Marxist Animalism
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“Until one has loved an animal a part of one’s soul remains unawakened.”
Anatole France.
Deleted.
“Until one has loved an animal a part of one’s soul remains unawakened.”
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Yes, I’ve had a few clients with that particular problem as well. One was known by the nickname “porky” locally, and it wasn’t because he was fat! 🙁
Obviously the source is biased but posted for the alternative view.
https://www.fwi.co.uk/news/fw-opinion-8-reasons-why-becoming-vegan-is-the-wrong-choice
Bijou, attempting to trivialise other people’s feelings?
Not worthy of a socialist.
Bijou, attempting to trivialise other people’s feelings?
Not worthy of a socialist.
I would tell you to go and stick your head up a dead bear’s arse, but I presume that would breach your moralising, self developed code of socialist behaviour, so I won’t tell you to go and stick your head up a dead bear’s arse. So just to be absolutely clear I am definitely not telling you to go and stick your head up a dead bear’s arse.
Very profound, Bijou.
Capitalism and animals today.
In previous stages of class society, animals were the main form of wealth and sometimes of exchange. Capitalism’s subsequent development was dependent on primitive accumulation, and in many parts of the world it was the rewards of the economic exploitation of animals that provided the incentive to clear people from the land. In early capitalism, animals still provided the main means of transport and were absolutely central to the economy.
Today capital has diversified and the animal industry is one among many. Some would no doubt argue that capital has no imperative to exploit animals, and that a consistently ‘cruelty free’ capitalism is a possibility. Indeed this view seems to be shared both by pro-capitalist advocates of market forces liberating animals (through consumer boycotts), and by anarchists and communists for whom this is ‘proof’ that opposition to animal exploitation offers no threat to capitalism.
Of course it is possible to imagine a theoretical model of capitalism that does not depend on animals, but this is to confuse an abstraction with the actually existing capitalism that has emerged as a result of real historical processes. Similarly we could imagine a capitalism without racism or women’s oppression, yet both of these have played a crucial role in maintaining capital’s domination and continue to exist despite superficial changes to the contrary.
It would be a mistake to think that the exploitation of animals is now only of marginal concern to capital. The companies involved in funding animal experiments are some of the world’s largest multinationals.
Agri-business is becoming increasingly capitalised. In the past capital was largely invested in the manufacture and retail of products made from animals reared by relatively independent farmers. Today, farmers are going out of business as larger companies take over every stage of the animal industry.
For instance, one company, the Grampian Country Food Group supplies one-third of UK chickens to eat (200 million a year). Direct corporate involvement in farming will be accelerated as capital expands its new biotechnological frontier.
The animal industry continues to dominate land use in many parts of the world. In Britain 80% of agricultural land is used directly or indirectly for meat and dairy production (Spencer). In many parts of the ‘Third World’, food production is dominated by the growth of cereals to sell for animal feed in the West rather than to meet local needs. Animals in factory farms produced huge amounts of waste, with frequent incidents of pollution of water and land.In Marxist terms, meat production represents the destruction of use-value to increase exchange-value. Food that could be used to feed people is instead fed to animals in order to increase profit. Most of the energy and nutrition this provides is (from an economic point of view) wasted in keeping the cattle alive, rather than directly transferred into muscle. Ten acres of land will support 61 people on a diet of soya beans, 24 on wheat, 10 on maize but only 2 on meat from cattle. Cattle are thus used by capitalism as a form of fixed capital, consuming living and dead labour in order to produce a product (meat) containing increased surplus value.
McDonalds has become a totem of capitalist expansion, at the cutting edge of the development of low-waged, casualised work combined with the most advanced spectacular techniques of marketing. No part of the world is held to be completely subordinated to the global market until a McDonalds has opened there.
The continuing enclosure of space, marked by deforestation and dispossession is as dependent on the animal industry as the earlier stages of primitive accumulation. Forests are still being cleared for animal grazing or to grow animal feed, peasants cleared from the land to make way for international agri-business. The dynamic of capitalism is towards more control over all life, human or animal. If things move in the opposite direction it will only be because capital has been forced to take a different turn or be abolished altogether.
“Marxist political economy adopted the enlightenment project of the domination of nature in its entirety with the natural world being perceived as an unlimited raw material for industrial progress.
Faced with the disastrous ecological consequences of industrial development on the one hand, and the challenge of radical ecological groups on the other, some communists have begun to criticise this model.
But few of them have been prepared to extend this critique to the notion of human beings as the only creatures worthy of consideration.”
These extracts have been taken from the anonymous Beasts of Burden pamphlet.
Btw, i’ve relayed, Bijou, your vulgar retort to the beautiful quote of Anatole France to my friends as an example of my Marxist forum experience when the subject is nonhuman animals.
The rightwing populist media enjoy targeting Asians for eating wild-life animals and spreading diseases. Here is another report
A restaurant in Albania is offering diners meat from illegally hunted bears – part of an illicit trade in wildlife that is “out of control” in the country, investigators claim. Researchers said it was the first time they had seen bear meat cooked in Europe, and experts warned that the crude butchering of animals may lead to outbreaks of zoonotic diseases such as coronavirus.
Btw, i’ve relayed, Bijou, your vulgar retort to the beautiful quote of Anatole France to my friends as an example of my Marxist forum experience when the subject is nonhuman animals.
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Which translates as “I’ve told the teacher on you!”.
I think you would find you had better responses to your point of view if you tried a less sanctimonious, holier than thou and humourless approach to your postings. As my mother used to say, “you’ll catch more flies with sugar than you will with vinegar, son”
Your vulgar retort was to a beautiful quote by Anatole France.
Am I supposed to honour that?
It simply shows you up. Not me.
Well that’s another contributer to your thread you have lost due to your humourless, self righteous attitude.
Self-righteousnessSelf-righteousness is a feeling or display of moral superiority derived from a sense that one’s beliefs, actions, or affiliations are of greater virtue than those of the average person. Self-righteous individuals are often intolerant of the opinions and behaviours of others.In contrastFrom the Cambridge dictionary:Vulgar:not in the style preferred by the upper classes of society😈If I made fun of poetry about human love and friendship, or trivialised human death and suffering, you lot would rightfully be indignant. Yet we “animalists” have to put up with ridicule every day.
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