Speaking Up for Animals Quotes

“When pressed, hunters who claim that they just want “to be out in the wilderness,” will admit that the kill is essential—or at least the hope of a kill. As it turns out, there is no correlation between hunting and hiking, climbing, backpacking, kayaking, or any other outdoor activity. Hunters do not purposefully linger in the woods after a kill, but quickly begin the process of preparing to head home with the corpse. For hunters, the kill is the climax—the most important moment. They are not driving into the woods (or sometimes actually walking) for the sake of beauty, but in the hope of a kill.”
― Lisa Kemmerer, Speaking Up for Animals: An Anthology of Women's Voices

“You ultimately decide, every day, whether or not your life will speak on behalf of the oppressed, or remain an inaudible but decisive tool for the status quo.”
― Lisa Kemmerer, Speaking Up for Animals: An Anthology of Women's Voices

“The same patriarchy that oppresses women oppresses nonhuman animals. Farmed animals and “housewives,” “lab” animals and prostitutes, dancing bears and girls in the sex trade—all have too long been exploited by the same patriarchal hierarchy wherein the comparatively weak are exploited for the benefit of the powerful.”
― Lisa Kemmerer, Speaking Up for Animals: An Anthology of Women's Voices

“Animals who are exploited for “organic” foods are raised, maintained, transported, and slaughtered just like their nonorganic” counterparts: They are debeaked, dehorned, detoed, castrated, and/or branded, and they are kept, transported, and slaughtered in the same deplorable conditions.”
― Lisa Kemmerer, Speaking Up for Animals: An Anthology of Women's Voices

“Feminists have often highlighted the “otherness” of nonhuman animals while highlighting similarities between women and the men who hold power. Biologically speaking, any two humans will be
more similar than a human and any other species. But the position of most women in patriarchal societies is closer to that of chickens and cows than it is to that of the men who hold power.”
― Lisa Kemmerer, Speaking Up for Animals: An Anthology of Women's Voices

“There is no other industry as cruel and oppressive as factory farming. With regard to numbers affected, extent and length of suffering, and numbers of premature deaths, no other industry can even approach factory farming. Billions of individuals are exploited from genetically engineered birth, through excruciating confinement, to conveyor belt dismemberment. Consequently, there is no industry more appropriate for social justice activists to boycott.”
― Lisa Kemmerer, Speaking Up for Animals: An Anthology of Women's Voices

“Most consumers are unaware of the ongoing, intense suffering and billions of premature deaths that lurk behind mayonnaise and cream, cold cuts and egg sandwiches.”
― Lisa Kemmerer, Speaking Up for Animals: An Anthology of Women's Voices

“Both women and nonhuman animals have traditionally been viewed as property—"things” to be owned and controlled by those in power. While the plight of women is linked with that of nonhuman animals through a single system of oppression, through their comparative powerlessness and invisibility, and through sexual exploitation, it is important to elucidate these similarities through concrete examples. Links between women and nonhuman animals are nowhere more apparent than through the vulnerabilities of mothers and their young, and the control of pregnancies and offspring; this particular form of oppression is nowhere more blatant than on factory farms.”
― Lisa Kemmerer, Speaking Up for Animals: An Anthology of Women's Voices

“For most women (as for most men) links between sexism and speciesism are not readily apparent. We have been conditioned not to see exploitation. For example, men generally have no idea how patriarchy affects women—unless they go out of their way to learn. The same is true for women with regard to cows and pigs and chickens and turkeys.”
― Lisa Kemmerer, Speaking Up for Animals: An Anthology of Women's Voices

“The reproductive abilities of women and other female animals are controlled and exploited by those in power (usually men) and both are devalued as they age and wear out—when they no longer reproduce. Cows, hens, and women are routinely treated as if they were objects to be manipulated in order to satisfy the desires of powerful men, without regard to female's wishes or feelings.”
― Lisa Kemmerer, Speaking Up for Animals: An Anthology of Women's Voices

“The same patriarchy that oppresses women oppresses nonhuman animals. Farmed animals and “housewives,” “lab” animals and prostitutes, dancing bears and girls in the sex trade—all have too long been exploited by the same patriarchal hierarchy wherein the comparatively weak are exploited for the benefit of the powerful.

Those who are aware of history, of patriarchy and of the feminist movement, tend to understand how difficult it is—and how important—for people to rethink basic behaviors in order to bring about deep and lasting change. We must rethink how we speak, how we spend our time, and what we consume. This is as true for fighting sexism as it is for fighting speciesism—or any other form of domination, exploitation, and oppression. We must change our lives first, and most fundamentally. I hope that
readers working to improve the lives of girls and women . . . will realize that they can and must choose not to continue to exploit nonhuman animals while working to liberate girls and women.”
― Lisa Kemmerer, Speaking Up for Animals: An Anthology of Women's Voices

“Those who are willing to work for change, and make changes, too often do so only for the sake of their own liberation, without much thought to the oppression of others—especially other species. Feminists lobby against sex wage discrepancies, gays fight homophobic laws, and the physically challenged demand greater access—each fighting for injustices that affect their lives, and/or the lives of their loved ones. Yet these dedicated activists usually fail to make even a slight change in their consumer choices for the sake of other much more egregiously oppressed and exploited individuals. While it is important to fight for one’s own liberation, it is counterproductive (not to mention selfish and small minded) to fight for one’s own liberation while willfully continuing to oppress others who are yet lower on the rungs of hierarchy. While fighting for liberation, it makes no sense for feminists to trample on gays, for gays to trample on the physically challenged, or for the physically challenged to trample on feminists. It also makes no sense for any of these social justice activists to willfully exploit factory farmed animals. Can we not at least avoid exploiting and dominating others while working for our personal liberation? Those who seek greater justice—whatever their cause—must make choices that diminish the cruel exploitation of others. As a matter of consistency and solidarity, social justice activists must reject dairy products, eggs, and flesh.

There is no other industry as cruel and oppressive as factory farming. With regard to numbers affected, extent and length of suffering, and numbers of premature deaths, no other industry can even approach factory farming. Billions of individuals are exploited from genetically engineered birth, through excruciating confinement, to conveyor belt dismemberment. Consequently, there is no industry more appropriate for social justice activists to boycott. Even if we aren’t prepared to take a public stand, or take on another cause, we must at least make a private commitment on behalf of cows, pigs, and hens by leaving animal products on the shelf at the grocery store.”
― Lisa Kemmerer, Speaking Up for Animals: An Anthology of Women's Voices

“Organic” labels do nothing for a cow who is perpetually impregnated and milked, who loses her calf to the veal industry—or to protect her calf, who is sold at birth to the veal industry to be slaughtered. “Organic” products are designed to optimize human health and reduce environmental degradation. Those who invest in organic products are not making a choice that promotes the well-being of farmed animals.”
― Lisa Kemmerer, Speaking Up for Animals: An Anthology of Women's Voices

“Animals arrive at slaughter exhausted, thirsty, hungry, and terrified. Every year 100,000 factory farmed cattle arrive at slaughter injured, or too dispirited to walk; undercover investigators have repeatedly
documented downed animals who are kicked, beaten, pushed with bulldozers, and dragged from transport trucks with ropes or a chain, though they are fully conscious, in pain, and bellowing pitifully. Cows exploited in the dairy industry, because they are older and their bodies have been exhausted by perpetual pregnancy, birthing, and milking, are among the most pathetic when they arrive at slaughter.”
― Lisa Kemmerer, Speaking Up for Animals: An Anthology of Women's Voices

“The sex trade is also flourishing under the patriarchal objectification of women, paid for by men who are willing and able to own or rent a girl (or sometimes a woman) for sex. Those who are exploited are comparatively powerless, and cannot refuse sexual advances or deny the wishes of those who pay (someone else) for their services.

In these situations and many others, men own and control the bodies of women as they own and control the bodies of sows and cows and hens. Sexual exploitation of human females for the benefit of males is mirrored in contemporary animal industries. Men who control animal industries exploit females for their reproductive abilities as if nonhuman animals
were objects devoid of will and sensation. Sows are treated as if they were bacon factories and cows are treated as if they were milk machines. Sows,
cows, hens, turkeys, and horses are artificially inseminated to bring profits to the men who control their bodies and their lives. Women in the sex trade are similar to factory farmed females . . . .

Even comparatively privileged women in relatively fortunate marriages can readily be likened to sows and cows. . . . The reproductive abilities of women and other female animals are controlled and exploited by those in power (usually men) and both
are devalued as they age and wear out—when they no longer reproduce. Cows, hens, and women are routinely treated as if they were objects to be
manipulated in order to satisfy the desires of powerful men, without regard to female's wishes or feelings.”
― Lisa Kemmerer, Speaking Up for Animals: An Anthology of Women's Voices

“When pressed, hunters who claim that they just want “to be out in the wilderness,” will admit that the kill is essential—or at least the hope of a kill. As it turns out, there is no correlation between hunting and hiking,
climbing, backpacking, kayaking, or any other outdoor activity. Hunters do not purposefully linger in the woods after a kill, but quickly begin the process of preparing to head home with the corpse. For hunters, the kill is the climax—the most important moment. They are not driving into the woods (or sometimes actually walking) for the sake of beauty, but in the hope of a kill. The kill can be likened to male orgasm. Sex is traditionally thought to be over when the man has an orgasm, and the hunt is never so decisively over as it is after a successful kill. As a teacher, I impatiently listened to a young man matter-of-factly defend the importance of hunting because he found the experience “orgasmic.” From his point of view, all that mattered was how exciting and wonderful the experience was for him. The “side affects” of the man’s preferred action—the experience of the deer (and the woman)—are deemed to be so irrelevant that
they are not even mentioned.”
― Lisa Kemmerer, Speaking Up for Animals: An Anthology of Women's Voices

“Oppressions are linked. We cannot free human beings without freeing cows, sows, and hens along with women and men who are systematically oppressed by those in power. Rather than seek to fight our way up the patriarchal ladder, those working for social justice need to dismantle hierarchies, and cease to exploit all those who are less powerful—even if we must give up a few culinary favorites in the process . . . . Each of us decides, over the course of our daily lives, whether we will ignore the suffering of nonhuman animals . . . . We choose where our money goes, and in the process, we choose whether to boycott cruelty and support change, or melt ambiguously back into the masses.”
― Lisa Kemmerer, Speaking Up for Animals: An Anthology of Women's Voices

“Those who are aware of history, of patriarchy and of the feminist movement, tend to understand how difficult it is—and how important—for people to rethink basic behaviors in order to bring about deep and lasting change. We must rethink how we speak, how we spend our time, and what we consume. This is as true for fighting sexism as it is for fighting speciesism—or any other form of domination, exploitation, and oppression. We must change our lives first, and most fundamentally. . . . [Feminists] can and must choose not to continue to exploit nonhuman animals while working to liberate girls and women”
― Lisa Kemmerer, Speaking Up for Animals: An Anthology of Women's Voices

“With regard to farmed animals, we are the ones who are in power. We are the ones who have the power to change our consumer habits. We are the ones who either put our money down for their lives, or boycott animal products.”
― Lisa Kemmerer, Speaking Up for Animals: An Anthology of Women's Voices

“While it is one thing to strive for a cause that fundamentally and primarily benefits you—your freedom and equality (or the freedom and equality of those you know and care about), or for your environment (on which you depend for survival)—it is quite another matter to struggle on behalf of a cause that does not benefit you directly.”
― Lisa Kemmerer, Speaking Up for Animals: An Anthology of Women's Voices

“Those who seek greater justice—whatever their cause—must make choices that diminish the cruel exploitation of others. As a matter of consistency and solidarity, social justice activists must reject dairy products, eggs, and flesh.”
― Lisa Kemmerer, Speaking Up for Animals: An Anthology of Women's Voices

“While fighting for liberation, it makes no sense for feminists to trample on gays, for gays to trample on the physically challenged, or for the physically challenged to trample on feminists. It also makes no sense for any of these social justice activists to willfully exploit factory farmed animals. Can we not at least avoid exploiting and dominating others while working for our personal liberation?”
― Lisa Kemmerer, Speaking Up for Animals: An Anthology of Women's Voices

“Feminists lobby against sex wage discrepancies, gays fight homophobic laws, and the physically challenged demand greater access—each fighting for injustices that affect their lives, and/or the lives of their loved ones. Yet these dedicated activists usually fail to make even a slight change in their consumer choices for the sake of other much more egregiously oppressed and exploited individuals. While it is important to fight for one’s own liberation, it is counterproductive (not to mention selfish and small minded) to fight for one’s own liberation while willfully continuing to oppress others who are yet lower on the rungs of hierarchy.”
― Lisa Kemmerer, Speaking Up for Animals: An Anthology of Women's Voices

“Those who are willing to work for change, and make changes, too often do so only for the sake of their own liberation, without much thought to the oppression of others—especially other species.”
― Lisa Kemmerer, Speaking Up for Animals: An Anthology of Women's Voices

“Even with the onset of contemporary animal advocacy, and the unavoidability of at least some knowledge of what goes on in slaughterhouses and on factory farms, most of us choose to look away—even feminists. Collectively, feminists remain largely unaware of the well-documented links between the exploitation of women and girls, and the exploitation of cows, sows, and hens.”
― Lisa Kemmerer, Speaking Up for Animals: An Anthology of Women's Voices

“Even with the onset of contemporary animal advocacy, and the unavoidability of at least some knowledge of what goes on in slaughterhouses and
on factory farms, most of us choose to look away—even feminists. Collectively, feminists remain largely unaware of the well-documented links between the exploitation of women and girls, and the exploitation of cows, sows, and hens.”
― Lisa Kemmerer, Speaking Up for Animals: An Anthology of Women's Voices

“Free range,” “cage free,” and “certified humane” labels are just as meaningless for farmed animals as are “all natural” labels. Just like farmed animals enslaved by organic industries, farmed animals exploited by “free range,” “cage free,” and “certified humane” producers are routinely debeaked, disbudded, detoed, castrated, their tails are docked, and/or they are branded (depending on the species). Neither do “free range” and “certified humane” labels protect cows from perpetual impregnation, pregnancy, birth, calfsnatching, transport, or dismemberment (slaughter) at a very young age. Finally, “free range,” “cage free,” and “certified humane” labels fail to help “spent” hens, who are sent to slaughter at the same youthful age.”
― Lisa Kemmerer, Speaking Up for Animals: An Anthology of Women's Voices

“There is no requirement that the cows, pigs, or hens who were exploited to create “natural” products be treated any different from how other factory farmed animals are treated. Farmed animals who are exploited for “natural” products are not allowed to live in natural conditions—they are not even allowed to satisfy their most basic natural behaviors.”
― Lisa Kemmerer, Speaking Up for Animals: An Anthology of Women's Voices

“There is no requirement that the cows, pigs, or hens who were exploited to create “natural” products
be treated any different from how other factory farmed animals are treated. Farmed animals who are exploited for “natural” products are not allowed to
live in natural conditions—they are not even allowed to satisfy their most basic natural behaviors.”
― Lisa Kemmerer, Speaking Up for Animals: An Anthology of Women's Voices

“As long as we foster power-over—whether over pigs or turkeys or women—most human females will remain under the control of men, along with pigs and cows and chickens (who will generally remain yet lower on the rungs of power). In seeking to stand above nonhuman females, women help to maintain a hierarchy through which they are held below men. As long as we support a hierarchy, as long as we support a system which grants some individuals power over other individuals, men will dominate over women.”
― Lisa Kemmerer, Speaking Up for Animals: An Anthology of Women's Voices