Adam Kochanowicz's interview with Michelle and Chris of the Peaceful Prairie Sanctuary.
The Vegan News (number 9).
24.7.09
A Good Deed to End 'Animal Rights July.'
Animal Rights July at UCD ends on Wednesday 29th (7.00pm, Theatre ‘N’) with something different, a showing of vegan playwright G.F. Newman’s Judge John Deed (the only high court judge who cares for an ALF-rescued beagle).
The episode to be shown, Everyone’s Child, interweaves two powerful animal-related themes, an ‘animal rights hunger striker,’ and a 15-year-old boy, vegetarian since the age of two - and then vegan - who refuses a heart transplant due to his ethical principles. The case of the hunger striker reveals the insider dealing in the ‘corridors of power,’ while Deed has to decide whether he should allow surgeons to operate on the child, Jason Powell, against his will.
G.F. Newman is well-known for his hard-hitting stories of ‘faction.’ He famously exposed routine police corruption in the 1970s, when most treatments of law enforcement officers were in the mould of Dixon of Dock Green, and revealed the problems in the British ‘health service’ in the 1980s.
Animal Rights July will end, then, with something out of the ordinary - nevertheless, Everyone’s Child is an extremely powerful and thought-provoking drama. As a real bonus, Judge John Deed creator, writer, and producer, Gordon Newman, has very kindly agreed to introduce the film himself live via Skype. This will be a fine end to the Animal Rights July programme.
[I would like to thank all those who have helped in a million ways with Animal Rights July. I am especially grateful to our keynote speaker for the month, Professor Gary Francione, for his talk on the 22nd, about which I am still receiving emails saying how enjoyable and informative the evening was].
The episode to be shown, Everyone’s Child, interweaves two powerful animal-related themes, an ‘animal rights hunger striker,’ and a 15-year-old boy, vegetarian since the age of two - and then vegan - who refuses a heart transplant due to his ethical principles. The case of the hunger striker reveals the insider dealing in the ‘corridors of power,’ while Deed has to decide whether he should allow surgeons to operate on the child, Jason Powell, against his will.
G.F. Newman is well-known for his hard-hitting stories of ‘faction.’ He famously exposed routine police corruption in the 1970s, when most treatments of law enforcement officers were in the mould of Dixon of Dock Green, and revealed the problems in the British ‘health service’ in the 1980s.
Animal Rights July will end, then, with something out of the ordinary - nevertheless, Everyone’s Child is an extremely powerful and thought-provoking drama. As a real bonus, Judge John Deed creator, writer, and producer, Gordon Newman, has very kindly agreed to introduce the film himself live via Skype. This will be a fine end to the Animal Rights July programme.
[I would like to thank all those who have helped in a million ways with Animal Rights July. I am especially grateful to our keynote speaker for the month, Professor Gary Francione, for his talk on the 22nd, about which I am still receiving emails saying how enjoyable and informative the evening was].
18.7.09
No Connection.
While I was busy selling raffle tickets at a recent benefit gig for the Irish Vegan Society, a woman approached with a common question about dairy: she could see the problem about meat eating - but surely there are no ethical issues regarding milk and cheese.
I explained, as you do, about the fact that calves are taken away from their mothers so we can consume this baby food of another mammal in our never-weaned society. Now, usually at this point, people tend to assume that we ‘share’ the mother’s milk with the calf: we just ‘take the surplus.’ However, on this occasion I was shocked to find that the woman had no awareness that pregnancy and lactation were connected. She also was unaware that cows do not ‘give milk for life,’ seemingly still a commonly held myth. Even those who hold this false belief surely assume that the cow would need to be pregnant to begin this process?
So, trying to talk over a Johnny Cash tribute band, I said it would be the same as if she were breastfeeding her own child, eventually the milk flow would decrease and then stop. For it to begin again fully, she would need to be pregnant again. Rather than this statement clarifying the issue, as I had hoped, the woman was more confused. She was apparently unable to make any connection between a human mother breastfeeding her children and cow’s milk.
Have the dairy industry been so successful in achieving this disconnect, and is part of the resistance in human animals to acknowledge that they are animals also manifest in a denial of the fact that we are mammals capable of feeding young just like other mammals do?
I explained, as you do, about the fact that calves are taken away from their mothers so we can consume this baby food of another mammal in our never-weaned society. Now, usually at this point, people tend to assume that we ‘share’ the mother’s milk with the calf: we just ‘take the surplus.’ However, on this occasion I was shocked to find that the woman had no awareness that pregnancy and lactation were connected. She also was unaware that cows do not ‘give milk for life,’ seemingly still a commonly held myth. Even those who hold this false belief surely assume that the cow would need to be pregnant to begin this process?
So, trying to talk over a Johnny Cash tribute band, I said it would be the same as if she were breastfeeding her own child, eventually the milk flow would decrease and then stop. For it to begin again fully, she would need to be pregnant again. Rather than this statement clarifying the issue, as I had hoped, the woman was more confused. She was apparently unable to make any connection between a human mother breastfeeding her children and cow’s milk.
Have the dairy industry been so successful in achieving this disconnect, and is part of the resistance in human animals to acknowledge that they are animals also manifest in a denial of the fact that we are mammals capable of feeding young just like other mammals do?
16.7.09
The Evolution of Animal Ethics in Japan by Dr. Koichi Tagami.
Over a number of exchanges with Dr. Koichi Tagami of Rissho University, Toyko, Japan, I have been exploring how the issue and idea of animal rights is evolving in Japan. Dr. Tagami is an expert on Marx's theory of alienation and is the author of "Practical Environmental Ethics" (2006), extracts of which can be found here.
I am grateful to Dr. Tagami for giving me permission to reproduce the following exchange.
Dear Dr. Roger Yates.
First of all, I would like to explain how I have come to accept the theory of animal rights.
To begin with, my main research theme is 'the formation of ideas in early Marx’, and since the publication of my first article in 1991 I have been writing on issues surrounding the texts of early Marx, such as Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts and the German Ideology. After collecting the results of my research in a book entitled The Theory of Alienation in Early Marx, I obtained a doctorate in 2000.
However, this does not mean that I had no interest in, nor knowledge of, animal ethics. For I have been asked to teach ethics in university since 1994, and as a result, I have come to study issues in modern ethics, and become familiar with Peter Singer’s work. As you well know, Animal Liberation describes in detail the horrific conditions which animals suffer in factory farming, and this strongly impressed on me the strength of Singer’s argument. Yet, at the same time, I felt antagonistic towards his demand for vegetarianism. A ‘meal without meat’ seemed to me at that time unimaginably ‘abnormal’. I loved meat and was under the impression that I could not tolerate vegetarian meals. Besides, the fact that there were no vegetarians around me, and the fact that no one recommended it really worked against me.
In terms of my profession, there are many ‘academics’ who teach ethics, but there are no vegetarians, nor an ‘ethicist’ who supported animal rights (this is still the case).
On the contrary, the common attitude among the ethicists around me was that it was ‘ridiculous’ to put animals in the same category as humans, and that Singer’s argument was ‘extreme’ and did not deserve to be taken seriously. Consequently, although I felt that Singer’s argument was quite persuasive, I pretended to ‘look away’, and decided ‘not to think about it’. Nevertheless, ever since obtaining a doctorate, I have come to research environmental ethics in earnest. While re-reading books relevant to animal rights, I was becoming more convinced than ever of the evil of meat-eating. And Singer’s message that ‘one should become a vegetarian’ had changed from an irritation like ‘something in-between one’s teeth’ to an intolerable discomfort.
Yet the reason I still could not decide to be a vegetarian was that I believed that if I became a vegetarian, my muscles would deteriorate. I like training myself and I thought I couldn’t stand losing the results of all the exercise I had done over the years. That I used to worry about such a small thing is quite laughable now I think about it, but I didn’t know any vegetarians and couldn’t get rid of the stereotype of a ‘pale vegetarian’.
Around that time, I happened to come across an opportunity of going to India. It was December 2002. This trip to India turned out to be the biggest turning point in my life. It was literally a ‘culture shock’. One of the culture shocks I experienced was their diet. Apart from expensive restraints for tourists, diners for the Indian general public Alwasa served a set meal of dahl (a kind of soup) and vegetable curry, and even for snacks it was the rule not to use meat rather than the exception. In India ‘not eating meat’ is neither ‘abnormal’ nor ‘strange’, but rather a ‘natural’ thing to do. To witness the fact that far more people than Japan’s population are vegetarian made me feel certain that it is impossible to damage one’s health by not eating meat. After I came back to Japan, I had gradually reduced the amount of meat and animal product I consumed. And before long I became almost vegan at home, although I still consumed a tiny amount of dairy product. When I went out for a meal, if there was no way I could avoid it, I ate a small amount of animal product. Even in such cases, I chose sea food over meat. This is how my present eating habit became established.
Eating a small amount of animal product when I go out is a compromise I have to adopt in order to survive in Japan, which is an extremely backward country when it comes to vegetarianism. Of course I don’t want to consume animal product at all, but otherwise I wouldn’t be able to go out at all. Japan really is a difficult place for the vegetarian to live in. Once I became a vegetarian, I discovered that my worry that ‘I would lose muscles’ was totally unfounded. On the contrary, my muscles came to develop more easily through training. Being able to lead a much healthier life when I am vegetarian than when I was a meat-eater has allowed me to feel that it is right to be a vegetarian. And as I lived a vegetarian life, before I knew it, the desire for meat had disappeared. By becoming a vegetarian, I felt as though the thorn with which Singer had pricked my heart had been pulled out, and this gave me a stirring feeling that I was finally released from hypocrisy. I no longer have to adopt an attitude that is unworthy of an ethicist – that is to say, an attitude of pretence that animals are excluded as the objects of moral consideration.
However, once I became a vegetarian and seriously committed to animal issues as my own problems rather than somebody else’s, I started to look at Singer’s argument differently from the way I used to.
Although I used to think that Singer’s argument was a radical extremist one which forced people to become vegetarian, I began to think that in fact his argument is full of holes; a ‘loose’ argument. For although Singer emphasises that we should not inflict suffering on animals, he does not criticise the use of animals by humans in itself. Therefore, if animals are kept in comfortable environments and slaughtered painlessly, he will have no right to criticise factory faming. And as for animal experiment, if the ‘benefit’ humans gain outweighs the loss inflicted on animals, then, in Singer’s argument, animal experimentation is acceptable as an ‘exception’.
Soon after I became a vegetarian and started to engage with animal issues seriously, I discovered that Singer’s argument cannot be a true rationale for the protection of animals. For, because Singer’s theory is not a ‘rights theory’ that regards animals as ‘rights-bearers’, I cannot help but think that his theory is one that accumulates ‘deferral’ which allows the use of animals, and ends up rolling down the ‘slippery slope’, and that such a theory would make the animal rights movement spineless. Thus, although Singer made me aware that we should protect animals by becoming vegetarians, once I actually became one, I began to think that in order truly to protect animals, we should not stop at Singer’s position, but proceed to genuine animal rights theories such as Tom Regan’s or Gary Francione’s.
This is how I have become an animal rightist. Compared to the study on Marx, I have but begun to research animal rights. As a beginning I have submitted an essay [now published] entitled the Reality of Animal Rights Theories to a human rights organisation journal. The aim is to cause a stir in the present situation where Peter Singer is mistaken to be a representative of animal rights theories. Although you may find it unbelievable, in Japan there are few ethicists who subsequently declare themselves to be vegetarians and then support vegetarianism or animal rights theories. There is a gap between theory and practice. Against this tendency, I intend to deepen my research as a vegetarian animal rightist and to present my own position.
Yours truly,
Dr. Koichi Tagami.
We can only hope that, as Dr. Tagami continues his journey toward veganism, that it becomes as easy as it is elsewhere. It is a noteworthy and welcome development that there is someone in Japan able to explain what is - and what is not - animal rights.
I am grateful to Dr. Tagami for giving me permission to reproduce the following exchange.
Dear Dr. Tagami,
Hello and I hope you are well. As you are aware I am sure, I am interested in the philosophical evolution of the "animal rights movement". I see that in a very short period of time, you have realised and appreciated that one must turn away from Peter Singer's utilitarianism, and turn toward theorists such as Gary Francione and Tom Regan, if one wishes to gain a genuine animal rights understanding of human relations with the nonhuman world.
Given this, you have taken a journey that the "animal rights movement" refuses to take. Therefore, I would be interested to hear of your philosophical journey, so to speak, in your exploration of animal ethics. At the present time, in Europe and North America, there is a struggle going on involving animal advocates who are serious about rights and animal advocates who merely use rights rhetorically, in group names for example. I would very much appreciate your comments on this, should you wish to share them.
With very best wishes and respect,
Dr. Roger Yates.
Dear Dr. Roger Yates.
First of all, I would like to explain how I have come to accept the theory of animal rights.
To begin with, my main research theme is 'the formation of ideas in early Marx’, and since the publication of my first article in 1991 I have been writing on issues surrounding the texts of early Marx, such as Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts and the German Ideology. After collecting the results of my research in a book entitled The Theory of Alienation in Early Marx, I obtained a doctorate in 2000.
However, this does not mean that I had no interest in, nor knowledge of, animal ethics. For I have been asked to teach ethics in university since 1994, and as a result, I have come to study issues in modern ethics, and become familiar with Peter Singer’s work. As you well know, Animal Liberation describes in detail the horrific conditions which animals suffer in factory farming, and this strongly impressed on me the strength of Singer’s argument. Yet, at the same time, I felt antagonistic towards his demand for vegetarianism. A ‘meal without meat’ seemed to me at that time unimaginably ‘abnormal’. I loved meat and was under the impression that I could not tolerate vegetarian meals. Besides, the fact that there were no vegetarians around me, and the fact that no one recommended it really worked against me.
In terms of my profession, there are many ‘academics’ who teach ethics, but there are no vegetarians, nor an ‘ethicist’ who supported animal rights (this is still the case).
On the contrary, the common attitude among the ethicists around me was that it was ‘ridiculous’ to put animals in the same category as humans, and that Singer’s argument was ‘extreme’ and did not deserve to be taken seriously. Consequently, although I felt that Singer’s argument was quite persuasive, I pretended to ‘look away’, and decided ‘not to think about it’. Nevertheless, ever since obtaining a doctorate, I have come to research environmental ethics in earnest. While re-reading books relevant to animal rights, I was becoming more convinced than ever of the evil of meat-eating. And Singer’s message that ‘one should become a vegetarian’ had changed from an irritation like ‘something in-between one’s teeth’ to an intolerable discomfort.
Yet the reason I still could not decide to be a vegetarian was that I believed that if I became a vegetarian, my muscles would deteriorate. I like training myself and I thought I couldn’t stand losing the results of all the exercise I had done over the years. That I used to worry about such a small thing is quite laughable now I think about it, but I didn’t know any vegetarians and couldn’t get rid of the stereotype of a ‘pale vegetarian’.
Around that time, I happened to come across an opportunity of going to India. It was December 2002. This trip to India turned out to be the biggest turning point in my life. It was literally a ‘culture shock’. One of the culture shocks I experienced was their diet. Apart from expensive restraints for tourists, diners for the Indian general public Alwasa served a set meal of dahl (a kind of soup) and vegetable curry, and even for snacks it was the rule not to use meat rather than the exception. In India ‘not eating meat’ is neither ‘abnormal’ nor ‘strange’, but rather a ‘natural’ thing to do. To witness the fact that far more people than Japan’s population are vegetarian made me feel certain that it is impossible to damage one’s health by not eating meat. After I came back to Japan, I had gradually reduced the amount of meat and animal product I consumed. And before long I became almost vegan at home, although I still consumed a tiny amount of dairy product. When I went out for a meal, if there was no way I could avoid it, I ate a small amount of animal product. Even in such cases, I chose sea food over meat. This is how my present eating habit became established.
Eating a small amount of animal product when I go out is a compromise I have to adopt in order to survive in Japan, which is an extremely backward country when it comes to vegetarianism. Of course I don’t want to consume animal product at all, but otherwise I wouldn’t be able to go out at all. Japan really is a difficult place for the vegetarian to live in. Once I became a vegetarian, I discovered that my worry that ‘I would lose muscles’ was totally unfounded. On the contrary, my muscles came to develop more easily through training. Being able to lead a much healthier life when I am vegetarian than when I was a meat-eater has allowed me to feel that it is right to be a vegetarian. And as I lived a vegetarian life, before I knew it, the desire for meat had disappeared. By becoming a vegetarian, I felt as though the thorn with which Singer had pricked my heart had been pulled out, and this gave me a stirring feeling that I was finally released from hypocrisy. I no longer have to adopt an attitude that is unworthy of an ethicist – that is to say, an attitude of pretence that animals are excluded as the objects of moral consideration.
However, once I became a vegetarian and seriously committed to animal issues as my own problems rather than somebody else’s, I started to look at Singer’s argument differently from the way I used to.
Although I used to think that Singer’s argument was a radical extremist one which forced people to become vegetarian, I began to think that in fact his argument is full of holes; a ‘loose’ argument. For although Singer emphasises that we should not inflict suffering on animals, he does not criticise the use of animals by humans in itself. Therefore, if animals are kept in comfortable environments and slaughtered painlessly, he will have no right to criticise factory faming. And as for animal experiment, if the ‘benefit’ humans gain outweighs the loss inflicted on animals, then, in Singer’s argument, animal experimentation is acceptable as an ‘exception’.
Soon after I became a vegetarian and started to engage with animal issues seriously, I discovered that Singer’s argument cannot be a true rationale for the protection of animals. For, because Singer’s theory is not a ‘rights theory’ that regards animals as ‘rights-bearers’, I cannot help but think that his theory is one that accumulates ‘deferral’ which allows the use of animals, and ends up rolling down the ‘slippery slope’, and that such a theory would make the animal rights movement spineless. Thus, although Singer made me aware that we should protect animals by becoming vegetarians, once I actually became one, I began to think that in order truly to protect animals, we should not stop at Singer’s position, but proceed to genuine animal rights theories such as Tom Regan’s or Gary Francione’s.
This is how I have become an animal rightist. Compared to the study on Marx, I have but begun to research animal rights. As a beginning I have submitted an essay [now published] entitled the Reality of Animal Rights Theories to a human rights organisation journal. The aim is to cause a stir in the present situation where Peter Singer is mistaken to be a representative of animal rights theories. Although you may find it unbelievable, in Japan there are few ethicists who subsequently declare themselves to be vegetarians and then support vegetarianism or animal rights theories. There is a gap between theory and practice. Against this tendency, I intend to deepen my research as a vegetarian animal rightist and to present my own position.
Yours truly,
Dr. Koichi Tagami.
We can only hope that, as Dr. Tagami continues his journey toward veganism, that it becomes as easy as it is elsewhere. It is a noteworthy and welcome development that there is someone in Japan able to explain what is - and what is not - animal rights.
11.7.09
A Cow At My Table: an event in Animal Rights July.
The third event of ‘Animal Rights July’ in Dublin takes place at Theatre ‘N’, Newman Building, UCD campus, on Wednesday 15th July, 2009, at 7.00 pm.
A Cow At My Table has never been presented at a public event such as Animal Rights July before in Ireland. It is a powerful documentary about our relations with other animals, filmed over five years, by journalist, media artist and teacher, Jennifer Abbot.
What makes A Cow At My Table compelling is that it features voices from both sides of ‘the animal issue,’ and particularly about the issue of using nonhuman animals for food.
With archive and contemporary footage, the film explores issues such as the transition from ‘family farms’ to large-scale ‘factory-farming,’ the role of animal welfare organisations, animal welfare experts, and the critique of animal use by more radical animal protectionists and animal rightists.
Commenting on A Cow At My Table as part of his Animal Rights July agenda, event organiser Dr. Roger Yates said: “Abbot’s documentary raises important issues which are central to my own research in sociology but also addresses everyone’s concerns about how ~and indeed whether~ we should use other animals for our benefit. For example, it looks at the socialisation process, which gives us our first attitudes to our relations with animals; the relationship between social movements and their countermovements; and, most of all, examines the role of the ideology and practice of animal welfarism in society in general and in the animal protection movement.”
“Animal welfarism is the institutionalised means by which we regulate the use of animals. Essentially, it promises ‘non-cruel use’ and suggests that existing problems can be solved with increased regulation and legislation. However, there are several problems with this. For example, in relation to so-called farm animals, animal welfare organisations seem to be forever forced into a ‘never-win’ situation. This can be demonstrated by current events that affect Ireland. At the moment a European ‘farm animal’ welfare group with a branch in Ireland simultaneously lists as its achievements and ‘welcome improvements’ the bringing about of reforms in EU law while publishing exposes of the violations of those same laws and regulations.[1] A three-stage process seems to be in play. Not only do the welfare groups spend years campaigning for change, this is followed by a long period of implementation [much EU legislation on ‘farm animals’ does not take effect until 2013, see HERE] and then these same groups spend years monitoring the reforms they supported, exposing violations of regulatory laws they were instrumental in creating.”
Speaking about present day animal advocacy, Dr. Yates also said: “A Cow At My Table can be seen as a plea for a new approach to animal advocacy, a call which has been answered in the last few years by a new abolitionist movement in animal rights which sets veganism as its moral baseline and concentrates its attack on animal use rather than animal treatment while being used.”
Praise for A Cow At My Table…
"...an extraordinarily compelling, powerful and visually stunning documentary."
—Vancouver International Film Festival
"...idiosyncratic and refreshingly unpredictable... may become one of the most persuasive videos of the coming decade."
— Animal People
"... a brilliant documentary."
—Toronto Star
"You should watch and love Abbott’s film ... This work has a sense of vision, reason and direction that make Abbott an admirable documentarian."
— Victoria Independent Film & Video Festival
"...an important film!"
— J. Hunter Todd, Chairman & Founding Director, WorldFest Houston
"[a] startling, even-handed and extremely accomplished documentary."
— Jim Sinclair, Pacific Cinematheque
"Gently pits animal activists against the meat industry in a probing reflection on flesh foods... Like all the best documentaries, this film offers more questions than answers."
— Cameron Baily, NOW Magazine, Toronto
"Stylistically inventive and able to find a visual beauty within this ugly subject, A Cow at My Table uncovers balance and truth in a very complex subject with numerous sides."
— Alex MacKenzie, Blinding Light!! Cinema
"...at once a rigorous exploration of the meat industry and a visually elegant and stylistically compelling work of art."
— Heather Frise, Director, Bones of the Forest
"...expertly reported."
— Willimette Week
"...a compelling and highly acclaimed documentary ... presenting a powerful and thorough inquiry into the institution of meat."
— Animals’ Agenda
[1] The Irish branch of an animal welfare organisation says (currently on its web site – visited 10th July 2009) that it “has been campaigning for better conditions for pigs in Ireland since 1992. Since then, EU law has brought about welcome improvements: tethering of pregnant sows is now illegal; the keeping of pregnant sows in narrow stalls after the first 4 weeks of pregnancy will be illegal from 2013; routine tail-docking is now prohibited under EU law; and EU law requires that fattening pigs must be provided with manipulable enrichment material (such as straw or mushroom compost) that they can root in; from 2013, breeding pigs will also have to be given manipulable enrichment material.” [emphasis added.]
Using material from 2007 and 2008, the British branch of the same organisation writes on Pig welfare and EU legislation: “Tail docking and environmental enrichment: Tail docking: (cutting off the piglets’ tails) is carried out to prevent pigs biting each other’s tails. Routine tail docking is prohibited by EU legislation yet the investigation found the practice to be widespread – up to 100 per cent in some countries. A 2007 European Food Safety Authority report also found that over 90 per cent of EU piglets are tail docked. Tail biting occurs because the pigs are bored and frustrated in their bare, sometimes slatted floored pens and chew and bite each other’s tails.
“Environmental enrichment such as straw would drastically reduce or prevent tail biting and so stop the practice of routine tail docking. Under EU law this must be provided yet the investigation found enrichment materials to be lacking in the vast majority of farms visited. Under EU law the enrichment should consist of straw or some other natural material that enables pigs to engage in their natural behaviours of rooting, foraging and exploring.” [emphasis added.]
5.7.09
Time to Save Our Home?
Saving our HOME.
A movie event as part of “Animal Rights July.”
Where: Theatre N, Newman Building, UCD campus;
When: Wednesday evening 8th July;
Time: 7.00-9-45. FREE ADMISSION.
Week 2, July 8th:
Showing of the new 90-minute environmental film “HOME”
followed by discussion.
In 1972, the United Nations General Assembly established World Environment Day (5th June) to further “worldwide awareness of the environment and enhance political attention and action.” The theme of the 2009 World Environment Day (WED) was ‘Your Planet Needs You: Unite to Combat Climate Change’ and included the global launch of “THE HOME PROJECT.”
The release of “HOME” was a landmark event. For the first time ever, a film was released on the same day in over 50 countries and on every format: movie theatres, TV, DVD and the Internet. Directed by Yann Arthus-Bertrand and produced by Luc Besson, “HOME” uses beautiful, high definition aerial photography from over 60 countries to tell the story of the Earth’s ecosystem, how humans have affected it, and how environmental problems are all interconnected.
Some scientists (such as James Lovelock, who recently lectured at UCD on his Gaia Theory [see below]) believe that global warming is now irreversible and disaster is inevitable but the message of “HOME” is more hopeful – provided action is taken now.
Prime movers in The Green Party have been invited to attend Animal Rights July, it is hoped that they will be able to attend this important event focused on environmental issues.
Dr. Roger Yates explains why “HOME” has been included as part of “Animal Rights July”: “The film itself is not about animal rights, per se, but clearly environmental issues affect the nonhuman world as much, and sometimes more, than human society. In the end, the fate of all animals, including human beings, is interlinked. This film is impressive in that it does not shy away from issues conspicuously absent in Al Gore’s recent film on the environment. The issue of the devastating impact meat eating has on the planet is described in HOME and, indeed, supports UN statements about the climatic damage caused by a meat-based lifestyle. For example, the waste of water in producing meat is enormous compared to the water needed to produce plants. It certainly is not green to eat meat.”
US Law professor and animal rights philosopher, Gary Francione, who will present a live lecture as part of Animal Rights July (see separate document, Animal Rights July at-a-glance, attached), says, “HOME is better by miles than Al Gore’s document, An Inconvenient Truth...There is explicit criticism of intensive agriculture and discussion about the inefficient use of resources (grains, water) used to produce meat. Although the film certainly does not advocate veganism, that is the logical implication of its message. As I have argued for longer than I care to remember, anyone who cares at all about the environment should be vegan even if she/he does not care about the moral issue involved in animal exploitation.”
Roger Yates added: “The is a good deal of talk in Ireland at the moment that we all need to pull together to escape the ravages of the global economic recession, there is much less discussion on the need to act collectively for the sake of the planet. We talk a lot about human rights and our love for our children – it is a direct contradiction of those claims to carry on living as we do. HOME tells us that we must take responsibility and one of the best – and easiest – ways we can is through changing what we consume. The message of HOME is also a direct challenge to The Green Party to address the issue of meat-eating, which it has shown a remarkable, if understandable, reluctance to do.”
World Environment Day
James Lovelock at UCD, April 2009.
Gary Francione’s full statement on HOME.
How Environmentalists are Overlooking Vegetarianism as the Most Effective Tool against Climate Change.
‘Maybe no Green dares tell the voters that vegetarianism is the only sure way to curb global warming because they haven't personally grasped the argument yet.’
A movie event as part of “Animal Rights July.”
Where: Theatre N, Newman Building, UCD campus;
When: Wednesday evening 8th July;
Time: 7.00-9-45. FREE ADMISSION.
Week 2, July 8th:
Showing of the new 90-minute environmental film “HOME”
followed by discussion.
In 1972, the United Nations General Assembly established World Environment Day (5th June) to further “worldwide awareness of the environment and enhance political attention and action.” The theme of the 2009 World Environment Day (WED) was ‘Your Planet Needs You: Unite to Combat Climate Change’ and included the global launch of “THE HOME PROJECT.”
The release of “HOME” was a landmark event. For the first time ever, a film was released on the same day in over 50 countries and on every format: movie theatres, TV, DVD and the Internet. Directed by Yann Arthus-Bertrand and produced by Luc Besson, “HOME” uses beautiful, high definition aerial photography from over 60 countries to tell the story of the Earth’s ecosystem, how humans have affected it, and how environmental problems are all interconnected.
Some scientists (such as James Lovelock, who recently lectured at UCD on his Gaia Theory [see below]) believe that global warming is now irreversible and disaster is inevitable but the message of “HOME” is more hopeful – provided action is taken now.
Prime movers in The Green Party have been invited to attend Animal Rights July, it is hoped that they will be able to attend this important event focused on environmental issues.
Dr. Roger Yates explains why “HOME” has been included as part of “Animal Rights July”: “The film itself is not about animal rights, per se, but clearly environmental issues affect the nonhuman world as much, and sometimes more, than human society. In the end, the fate of all animals, including human beings, is interlinked. This film is impressive in that it does not shy away from issues conspicuously absent in Al Gore’s recent film on the environment. The issue of the devastating impact meat eating has on the planet is described in HOME and, indeed, supports UN statements about the climatic damage caused by a meat-based lifestyle. For example, the waste of water in producing meat is enormous compared to the water needed to produce plants. It certainly is not green to eat meat.”
US Law professor and animal rights philosopher, Gary Francione, who will present a live lecture as part of Animal Rights July (see separate document, Animal Rights July at-a-glance, attached), says, “HOME is better by miles than Al Gore’s document, An Inconvenient Truth...There is explicit criticism of intensive agriculture and discussion about the inefficient use of resources (grains, water) used to produce meat. Although the film certainly does not advocate veganism, that is the logical implication of its message. As I have argued for longer than I care to remember, anyone who cares at all about the environment should be vegan even if she/he does not care about the moral issue involved in animal exploitation.”
Roger Yates added: “The is a good deal of talk in Ireland at the moment that we all need to pull together to escape the ravages of the global economic recession, there is much less discussion on the need to act collectively for the sake of the planet. We talk a lot about human rights and our love for our children – it is a direct contradiction of those claims to carry on living as we do. HOME tells us that we must take responsibility and one of the best – and easiest – ways we can is through changing what we consume. The message of HOME is also a direct challenge to The Green Party to address the issue of meat-eating, which it has shown a remarkable, if understandable, reluctance to do.”
World Environment Day
James Lovelock at UCD, April 2009.
Gary Francione’s full statement on HOME.
How Environmentalists are Overlooking Vegetarianism as the Most Effective Tool against Climate Change.
‘Maybe no Green dares tell the voters that vegetarianism is the only sure way to curb global warming because they haven't personally grasped the argument yet.’
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