Animal Rights/Human Rights
Entanglements of Oppression and Liberation

Interview By Claudette Vaughan

The near extermination of Native Americans and of the buffalo are perfect examples of a type of reverse speciesism happening in the world today where both human rights and animal rights are conspicuous by their absence. David Nibert’s book “Animal Rights Human Rights” addresses the entanglements of oppression from both a human and non-human animal perspective. In short, Nibert identifies the problem lying squarely at the feet of the capitalist system. We highly recommend the book and here we interview the author.

Abolitionist: Is there a war against the weak happening in the world today David, or is what is happening just a coincidence of not being able to keep up with the frenetic pace of the capitalistic machine and so those that can’t or won’t keep pace with consumer corporate and predatory capitalism are spat out and left behind in this age of “progress” to fend for themselves?

David Nibert: The frenetic pace of global capitalism, as promoted by economic and political elites in the United States and like nations, is tantamount to war against the earth and the vast majority of its inhabitants. What’s going on in the early 21st Century is, in many respects, a continuation of the same violent and predatory practices that have served the interests of elites for the past ten thousand years. Ever since members of our species developed the means to create an economic surplus, humans and other animals have been exploited to produce wealth. Today, many humans in western nations are programmed to accept the idea that contemporary human societies – at least the “good” ones – are enjoying capitalist-generated liberty and democracy. They are taught that powerful transnational corporations are promoting prosperity in “underdeveloped” nations by creating jobs for the “disadvantaged.” They believe that, on the one-day of the year when they are transformed from consumers to citizens – election day – their votes for either Tweedledum or Tweedledee are all that is required in a democracy. They are taught that other animals “serve important functions” for humans, that this “natural way of life” is fine as long as other animals are not treated “inhumanely” and that in fact there is no real cruelty involved. (The public - “There are laws against that sort of thing, aren’t there?”)

With enough of the human population of the United States subscribing more or less to these elite-driven fabrications, oppression flourishes. When many are confronted with the hard realities of life in the U.S., with its grotesque disparities in the distribution of wealth and income, most believe their failure to live the “American dream” is the consequence of some personal failing. How could it be otherwise in the “land of opportunity?” The possibility that tens of millions in the United States will contemplate their lives seriously, or search for answers or contemplate alternatives to their society is profoundly undermined by the capitalists’ profitable trappings and distractions: professional and amateur sports, alcohol, television – especially soap operas and reality shows – and, perhaps most of all, by their continual struggle to “make-ends-meet.”
It is in the context of this hegemonic milieu that other animals and devalued humans are increasingly becoming fodder for the capitalist system. The elites’ plundering of the previous centuries continues into the present moment, only perhaps accomplished with more finesse, when tyranny masquerades as democracy.

Abolitionist: Many people in the animal rights movement today justifiably think that the system is at fault with specific regards towards our treatment of the Animal Nations. In your book “Animal Rights/Human Rights: Entanglements of Oppression and Liberation” you talk about this?

DN: My book was, in many respects, a process of self-development. I was so indoctrinated by the corporate-dominated culture that I had nearly completed my Ph.D. before the question of the treatment of other animals ever occurred to me. (And even then, it only was because I accidentally stumbled onto an animal rights demonstration in 1983, not because the obvious just occurred to me.) When I finally did begin to think about the oppression of other animals, I considered it from a critical sociological perspective.

Sociology examines social issues from a systemic or holistic vantage point, and application of this perspective to the treatment of other animals reveals that the awful treatment they receive in human society is driven by the system. Specifically, oppression of other animals is produced by three processes that thrive under capitalism. The first, and primary factor, is that their mistreatment is motivated by desire for economic or material gain. Second, potential oppressors must have the power to exploit, and in contemporary society this power is largely found in the authority of the state. Third, the oppressors, motivated by economic gain and given the legal power to exploit, work to foster an ideology – or set of beliefs – that explains and justifies their actions and the oppressive arrangements they create. I call this model the Theory of Oppression, as it also largely explains racism, sexism, classism, homophobia, ageism and other forms of injustice. In my book I devote a chapter to each of these three factors and provide evidence to support the theory.

In the book I also argue that the oppression of other animals is not just similar to the oppression of devalued humans but that these various forms of oppression are entangled and mutually enabling. I came to promote this idea early on in my animal advocacy efforts as, frequently, I was challenged by friends on the left, or by university colleagues, for my lack of prioritization – by working on the problems of other animals instead of those of humans. Even though I never stopped my advocacy for devalued groups of humans, I argued that progress in the struggle against injustice for any group is only as solid and sustainable as the level of progress of justice achieved for every devalued group. Drawing from social scientific and advocacy literature, I maintained that a socially constructed and generally accepted “hierarchy of worth” underlies the notion that certain groups of human and other animals are less important and valuable than others. This way of thinking is necessary for oppression to occur, and once it is accepted economic forces play a profound role in determining what groups are less valued or expendable. History demonstrates that, while some devalued groups may obtain a certain higher status at any point in time, as long as the hierarchy exists, their descent is possible when circumstances – especially economic circumstances – change. In our work, we must foster the recognition that all creatures are of worth in order to effectively challenge systemic oppression.

Abolitionist: There is now a movement for global justice seeking nothing less than reversing the last 500 years of redistribution of wealth upward in the global class structure. This is being done with the arranging of programs designed to redistribute the control of capital down to the grassroots community level. Since the non-human animals interests are not part of this structure how do you see the future for nonhumans when their interests aren’t even taken seriously yet AND if there is a redistribution of wealth occurring for humans at a grassroots level will this be blocked by the World Bank and the IMF if it becomes too much of a threat to neo-con and its interests?

DN: Hope for a more just and democratic world is found, in large part, in the grassroots struggles of exploited and marginalized people throughout the world. However, in most human societies, where masses of humans are struggling for daily existence, many have little awareness of or concern about the gross injustices committed against other animals – and how the fates of the devalued are intertwined. Sadly, but not surprisingly, the interests of other animals are rarely considered when initial plans for a more equitable form of social organization are promoted by those who exist in conditions of poverty. In my book, I invoke Abraham Maslow’s concept of the hierarchy of needs to help explain this oversight. In essence, Maslow suggested that most humans need to have their basic needs met before they are able to respond empathetically and altruistically. This is one of the reasons I believe the development of socialist society is essential for the achievement of substantial and sustainable justice for both humans and other animals. So, while these initial plans for dramatic social change envisioned by many grassroots activists may not explicitly include justice for other animals, I believe the interests of the other inhabitants of the earth can best be raised, debated and acted on when the forces of corporate greed do not preclude mass consciousness and liberation.

To date, however, global elites have been very unfriendly to groups working to establish an alternative economic systems, especially when voters indicate a preference for a more humane and ethical system. The United States government has been especially active in preventing alternative economic systems, or even reformist political leaders, from capturing the world’s imagination. Putting aside political rhetoric about spreading democracy and freedom throughout the world, U.S. leaders historically have been quick to use covert tactics and military power to place, and keep, capitalist-friendly regimes in power. Most people in the United States have little or no knowledge of the true nature of U.S. foreign policy and its practices – past and present.

The World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF) (both conveniently located in Washington D.C. – in the same building complex) have also played very powerful roles in promoting cash export economies in Third World countries, selling Western products to them at inflated prices and pushing displaced peoples into areas where their labor is exploited. The World Bank promotes these activities with “development loans” and, when the predictable level of debt staggers Third World countries, the IMF further “aids” these already super-exploited areas by tying more loans to structural adjustment programs that involve conditions of profound social austerity and the privatization of publicly held resources.

For instance, a great deal of U.S. foreign “aid” and World Bank activity in Latin America in the latter half of the 20th Century promoted the production of cow flesh and skin, much of it sent to the United States and other powerful capitalist nations. Loans for the construction of roads, bridges, slaughterhouses, ports, energy plants and the expansion of ranches were difficult to pay back from the trade in cow flesh, especially when U.S. ranchers promoted a “beef” import act to stifle Latin American competition.

Conflicts between ranchers and subsistence farmers, rubber tappers and Native Americans were common, and brutal repression ensued – and continues to the present. What is more, Latin American nations were exhorted to develop coarse grains for export “animal feed.” A great deal of land that once was used for the cultivation of corn, beans and other direct consumables for humans was expropriated or converted to coarse grain production. Hunger, malnutrition and poverty in Latin America increased as a result of capitalist “aid.” Vastly increased numbers of cows were raised in captivity and murdered for the economic value of their bodies, and their resistance to this oppression is witnessed by the widespread use of whips, electric prods and other implements used to enact their compliance.

As a result of this plundering to keep flesh on the tables of the affluent, countless other animals have been displaced or killed, especially in the rainforest. Millions of other animals in the tropics have been captured and turned into commodities for the exotic pet trade.

Efforts to encompass the world with elite-created rules of trade, via the WTO and regional “free trade” agreements, are simply a way for the most powerful elites to bring the global economic activities almost wholly under their control, with little intervention from bothersome sovereign states and the potential that democratic processes might undermine that control. If the elite capitalists are able to complete this ultimate rigging of the global politico-economic system, they will have accomplished their goal of global domination – the same ambition they attributed to the “evil communists” during the 20th century. (It is worth noting that Paul Wolfowitz, one of the neoconservative architects of the U.S. invasion of Iraq, is now head of the World Bank.)

Abolitionist: What is your view on speciesism David? Do you support the concept and how can the movement expand its understanding of the causes of speciesism and its relationship to, and entanglement with, the oppression of devalued groups of humans?

DN: Most of the animal rights literature treats speciesism as prejudice or discrimination, and some writers compare it to racism and other forms of injustice. Sociologists, however, have long maintained that racism, sexism, classism and related injustices are actually ideologies. Ideologies are belief systems that are created to legitimate oppressive social arrangements (the third element in the Theory of Oppression). Prejudice and discrimination are the results of oppressive ideologies, harmful ideas and practices promoted by destructive belief systems.

This is an important distinction because oppressive ideologies like speciesism, sexism, racism and classism are created and promulgated by the powerful in order to justify arrangements that – in most cases – are producing material benefit for some members of society. What is more, these forms of oppression are intertwined economically, politically and ideologically – and sustainable progress requires the unraveling of each form of oppression. As long as socially sanctioned permission to exploit any group exists, all devalued groups are in peril. Unless all humans and other animals are respected and protected, the significant motivation to exploit will be rationalized by a belief system that is easily shifted to encompass other groups.

So, as the Theory of Oppression holds, the motivation or primary basis for the oppression must be neutralized, and societal practices altered, to reduce prejudice and discrimination and ameliorate oppression. It is not enough only to change minds, but the struggle is also to change the structure of society. Structural change is essential for a future with sustainable economic practices and reduced levels of oppression and violence. This is why a clear understanding of speciesism is important.

Abolitionist: In light of all that we are talking about, what is your view on Katrina and the US government’s non-response to assist and aid people of colour and the poor when it was called upon to do so?

DN: The Katrina catastrophe was rooted in the profound disparities in the distribution of wealth and income in the U.S. Deep tax cuts, largely continuous since the Reagan years – and almost unlimited military spending – have meant deep cuts in both social services and important infrastructure maintenance. In New Orleans, the inadequate levies were responsible for a great deal of destruction and the deaths of many humans and other animals. Classism and sexism played important roles in both poor evacuation plans and the unbelievably slow federal response to the tragedy. This insensitivity and lack of regard was compounded by ineptitude. Many administration positions in the United States government, especially under George W. Bush, are filled by political friends of the Administration. Such was the case with Michael Brown, who was appointed director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) despite his lack of any disaster relief experience.

Today, millions in disaster relief funds have made their way into the pockets of large construction firms, and some of the money finally has made it into the hands of homeowners. However, little assistance is available for the thousands with limited incomes who rented their homes prior to the disaster.

Abolitionist: Can you talk about corporate capitalism and its intensified oppression in confronting the tyrannies of the 21st century? Will a new generation of grassroots activists have enough clout to oppose tyrannical rule from elite systems in your view?

DN: Following the capitalist imperative for continuous expansion, 21st Century corporate giants stride all around the world in search of profits. The more misery and suffering they generate, the more capital they accumulate. More factory farms, more free trade zones, more slaughterhouses, more maquiladoras, more rainforest destruction, more McDonald’s, more carbon dioxide, more unlawful invasions, more weapons . . . are all very profitable.

Mass international dissent and resistance are necessary to press effectively for a more just and sustainable world, and grassroots activists are key in promoting such vital change. But the task is confounded by cultural hegemony as countries like the U.S. seduce the world’s youth with consumerist ambitions while cultivating reverence for the “free market” system. What is more, the U.S. state’s endless “war on terror” – with its CIA abductions, secret prisons and penchant for torture – will not be friendly to any serious effort for change. These powerful obstacles, however, mirror the acknowledgement of the elites of the potential power of those who are organized for justice.

But resistance cannot be smashed. Democratic movements in Latin America are a sign that the masses in the Western Hemisphere are resisting U.S. domination. Venezuela, Brazil, Bolivia, Argentina and Uruguay are among the nations striving to break the tight grip of the United States while the Bush Administration is mired in the unending horrors it created it Iraq. Nonaligned nations meet in Cuba while Third World nations are organizing against rigged WTO rules. Organizing at the grassroots level was never more important. The fates of the world’s inhabitants – present and future – hinge on organized grassroots resistance. The clout lies in the attainment of an increased international, inclusive and encompassing movement.

Abolitionist: What is your view on the tyranny of corporate agribusiness, its systematic abuse and murder of billions of nonhuman animals annually, it’s poisoning of the food chain with pesticides and herbicides and its relentless bid for maximum profits above all else considerations?

DN: The ruse about the magnificent fruits of the green revolution – “increased food production for a hungry world” – continues to be taught to schoolchildren in the United States. Increases in production were brought about by profound increases in the use of natural gas and oil for toxic pesticides, herbicides, fungicides and to power machinery and giant corporate farms – mega-farms that took the place of countless family farmers who could have turned to organic crops. Increasingly, huge corporations like ConAgra, General Foods, Kraft/Phillip Morris and Archer Daniels Midland continue to poison what passes as food while promoting genetically engineered crops. As just one example, Greenpeace recently documented Cargill’s role in illegal rainforest destruction in Brazil.

If terrorism was defined in a just manner, it would unquestionably include corporate treatment of the billions of other animals whose oppression by agribusiness constitutes one of the worst horrors of the modern age. These acts of terrorism are compounded by agribusiness’s destruction of the soil, its role in the rapid depletion – and poisoning – of the world’s fresh water supply, its contribution to global warming, and its promotion of genetically engineered “frankenfood.” In the United States, flesh-producing corporations like Smithfield and Tyson exploit the labor of women, people of color, immigrants and those with few opportunities for decent employment. And the destruction that agribusiness has wrought on the health of those in the United States is being exported at growing speed to a largely unsuspecting Third World, where the citizens are beginning to experience increased rates of heart disease, diabetes and various forms of cancer. All of this misery and destruction is due to the nature of the capitalist system and is being furthered by the Wolfowitzs of the world.

Abolitionist: Much research is currently being concentrated on exposing the interlocking systems of oppression in the prison industrial complex. What is your view of the prison industrial complex, its privatization and the assumption of the State that this multifaceted system of oppression that designates prisons as a solution to social, political and economic problems?

DN: The acquiescence of many in the United States to the interlocking oppressions characteristic of the capitalist system is obtained, in addition to the reasons stated earlier, by the cultivation of classism and racism. The corporate-controlled media generally present serious crime as arising from the actions of the poor – especially poor black men. This point has been persuasively argued by Jeffrey Reiman in his book The Rich Get Richer and the Poor Get Prison. Reiman maintains that the greatest dangers to most citizens in the United States are the actions of the affluent. For example, deliberate decisions to increase profits by skimping on worker safety improvements, keeping health care out of the reach of millions, the loss of billions of taxpayer dollars to corporate fraud and corruption and the like are not treated as crime, or at least not as serious crime. Instead, media moguls parade endless programs before the public with the message that real crime is one-on-one violent crime. Most of the perpetrators of this type of crime, the crimes that make it to the television screen, are people with few resources. The public is told that their safety depends on the government’s ability to lock more people up for longer periods. There are more than two million people incarcerated in the United States today, and black men are disproportionately represented among them. While imprisonment may not be any solution for the problems facing people in the United States, it does reduce the potential for people in the United States to organize and resist corporate domination – because of the destabilizing effect that heavy policing of the poor has on many communities, and because devalued people are labeled as a leading cause of domestic economic and social problems.

Hurt by declining federal funds and corporate flight to the Third World, the contracting out of prisons is viewed as smart management by state governments. (In many cases, the privatizing of public services also replaces public employees, who generally have more legal rights and who often are unionized, with non-union, private-sector workers who have fewer rights, particularly under the Bush Administration.) One of the goals of capitalist global domination is to privatize everything from which they can squeeze out a dollar.

Abolitionist: With George W. Bush in power and the stacking of the courts in favour of “pro-life” conservative evangelical friendlies, what is the way forward for the animal liberation and advancing the cause for animal rights in the USA today David?

DN: George W. Bush is so extremist in his unlawful and appalling “war against terror” that he is losing the support even of some of his right-wing friends in Congress. However, the Democrats are not much better on most issues. Democrats currently are working with Republicans and the FBI on the development of the Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act, which many believe will become law within the year.

The FBI and the U.S. Department of Justice have played a key role in defending the status quo in the United States. From rounding up and deporting union activists (as in the infamous Palmer Raids), to assassinating and falsely imprisoning members of the Black Panther Party and the American Indian Movement, to trying to discredit and harm Martin Luther King, Jr. and John Lennon, the FBI is more than ready to thwart serious efforts to reduce the extreme level of oppression of millions of sentient beings whose bodies are used to gain profits.

These multitudes of oppressed others resist their horrible captivity and treatment on a daily basis – as evidenced by the need to use electric prods, bull hooks, chains, clubs and whips to force their compliance. As the number experiencing this oppression grows, it is essential that activists in the United States increase efforts to educate the public about the horrors that are behind such “products” as “meat,” “milk,” eggs and “leather.”

It is so important that those with welfarist viewpoints begin to recognize that reformist campaigns only produce public perceptions of more “humane” – and thus, acceptable – oppression. And, once modest reforms are agreed to, or enacted, there is no real interest, or funding, to enforce them. And, worst of all, all the effort that has gone into sensitizing the public to suffering and injustice largely evaporates as many happily make their way back to the establishments that peddle flesh.

Animal liberationists must continue to work to bring welfarists to a strategic campaign for the abolition of animal suffering. Increased unity for abolition should be supplemented with increased unity among all groups working to end oppression. Because all forms of injustice are intertwined, and because it will take a movement of this size to make the existence of capitalist oppression a recognized social problem in the United States, such solidarity is a prerequisite for the development of a socialist system. A united movement of campaigns for justice in the United States, working in conjunction with similar movements throughout the world, is how the capitalist leviathan can be brought under control. With so many working for justice for oppression humans and other animals, we all can’t be arrested as terrorists, eh?