Non human first declaration another racist attack on animal rights
Antifascist Animal Liberator | 30.12.2013 09:30 | Animal Liberation | Anti-racism
Few things unite the animal liberation movement more than the rejection of Speciesism but recently we have discovered a Racist sympathiser page has sprung up under the banner of NON HUMAN FIRST that is causing a major stir within the animal liberation movement
The animal liberation movement is and always has been a anti racist anti Speciesist movement and rejected racists inclusion at every attempt but recently a group calling itself NON HUMAN FIRST has sprung up and makes it very clear that they will not ban racists and will welcome them with open arms on demo's.
Their page can be seen here:
https://www.facebook.com/NonHumansFirstDeclarationSupportersPage
Richard deboo explains why this racist group is wrong.
The “Putting non-humans first” ‘project’ claims that so long as one is driven by a determination to end the enslavement of non-human animals, then it does not matter what views and opinions one holds with regards to other humans (and we know that many are in positions of exploitation, legalised discrimination and on the receiving end of great violence and often fatal harm).
The suggestion that, so long as one does something to help non-human animals, it matters not at all if one is at the same time also racist, misogynist, disablist or homophobic (and so on) is a ridiculous assertion that not only strains credibility but is a venal debasement of the meaning of justice.
Justice does not sanction one prejudice when contrasted with another; justice is not satisfied with one bigotry replacing another; justice is not served when the chauvinist is regarded as a worthy ally in the fight for freedom for our non-human friends. It is a mockery of justice and confirms only that injustice will continue to dominate our society.
The propositions put forward by “Putting Non-humans first” are an incoherent mess of illogical, ill-conceived and inchoate statements that act only as a sop to the bigoted, providing them with a false sense of entitlement to ridiculous, discredited and obscene opinions whose only intention is to perpetuate discriminatory, exploitative, antagonistic and downright contemptible attitudes towards their own target group – whether based on gender, sexual orientation, race or other arbitrary characteristic that rankles with their unformed, squalid reactions to those whom they perceive as “different” and therefore unworthy of the respect, tolerance, compassion and decency that they expect to be granted to themselves.
They claim that non-humans are in a precarious state of emergency (which is true) and thus it is of no concern if anyone seeking to help those non-humans also has attitudes that “conflict with human rights ideology” (their wording). That last part is not true.
Prejudice of any kind is a sickness of the mind. The cure is social justice, expressed fully and completely, without compromise or twisting or hiding of the truth.
The promotion of animal rights is one of the most astonishingly difficult prejudices to overcome, given how deeply embedded it is in the cultural structures and legal and political systems of our world.
We all have to work extremely hard to ensure that those who currently hold the opinion that non-human animals are unworthy of the full protections of the law and the extension of love and compassion to them and the proper attention to and satisfaction of their needs must be mindful that, if we then at the same time, hold opinions contrary to the basic principle of social justice (that no-one should be discriminated against based on some randomly-chosen trait) it makes us look ridiculous, foolish, very stupid, and frankly really pathetic.
It is difficult enough to find an outlet in the traditional media that will present animal protection issues in a favourable light without us making it so much easier for those who oppose our compassionate views to hold us up to the cold light of public scrutiny and say, “Look! Look at the your animal rights zealots! Fanatics all of them – racists, homophobes, women-hating! Look and see! Aren’t they stupid?!”
Yes, it is stupid. It has no place in a tolerant, empathetic and compassionate animal protection philosophy. Animal protection is a matter of pure social justice. Non-humans are exploited against precisely because society currently tolerates and condones the commonly-held prejudice against them, based purely on their species membership.
The full article can be read here: http://www.richarddeboo.com/justice-knows-no-bounds-why-putting-non-humans-first-is-wrong
The non human first membership is a small group in numbers and mainly gets its support from the 269 life campaign.
Its admin is unknown to us but we would be seriously questioning their intentions on this.
We as animal liberationists MUST reject Speciesism at every corner we can not tolerate or accept racists or fascists within our ranks and we MUST reject racist groups such as non human first campaign and expose them as what they are. Racists.
if you are on facebook like a true antifascist animal liberationists page here: https://www.facebook.com/AnimalLiberationMemes
Their page can be seen here:
https://www.facebook.com/NonHumansFirstDeclarationSupportersPage Richard deboo explains why this racist group is wrong.
The “Putting non-humans first” ‘project’ claims that so long as one is driven by a determination to end the enslavement of non-human animals, then it does not matter what views and opinions one holds with regards to other humans (and we know that many are in positions of exploitation, legalised discrimination and on the receiving end of great violence and often fatal harm).
The suggestion that, so long as one does something to help non-human animals, it matters not at all if one is at the same time also racist, misogynist, disablist or homophobic (and so on) is a ridiculous assertion that not only strains credibility but is a venal debasement of the meaning of justice.
Justice does not sanction one prejudice when contrasted with another; justice is not satisfied with one bigotry replacing another; justice is not served when the chauvinist is regarded as a worthy ally in the fight for freedom for our non-human friends. It is a mockery of justice and confirms only that injustice will continue to dominate our society.
The propositions put forward by “Putting Non-humans first” are an incoherent mess of illogical, ill-conceived and inchoate statements that act only as a sop to the bigoted, providing them with a false sense of entitlement to ridiculous, discredited and obscene opinions whose only intention is to perpetuate discriminatory, exploitative, antagonistic and downright contemptible attitudes towards their own target group – whether based on gender, sexual orientation, race or other arbitrary characteristic that rankles with their unformed, squalid reactions to those whom they perceive as “different” and therefore unworthy of the respect, tolerance, compassion and decency that they expect to be granted to themselves.
They claim that non-humans are in a precarious state of emergency (which is true) and thus it is of no concern if anyone seeking to help those non-humans also has attitudes that “conflict with human rights ideology” (their wording). That last part is not true.
Prejudice of any kind is a sickness of the mind. The cure is social justice, expressed fully and completely, without compromise or twisting or hiding of the truth.
The promotion of animal rights is one of the most astonishingly difficult prejudices to overcome, given how deeply embedded it is in the cultural structures and legal and political systems of our world.
We all have to work extremely hard to ensure that those who currently hold the opinion that non-human animals are unworthy of the full protections of the law and the extension of love and compassion to them and the proper attention to and satisfaction of their needs must be mindful that, if we then at the same time, hold opinions contrary to the basic principle of social justice (that no-one should be discriminated against based on some randomly-chosen trait) it makes us look ridiculous, foolish, very stupid, and frankly really pathetic.
It is difficult enough to find an outlet in the traditional media that will present animal protection issues in a favourable light without us making it so much easier for those who oppose our compassionate views to hold us up to the cold light of public scrutiny and say, “Look! Look at the your animal rights zealots! Fanatics all of them – racists, homophobes, women-hating! Look and see! Aren’t they stupid?!”
Yes, it is stupid. It has no place in a tolerant, empathetic and compassionate animal protection philosophy. Animal protection is a matter of pure social justice. Non-humans are exploited against precisely because society currently tolerates and condones the commonly-held prejudice against them, based purely on their species membership.
The full article can be read here:
http://www.richarddeboo.com/justice-knows-no-bounds-why-putting-non-humans-first-is-wrong The non human first membership is a small group in numbers and mainly gets its support from the 269 life campaign.
Its admin is unknown to us but we would be seriously questioning their intentions on this.
We as animal liberationists MUST reject Speciesism at every corner we can not tolerate or accept racists or fascists within our ranks and we MUST reject racist groups such as non human first campaign and expose them as what they are. Racists.
if you are on facebook like a true antifascist animal liberationists page here:
https://www.facebook.com/AnimalLiberationMemes
Antifascist Animal Liberator
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