On “The False Choice of Pacifism”
"The False Choice of Pacifism" is another thought-provoking section in Sam Harris’ The End of Faith (this is the last time I’ll be writing about the book, I promise). He calls pacifism "flagrantly immoral" (199) and notes that the problem is that it creates ethically asymmetric warfare, and "a terrible facet of ethically asymmetric warfare [is that] when your enemy has no scruples, your own scruples become another weapon in his hand" (202).
While it can seem noble enough when the stakes are low, pacifism is ultimately nothing more than a willingness to die, and to let others die, at the pleasure of the world’s thugs (199).
I didn’t think I could ever be persuaded that violence is necessary. But when I read, particularly about religious fundamentalists who are happy to give their lives, and take the lives of children and adult civilians while they’re at it (and who in fact plan to do such things), I wonder what will stop them. They are not only not afraid to die, but they want to die (be martyred). They kill civilians intentionally. What are we supposed to do about that? How do you influence people who gave up on rationality a long time ago?
I’m not saying I’ve been persuaded, but I certainly do struggle with this. I wonder about animal rights activists who use violence. Many of us, at one time or another, have received e-mails or comments from Dr. Jerry Vlasak, and we’ve all read what he has to say about the use of violence. Here’s a comment he wrote earlier this year on Animal Person:
As speciesists, you are willing to endorse the use of violence in struggles for human liberation (think South African Apartheid, human slavery in the US), but deem it immoral if used to protect and liberate animals. If mentally retarded orphans were being caged, experimented upon and killed in laboratories, would you keep writing your letters to government bureaucrats, handing out fliers, or would you do what ever it took to get those people free? How about if they were part of your own family?
Well, to some of us, non-human animals are family, and they deserve to be free using whatever means necessary to free them. For more than a century, the same old, tired and useless tactics have resulted in more animals dying in labs and slaughterhouses every year. Someone once defined insanity as continuing the same tactics that don’t work and expecting different results year after year.
Those who abuse animals are not innocent bystanders, and if they refuse to stop torturing and killing innocent non-human animals, they should be stopped.
This doesn’t convince me, as I’m sure the abusers would simply be replaced by other abusers, and from what I’ve read and seen, violence and intimidation (which is a form of violence) do not in fact deter. In addition, they have been instrumental in the passing of legislation that could make even peaceful activism more difficult (legally). However, one thing strikes me as true (and I’m happy to be corrected about this): Isn’t Dr. Vlasak correct about speciesism? Would we (and certainly we have, in the past) use violence as a tactic if there were human animals rather than nonhuman animals in labs and slaughterhouses? And if so, isn’t that speciesist (to endorse violence to liberate human animals but not nonhuman animals)?
Again, I don’t condone the use of violence in the struggle for animal rights. But does it make me a speciesist (and if it does, is that a big deal?) that when I think about the people who want me dead because of what they believe and what they think I believe (or not), I’m not sure I see a peaceful solution? These aren’t people you can negotiate with; they’re completely irrational. Am I talking about apples and oranges, as one example is about liberating somebody and the other isn’t? In addition, nonhuman animal exploiters, as far as I know, aren’t willing to (or thrilled to) die to further their cause.
Clearly, this is something I struggle with. Please don’t comment or e-mail in a way that is full of vitroil, condescension, or ridicule. If you have something productive to say, I welcome you.
About a year ago I watched an interview on 60 minutes with a surgeon from California who is a member of ALF (Animal Libertion Front). While I consider myself a pacifist, I feel if I were younger I would be helping him and others liberate animals from their prisons. He spoke of their web site and magazine Bite Back so I checked out the site. I couldn't help rallying for the thousands of animals they free each year. Some of the quotes on their site are: Action not legislation frees animals. Buttons, patches, and words don't save lives, boltcutters do. Defeat the fear and transform your rage into action. I don't consider using bolt cutters to free animals a form of violence, but some of their other tactics are border line. Every hoiday I stand in front of grocery stores handing out literature trying to show people that there are alternatives to pigs and turkeys as center pieces for their dinner tables. While most will take a pamplet and some will even engage in a discussion, the majority of people look at me with pity as if to say this more misguided creature. At times it's very disheartening, yet I forge ahead knowing I am opening some peoples minds. I also go to vet, and medical offices as well as pet stores with magazines and literature. There are times I question my pacifist actions as to whether I am making a difference or not, but to do nothing would be giving up and I already feel hopeless enough at times.
Tricia,
Bite Back (the office, at least) is about 15 miles from my house. I've always been curious and wanted to go, just to see what is the office houses and if there's any kind of surveillance. I understand the desperation, rage, and thirst for justice that would lead to the use of property damage to liberate (but not to violence that would physically hurt anyone). I have a tough time making the jump from understanding to endorsing, though.
Mary,
All I can say to you is so close yet so far. I say this because I envy your proximity. I personally don't agree with the property damage and don't know if anyone has ever been hurt or killed by their actions, but when I see them gently lifting rabbits, hens and other prisoners from their cells all I can think is one animal at a time will know freedom, fresh air, sunshine and the grass beneath them. I don't consider cutting a fence that imprisons and tortures animals property damage, but some of their actions are questionable. Meanwhile I will always side with the weak and the helpless no matter the price.
I like to say, "I'm a pacifist, but that doesn't make me passive." There's a monumental difference between someone who seeks violence and someone who only resorts to violence when all other options have failed, as opposed to being such a pacifist that one would let others kill him before resorting to violence himself (important consideration–certain martial arts techniques help diminish the level of violence one needs to return in order to preserve one's own life). Bottom line: self defense is and acceptable form of violence to me, but aggression is not.
Now, let's look at violence and "property theft" in the name of defending the defenseless. I'm just gonna "talk" out loud here:
Without removing the fundamental support for animal exploitation that permits animal experimentation to exist in the first place, animal research will continue regardless of how many subjects are individually liberated. In fact, when experiments are restarted, more animals will likely be exploited as a result. Now, this isn't to say that the cost to the exploiters couldn't become high enough that a lab might run out of grant money and abandon the experiment altogether, but this is not often the case, and new non-human subjects are typically acquired.
While saving even one animal's life seems so incredibly wonderful and moving, I can't imagine the guilt I'd feel at having another animal come in and take her place in the study, and perhaps even more. If there was a control subject (or other subject involved in the experiment underway that was not rescued) that may have to be killed so a new control subject can be purchased to replace her, it actually makes the situation worse. The math works out as follows: 1 animal rescued and convalescing, 1 killed by the exploiters, and two more brought in to start all over and then, likely, to also be killed at the end of the experiment. So, instead of 2 animals being killed, 3 are now killed. And all 4 of them had to go through some sort of experimentation, instead of only 2. Now multiply this by the number of animals actually liberated from labs.
Besides, the rescue of one animal in over 300 million can't sufficiently ease my psychic discomfort. So I saved one animal, but what of the others still left? What have I done to spare them the horror of being used as a research tool? Nothing. I have not challenged the paradigm that makes such work possible. I have only inconvenienced a laboratory. On top of which, I just don't see ARAs successfully rescuing every single one of the millions of animals currently being used in research. The only way to end animal experimentation and save millions upon millions of lives (as opposed to the small handful that one person might be able to rescue in one lifetime) is to invalidate this work permanently on ethical grounds (though scientific grounds are perfectly valid as well). Resorting to violence is not going to stop all research. It is going to bring down more draconian laws and penalties, and it is going to force research overseas, where activists may have a much tougher time opposing it legally and otherwise.
This isn't about activist speciesism. It's about dealing with speciesism in the general population. We have to begin with the fact that, as of now, our society is generally supportive of experimentation on nonhuman beings. Violently opposing something the general public supports will lead to strong resistance from those we need to persuade to our point of view. This inhibits the animal rights movement, and we just don't have the numbers to honestly believe that, if a handful ARAs take up arms and storm the castle/labs, the peasants/general public will rise up and follow suit. Instead, the ARAs will be tossed in jail, and we will have gotten nowhere.
I want to end animal exploitation. I'm against speciesism, but I'm not going to end speciesism by freeing a few dozen animals from labs in my lifetime. It seems to me that the only way to save the millions of animals in labs, much less the billions enslaved in factory farm systems, is to pursue animal rights advocacy that seeks to shift our society's attitude toward animals until people are willing to give the interests of animals equal consideration. It's not going to come easy (where's the incentive?), but it's not going to come through pissing off the people who are in a position to call the shots, either. As a bonus, ARAs engaging in outreach activities do not infringe on the rights and privileges of others (unjust though some of these rights and privileges may be), and so they stay out of prison and can continue to work on behalf of animals continuously throughout their lives.
Animals deserve our patience. If we grow impatient and resort to tactics that set us back, we are only harming animals, not helping them.
Okay, that's my thinking on this in a nutshell. I'm perfectly willing to be proven wrong, and I'm sure I left a flank unattended, but it's a start.
Eric,
While I agree with most of what you say and realize we must be patient it is difficult when the suffering of innocent animals is so massive. ALF has shut down many furriers and mink farms etc., but you're probably right saying they were replaced by new shops and farms. 3 months ago I went to check on a dog that looked abused. When I walked into the back yard the size of a postcard I noticed many little wooden boxes. I asked the woman what the boxes were for and she told me she bred rabbits. I asked her to open the wooden doors so I could see them and am still having nightmares from what I saw. The first hutch she opened showed a rabbit in a wire cage the size of a shoe box with no food, water or bedding. She was cowering and shaking and stared at me in complete terror. I couldn't get her image out of my mind so 2 days later I purhcased her. I don't regret getting her, but I do regret the fact that she was most likely replaced by another breeding rabbit. To see her hop, spin and leap for joy and sleep on a bed with pillows is very rewarding knowing she was in a dark wire cage for 2 years. I called the humane society, animal control and other agencies and received the same response: if the rabbits are fed, given water and have shelter there is nothing they can do. I get heart sick every time I think of the rabbits I left behind, but know if I bought them all the breeder would simply buy more to torture. So I suppose what I did by purchasing this bunny was as much for me as it was for her. I think those who free animals from labs know they will be replaced, but the frustration they feel by waiting patiently for the research to end is too overwhelming.
Jerry Vlasak is definitely wrong in calling us speciesists. His mistake rests in presuming that humans would generally liberate other humans from legal vivisection, even if this means that the vivisected humans will simply be replaced by more humans.
It's a sad fact that legalized institutional speciesism puts us in such a dilemma which would necessitate weighing actions not just on their moral worth (liberating the abused is morally justified), but also requires weighing the consequences (liberating one abused person would result in others being abused in his/her stead).
Kenneth,
I guess I was wondering whether readers of this blog would use violence to liberate other humans, because in that case he WOULD be right to call us speciesist. His assumption is that we would use violence to help people (as we have many, many times) but not animals, but he states it as a fact. And stating it as a fact is where he went wrong, as you imply. I appreciate the way you use legal, too, to underscore that what happens to animals is perfectly within the law, and that's the heart of the conundrum.
I WOULD use violence to liberate humans, but not if this means that the liberated human would only be replaced by someone else.
Let me explain this by a hypothetical:
Suppose there is a group of terrorists holding a million humans as hostages. These terrorists plan to kill 10 humans, while keeping the rest hostage just in case. But 10 victims will suffice for their purposes. Suppose also that the government and the majority of the population actually support the terrorists. Suppose also that we can't possibly liberate (by force) more than 10 humans, and we cannot kill all the terrorists.
In this case we have 3 options:
1. Liberate the 10 hostages who are about to be killed.
2. Kill one or a few terrorists.
3. Conduct educational campaigns to get people to oppose the terrorists and the killing of hostages.
If we select option 1, this will simply mean that we instantly condemn 10 others to die.
If we choose option 2, and kill one or a few terrorists, this means simply that other terrorists will take their place (remember that we cannot free all the hostages).
If we choose option 3, this means that 10 hostages (no more and no less) will be killed (something which will happen anyway, no matter the option we choose), but in time we will gather enough public support (if we work hard enough) to oppose the practice. Then, when we get enough support, we will have the option of freeing all the hostages and stopping the terrorists.
It is true that if the conditions (for humans and non-humans) were similar, and we acted differently, we would be speciesists. However, the fact that I had to exaggerate and invent a situation just to make it similar to non-human vivisection, shows that the conditions are not the same.
It does take quite a bit of creativity to compare apples to apples.
I don't ever think that nonviolence is an easy choice, particularly when it seems like there will be a short-term gain or an incremental gain of some sort with violence. But I have to think that using the tactics of the opposition, which I'm so deeply against, can never be a good decision. (And I realize by using the word "never," someone will come up with a scenario where I should use violence, but they'd have to do what you did–exaggerate and invent . . . )
Kenneth, Tricia, Neva, Eric (anyone else?) how do you feel about using violence to combat fundamentalist Muslims and others willing to kill themselves and civilians for their religious beliefs? I found Sam Harris fairly convincing here.
"Kenneth, Tricia, Neva, Eric (anyone else?) how do you feel about using violence to combat fundamentalist Muslims and others willing to kill themselves and civilians for their religious beliefs? I found Sam Harris fairly convincing here".
Good question, and it's quite a coincidence that at the moment I'm having a second reading of that particular book (The End of Faith).
I found that particular chapter very troubling to me (I had never thought about the issue from that perspective), and I admit that Harris does make a convincing case.
What to do…good question. Perhaps, if the funamentalists get their hands on nuclear weapons, I suppose it could be a case of who strikes first survives. Of course, innocents would be killed, no matter who strikes first. I still feel uneasy about this conclusion, but I must admit that Harris has made some very valid points.
I still need to pick up a copy of that book…. and then make some time to read it.
I hear Harris's POV (as described by Mary) from my Republican father as well. There are people in this world that want to see Americans dead, period. I don't doubt this is true, and more so ever since we invaded and occupied Iraq.
We should be proactive with our intelligence efforts and do our very best to prevent fundamentalist killers from fulfilling their agenda, but that doesn't mean human rights go out the window, despite what the current administration would have us believe.
I'm against the death penalty and other abuses for murder and all crimes, including terrorist acts. Two wrongs don't make a right (and who needs the martyrs?), so I'd rather fundamentalist terrorists us are tried, convicted and locked away to protect innocent people. That's the type of prisoner I'm willing to pay to keep behind bars. I realize this is more expensive than simply killing people who threaten us, but we shouldn't be party to continuing the murderous cycle.
We should us be more proactive in defusing the situations that breed this sort of fundamentalism.
Interesting blog; my first visit. I'm quite nonviolent myself, but I appreciate when the lives of violent people come to an end. If I didn't have a wife and children, I would not hesitate to work outside the law to bring swift justice to those who live by cruelty.
That's my passionate side, anyway; and in fact, that part of me is kept in check by my religious faith. I realized at one point that the situation is so bad, hardly anyone really cares, it seems, that only God could make things right. One thing lead to another, and I became a Hare Krishna devotee.
As such, I've come to accept that the world is the way it is. I can do my part, but I'm not going to change the nature of it. The best I can do is chant Hare Krishna.
Actually, it reminds me of several years ago… I was staying in Olympia, WA, and I went with my wife (before we married) to an Earth First! rally in the Olympic National Forest. We made a wrong turn on the way there and missed the event. Almost everyone had already been arrested for 'crossing a line' prohibiting the public from going near the logging area. My wife and I wanted to do something even though we were late, so we chanted Hare Krishna Hare Krishna Krishna Krishna Hare Hare, Hare Rama Hare Rama Rama Rama Hare Hare out loud for several hours. When we finished, the logging people turned on their spotlights so we could find our way down the road, and wished us a "good night." They knew we didn't approve of the logging, and we touched them with spiritual happiness. Isn't that what it's about?
Eric: I can relate to your point of view, but Harris' argument in that particular chapter, in short, is as follows:
Many fundamentalists actually believe that they will go to paradise if they kill the infidels (us). These fundamentalists take this from scripture, and aren't interested in reason. After all, who has the right to challenge "God's word".
Now suppose some of these fundamentalists get hold of nuclear weaponry. They would consider it a sacred duty to use the nuclear weapons and believe they will actually go to heaven for it.
What to do if ever fundamentalists get hold of nuclear weapons? Should we strike first? That's the difficult question.
This has nothing to do with the war in Iraq, which I opposed. Saddam Hussein, for all the thousands he killed, was actually hated by these fundamentalists.
My sentence: "Many fundamentalists actually believe that they will go to paradise if they kill the infidels (us)" should have read: Many fundamentalists actually believe that they will go to paradise if they kill the infidels (us), and die in the process. We're talking about people who are prepared to die as suicide-bombers.
As a newcomer, I'm late in reading this thread, but it's an important topic and I'd like to share my thoughts. We are seeking to end the violence imposed on animals– thus to say the least, it's inconsistent to use violence in their name. What kind of a movement would we have if we didn't lead by example?
That said, I don't think violence can ever be moral. At best, it's necessary in some situations, such as in self defense against violence itself. If there were no other way to protect my dogs from a violent threat, I don't think I would be wrong to defend them similarly. I feel the same about people who want to kill us. When we act in self defense, it's not wrong.
But I think Dr. Vlasak's postion is. Opposing activist violence is not speciesist. Why, I wonder, does he not take a lesson from history, the abolition of human slavery? Abolitionists did not use "any means necessary" to accomplish their goal (well, except for James Brown and his crowd). They did not use violence against slave owners. They worked to end the slave trade, and to gain support for their ethic. We work toward ending the property status of non-human animals by conveying our ethic, and by taking measures to stop breeding them.
Unfortunately, rescuing lab animals is not the same as rescuing human slaves, for as explained above, this results in using more animals, and repeating experiments.