Animal Rights- the new wedge issue?
There’s a video circulating the interblags at the moment in which Tucker Carlson, everyone’s favorite love-to-hate conservative pundit, somberly declares that Michael Vick “should have been executed” for his previous life as a dog-killing enthusiast. It’s been chuckled at politely, and filed away as yet another entry in the “right-wingers sure say a lot of extremist nonsense these days” bin. But I see it as something more.
If there is one issue that has the potential to badly divide the Republican Party sometime in the near future, I’m convinced it’s the cause of animal rights.
There is, after all, no mainstream consensus as to what is the properly “conservative” line to take in regards to animals. I think it stems from the fact that animals exist in this sort of hazy middle ground between the Republicans’ two favorite things: property and life, and their approach to dealing with one is very different than their attitude towards the other.
So you have some folks on the right, like Tucker, who take the position that the lives of dogs and cats and horses are just as sacrosanct as human ones, and therefore any wilful slaughter or abuse of them is a vile crime basically equivalent to murder or torture. Respect for God’s creatures is just basic Christian decency, they say.
Then you have the more cool-blooded right-wingers on the other side, who argue that while animals may be cuddly and jolly, they’re still ultimately things that are bred and kept for the pleasure of man. It’s thus no terrible crime to trade, kill, or abuse them in the pursuit of some more important human need, be it food, profit, science, or whatever else. Indeed, since the right to freely obtain and trade things is one of the basic tenets of capitalism, any restraint on the right to own or use animal property in any way an individual sees fit is basically a blow against the free market itself.
The Human Society Legislative Fund is America’s largest animal rights lobby group, and, like any good lobby group, doles out scores to legislators based on recent Congressional votes relating to their cause. Though they seem like a fairly liberally-biased group (they consider votes on climate change and guns in parks to be “animal-related,” for instance), it’s still interesting to note that HSLF scores are not entirely lopsided towards the Democrats.
In the House of Representatives, which, according to the HSLF, considered 14 animal-related bills in the 111th Congress, 24 Republican congressmen won an animal rights approval score of over 50, with nine of those 24 earning scores of 70 or higher. Even when they failed, very few Republicans did abysmally poor, with only a handful of legislators scoring under 10, indicating that almost every Republican felt the need to vote in favor of at least a couple of animal rights initiatives (for many, it was the latest bill to ban the bizarre stepping-on-animals porn known as “crush videos” — almost no one in the GOP was opposed to that, despite the fact that the courts have repeatedly ruled such laws an unconstitutional ban on free expression).
Likewise, there’s no real correlation between how conservative a Republican is, and how likely he is to support pro-animal legislation. South Carolina Congressman Henry Brown, for example, earned both an 80 rating from the HSLF and a 91 lifetime rank from the American Conservative Union. Indeed, all but two of the nine most pro-animal Republicans hold a lifetime ACU score over 70.
Of course, when I say that there’s no correlation, that means that the opposite is just as likely to be true. Many very conservative Congressmen are also very anti-animal, including our old buddy Ron Paul (ACU lifetime score, 82; HSLF score, 7) and Minnesota’s Michelle Bachmann (ACU, 100; HSLF, 13).
What this suggests to me is that the Democrats could make great hay in this current, ultra polarized political climate, by pushing a lot of high-profile animal rights legislation in order to foment civil war among the opposition. Democratic politicians and the Democratic base rarely meet an animal rights bill they dislike, after all, since most animal rights laws tend to involve banning or regulating something. Republicans, however, can’t seem to agree if protecting animals from torture and slaughter is a justifiable act of Jesus-like compassion, or merely blasphemous, tree-hugging big government busybodying.
The “crush video” episode is actually an excellent example of this in practice; the bill that Congress passed was quite brazenly unconstitutional in its contempt for the First Amendment, yet was still able to quickly secure a majority of Republican support due to the intensely emotional, personal reaction many GOP legislators have to anything involving animal cruelty. Though we may all agree that outlawing the torture of animals for sexual pleasure is a practice hideous enough to justify subverting the Constitution and expanding the powers of government, precisely how much of this sort of thing would the Tea Party be willing to tolerate? Should we ban photos of tortured animals next? Or how about the super-gross pictures of cut-up puppies they use in veterinarian textbooks?
Or Bill HR 1326, an act to prevent laboratory experiments on chimpanzees — currently being considered in a House committee? Or the long-running effort to prevent the slaughter and sale of horse meat?
I’m not in any rush to see the Republicans fail any more than I am in any hurry to see the Dems succeed. But in an era where we are hearing ever-more self-righteous claims of ideological purity on the right, I think it might be nice if everyone could be politely reminded that not all issues fit into a neat little “right or left, government or freedom” dichotomy.
December 30th, 2010 at 12:52 am
Three people (all Republicans, to my shame-by-association) voted against the crush video ban: Paul Broun and Tom Graves of Georgia, and famed Texas libertarian Ron Paul. Paul explained his vote with his expectation that the bill will be found unconstitutional. http://exm.nr/c571yw Broun defended his vote with the claim that animal cruelty laws should be a state issue. http://bit.ly/gnn7y1 I wonder what Tom Graves' rationale is. In any case, issues of sexual gratification from animal rights abuses seem to separate the hardcore right-wing libertarians from mainstream ("sane") legislators. (See how I distanced myself there?) I'd expect bestiality in which the animal is unharmed to be more of a left-wing libertarian weakness, since it opposes traditional morality but doesn't physically harm anyone. (And now I've bashed liberals, thus reuniting Republicans on our common ground.)
The name "Humane Methods Of Slaughter Act" is ridiculous. Does anyone, even among hunters, ranchers, and butchers, imagine slaughter to be even potentially humane? Sure, it's not inhumane to the omnivore mind to get food from an animal, but merely lacking an element of torture in the killing is insufficient to warrant the label "humane." I say that as one with a delicious-looking elk steak in his freezer. (Elk tastes like lean beef, except the scent and flavor are stronger. Makes fantastic jerky.)
December 30th, 2010 at 3:39 pm
Concerning animals I find much of the conversation to be highly illogical. I think this is more a feature of the emotion people pour into the conceptual place that animals hold than it is a problem necessarily. How people interact with and formulate animal relations is characteristically irrational, it's illogical but that observation is itself not sufficient to dismiss the underlying issues.
When you get into the moral basis for being a vegetarian it seems to me, as an outsider, to be hopelessly obtuse. You'll have the vegetarians clothed beneath a neo-liberal interpretation of efficiency where vegetarian diets are more humanitarian because they strain the earth's resources in way more equitably than meat. Then you'll have the "bleeding-heart" vegetarians who get bent out of shape with the violation of divinity for all life. The moral form of the former is much more directed and linear than the latter because I when logically deduce what properties of plant life are okay to extinguish that are sacred in animals you're not really talking about spark of existence anymore but of factors of personality or individualized agency. No one gets weepy over moss but if you're talking about this logically, why not? I think it's precisely because we're talking about the mysterious genesis of emotion that makes "logic" a too high of standard to hold a fully matured ideology like the modern conservative party too for an issue like animal rights.
This issue, to ever appear in mainstream politics, would HAVE to be forced. Whatever your warboard looks like, dotted with however many army figurines and troop movements, I feel like the public fight would never be taken seriously. Or if it was, it would be given legitimacy in such a way the expedites its own death, collapsing into a grave of its own design as no one has the stamina to listen to animal rights debate getting dragged out to much length. Its almost similar to drug legalization where no matter how soberly discussed seems to be the conversation that has to wears socks under its sandals.
January 1st, 2011 at 2:29 pm
It'll be kind of interesting if these niche 'animal-rights' issues get any bigger in Canada but personally I think its bit of a flash in the pan and the Canadian public has more important things to worry about.
That said I think food issues (of which animals play a crucial part) will only get bigger as people began to realize how unsustainable our food production and distribution system is. This is an issue that has appeared on the political radar very recently with a major party (the NDP) even doing a nationwide study/consultation on food sovergnity. Despite being run by urban elites, the Conservative Party will have to be next to seriously investigate the issue considering that they (like the NDP) depend on rural ridings.
A positive side is the recent Tory by-election win of "right-wing environmentalist" Robert Sopuck who been suggested as an Environment Minister despite his neophyte status. He is a biologist who grows and hunts as much of his food himself in a sustainable manner.
I think meat consumption will have to decrease if we want to make our food system more sustainable. Since we eat far more meat then is healthy; this (in theory) should not be too difficult. I went from eating meat 3-4 times a day to being a vegetarian so anybody can do it. Although I've also taken up hunting and fishing in order to decrease my reliance on the mainstream food system but there is a very long way to go.
I think animal-rights activists will be the most effective if instead of animal porn videos they focus on a sustainable food system which will require decreased meat consumption and a decrease of massive industrial animal harvesting with the associated environmental and human health problems.
January 3rd, 2011 at 8:39 am
I strongly disagree with your conclusion that the crush pornography prohibition was "brazenly unconstitutional." The first amendment has always been understood to protect only free speech, and not action (with some limited exceptions for "symbolic speech" like flag burning). Just as you can't burn down someone's house to make a political point and then seek refuge in the first amendment, pornographers likewise can't seek such a refuge when they kill animals. That said, the act still may be challenged in court, but it's by no means obviously unconstitutional (when the previous ban – whose defects the new act was designed to cure – came before the court, it was only overturned 5 to 4). While congressional Republicans are far from free of hypocrisy, I strongly doubt that any who voted for the act honestly believed that it in any way actually subverted the Constitution.
Secondly, I seriously doubt that animal rights is going to divide the Republicans in any meaningful way. While they may, as you skillfully show, disagree, it's just not an issue that many Republicans will ever get strongly worked up about either way (with very rare exceptions like the Tucker Carlson example you cite). They'll diverge in roll call votes, but they won't call each other traitors like they would over something like climate change, abortion, health care, or immigration. When even conservatives disagree on how to handle an issue, more likely you'll see an 'agree to disagree' attitude rather than serious division.
January 5th, 2011 at 4:08 pm
This also incorrectly assumes that modern politics are directed by "beliefs" and "convictions" and not as the trite series of public appearances of already well strategized careers.
January 14th, 2011 at 8:38 am
"Democratic politicians and the Democratic base rarely meet an animal rights bill they dislike, after all, since most animal rights laws tend to involve banning or regulating something. "
Replace that with "Democratic Politicians and their mothers turns penny trick on street corners" for the exact same amount of actual semantic content. You don't expect people to actually believe that (though you may expect them to nod approvingly). Hell, even you doubtlessly don't believe that. It may be a good point too make when preparing for a particularly polite pub fight, but it's not much of a one when trying to make a muddled point about ideological simplifications and their inability to actually process objective reality.
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So you have some folks on the right, like Tucker, who take the position that the lives of dogs and cats and horses are just as sacrosanct as human ones
I would like to correct your statement. It's not that Tucker Carlson believes animal life is equal to that of humans. It's because Tucker Carlson believes animal lives are equal to the lives of black people. Michael Vick has been punished and he has emerged in a positive life, ready to move on with his life. He can't take back what he has done, and it's time for people to move on.
Some of the people making comments like these don't get nearly as angry when police brutalize or kill "innocent" blacks.
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