The defense of civil disobedience within the mainstream animal rights movement is almost vanishingly small. This speaks volumes about the sort of symbolism the movement will and will not tolerate.
MARC BEKOFF: ‘I recently learned of a book titled Beyond Cages: Animal Law and Criminal Punishment by Justin Marceau, Professor of Law and the Animal Legal Defense Fund Professor at the Sturm College of Law at the University of Denver. He is also a member of the People for Animal Welfare (PAW) formed by a proclamation of the Governor of Colorado…
Professor Marceau’s book caught my attention because of my own work with inmates at the Boulder County Jail and our discussions about animal behavior, compassionate conservation, the important of empathy and compassion for all beings, and different forms of incarceration and punishment including that for animal abusers…
The book starts with an epigraph from Breeze Harper’s wonderful anthology, Sistah Vegan: “All movements seem to start out with a relatively narrow focus, which then widens in response to the recognition of the interconnectedness of oppression.” And the first line of my introduction sort of sums up my contribution, “The animal protection movement is living out an untenable paradox: motivated by a vision of progressive social reform, while relying on regressive social policy.”
I also think that the long-term project of securing animal protection through prosecutors—the idea of securing radical change through the most mainstream means—has had the effect of diluting the animal protection message. I think rather than achieving radical ends, the welfarist and inherently status-quo-reinforcing means have diluted the goals and vision of the movement.
For decades the movement has been ingratiating itself to prosecutors, at no small cost. And never does the movement call on this reservoir of goodwill to help activists charged with civil disobedience. The defense of civil disobedience within the mainstream movement is almost vanishingly small. This speaks volumes about the sort of symbolism the movement will and will not tolerate’. SOURCE…
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