Gandhi's way won't do: Animal
rights activists do not want to resort to violence but many see
it as the only option
The Guardian (London)
September 6, 2004
Guardian Leader Pages, Pg. 15
Karen Dawn
At their meeting in Kent yesterday, some 3,000 members of the Animal
Liberation Front watched a video address by Jerry Vlasak, the prominent
activist banned from entering the country because he condones violence.
Some militants have vowed to escalate attacks against animal abuse
industries. With such threats, the activists are finally having
an impact. The builders' trade association has declared its members
will refuse animal research projects without indemnification.
The activists have been widely condemned even within the animal
protection movement. Peter Singer, on these pages, denounced violence
and said our movement risks serious damage from association with
the handful of activists willing to go beyond peaceful protest.
But did the Black Panthers seriously damage the American civil
rights movement? Rather, they amplified the still radical but sane
and nonviolent voice of Martin Luther King.
Horrified by the violence of some anti-abortion activists, I am
distressed to see some of our movement resort to similar tactics.
But even Singer, after condemning the militants' threats, wrote
"there is little more that non-violent activists can do".
I agree, at least without the threat provided by the militant fringe.
And doing nothing, leaving the animals at the mercy of the drug
industry, is not an option.
Every year drug companies introduce hundreds of new drugs that
contribute almost nothing - they replace those on which patents
have expired, since drug companies make less money on generics.
Hundreds of thousands of animals die each year in tests for those
copycat drugs. Would such practices, if well-publicised, have public
support?
We do not do harmful tests on humans, though it would be better
science, because it would be unethical. Animal rights activists
argue that our natural preference for our own kind does not make
tests more ethical when performed on animals. Those who disagree
about tests for life-threatening diseases still should not accept
that testing wholesale.
After 30 years of fighting cancer with animal testing, cancer deaths
are up - people with cancer live longer, but more contract it. Many
studies published in scientific journals have linked western diets
to a host of diseases, including cancer. If animal testing funds
were diverted to programs encouraging dietary change, we would finally
see disease rates plummet - and by ethical means. Instead, governments
support the inhumane factory farming industry, encouraging westerners
to consume, cheaply, far more meat than is healthy. And they support
the animal testing industry to combat the diseases they encourage.
A cornerstone of public support for vivisection is the assurance
that scientists do everything they can to protect the animals they
are killing. On the SHAC website there is footage showing a scientist
punching a beagle puppy for struggling during his torture, and a
monkey on a Huntingdon Life Sciences' operating table raising her
head with her chest cut wide open. We hope these are aberrations
but daily life in laboratories is inhumane. Millions of animals
live in tiny cages, taken out only to be stuck with needles, cut
up, or fed poison or the latest drug.
In contrast to Vlasak, many animal rights leaders have said we
should look to the tactics of Gandhi and King. But if, during their
eras, Indians or African-Americans had been slaughtered by the millions
per year, would we have condemned threats of violence and called
for peaceful protest? Such calls from animal protectionists suggest
that the laws are worth more to them than the lives of those they
have vowed to protect.
Some would argue that we should consider the human lives scientists
might save. Then what of scientists who don't save lives but do
terminal experiments on primates, testing illegal drugs or investigating
premenstrual syndrome? Do such arguments suggest the jury is still
out on violence against them?
If we invoke a leader, at this point it must be John F Kennedy,
who said: "Those who make peaceful revolution impossible make
violent revolution inevitable." Nobody sane wants violent revolution.
But the scientific testing system needs a revolutionary overhaul.
The government should be ashamed that its unquestioning support
for a corrupt system has let the situation come to this. Threats
of violence against humans should not be the only way to get the
profligate violence in our laboratories discussed either in parliament
or in the world's leading newspapers.
Karen Dawn is a contributor to the book Terrorists or Freedom Fighters:
Reflections on the Liberation of Animals and runs www.DawnWatch.com.
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