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PETA’s letter to Ben and Jerry

September 27, 2008 | Leave a Comment

I’ve accentuated the important parts of the letter here:

September 23, 2008

Ben Cohen and Jerry Greenfield, Cofounders
Ben & Jerry’s Homemade Inc.

Dear Mr. Cohen and Mr. Greenfield,

On behalf of PETA and our more than 2 million members and supporters, I’d like to bring your attention to an innovative new idea from Switzerland that would bring a unique twist to Ben and Jerry’s. Storchen restaurant is set to unveil a menu that includes soups, stews, and sauces made with at least 75 percent breast milk procured from human donors who are paid in exchange for their milk. If Ben and Jerry’s replaced the cow’s milk in its ice cream with breast milk, your customers–and cows–would reap the benefits.

Using cow’s milk for your ice cream is a hazard to your customer’s health. Dairy products have been linked to juvenile diabetes, allergies, constipation, obesity, and prostate and ovarian cancer. The late Dr. Benjamin Spock, America’s leading authority on child care, spoke out against feeding cow’s milk to children, saying it may play a role in anemia, allergies, and juvenile diabetes and in the long term, will set kids up for obesity and heart disease–America’s number one cause of death.

Animals will also benefit from the switch to breast milk.

Like all mammals, cows only produce milk during and after pregnancy, so to be able to constantly milk them, cows are forcefully impregnated every nine months. After several years of living in filthy conditions and being forced to produce 10 times more milk than they would naturally, their exhausted bodies are turned into hamburgers or ground up for soup.

And of course, the veal industry could not survive without the dairy industry. Because male calves can’t produce milk, dairy farmers take them from their mothers immediately after birth and sell them to veal farms, where they endure 14 to17 weeks of torment chained inside a crate so small that they can’t even turn around.

The breast is best! Won’t you give cows and their babies a break and our health a boost by switching from cow’s milk to breast milk in Ben and Jerry’s ice cream? Thank you for your consideration.

Sincerely,

Tracy Reiman
Executive Vice President
PETA

And thus you see, the human breastmilk was just a hook. They weren’t being serious. No one was honestly suggesting that B&J’s should hook women up to pumps and use their milk to make ice cream. Get real.

Oh, and PETA wasn’t hurting any women by discussing breastmilk’s nutritional value to human babies. Hello? Remember all those babies in China who DIED because they got cow’s milk instead of breastmilk?

Everyone who missed the point of PETA’s letter and who accused PETA of being sexist for discussing human breastmilk was being intellectually dishonest, anti-animal, and anti-PETA.

Guide To Analyzing PETA’s Nude Activism

September 2, 2008 | 2 Comments

In order to help some theorists better defend their positions, I’ve created this handy-dandy guide for discussing the use of nude or nearly nude demonstrations and campaigns within the animal rights movement:

Clearly define your terms.

Suggested terms to defined: pornography, commodification, objectification, sexual objectification, sexism. You cannot assume that just because you look at an image and think it represents pornography that others will share your perspective. Even if/when you show them the image they may not agree with you.

For example, Nathan says PETA has a “willingness to reinforce sexist attitudes by embracing the strategic objectification of human females” and he links to these images as proof: Amanda Beard, Jenna Jameson, Eva Mendes. However, in my definition of ‘objectification’ these images are not good examples and in fact prove the opposite of Nathan’s claim. Objectification means reducing someone to an object, dehumanizing that person. Classic examples include: 1) pornographic images of women with their heads missing and 2) the routine use of the military to identify boot camp trainees by number rather than name. A key component is often a loss of identity. Objectification is when people are treated as interchangeable, disposable, replaceable objects. But the examples Nathan chose did not in anyway dehumanize the models. Because these were celebrities, their names and identities were a vital part of the campaigns.* Because Nathan didn’t clearly define his terms, his examples supported the opposite of his claim.

Remember your gender.

If you’re a man, you simply haven’t experienced sexism in the same way as women have. You cannot claim to completely understand it. Do not ignore your gender and act as if it doesn’t matter - it does. You can’t ignore your power and influence. You must acknowledge your privilege. If you’re a woman, remember that other women have different experiences based on their race, class, age, appearance, religion and so forth. We’re not all the same, so even though you have a better understanding of sexism because you’ve experienced it, you probably haven’t experienced the same kinds of sexism as other women have. When we analyze images, we should acknowledge our baggage and our privilege as well as the ways in which we might misinterpret the images.

Intent matters.

When we view something, our reaction is only a piece of the puzzle. If you see something and automatically identify that as pornography that might say more about you and how you view the world than about the person who created the image. Just because something turns you on (or off) doesn’t mean it was meant to be sexual. Often, the intent of nude or nearly nude activism is to get attention, because nudity is uncommon. Do not conflate nudity with sexuality. If you make the case that something resembles pornography, you MUST explain why.

Don’t take short-cuts.

You can’t assume your reader agrees with your position. You can’t assume your reader has your background, your experiences, or your understandings. You must carefully make your case, without leaping from one concept to the next.

For example, Gary claims, “For many years, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals has promoted sexist campaigns. This started with their ‘I’d rather go naked than wear fur’ campaign in the early 1990s and has ‘progressed’ through a series of increasing cheap and puerile promotions, culminating in its most recent PETA’s State of the Union Undress,” But he hasn’t clearly explained how nudity relates to sexism. “I’d rather go naked than wear fur” is simply a true statement for many people and not at all sexist. The State of the Union Undress is a strip-tease and, depending on your view, is either an example of free-speech or pornography (or both**). His argument, in its current state, appeals more to prudes than to feminists.

Moreover, do your research. If you claim, “Consider that they don’t use images of male nudes, nor do they use images of women with varying body sizes,” then how do you explain the men here? Your analysis needs to be a) accurate and b) reflect the other parties involved. In this case, there’s another party that’s partially responsible for this perceived sexism: the mainstream media is responsible for NOT showcasing the times when PETA uses men and women of varying body sizes.

Take care not to be hypocritical.

If you think objectification is wrong, don’t treat women as objects. That means, use their names when possible. Quote them, link to them, support them. DO NOT post images of them and then criticize them without even taking into account what they say their intent was. Don’t assume anything about the entire group of women who go nude for animals. Even if you think some have been pressured or coerced (either overtly or through internalized sexism) you simply cannot assume they’re all victims. Likewise, just because some women defend their actions and claim it was a free choice doesn’t mean all women who participated made a free choice. It’s critically important to recognize women’s autonomy, individuality, and agency. And it’s critically important to listen to them.

Make specific recommendations for change.

Always conclude with a specific call to action. Don’t merely criticize without offering alternatives; suggest ways PETA can do better. Even if you can’t think of specific actions or goals, suggest an open discourse on the issue so that other people can participate and create change. (FYI disabling comments is not a good way to do that. If you disable comments, point readers to a place where they can discuss the issue all together.)

This is just a beginning. I’m sure if someone wanted me to write a book on this topic I could. :)

— Notes —

* One could argue that the entire notion of ‘celebrity’ is dehumanizing and commodifying, certainly celebrity through pornography, as in the case of Jenna Jameson. But that’s not what Nathan’s done here. That’s not the approach he or others have taken when criticizing PETA’s use of nude or nearly nude people for animal rights campaigns.

** In my opinion, ‘pornography’ is differentiated from ‘erotica’ and from ’sexualized or nude political speech’ by two distinguishing characteristics: 1) the only intent of porn is to sexually arouse and stimulate, 2) porn is a product that can be bought, sold, traded, that is, porn is a commodity. Erotica also intends to stimulate and is also often a commodity, but isn’t necessarily a commodity. Erotica is more closely related to art than to pornography. Nude political speech is not necessarily sexualized or pornographic. And both ‘nude political speech’ and ’sexualized political speech’ differ from pornography because the intent is to express a political idea, not to sell a product. There is a big difference between selling a DVD and “selling” an idea.

Full Frontal Factory Farming

May 18, 2008 | Leave a Comment

Shown above: women in yellow bikinis in cages during a PETA protest against battery cages for egg-laying hens.

Shown above: egg-laying hens in battery cages. (source: Compassion Over Killing)

Vanessa at Feministing has stooped to a new low in her constant criticism of PETA:

Should we be surprised this is the work of PETA? It just never ends. And you have to love their press release on the “demonstration”:

She put quotes around the word demonstration because she doesn’t think it is truly a demonstration. She thinks it’s a sexist stunt and only a sexist stunt, nothing more. She trivializes the activists by refusing to acknowledge their political speech as speech. She thinks animal rights is just a joke, not something we should seriously consider, so when women get inside cages to protest battery hen cages for egg production, Vanessa won’t call that political activism. And she certainly won’t admit the personal agency of the women involved.

No wonder all she can see is sexism. She truly can’t see the actual message at all. She’s so blinded by her own judgments that she can’t form a serious analysis. Feministing criticism of PETA is too shallow. It winds up silencing women’s voices and ignoring their political and social activism.

Ironically, this shallowness is the best reason that PETA should re-evaluate this type of activism. The sad fact is that most people are too shallow. They don’t ‘get it.’ They can’t see the forest through the trees and they can’t understand animal rights when they’re blinded by perceived misogyny or sexiness. (Granted, many people simply refuse to see the truth no matter how you present it to them. They’ll justify their exploitation of animals through any means possible.) The few people who are open to a paradigm shift and are receptive to animal advocacy deserve a clear message without any distraction. Sexualization distracts and confuses so maybe it shouldn’t be used.

However, it sure does work to drum up publicity. Feministing, for example, can’t stop writing about it. In fact, the only time they ever write about animal rights issues are when they’re criticizing animal rights advocates. It’s obvious these campaigns work to get attention and that’s exactly why PETA keeps doing them.

Let’s get a few things straight here:

1. Objectification is the act of treating someone as an object. That is, objectification is refusing to acknowledge the individuality, the personality, the sentience of another. Example of objectification: “interchangeable bleached blondes with fake tits“.
2. There are lots of different kinds of objectification - it’s not only about sexual objectification. Sexual objectification is treating someone as a sexual object, not as an individual. But sexualizing something is not necessarily objectifying it. They are different. Example of non-sexual objectification: the way all factory farmed animals are treated.
3. Sexualization is turning something that’s not sexual into something that is sexual. It’s making something sexy. There are lots of ways to make something sexy and some are better than others. Making something sexy doesn’t necessarily demean, trivialize, objectify, dehumanize, or otherwise harm women. It all depends on the context. Examples of sexualization: “My Bush Would Make A Better President”, “Will Give Blow Job For Impeachment.”
4. Consent is damn important. Agency is damn important. Personal, bodily autonomy is damn important. When women express their autonomy and freely choose to advocate for animals by doing whatever they want with their own bodies, their choices ought to be respected.
5. Context is important. When pornographers show naked women in cages the meaning is different than when PETA shows naked women in cages. PETA’s message that cages are inhumane and wrong is damn important here and contextualizes the images to say something along the lines of, “no non-consenting, sentient being belongs in a cage.”

I have a suggestion for Vanessa and anyone else who dislikes nearly nude women in cages type of activism: Next time you’re tempted to write about this, don’t. Instead of posting the PETA image and committing the same offense you criticize PETA for doing - using women’s bodies to promote a political agenda - use an image of the animal that the women are representing instead. Show PETA that you don’t need sexualized images of women to inspire you to write about animal issues.

Instead, the next time your write about reproductive rights, remind readers that female animals raised for food are routinely forcibly impregnated. The next time you write about how mothers should be allowed to breastfeed in public, remind readers that calves rarely get to suckle their mother’s milk because they’re turned into veal and their mother’s milk goes to humans instead. Next time you write about birth rape, remind readers of the institutionalized birthing process of a sow’s gestation crate. Make your feminism about all females, not just the human ones.

Thought You Should Know

May 13, 2008 | Leave a Comment

FYI

via PETA Files.

Not My Kind Of Feminism

April 4, 2008 | 4 Comments

Shown: Dixie Chicks use their bodies to demonstrate their 1st Amendment rights. Some women will use their bodies to make strong political statements, because they refuse to be silenced. If that offends you, that’s your problem, not theirs.

Crap like this makes my blood boil.

In Peta’s world, it seems that it is perfectly acceptable to reduce women to the status of animals, or meat: one Peta image shows a woman being clubbed “to death” by a man; another shows a woman wrapped in cling film to resemble cuts of meat in a supermarket. Perhaps the most egregious example of Peta’s work occurred in London on Mother’s Day this year, when it staged an event that was ostensibly to raise awareness about farrowing-crate confinement, a technique used in factory farming, in which sows are squeezed into narrow metal stalls barely larger than their own bodies. A heavily pregnant member of Peta’s staff lent her body to the cause - naked except for a pair of pink underpants - by kneeling on all fours in a metal cage. Another pregnant Peta worker gave out leaflets to passersby, with the words, “Unhappy Mother’s Day for Pigs. Go Vegetarian”. The image was disturbingly reminiscent of some of the nastier pornography I have seen. As Jill Filipovic, of the website Feministe.us, noted, this stunt showed that Peta promotes “animal rights at the expense of women’s rights - and that’s not only simplistic, but it’s bad for everyone involved. If you want to draw attention to the plight of animals by humanising them, go for it. But you don’t have to dehumanise women in the process.”

The image that “was disturbingly reminiscent” of nasty porn was this:

This is not porn; this is political expression. If you are turned on (or turned off) that’s your issue, not hers. She is not intending to arouse and pleasure; she is intending to educate and inspire.

Dear Julie Bindel and Jill Filipovic,

Actually, it’s not reminiscent of pornography; it’s reminiscent of gestation crates. It was a demonstration about factory farming and if you actually listened to the message instead of slapping labels on people without talking to them, maybe you’d understand that.

I’ve said it a million times, but I’ll say it again. You can’t just look at the image and come to your own conclusion about what that says to you. You, as a meat-eater, have a certain world view that affects what you see. You set up an artificial hierarchy that deems animals as inferior to humans. When you see humans willingly act like animals for the purposes of expressing deeply-held moral and political beliefs you can only understand them by listening to them. You cannot understand their message simply by viewing their naked bodies. Their shocking demonstrations are invitation to talk. You are expected to do more than stare like a titillated voyeur. You are expected to think, to use your brain. When all you do is look (and then complain about the demonstration, sometimes even posting pictures of it on your blog) YOU’RE the one objectifying the women, not PETA!!! You’re the one dehumanizing them!!! You’re the one silencing their voices and only paying attention to their naked bodies!!! LISTEN TO THE WOMEN YOU CLAIM TO PROTECT. Listen to them.

Here’s what Neomie, the nearly naked pregnant woman in a gestation crate wrote:

[...] Actually I wasn’t cold, and more importantly it was my choice to do it. I did this demo on my own will; I took my clothes off and went in this crate because I wanted to. I’m lucky enough to have the choice to use my body to speak up for the animals and to raise awareness about the conditions the sows are kept in.Other animals are made of flesh, blood, and bone. They have the same five physiological senses that humans do, and the same range of emotions. They love their babies and want the best for them. But farmed animals are treated no better than dirt, and it’s immoral.

Mother animals on factory farms are treated like machines: For example, mother pigs are crammed into tiny crates that are not much larger than their bodies for more than a month at a time, and all mother farmed animals are never able to cuddle and raise their young or fulfill any of their basic maternal desires. When they are no longer able to have babies, mother farmed animals are killed for pet food and soup—their bodies are too trashed for anything else.

I went to a slaughterhouse once, and I have seen for myself pigs arriving in overcrowded trucks, with broken legs, bleeding wounds and such a sad look in their eyes. When the driver opened the doors of the truck, a lot of dead pigs fell on the floor, they didn’t even make the journey to the slaughter house!

I will never forget these sad eyes I made eye contact with (see for yourself here: http://www.noemieventura.com/galleries/meet_your_meat/?pic=20 and here: http://www.noemieventura.com/galleries/meet_your_meat/?pic=21).

The person unloading the truck was using an electrocuting stick to force them to go out and was kicking them and punching them. There is no excuse for such extreme cruelty. These animals are living such miserable conditions and more than that, after a stressful and painful existence we are stealing their lives.

So honestly, compares to what these animals have to go through, staying nearly naked in a crate for an hour is nothing![...]

The only kind diet is a vegetarian diet.

Thanks all for your attention,

Noemie.

Exactly what kind of feminism thinks women shouldn’t be allowed to use their bodies in legal ways for political and moral expression? What kind of feminism calls active, political women exploited and oppressed and then refuses to listen to them? What kind of feminism says a woman’s political expression is dehumanizing?

Not my kind of feminism.

PS - If you want to see some seriously disturbing pictures of animal and human rights violations, visit her bilingual blog. I’m a little queasy after having seen these photos.

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