point suggested? As long as we don't bake cookies I take it. Wouldn't want to be thought of as "blasé bourgeois pacifists" now would we? It would take more time than it's worth to showcase even a handful of the examples of discussion on ARZone (.net and facebook) about "biological and ecological breakdown of mass extinction and global climate change".

=========================================================

(3) dialogue and learn from one another;

Like this perhaps?

We accurately identified this moribund manifestation as a bourgeois, elitist, single-issue, consumerist, apolitical,pseudo-abolitionism going nowhere fast.

[Billy L]

It's interesting how things seem to connect, I just stumbled across this:

Public Class - Overcoming Racism: A Radical Approach

Is racial conflict inevitable in a multi-racial society? Or is it the product of social and economic conditions -- past and present -- that can be understood and changed?

This two-part class will utilize works by writers of color, feminists and radicals to explore these questions and the vanguard role of people of color in social justice movements, including the challenges and rewards of organizing across color lines.

http://www.socialism.com/drupal-6.8/?q=node/24#mar13event

This is the type of alliance that Best seems to call for.

As a bleeding-heart bourgeois pacifist cookie-baking sissy, it seems to me that efforts to connect with radical organizers such as this would be more productive than the scattered sabotage actions Best promotes, or at least would be a better use of the majority of one's time. Roger's comment on his experience is not encouraging, but not many things in regard to animal rights seem to be. Alliance politics and all-inclusive grassroots organizing of apolitical working-class folks is a developing curiosity I hope to be able to explore more in the near future.

Roger Yates said:

Hi Carolyn,

I doubt that anyone believes that we just have to wait for there to be a vegan world, just because "we want it."

I agree with Best's analysis - and always have, to a great degree - I just wish he could write in an accessible way and not in a way that alienates. If Lynne Yates, in ARZone podcast 22 - http://arzonepodcasts.blogspot.com/2011/11/arzone-podcast-22-vegan-... is right about the average reading ages, then most of what Best writes will not be understood by most human beings on the planet!

From the links you have provided, it appears that Best expects "alliance politics" to emerge between animal advocates and "Left groups" - and so there is the immediate problem he speaks of, namely that most people in animal advocacy are white and are middle class (just like Best himself, as Billy points out).

This "problem" has been known and written about before Best was really active in the animal movement, and the same question is begged: what are we to do about it.

For example, in 1996, Ted Benton wrote in the Jan/Feb edition of the New Left Review about animal rights and The Left. His article is entitled, The Politics of Animal Rights - Where is The Left? - http://www.newleftreview.org/?view=1834 He talks about how The Left are "dismissive" of animal rights.

Similarly, in the March 14th, 1996 Animal Rights Commentary from the Rutgers Animal Rights Law Centre, Gary Francione[1] writes about "Animal Rights and The Left." Francione says that a "prominent left-wing commentator" tells him that there are "too many  human problems" for him to be concerned about other animals.

This is pretty standard stuff. In the 1980s, I spoke to a few political party meetings in Liverpool, England. The Left groups were the most difficult - they were opposed to hunting and other forms of animal use that they thought they could make class-based claims about, but they thought "meat" was an essential food for the working class. They all expressed the view that "animal issues" should wait until human issues were resolved.

So Best is not saying anything new - or wanting anything new. Animal advocates in my experience have always tried to make contact and alliances with others "on the Left." Of course, there is also an important distinction to be drawn between the movement's grassroots and its mainstream careerist organisations.

I feel that if Best want to make progress on this, he needs to write in a clear fashion and spell out exactly who he is talking about in these vague concepts he sprays about. As I said in my comments to Tim, I'm not sure of Best sees ARZone as part of the problem or part of the solution.

[1] Of note to movement historians and students of social movement claims-making is the fact that Francione, in 1996, is still referring to himself as a vegetarian and there is no mention of dairy consumption in his article, just a focus on "meat eating." Francione writes, "I am still very much a vegetarian. I believe that animals, like humans, have at least the right not to be treated as property and that there is absolutely no moral justification for eating animals."  

Carolyn Bailey said:

I thought this was an important essay because I believe that it's important for advocates to understand that veganism isn't becoming more widespread simply because we want it to. 

I think Dr. Best makes some important points, particularly about China and India, and I believe that, as was said in an ARZone podcast, it's important to understand what the real problem is. Until we do that, it seems unlikely we'd be able to work toward resolving it. 

I think, also, this work, from Dr. Best, might be useful in understanding his overall position. Following are four different places where he clarifies his theory, politics, tactics and solutions. 

I'd like to be clear that I don't necessarily support these tactics and solutions, but I think it's helpful to understand what Dr. Best is advocating for. 

“Rethinking Revolution: Animal Liberation, Human Liberation, and the Future of the Left,” The International Journal of Inclusive Democracy, Volume 2, Issue #3, June 2006 (http://www.inclusivedemocracy.org/journal/vol2/vol2_no3_Best_rethin...).

 

“The Killing Fields of South Africa: Eco Wars, Species Apartheid, and Total Liberation,” Fast Capitalism, Issue 2, Volume 2, 2007

(http://www.uta.edu/huma/agger/fastcapitalism/2_2/home.html).

 

Manifesto for Radical Abolitionism: Total Liberation By Any Means Necessary

http://www.animalliberationfront.com/ALFront/Manifesto-TotalLib.htm

 

“!3 Ways to Promote Alliance Politics and Total Liberation”

http://carmen4thepets.wordpress.com/13-ways-to-promote-alliance-pol...