ARCO's Abolitionists - A Vegan Forum

AnimalFriendly wrote:I found AR2007 to be a valuable use of my time. As a presenter, I shared skills and information that I had learned over the years, and I had some great discussions with individuals attending the conference, some of whom became vegan and/or started leaning toward a more abolitionist bent, particularly with the aid of Alex, Harold Brown and others who argued the abolitionist viewpoint. I will be returning for 2008, likely presenting in some capacity, and I intend to press even harder for abolitionist animal rights advocacy, particularly in light of Alex's own commitment to those principles. I don't see this as a waste of time at all.

AnimalFriendly, I am soooo pleased that you posted your intention to go! If the time permitted, I would be there also interacting with everone possible about AR in the true meaining of the term. I am clearly vegan-abolitionist now, but was one of the multitudes who were ignorant about the differences between welfarism and animal rights when this former vegetarian join PeTA a few years ago. Rolling eyes, thank goodness and knowledge it was a brief membership. It was when I attended their "Helping Animals 101" conference just 2 miles from my house that I began to cringe about the org I joined in ignorance. Then later on the main ARCO threads, James helped me see the light. If he had been there at that PeTA conference, I would have left the hotel with him and others to start a revolution. There was no one else but PeTA welfarists there, and no de-programming and progressive thought was probable.

I truely feel that there are potential AR activists out there that would be ready, willing, and able to split with the welfare groups IF they had another frame of reference. The conference would be a perfect place to deliver that vegan-abolitionist message to those like me who were not on the clue-train.

Faunus

I understand the argument that we should attend these welfarist conferences because they give us a chance to promote our message. I would not want to miss out on any genuine opportunity to promote abolitionism. But it is naive to think that the welfare groups that run these conferences would allow abolitionists to attend if they thought there was any real chance that they could subvert what was going it. This means that they must let abolitionists attend for other reasons, probably because they feel they get something out of it. I don't mean that no one at these events is convinced by talks and presentations by abolitionists. I am sure that some people are. I am saying that the welfare groups must think that whatever they lose in this respect is outweighed by what they feel they gain.

James, I totally appreciate and respect what you are saying! My question is, "when will the vegan-abolitionist conferences begin - and where?". Up to this point, we don't even have leaflets - one of the reasons why I've completely stopped setting up info stalls here in Atlanta. Those stalls were my favourite mode of communication because there was a lot of valuable interaction with concerned citizens who had questions. What we have here is the Georgia Animal Rights and Protection group that is nothing more than an arm of the multi-armed welfarist goddess herself, Ingrid E. Newkirk. GARP flatly denies this when I confronted them about it, but all of their e-mails to me about their upcoming meetings are PeTA oriented, even with folk from Norfolk, Virgina flying down to support the protests and demos. Well screw this.

I must tell you that during that "Helping Animals 101" conference, even in my very naive days, I nearly fell through my chair as I listened to Bruce Friedrich talk about their welfarist tactics and goals. I came quite close to walking out when another PeTA clone from the Virginia office spoke of her "compassionate" killing of healthy dogs, gave a slide-show about it, and attempted to justify this murder under the misleading term "euthanasia". I sensed speciesism, although I did not have that word in my vocabulary - and thought of homeless humans "without a sign of a future" as she worded it, arising simultaneously. Many of us sat there in horror at the justification of speciesist killing, but the atmosphere was not one where the opposition could readily voice its dissent. Why? It was exclusively a PeTA conference, not a conference where multiple points of views are presented, particularly vegan-abolitionist ones. In conferences like this in the future, it could be a sheer embarrasment to arrive promoting welfarism if abolitionists arrive in numbers unmercifully challenging them during these events. I look forward to the days when they think twice about doing so, but this future must be created on their backs.

Another point is that I was not the only one who challenged Bruce Friedrich when the opportunity came with microphone up to mouth. Even during a PeTA conference, not everyone thinks he is the "golden boy". They wanted us to do a KFC demo after the conference. More than a handful thought "WTF is the difference if people boycott KFC and go to Wendy's or Churches Fried Chicken"? The look of disgust in these fellow PeTA members I'll never forget. We talked about it only amongst ourselves. I seriously wonder if how many of them have left the "animal protection movement", or have found other sources confirming their suspicions that welfare orgs are not AR.

Now let me ask this to anyone reading this thread: What situation will create a better opportunity to present (and have received) a communication about the vegan-abolitionist message: talking with people at work over the next 4 weeks and in your days off, or presenting it at this conference?

With respect, Faunus

Hi Faunus. Thanks for your thoughtful reply.

Faunus wrote:In conferences like this in the future, it could be a sheer embarrasment to arrive promoting welfarism if abolitionists arrive in numbers unmercifully challenging them during these events. I look forward to the days when they think twice about doing so, but this future must be created on their backs.

If this happened then the welfarist groups simply would not allow abolitionists to attend in the future. The only reason they let us attend is because this does not happen. As I said above, I think we lose more by going than by not going. For example, take a look at United Poultry Concern's Conference next year: http://upc-online.org/winter07/conf.html They claim to be debating the abolition/welfare issue, but most of the speakers are overwhelmingly welfarist (I think there is only one speaker who disagrees with the whole "happy" meat/welfarist approach.) So there will be no real debate. But we facilitate the idea that there is when we attend these events. As I said above, if they thought there was any chance we could subvert their agendas, then they would not let us attend. They let us attend only to the extent that they feel it is beneficial to do so.

Faunus wrote:My question is, "when will the vegan-abolitionist conferences begin - and where?".

I think we have to remember that these welfarist conferences are organized by multi-million dollar organizations. We simpy do not have that kind of money. But hopefully, in the future, we can organize events.

Faunus wrote:Now let me ask this to anyone reading this thread: What situation will create a better opportunity to present (and have received) a communication about the vegan-abolitionist message: talking with people at work over the next 4 weeks and in your days off, or presenting it at this conference?

My view is that we should simply concentrate on doing our own thing. I know its tough at the moment, but it will never get any easier if we keep looking to the welfare movement to provide us with opportunites to promote abolitionism.

hummingbird wrote:Great artcle James,

I always visit your blog and enjoy reading your posts, it is one
of my forvorite blogs!
To me it is mystery, why so called 'two track activists' can ever
disagree that total abolition must go, rather than supporting we-
lfarism.
We can not afford to waste our time and money unlike muti-mill-
on wealthy welfare/new welfare orgs.
We need to spend our resources wisely and effectively, don't we?

Some more stuff one Phelp's "one track" activism article:

Given that, according to Phelps, "rational advocacy requires that we constantly seek and evaluate feedback on how well our campaigns are working and make frequent mid-course corrections," I would have thought that the decades of welfarism which have done nothing to reduce the numbers of animals exploited/killed would have been ripe for critical reevaluation. Instead he blames a movement that wasn't even in existence during the years he mentions. More to the point, he ignores the fact that the rise in numbers of animals killed is correlated with welfarism's being the dominant paradigm in the animal movement. The animal movement has always been overwhelmingly welfarist. It has never made veganism a nonnegotiable baseline and in accordance with that embraced vegan outreach as its primary mode of campaigning. Thus we should not be suprised that, as Phelps writes, "forty-seven years after the beginning of the vegan movement and twenty-two years after the birth of the modern animal rights movement, the number of animals slaughtered for food in the United States is continuing to rise." After all, why would the numbers of animals killed have gone down when the animal movement has spent its time and money promoting "humane" exploitation and welfare regulation as opposed to veganism and abolition?

And secondly, I do not see how "two track" activism could cause a greater reduction in exploitation/animals killed than could "one track" activism. Phelps thinks that if one track is good, then two must be better. That would follow only if the second track was as good as, or better than, the first track. But it isn't. The second, welfarist track is much less efficient and productive than the vegan/aboiltion track. Any time and money spent advocacting more "humane" consumption is not spent advocacting no consumption of animal products; any time and money spent advocating welfare regulation is not spent advocating abolition. In short, "two track" activism does nothing but starve those forms of advocacy that are maximally conducive to abolition of resources. Thus any time and money spent on the welfarist track is wasted (relative to what could have been achieved if it had been spent on the abolition track). It is, as I put it above, an opportunity cost.

Thank you for posting another great article James!

I always disliked PETA and HSUS even while I was supporting welfarism in the past.
I never attended conferences organized by such groups. However I attended some
of the FARM's conferences.
In my previous post I quote Alex Hershaft 's critiques of welfarism.
And one of the FARM's conferences, Alex spoke to us about fundraising, he said " FARM
runs by very small budget compared to other national orgs.
I have my own money and I always try to be thrifty. Instead of paying high rent for an
office, I use my house for our office.
I get good discounts when I order huge quantity of FARM's materials from printers and
publishers. Stay in touch with members not only when you ask money."

Unlike multi-millionaire traditional/new welfare orgs, I have never received aggressive and
persistent fundraising letters from FARM.

I am not very sure but I think FARM is quite fair to abolitionists.
I know despite Alex's critiques of welfarism, majority of speakers and attendees will be
traditional/new welfarists at AR2008.

James, what do you think?
Do you think AR2008 is one of them?
" If they thought there was any chance we could subvert their agendas, then they would not let
us attend. They let us attend only to the extent that they feel it is beneficial to do so" ?

Hi Hummingbird. I don't know much about FARM, but I liked what Alex Hershaft said recently about the problems with welfarism. I would just always make sure that groups are pushing an abolitionist agenda and don't have anything to do with welfarism or the corporate movement. But of course it is up to you what you do and who you support. I know these are tough decisions so I hope you manage to come to one that you feel comfortable with

Best wishes,

James