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Animal philosophy, slaughter in art history, and the gaze in contemporary slaughter

Some Animal philosophy

• Think about the complexity of our "psychology of perception of animality"

• pets vs. non pets
• loving food animals.
• psychology of snakes and vermin
• Why do we react differently to a kid kicking a can down the street vs. kicking a sheep's head down the street?

• Not hard for us to compartmentalize, but we experience cognitive dissonance at some cultural diffs: where our pets are their food animals or where their pets can become food animals. Also, dissonance in spending on pets. Extension of vet science requires us to price our love of our pets.

• Some theory -- start with Derrida's, "The Animal That I therefore am..." -- story of the philosopher's encounter with his cat. Notes from Slivinski 2012

• So, maybe also philosophical sources of dissonance -- Rethinking subjectivity, we are now exposed to the gaze of the animal. Is there a new kind of thinking that emerges if you take into account the gaze of the animal? (Parallels -- if you take into account soil, your gut, dietary diseases of the industrial food system.)

• Obvious opening for a vegan argument, but consider other options.

• Pair Derrida with the 19th century growth of two movements: industrial slaughter, concern about Humane slaughter, societies to promote vegetarian and vegan diets.

• Other pieces of the story. Meat ideology -- partially based in fact.

Food and slaughter in Art History

• Some images of pre-modern slaughter.

• Add pics from Chicago stockyards and Testaccio, Rome

Other ways of using gaze theory

• Said and neo-colonial gaze
• Foucault's panopticon
• The gaze as a way of periodizing pre-industrial, industrial, and hyper-slaughter.

• Pre-industrial slaughter modeled the gaze on the butcher, who would normally have seen dressed meat and may have participated in slaughter. 2-3 degrees of separation in the gaze. Butchers in US make good money. Socially esteemed due to trust involved in buying meat. In transition, typical to see cattle marched through city streets to slaughter.
• Industrial slaughter -- Involves the technical gaze of the engineer. (Note mistake in early French slaughterhouse design.) At the same time the work of industrial slaughter is done by immigrants (Chicago) or non-Romans (Testaccio). (Oddly, Chicago Stockyard had tours.) We don't see the people who see the slaughter. As industrial slaughter increases, we no longer see the animals either. From dressed beef to meatpacking and industrial meat products.
• Hyper-slaughter -- Post-gaze. Inspectors can't see every animal. Workers are "disappeared" through ICE and deportation. Facilities moved out of cities. Hyper-slaughter food chains involves less visible production (video prohibited, completely enclosed facilities). Hyper-slaughter culture eliminates the body of the animal from the consumers sight (transition from older supermarkets in US and mercati in Italy).

Some Problems of Hyper-slaughter and its supply chain

For animals and eaters

• Dismembering animals alive, hogs going into scalder alive

• Lowering voltage on stunners -- belief that overstunned animals don't bleed thoroughly. Claim has been debunked.

• Lack of rules on animal transport lead to animals freezing alive.

• Streamlined inspection has led to 6,000 inspectors "looking at" 8 billion animals a year.
• "We used to trim the shit off the meat, Then we washed the shit off the meat. Now the consumer eats the shit off the meat." USDA Inspector (in Eisnitz p. 155)

• No slaughter rules mandated for chickens. Again, belief that stunning prevents exsanguation. One plant 1/2 million a day.
• Streamlined inspection since 1985: 450 inspectors 1.5 billion birds. 91 birds a minute.

For slaughterhouse workers and communities

• Containment pig farming, odor and waste. confinement operations and neighbors

• Non-white often non-citizen workers are not well received in white rural towns. High turnover, often increases in crime. Yet, undocumented slaughterhouse workers are preferred for their work ethic and their legal vulnerability.

• Workers health and vulnerability. -- pattern of deportation for worker's making compensation or injury claims.

• 2008 neurological disorders from pig brain mist. On going concerns about exposure of meat workers to pathogens and "zoonotic transmissible agents" [1]

• Trauma from slaughter PTSD, but also PITS, found also in executioners, combat veterans, and Nazis in World War II.

• Injury rates in slaughterhouses higher in last 25years than for any industry (fitz 2010). Though recently some improvements.

• Early 1970's beef kill lines at 179/hr , by early 90s 400/hr (Fitzgerald, 2010). Now 1,000 to 1200/hr.