The beginnings of Animal Liberation - July 2011

The Beginnings of Animal Liberation

The first meeting of Animal Liberation in Australia was held at the Total Environment Centre, in The Rocks, on 7 December 1976. The meeting was a result of a conversation which I had with Milo Dunphy, Director of the TEC, after reading Peter Singer’s Animal Liberation. I bemoaned the fact that there was no organisation in Australia which opposed factory farming, including the RSPCA, and Milo offered to make the facilities of the TEC available so that I could form a committee to campaign against intensive livestock production. At the first meeting only six people were present. We resolved to call the new organisation Animal Liberation, and to write to Peter Singer to ask him to become patron.

A major campaign was undertaken to inform the public about the way in which eggs were produced, broilers were grown and killed, and pigs were reared and slaughtered. This was successful inasmuch as public ignorance concerning the factory farming of animals was dispelled, and it became public knowledge that factory farming was a cruel and environmentally destructive method of producing food animals.

In 1979 through the Animal Societies Federation (NSW) which Animal Liberation(NSW) was instrumental in forming, Animal Liberation agitated for formation of a NSW Animal Welfare Advisory Council to which an Animal Liberation representative was appointed. Animal Liberation NSW) was also instrumental in starting the Australian Federation of Animal Societies (now called Animals Australia). The first meeting was arranged by Peter Singer and myself at Monash University in 1980, and at that meting it was resolved to form the Federation, which has expanded in influence as the years have passed. Animal Liberation (NSW) was instrumental in encouraging and assisting the Australian Democrats to draw up an Animal Welfare Policy.

Within a few years Animal Liberation had attracted a number of talented and skilled professionals who dedicated their spare time to the organisation. Animal Liberation branches had started in all States and territories of Australia. Although it was stressful being vilified by the rural community, there was a feeling of camaraderie and fun – some of the committee formed the Flying Zucchini Circus (these included Ron Bradford, Suzi Krawczyk, Peg Ryan, Lyn Carson, Brian Slapp, Jo Thirsk, Janice Connolly and Janice Raynor. The Flying Zucchini circus troupe was a hit at many of the early demonstrations, having been trained in the skills of acrobatics and even fire-eating. We employed Genny Young to work for Animal Liberation two days per week, and opened a small office in a lane behind Broadway. Sharon Watson (a psychologist) and Ray Kidd, a bikie in leathers who confessed to being a former hunter, were also huge contributors to the committee in those days. Ray recalls the day when, at one of the early committee meetings, with six in attendance, we opened a rural newspaper to read ‘The well-oiled Animal Liberation machine swung into action’. If only the rural community had known that the Animal Liberation contingency was so small and poorly funded, perhaps they would not have been so anxious about our lobbying power.

We had many early difficulties. I well remember at one early committee meeting, Genny pointed out that we desperately needed a golf-ball typewriter. The late Elsie Quinn was present at the meeting as we deliberated whether to purchase this costly ($250) item of equipment, and she offered to pay for it. Later she told us that she had no idea how she was going to find the money, but that night she went to the club and won it on the pokies. On another occasion Genny rang me to explain that there was absolutely no money left in the bank account, and she did not know what to do. I was not very helpful with suggestions, but later she rang to explain a man had walked into the office and given a donation of id="mce_marker"0,000 in cash. When she had asked to whom she should address the receipt, he just answered, ‘call me Robin Hood.’

In 1985 Animal Liberation (NSW) finally reached an agreement with the NSW Egg Corporation, the chairman of which agreed to identify free range eggs so that finally consumers would be able to chose whether they wanted to buy caged or free range eggs. In 1986, Pulling the Wool exposing the cruelty of the Australian wool industry, brought to public attention the stock mutilation called mulesing, and in 1986 Animal Liberation (NSW), through ANZFAS, was instrumental in bringing about a Senate Select Inquiry into animal welfare in Australia. In 1986 an Animal Liberation representative (myself) visited various MP's in London and requested them to introduce a ban on the import of Australian wool to the UK. Although unsuccessful, this attempt created a storm in the media and thus helped raise awareness of the cruelty of the Australian wool industry and in particular, mulesing. At the time I was on a CSIRO advisory committee. The National Farmers Federation agitated to have me removed due to my ‘unAustralian’ behaviour. Although the CSIRO did not request my removal, I resigned.

Also in 1986 an Animal Liberation representative (myself) visited Bahrain and Kuwait at the invitation of the Australian Government to inspect the slaughter facilities for Australian sheep, thus, together with many demonstrations at ship loading points, raising public awareness of this issue. Many demonstrations were held down at the dockyards, outside Parliament House in Canberra, outside the Royal Easter Show, Parliament House in Sydney, and other venues, such as circuses.

Since these early beginnings Animal Liberation has continued to grow in influence and effectiveness. The skill and abilities of the current membership and board have meant that the nature of the debate about cruelty on the farm has shifted. Previously there was a need to vigorously argue the case that animals suffered in intensive conditions, that most stock operations were cruel, and that vegans were not crack-pots. Due to the effectiveness of the people involved with Animal Liberation today, the whole climate of opinion is changing. Once it would never have been possible to have the cruelty of slaughter conditions in Indonesia shown on television. Even if it had been shown, it is unlikely that it would have caused such public outrage. Animal rights is entering a new era of respectability.

Not only are public attitudes changing, but, equally importantly, a new philosophy is emerging in which it is recognized that animals and the natural world have rights, and that these rights must be addressed through the law and the courts. Recently, a lecturer at UWS, Dr John Hadley, pointed out that the call for extending guardianship is needed. Guardianship is the management of property by a person or trust on behalf of a mentally incompetent person, and John Hadley argues that this right must be extended to animals or the environment. This trend has been gathering momentum in philosophical and legal circles since the early 1970s and is needed (Want to stop loss of biodiversity: give animals property rights) Another example is that recently, the Austrian parliament passed a law requiring each province to appoint an “animal solicitor” to advocate on behalf of animals in court proceedings.

PERSONAL SUFFERING – COLLATORAL DAMAGE

Many of those who have worked for the needs and interests of animals have done so at a personal cost. The sadness of learning the truth about animal suffering and human cruelty is sometimes overwhelming. It would be easy to become a misanthropist, discouraged by human ignorance and cruelty and by the fact that over 140 billion animals are slaughtered worldwide for food every year, in the egg, dairy and meat industries alone. It is easy to feel furious because even one’s friends believe that because meat was once eaten by humans, it is ‘natural’ and therefore should continue to be eaten. This naturalistic fallacy is often used to justify an act on the grounds that it is ‘natural’. Cannibalism was natural once too, but few people would argue it is acceptable today.

Only by believing in the vision of a new world of mercy, understanding and compassion will we be able to find solace. In that fulfilled and contented world to come, humans will be able to walk through the forest, no longer feared by the wild creatures, because there are no longer hunters impingeing upon one’s right to relate to the wild creatures. There will be small-scale, ecological agriculture in which there is no slaughter, but instead a symbiotic relationship. The cities will be full of spaces where animals can live side by side with humans – possibly dwarf cattle, and other agricultural animals will become friends rather than commodities to eat. Birds will alight on our shoulders. Humans will sit in the shed with the cattle and find themselves cured of stress and distress. Dogs and horses will work with us, but there will be no exploitation, no cruelty, rather a mutual sharing and rejoicing in cross-species communication.

It will be a world of peace, because the relationship between humans and animals has been healed, because when the weapons of war against the animals are laid to rest, when the slaughterhouses close and the sports shooters throw away their guns and arrows, when this compassion and this cross species communication is restored to its perfection, then war between human and human and war between nation and nation will also be impossible. It will be impossible because when we have learnt to understand the animals, when we have learnt to listen to them, then we will listen to, and understand each other.

We need to believe that this new culture will come into being, and we need to envisage it, so that our thought-forms flood the world with the reality of the coming peace.

Those who campaign for the rights of animals are those who will bring about that new perfect beautiful world where there is always a creature, either wild or domestic, into whose soft fur we can bury our face, in whom we can find comfort if in grief, and with whom we can rejoice at the sacred mystery of cross species communication, where the love of creature for creature, comes into fruition. Every letter one writes, every demonstration one attends, every word one speaks, will have its effect, its repercussions, its threads of promise. In visualising that world, in believing in that world, in upholding our right to see that world, we are bringing it to fruition.

In every mind of every person who loves the creatures, who has given their time, their energy, their determination to fight for a better world for them, lies this unrecognised store of hopefulness, of expectation, of belief in a future perfection of relationship. Let us open this packet of hope, this vision of future perfection, and allow it to reign supreme.

That ultimate perfection is perhaps a perfection so perfect, that we are too afraid to open that secured cache, to afraid to dare to hope. So let us believe in that world, and know that all we are doing, all we are achieving, will make the present suffering a bad dream of the past.

Christine Townend.