The Best and the Good Enough: Abolitionists, Welfarists and the agonizing quarrel over the Humane Farms Initiative

The initial polling looks good for Proposition 2 here in California, the Humane Farms Initiative. Backed by a coalition of animal welfare, veterinary, and family farming groups, the proposition is modeled on initiatives already successfully passed in New Jersey, Florida, Colorado, and Arizona. It’s just about the simplest initiative in town, requiring that every farm animal in California be allowed the freedom to stand up, turn around, and spread its wings (or other limbs.) Implementation will not be required for nearly seven years, until 2015. The proposition is endorsed by the Humane Society of the United States, most of the leading veterinary groups in the state, and a variety of small family farms that struggle to compete with the heavily mechanized agricultural behemoths (the ones, of course, who use the harshest confinement practices.)

The proposition has attracted bi-partisan support. No one would call congressmen Elton Gallegly (R-Ventura) and John Campbell (R-Orange County) liberals; both have written to their colleagues asking for congressional backing for Proposition 2. (See PDF here). Gallegly in particular represents a district with a heavy agricultural presence, making his support all the more noteworthy. The primary public opposition comes, of course, from the biggest of the agricultural producers, along with a loud minority of veterinarians who insist that current confinement practices (in which veal calves cannot stand up, and chickens in battery cages cannot spread their wings) are humane. But there are others, normally on the opposite side of the issue from Big Ag, who are also strongly against Prop 2.

My wife and I have donated to the Yes on 2 campaign; indeed, we’ve given more to this cause than to any other initiative that has ever appeared on the ballot. But though I have given money and time to the Yes on 2 cause, I will admit that I am, in some ways, ambivalent about the measure.

I am a vegan, of course, and am committed to animal rights. As some folks are aware, there’s an often-misunderstood distinction between animal rights and animal welfare groups. The animal welfare groups (the Humane Society, the ASPCA, and many other centrist organizations with broad appeal) are concerned with improving conditions for farm animals and pets. Animal welfarists don’t question the right of human beings to raise animals for food or to kill animals as part of industrial agriculture; they simply work to ensure that the quality of life for both farm and companion animals is of reasonably high quality. Animal welfarists may or may not be vegan; indeed, most animal welfarists do consume some kind of animal product on a regular basis. The focus of animal welfare work is improving conditions for farm animals — not dismantling animal agriculture. Animal welfarists accept that humans have the right to raise, hunt, slaughter and consume other living things. They wish only to make sure that the raising, hunting, and slaughtering are done in a way to minimize pain and suffering to the animals involved.

Animal rights advocates are just that. Animal rights advocates believe that animals have rights, and that those rights are inalienable. They are not granted by humans as a result of our good will or our prosperity. Indeed, most animal rights philosophy stresses that rights are rooted in sentience and the capacity to feel pain and pleasure. Some animal rights thinkers are reluctant to give animals full and equal status with humans, while others are convinced that animals are intrinsically as valuable and “rights-endowed” as people. (Leading animal rights thinkers include Peter Singer, Stephen Best, and my own favorite, Rutgers University philosophy professor Gary Francione.) Virtually all animal rights advocates are vegan, and indeed veganism is the way in which animal rights is made both radically personal and deeply practical. (I like to call veganism “incarnational compassion”.) Animal rights advocates are often called abolitionists, because they want to abolish the use of animals in medical research and in farming.

From an animal rights perspective, then, welfarist reforms like Proposition 2 are problematic. On the one hand, there’s no question that it is better for an individual calf to be able to get up and move around than to be chained in place. It is better that a hen be in a cage big enough to spread her wings than to be in a cage so small that she can never do so. No one disputes that. But from an abolitionist perspective, the problem with welfarist reforms is that they allow those who eat meat (or dairy and egg products) to alleviate their guilt. As long as the cows are “happy”, as long as the chickens can cluck and socialize, those who might otherwise be morally compelled to veganism (the ultimate abolitionist goal) can consume animals and their secretions in good conscience. Indeed, some abolitionists (like Francione) are ardently opposed to Proposition 2 for this very reason. It’s not only Big Ag that stands in opposition to what is, by all accounts, a moderate reform; the Humane Farms Initiative is also opposed by those who see the whole notion of a “humane farm” as a cruel oxymoron. Anything that gives moral cover to the practice of raising and killing animals for human pleasure ought to be rejected. Gary Francione writes:

Creative, nonviolent vegan education is the best way to reduce animal suffering and death in the short term and in the long term. Increased veganism is the only means to achieve the abolition of animal exploitation. Efforts like Proposition 2, which make the consumption of animals more acceptable, will only reinforce speciesism and the notion that it is morally acceptable to consume nonhumans as long as we do so “humanely.”

Animals advocates should not vote for Proposition 2.

It was agonizing for me to read that.

For me, veganism is not a lifestyle choice. It is a moral imperative. Like Francione, I want the farming industry gone. I want a world in which we gradually reduce the population of farm animals through natural death. (Most farm animals are born as the result of brutal forced matings or inseminations, not “natural” intercourse.) My dream is a world where the eating of meat is unthinkable, and where the arguments in favor of keeping animals for our use is seen as morally reprehensible, on par with the arguments of two centuries ago offered in defense of slavery. I share the abolitionist goal, and though I do not support violence to achieve this goal, understand completely how some in our community feel compelled, like John Brown in 1859, to turn to force.

And in the end, I will vote yes on Proposition 2. Slavery was ended in this country by a combination of violence (the Harper’s Ferry insurrection and the Civil War); economic changes; and a growing sense that human ownership of other humans was immoral. The slaves were freed by a grand coalition of the violent and the non-violent alike. Nat Turner’s bloody revolt brought freedom closer, as did Olaudah Equiano’s eloquent narratives. Those who worked only to ameliorate conditions rather than ending involuntary servitude entirely did not delay final emancipation; indeed, they helped turn hearts and minds against the terrible system. At the same time, final emancipation, when it came, came with bloodshed too. We need our John Browns and our Grimke Sisters; our Nat Turners and our Harriet Tubmans. This is not my way of endorsing the killing of those who slaughter animals; consider it a tacit acknowledgment that all successful justice movements have their radicals and their moderates, those who embrace violence and those who abhor it.

The movement for animals can proceed on multiple tracks. Moderate welfare reforms can and will bring about real improvements for animals. Do I want every human who can become vegan to become vegan? Of course. But I also know that that day is a long way off, and I know that I may not see the end of the slaughter in my lifetime. So I’m willing to work with those for whom veganism (or even vegetarianism, its half-way house cousin) is a bridge too far. If they’re not ready to see animals as endowed with rights, perhaps they can at least be convinced that all sentient creatures — particularly those, like farm animals, who are directly under our control — are entitled to a life made as comfortable and dignified as possible. And entitled, yes, to a death that is free from pain and fear.

My abolitionist side warns me that the “good is often the enemy of the best”. Folks like Francione and Best, whom I admire deeply, inspire me to push harder for radical social change. But I’m not willing to let the “best be the enemy of the good.” The goal is to stop the slaughter, but until we win that final victory, we have a chance to make real improvements. Successful wars are made up of both decisive battles and slow incremental victories, as well as occasional heartbreaking defeats. Proposition 2 is not perfect, and it does nothing directly to end the imprisonment and slaughter of farm animals. But it will bring about tangible benefits that can and will transform the lives of millions of our fellow living beings. That’s too important an opportunity to pass up.

Join me, please, in voting yes on Proposition 2.