The Word that Started It All: Dr. Richard Ryder Talks About Speciesism, Painism, and Happiness

The Word that Started It All: Dr. Richard Ryder Talks About Speciesism, Painism, and Happiness

In the early 70’s, Oxford was home to a group of thinkers who would have a huge influence on animal activism in the following decades. Dr. Richard Ryder was right in the thick of it — he invented the term “speciesism” and leafletted Peter Singer! Now, Ryder is arguing for a new way to set our priorities as activists: don’t try to help the largest number of animals, he says… instead, always help the ones who are in the most pain. Tune in and learn why he believes this is the only sensible way. Continue reading

Animals as Persons: An Interview with Gary Francione

Gary Francione begins his new book, Animals as Persons: Essays on the Abolition of Animal Exploitation, with the following sentence-long paragraph: “My animal rights scholarship is controversial.” Known for his staunch critiques of animal welfare, Animals as Persons draws together a number of essays relevant to the Western animal movement today. In this interview, Francione … Continue reading

Electric Animal: Interview with Dr. Akira Lippit

Rather than predetermined and fixed, the categories “human” and “animal” are in flux. In this interview, Akira Lippit talks about how notions of humanity and animality are tightly bound together. Tracing the disappearance of animals from various ecospheres and the simultaneous appearance of animals in cinema (among other technological media), Lippit explores the figure of the … Continue reading

Literature and The Postcolonial Animal: An Interview with Philip Armstrong

Literature and The Postcolonial Animal: An Interview with Philip Armstrong

Q: Why did the chicken cross the road? (To escape the factory farm? To find somewhere good to dust bathe?) A: Or, maybe, the chicken crossed the road to knock on Philip Armstrong’s door. In Armstrong’s prize-winning essay, “Sympathy”, he writes about a chicken who mysteriously appeared at his home and quickly made herself comfortable, … Continue reading

Animal Liberation, Critical Theory, and the Left: Interview with John Sanbonmatsu

Despite a recent proliferation of scholarship, Peter Singer and Tom Regan are still often understood as the first and last words on contemporary animal ethics and philosophy. John Sanbonmatsu offers a clear alternative perspective, through his viable challenge to the Academy, the Left, and the animal movements. Drawing on authors such as Marx, Gramsci, and … Continue reading

Igniting a Debate: Environmentalism, Religion, and a Call to Action

On this week’s show we connect with Steve Best, who co-edited the provocative anthology Igniting a Revolution: Voices in Defense of the Earth, and Lisa Kemmerer who contributed a chapter entitled, “In the Beginning: God Created the Earth and ‘Ecoterrorism’”. First, Best introduces Igniting a Revolution and discusses “revolutionary environmentalism”, a central theme of the book. He … Continue reading