Neoclassical abolitionism

Let’s get straight to the point; “new-welfarism” doesn’t’ exist. There, I said it.

Well, it doesn’t exist in the real world, but it does in the imagination of philosophers and social theorists, in the sense that they talk about it, and accuse others to practice it, as inquisitors and theologians used to accuse midwives of witchcraft. I suppose that one can find welfarists that are newer than others, so their welfarist activities are therefore “new”. For instance, a social worker whose job is to train disadvantaged people to used the Internet could be consider a new-welfarist, if we accept that access to the information highway is today one “need” that the oppressed can lack of. But I am being facetious; the term is never used referring human welfare, just animals’.

No long ago the “hot” debate among animalists was “animal welfare” versus “animal rights”. It was relatively easy to understand. Animal welfare people support the improvement of animals’ lives, while animal rights people oppose to the exploitation of animals on the bases that society did not gave them the rights they deserved. In other words, critics of either side saw it as the former only interested in helping individual animals by welfare reforms, while the latter only interested in the “long term bigger picture” utopian issues changing the paradigm of the human animal relationship in a fundamental level. In the English speaking world, this apparently opposite attitudes are well known, but funny enough in the Spanish speaking world this dichotomy did not really exist until very recently, among other things because people still used the term “ecologist” to lump together anyone concerned by Nature, animals and the environment. The term “animalist” (“animalista”), which I am kind of forcing in this blog, has existed for decades in Spanish, and everyone in Latin countries knows what it means. Primitive? I should think not.

I’m a cultural hybrid that has hopped through both English and Spanish speaking countries, so when I need to I can observe this sort of things from a certain distance, and benefit of the luxury of objective comparison. It’s true that organised animal protection started much earlier in the English speaking world, which could explain the fact that more time created more diversification of ideas, but in today’s world each country does not longer need to pay all its dues and endure the same long evolution in isolation. Because of modern communication, now one country can quickly learnt from another, and in this way save a lot of time and energy. Therefore, this classical dichotomy has spread, and now is more or less present everywhere. But curiously enough the effect of globalization works both ways, so in the same way that one world influenced the other in “dividing” the animalists with opposing approaches, the other might have influenced the one by uniting them a little bit. How? Some animal welfare organizations began to act as animal rights groups, and some animal rights groups began to act as welfare organizations. And I, for one, am the perfect example.

As many people I started my journey by being just another explotationist, gradually “awaking” to the reality of my actions and trying to “change my ways”. I was what Tom Regan calls a “Muddler”. I was not born in the journey; I was not push into the journey; I just gradually started walking in it. My first steps in the abolitionist process were very much within the classic animal welfare approach, but it did not take me long to find the first important milestone; by boldly jumping across it I became a vegan and an animal rights advocate. I never was a vegetarian; I made my first significant jump all the way to vegan, which I must say it really pleases me (although I very much regret I didn’t do it earlier). But here is the twist: I never left animal welfare behind; I simply added animal rights to my beliefs, as anyone adds a new skill or experience to their CV without deleting any previously acquired. I used to say that I followed the philosophy of animal rights and the morality of animal welfare. I helped to improve the lives of those animals that came across mine, while campaigning for a bigger change in society where animals would no longer be exploited, and those that transgressed their rights would be properly punished. I never found both approaches incompatible. For instance, I can look after myself by ensuring that I eat, drink and dress, and not because of that I am being selfish and wasting time with an “individual” (in this case, “me”) and a short term improvement (avoiding hunger and cold today), without fighting for the bigger social picture of “the collective” in a long term revolution. Equally, I can eat, drink and dress “veganly”, to ensure that I’m also sending the right political message to those that observe me surviving perfectly well. One can work simultaneously for the small and the bigger picture, or do it alternatively. The end result is the same. I never saw –and I still don’t see– any real and genuine reason of why animal rights people should heavily and constantly criticise animal welfare people, and vice versa, unless we are talking about some extreme “beyond the fringe” cases on either side.

New-welfarism doesn’t exist. There are not Universities where you can “major” on it, there are no organizations that accept this term or use it in their “who we are” web pages, there are no activist’s manuals that include this “type” of animalist in their mantras, and there are no tick boxes for this concept in any form aimed to asses people’s ideological makeup. If there are groups that accept being defined as “welfarists”, these have not changed enough their core campaigns and methods to justify the attribute “new”. What does exist is the need for a “new” animal-rights/animal-welfare dichotomy. In a world where this dichotomy has been smudged by animal rights people doing more welfare stuff, and animal welfare people doing more animal rights stuff, those that need the division, those that need to justify the difference, needed to invent a different concept, a different issue to differ from the others.

There always will be “others”, even among “us”. That is not bad in itself, since it keeps us all fresh and on check, forces us to be awake and non complacent, and gives us ideological variability, which at long term is very useful –since natural selection works as well with genes than with “memes”. I like the fact that one group can question the effectiveness of the other, because this can drive to self-evaluation, which may lead to better tactics. I like the fact that those that end up just asking donations to be used to ask for more donations, can be forced to “do something” by just asking them “what do you actually do?”. I like the fact that some activists are taking upon themselves to constantly remind us that the most significant change that anyone can make to help the world is becoming vegan, because it’s absolutely true (we ethical vegans sometime forget that it is our abolitionist “duty” to spread veganism in the world as much as we can, and it’s good that someone remind us about it from time to time). I also certainly like the fact that when one of us clearly stops walking the journey and starts going backwards, this can be flagged out with the aim of correction. But all these “good” things that come from this debate don’t come free of charge, especially if they are overdone. There is a price to pay, which I wonder if it could be reduced: the uncomfortable division, the unproductive defensiveness, the endless arguments, the unfair disfranchisement, the lack of collaboration, and, in the end, the bitter taste in your mouth and a feeling or having been left “alone”.

Much a do about nothing, really. Those that accuse others of being new-welfarists define them as kind of in between animal welfare and animal rights. They often define them as “abolitionists” that turned into single-issue-welfarists, accepting some reforms with the excuse that these would lead to a future abolition. And they use precisely the term “new-welfarism” possibly because this, for an old fashion animal rights defender, may sound a bit “offensive”. What they perhaps don’t realise is that there are as many “new-welfarist” that come from animal rights people moving towards animal welfare, as animal welfare people moving towards animal rights. There are examples of both individuals and organizations in this situation, from “vegans” starting to get prominent positions in animal protection organizations where they used to be regarded as a bit “odd”, to clear abolitionists messages and campaigns run with coalitions where animal welfare groups pay an important role. For instance, the RSPCA (Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals) joining the campaign for the abolition of hunting of mammals with dogs in the UK, or WSPA (World Society for the Protection of Animals) joining the campaign for the abolition of bullfighting in Catalonia. I know; some may claim that in these examples no actual “good” came from theses “changes of approach” –they may say that neither hunting nor bullfighting have in fact been abolished in either country. Time will give justice to these cases since they are still a bit too “tender” to expect seeing them complete –although for me they already “count”, since I know them very well – but as long as some particular animal abuse practices begin to be abolished somewhere in the world (no matter how geographically small that part of the world is and how specific such abuse is), it’s a step in the right direction, which is better than no step at all. It doesn’t really prevent that other animalists take more, bigger or better steps (I don’t buy the theory that new-welfarist campaigns “steal” a big piece of the “resources pie” so others don’t have anything left –there is a different pie for each issue/region). I don’t think that it “slows down” either the “big causes” such as the promotion of veganism and anti-speciesm, since it could be argued that you may “attract” some people’s interest with specific achievements than you might not get with general goals –and once “in”, there is a chance to “go bigger for good”.

But we should not forget either the “sins” of some of “the other side” of the animalist spectrum. It is very difficult to accept as “good enough” excuses for not becoming vegan or for not actively supporting a much wider and long term animal rights campaign, the fact of either really really really liking cheese, or that some newspapers really really really like to put the “terrorist” label on anyone not wearing a tie –or wearing a turban instead. You are welcome to join us in the journey, even if you arrived late and are very much “behind” (we all were once). But don’t expect us to slow down and wait for you if you decide to stop walking and have a long nap.

On the other hand, there are indeed examples from animal rights groups acting “welfarestly”, which have been the trigger of the new-welfarism banter. For instance, PETA (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals) campaign on slaughter methods, or Animal Aid’s campaign on CCTV in slaughter houses. What all this shows us is that it would be equally accurate to name these “new-welfarist” as it would be to name the others “new-animal rightist”. It would be equally accurate as it would be actually meaningless. Because what is “new” is not what one side is doing, but what both are doing. They are both getting closer to each other without actually renouncing to their core identities, and this is bound to be good at some level (especially if the “net” result of this “closing the gap” situation is more specific abolitionist successes than before, which could well be the case if a consequence of this is more collaboration). If we have to call them something different, perhaps it would be better we call them “new-abolitionists”, because their shift of attitude does show us something they all have in common: the recognition that the abolition of animal abuse is their common goal that can be achieved from different angles.

If some insist that “new-abolitionists” as something qualitative different do exist, and are going to judge them, they will need to do it on the basis of how much these are advancing in the abolitionist process, how many people “from outside” is being attracted to this process because of them, and how much “abolitionist value” they are adding to the animalist movement. Otherwise it all sounds a bit weak.

I must be a new-abolitionist myself, since I am equally engaged in animal welfare, animal rights and pure abolitionist campaigning. Always ensuring that I filter out any campaign that has nil abolitionist intrinsic value, I find myself comfortable switching from one to another, continuously refocusing my abolitionism to be sure I cover as many animals as possible, as many animal issues as possible, as many single and multiple issues as possible, and trying to achieve as many short, medium and long term goals as possible, for the individual animals as well as for the Animal Kingdom as a whole. All towards the same direction: the abolitionist direction.

But not everybody may have the chance to try such a multi-tasking strategy. That’s OK, each of us chose the path of the abolitionist process that fits them the best. It’s good that some try new routes and others follow the most established ones. We’ll never know what we will encounter in the future, and if we find a big bolder in our way, we want to have options to avoid it. But what has become a little funny –especially if you try to look at it from outside– is that in some occasions rather than opening new paths by removing obstacles and macheting away impenetrable growth, it seems that some are just cropping tiny dandelions from a perfectly transitable road.

What I mean is that often this debate started being about strategies, about the things different animalists do, but ended up being about semantics, about the things that different animalists say. In a nutshell, something like this:

-You are wasting our time, with you tiny single issue regulations.

-It’s not your time, it’s ours...besides, it’s not a regulation, it’s gradual abolition.

-Don’t make me laugh, you “welfarist”!

-I’m not a “welfarist”, I’m just a “pragmatist”!

-Yes you are, you are a “new-welfarist”

-Ah yeah, then you are a “fundamentalist”!

-I am not!, I’m an “abolitionist”. I know what you mean, take it back!

-I will not. In fact, I will go further. You are a “Francionist”!

-You can’t say that!

-Yes I can

-Sztybelist!!

-Bless you

And here is something ironic: Many people don’t know that one of the greatest abolitionists that ever existed was one of the founders of modern animal welfarism –as we know it. William Wilberforce, the 18^th century British Parliamentarian who successfully achieved many important milestones in the human slavery abolition process, happened to be one of the founders of the RSPCA, the archetypal animal welfare group (recognised as the first animalist organisation in the world, which still exists). He is not remembered as the great “reformist” of slavery, even if he spent most of his life trying to abolish only the trade of slaves, and only in the British Empire (“steps” that were instrumental in the global abolitionist process, but by no means were the only ones made before or after). The ironic bit is that being indeed a very “old” member of “the process”, his communion of abolition and welfare, and of humans and non-human animals, fits better the “new-welfarism” than the classical one animalists like myself started with. Perhaps he should be accused of “Neoclassical abolitionism”. If that is the case, if I have to get another label, I want to have that one too –and if you want to call me Wilberforcist, I’ll take it.

In the end, the labels don’t really matter that much. If some animalists want to make anti-new-welfarism their own flag, it doesn’t really matter that much either. It some “welfarists” (old or new) take it personally, and want to spend some time defending “their ways”, so be it. For me the important thing is that every day there are more of “us” that join the journey, and more of us that don’t feel obliged to sign up to any side. Because old or new, classic or contemporary, we are still on the same ship, going towards the same destination, travelling in the same long and arduous journey, until those that come after us may eventually find what we all have been aiming for.

I bet Wilberforce also dreamt about it in the old days.

Jaysee Costa