Tags
animal rights, corridor ecology, endangered species, habitat preservation, habitat restoration, habitat: space and place, wildlife conservation, wildlife habitat
Individual of endangered leatherback sea turtle
In 2007, Minnesota’s Habitat Conservation Partnership announced it reserved “100,000 acres and counting” of wildlife habitat. What makes this project innovative is that these 100,000 acres are connected land, not isolated, checkered patches that often do more harm to wildlife than good. Organizations allied in this partnership line the website’s sidebar and share their excitement for this “milestone” event. These organizations include hunter advocacy groups like National Wild Turkey Federation, Pheasants Forever, and MN Deer Hunters Association. I had to wonder, where are the animal rights groups in all of this? Why weren’t they involved?
Where are the animal rights organizations that rally to promote habitat preservation, corridor ecology, and ecological restoration? Certainly they care as much about wildlife having space and food to live as hunters do. I looked up two active animal rights groups in Minnesota, Animal Rights Coalition and Compassionate Action for Animals, and it turns out, when it comes to habitat conservation, they don’t have a stance. They focus their efforts primarily on farmed animal advocacy and vegan outreach. While farmed animals need all the help they can get, just because wildlife aren’t “visible” in society, they live and dwell among humans nonetheless and are thus impacted by social, economic, and political forces.
You would think that habitat destruction is a topic animal rights activists would talk about regularly. But the concern is highly selective. It’s not just the palm oil industry that destroys habitat. It’s soy too, a common staple among vegans. It’s cane sugar, it’s chocolate, it’s bananas, it’s conventional coffee, it’s anything made from fossil fuels, which includes damn near everything we use in the West. The point I’m trying to make is that habitat is always an animal rights issue. We can’t feasibly demand animals’ necessities for life without talking about habitat.
But rather than join the efforts for habitat conservation and bring animal rights concerns to the table (as many human rights activists have done in the last decade with environmental conservation), we simply don’t discuss habitat loss at all, and when we do, it’s isolated and reserved for “charismatic, exotic” animal species like gibbons, elephants, and orcas. When I was a frustrated, confused student of natural resources and animal rights, I sought comfort from my mentor Allan Strong, an avian conservation ecologist and wildlife biology professor. To my dismay, he told me I could choose habitat concerns or animal rights, but not both. In his course “Conservation Biology,” he reminds a classroom majority of wildlife and fisheries biology and forestry students that conservation and animal rights do not mix. I feverishly disagreed with him at the time. It was preposterous, I thought, to assume that animal rights activists are not concerned with conservation issues and thus don’t have anything to offer. It’s conservationists, with their attachment to sport hunting culture, that drive the wedge between an otherwise suitable collaboration. Later did I learn that it wasn’t just conservationists driving the wedge.
The ongoing conflict between animal rights and animal welfare has left the animal rights movement even more isolated from the grand arena of addressing social and ecological problems. Programs and conferences, like Compassionate Conservation, are emerging around the world now to explore the common ground of animal welfare and wildlife conservation. Animal rights continue to be in the periphery of discussions concerning animals’ lives. And the push for vegan lifestyles across the board may perhaps be sealing the deal for animal rights concerns ever having a stake in ecological issues involving animals.
Can we bridge ecological reality with animal legal protection? Can animal rights ever become relevant to the ecological needs of animal species worldwide? People like Marc Bekoff and Gay Bradshaw are certainly out there trying to bridge the divide, but two persons are not enough. I’m challenging activists and scholars across North America working to secure civil protections for animals to become more ecologically literate. Hunters cannot be the only group with a voice concerning wildlife habitat. The need for space, place, and lifeways are necessary for all living beings; they are realities we cannot escape. What use are rights for sea turtles if they no longer have places to live?
I just do see it the same way.
Among many militant animal rights advocates the ELF is supported as strongly for preserving wilderness as the ALF is for rescuing animals. Earth First! as well often gets regarded highly for defending wilderness. Hunt Saboteurs are primarily concerned with wildlife defense as well as are the folks destroying hunting stands and trap lines. Then there are various groups involved in wild sea life protection, whether patrolling for poachers (enforcing habitat conservation) or sinking ships.
On the less militant side, vegans and animals rights folks TALK A LOT about general environmental and habitat protection. The palm oil debate is huge.
http://animalvoices.ca/2010/09/14/sumatran-orangutan-society/
Perhaps its the volume of vegan podcasts, blogs, message boards, and people I interact with but habitat protection is far from off the radar of most animal rights advocates, many i know make considerable lifestyle changes and efforts in order to lower their own impact on the world. http://animalvoices.ca/2010/09/14/sumatran-orangutan-society/
I think the issue is that you don’t see many animal rights (as opposed to welfare) groups allying with mainstream conservation organization because of strong differences of opinion. A major point of contention between animal rights folks and conventional conservationists is the acceptance of mass culling of animals for ecological purposes. If you noticed some of the sponsors of wildlife conservation are hunting organizations who do it because they have an interest in shooting wildlife, Im not surprised animal rights organization would not want to ally themselves with them. I really think this is one of the main issue in the divide.
Also I would like to point out Animal rights groups rarely make public stances against child slavery a part of their core platform. At a certain point political and social advocacy organization must have a focus, relying on other groups whose focus is child protection or forest defense, ect.
Thanks for taking the time to respond!
“I would like to point out Animal rights groups rarely make public stances against child slavery a part of their core platform. At a certain point political and social advocacy organization must have a focus, relying on other groups whose focus is child protection or forest defense, ect.”
I don’t know what you mean by this. Are you using this as an example to suggest that habitat loss and ecological degradation are not animal rights issues? If so, I strongly disagree.
“Perhaps its the volume of vegan podcasts, blogs, message boards, and people I interact with but habitat protection is far from off the radar of most animal rights advocates, many i know make considerable lifestyle changes and efforts in order to lower their own impact on the world.”
And perhaps it is because of my academic background in natural resources and of my inability to separate ecological matters from animal matters that my perspective on the importance of ecological literacy in the animal rights community is amplified. In my experience, I rarely see it beyond campaigns for charismatic exotic wild mammal and bird species. It would be nice to see more animal rights efforts (whether it’s nonviolent direct action, community organizing, or institutional change) that take interconnected approaches, looking to bring justice for animal communities, in addition to individual beings or species.
“A major point of contention between animal rights folks and conventional conservationists is the acceptance of mass culling of animals for ecological purposes. If you noticed some of the sponsors of wildlife conservation are hunting organizations who do it because they have an interest in shooting wildlife, Im not surprised animal rights organization would not want to ally themselves with them.”
And that is one of the reasons why I couldn’t take being a wildlife biology major in college. Now that I’ve graduated and gotten older, I can’t help but wonder how different wildlife management would look if more voices from animal rights were present with the ecological knowledge to work against culling. It would be an amazing feat, albeit difficult, given the USFWS historical and cultural roots.
Anastasia,
Excellent post, this is an issue I’ve been thinking about more & more. Like you, I always assumed it was the conservation community that was “driving the wedge” and I’m still not sure it isn’t — animal rights talks the language of ethics, and hard science tends to pride itself on being agnostic on ethical issues. I’m painting with a broad brush here, I’m not a scientist, so quite willing to be wrong. In any event, I would like to see more rightists in among the conservationists too. In fact, I think it’s becoming more and more essential to challenge the unabashedly anthropocentric focus of science, where animals’ lives are concerned.
Anyway, I know I’m a little late to the party here (your post was in July…), but this issue just came up on Animal Blawg, in the form of wildlife collaring (to track animals, ostensibly for the purposes of conservation). So you and Skeptical Vegan, who also raises excellent points, may want to join in the comment debate going on over there.
http://animalblawg.wordpress.com/2011/10/04/taking-the-wild-out-of-wildlife-and-putting-it-on-facebook/
Anyway, glad I found your blog. I’ll be reading along.