Tag Archives: reproductive justice

reflections

Pro-choice is not anti-vegan

I submitted the below piece to the bimonthly zine, Sister Species Solidarity. I had never heard of the zine before, but it’s now on my feminist/animal liberationist reading list and I eagerly await the next issue. Creating knowledge and discussion outside of the realm of academia is important work, and I’m glad that the editors prioritize the voices of women and people targeted by sexism. There’s no pandering to male allies for the sake of “diversity and inclusion.” This issue’s theme was Bodily Autonomy, so I wrote about reproductive justice and abortion access. Enjoy! 

People often ask me, why are you pro-choice? (They will often ask me why I am pro-abortion, and why I care so much more about the lives of chickens, pigs, and cows than unborn humans.) They say that they are pro “all” life, that they don’t think terminating a fetus can possibly be consistent with vegan ethics of causing least harm.

First of all, I’m not pro-abortion. I’m pro-choice, which is an entirely separate framing of reproductive justice. If someone wants to carry a pregnancy to term, they should be able to do so. Every sentient being should be trusted to decide for themself when is the right time to start and build a family, and which kind of family they want to build. Single parents, teen parents, low-income parents, disabled parents, queer/trans parents, parents of color, etc. need support and resources that suit their families’ needs, not shaming.

The difference between a human uterus haver* and a hen is that the human can consent to having a fetus removed (one who is seeking an abortion is specifically asking for that), whereas the hen (lacking the ability to communicate with us humans) can’t consent to having her egg taken. The human and the hen both deserve the right to bodily autonomy and self-governance. Eggs aren’t just “lying around” – if you crack an egg open for a hen they will gobble it right up.

If you want to reduce abortion rates, which is a noble endeavor, the way to do that is comprehensive sexual education, accessible and affordable birth control and sexual health services, and resources and support such as parental leave and childcare support so that people feel like parenting is a feasible choice for them. Forcing a person to carry a child to term and then to keep that kiddo or give them up for adoption doesn’t sound like respecting someone’s bodily autonomy to me.

Also, it would be super if we could talk about not eating the bodies and secretions of other animals without being misogynist toward humans. Eating eggs (for instance) is wrong because taking something that belongs to someone else without their consent is wrong, not because women and periods (and therefore eggs) are gross.

*I am using the clunky phrase “uterus-haver” rather than “woman” because not all women have uteruses (think of trans women, or women who have had a hysterectomy) and not all people who have uteruses are women even though they may still be able to become pregnant (think of trans men or genderqueer or nonbinary female-assigned people.) Access to family planning care and abortions when needed is a reproductive justice issue for people of all genders.

**I will acknowledge one hole in my argument for reproductive justice. I do support spay/neuter programs for domesticated animals. I think it just to ask the question of why I would, when I absolutely oppose the control of reproduction for any human who is capable of consenting to their own reproductive decisions. The compromise with spay/neuter programs for domesticated animals is because we live in a world that is violent to nonhumans and that has exploited them at every turn for millenia. I believe that nonhuman animals are here for their own purposes and do not exist for us to use. At the same time, I wish to avoid causing them harm to the greatest extent that I can. I believe that on the grand scheme of things, not spaying/neutering animals (e.g. dogs and cats) will cause them to reproduce with one another which will ultimately cause more violence to their offspring in this speciesist society.

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reflections

Not a Pretty Picture: Pinup Slaughter

I love pinup, and I love when women celebrate one another’s beauty by dressing up in vintage styles for creative photoshoots.

I do not love animal slaughter, not even a little bit. I do not love that the real-life Portland area “humane” chicken slaughtering operation Marion Acres invites women in pinup over once a year for their “Ladies’ Chicken Harvest” as if the brutality of slaughter could be masked by the presence of a few attractive women in dresses and red lipstick. “Harvest” meant something along the lines of “gathering crops,” not ending the lives of sentient ambulatory beings, last time I checked.

Picture pilfered from the Modern Farmer article.

Some of the women talked about knowing where their food comes from as if that knowledge is mutually incompatible with learning, harvesting and eating vegetables. I would like to remind them kind treatment of chickens during life (and how kindly were they treated, anyway?) does not justify raising them for food at all, or make their deaths any kinder.

My veganism is deeply, deeply, connected to my feminism, and my feminism is grounded in the belief that all beings, human or nonhuman, should be able to live lives free from violence and full of joy shared with their loved ones. How could I call for my liberation, as a queer person, a female-assigned nonbinary person and a person of color, while simultaneously sanctioning the imprisonment and eventual slaughter of other critters? How could I defend my choice not to reproduce but manipulate other beings’ reproduction in order to feed myself? I find it disappointing that these women would uncritically and proudly adopt violent practices in an attempt to gain some of the power of masculinity. I wonder what it would look like for women/feminine people/queers to reject the most problematic aspects of patriarchy and violent masculinity to form a resilient, independent way of providing for ourselves and our families? I would love to see us providing for one another in a way that didn’t harm anyone, and to see partners to equitably share responsibilities of nourishing and caring for families and one another.

P.S. One thing that I am still grappling with, by the way, is how my unwavering support of spay-neuter programs fits in with a reproductive justice, anti-speciesist and anti-oppression framework. I think that it has to do with the fact that spay-neuter is a key part of a no-kill advocacy framework, which I believe fits in very well with a vegan ethic. No-cost and low-cost spay/neuter programs reduce the number of animals entering the shelter system, allowing more resources to be allocated toward saving lives. In the human realm, I believe that affordable and accessible and voluntary birth control and abortion are critical to ensuring reproductive justice for all: “when all people have the social, political and economic power and resources to make healthy decisions about our gender, bodies, sexuality, and families.” Of course, there is a long and ugly history of compulsory sterilization in marginalized communities, particularly with transgender people and people of color, but the obvious difference between human and non-human animals is that humans can consent to or refuse procedures, so they should always be given that choice. I’m still thinking about this, though!

P.P.S. (ETA) Originally I had use the world “femme” to describe the feminine women who participated in this slaughter and the associated photoshoot. I write this from a queer femme perspective, but the women who came to the so-called harvest were heterosexual cisgender women and so using femme (a term specific to LGBTQ community) to describe them was inaccurate and appropriative, so apologies about that. For more about how femininity and women are used to sell meat, check out The Sexual Politics of Meat by Carol J. Adams. 

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