Transcription

*Transcipt was generated automatically, its accuracy may vary.

0:12

Welcome to the Feminist Park podcast.

I'm Kwame.

And I'm Leilani.

It's great to be kicking off this journey with you all today.

Yeah.

We're diving into work that's really closely tied to the vision behind the Feminist Park project, which was founded by Hussain Stuck.

That project's goal is pretty ambitious, isn't it?

0:28

Imagining these truly equitable public spaces, starting with the idea for an intersectional feminist park right here in Berlin.

Exactly.

And this podcast, well, it's kind of an extension of that.

We're going to be digging into the academic research that, you know, supports and informs that kind of vision.

0:46

We'll be taking these dense, sometimes quite academic papers and really pulling out the core and insights.

And looking at them through specific lenses.

Things like environmental justice, intersectionality, anti colonial thought, queer theory.

All the stuff that helps us think critically about space.

1:03

Today we're shifting gears a bit, taking a really necessary, I think a deeply moral detour.

We're going to explore the bedrock of compassion itself, our ethical responsibility really to the vast community of life we share this planet with.

Absolutely.

1:18

We're doing a deep, detailed analysis of excerpts from the 10 Trusts, what we must do to care for the animals we love.

It's by the legendary Doctor Jane Goodall, an ethologist Doctor Mark Bickhoff.

That's right.

And this isn't just, you know, a plea for abstract environmentalism or saving species in general.

1:35

No, our mission here, taking our cue from this really powerful source material, is to move beyond seeing animals as just a collective resource or, you know, wildlife.

Right, like a backdrop.

Exactly.

We need to focus intensely on the individual life of the animal.

Being the author's core theme right from the get go is this urgent argument for forging a closer connection with the natural world and a more ethical attitude toward all the creatures we live alongside.

2:02

And that closer connection, it seems, really hinges entirely on one crucial cognitive shift.

The central argument they're pushing for, the one they demand we accept, is recognizing the importance and value of the individual animal.

If you look at the introduction, they spend quite a bit of time emphasizing that many animals, especially, you know, the ones with complex brains and nervous systems, they have unique personalities, they experience genuine emotions, they can solve problems in sophisticated ways.

2:29

Yeah, they're not just pre programmed biological machines.

Exactly.

Not just driven by innate instincts, which was the old view.

Precisely.

And you know, once you concede that an animal can make real choices or form lasting bonds or feel something like grief, well, that animal immediately gets an undeniable ethical standing.

2:48

It just does.

It changes everything.

It fundamentally transforms how we see our often callous or even abusive treatment of them.

It stops being a sort of neutral economic thing and becomes a profound moral contradiction.

And this focus on the emotional individual, it's really deeply rooted in Jane Goodall's own story, her own history of challenging institutional science itself.

3:10

It's kind of the origin story, this whole way of thinking, isn't it?

It really is.

When she first started studying chimps in Gombe back in 1960, she didn't have any formal university training.

Louis Leakey, the guy who sent her, specifically wanted the unbiased observations of a naive mind, as he put it, someone uncluttered by the kind of reductionist thinking that was common among ethologists back then.

3:33

And that reductionist thinking was absolutely the dominant scientific philosophy at the time.

So when her early findings came out and she was daring to name the chimpanzees, talking about their complex personalities instead of just giving them numbers.

Which seems so normal now, but was radical then.

3:49

Oh.

Completely radical.

The reaction was swift and pretty harsh.

Established scientists just dismissed her work as anecdotal.

You know, wildly unscientific.

Famously, they called her a Geographic cover girl because National Geographic featured her work.

Wow, patronizing much?

Totally.

4:04

She basically had to go get a PhD in ethology from Cambridge, not just to prove her findings about things like chimps using tools, but essentially to validate the very idea that human compassion, empathy, and careful observation could actually work with rigorous science, not against it.

4:24

It's easy for us to sit here now and say, oh, those reductionists were wrong.

But think about what that institutional pressure did.

It must have delayed the whole scientific community's ability to really see these truths for decades.

Absolutely.

It held back the entire conversation around animal sentience.

4:40

It's a really powerful foundation for a book like The 10 Trusts, which is all about challenging our whole inherited worldview.

OK, so let's dig into that worldview.

The book's main mission seems to be breaking down this artificial wall we've built.

That's the core of it.

The authors are working to show that humans are fundamentally part of the animal Kingdom, not somehow separate from it by, you know, some divine right or scientific decree.

5:03

They argue that this widely held belief in human superiority, this idea that we stand across an unbridgeable chasm from non human animals, it's just a false reality.

And it's a reality rooted partly in historical judeo-christian beliefs that gave humans dominion over the Earth.

5:19

But then it was tragically reinforced by reductionist science that basically treated animals like biological robots.

That's from the second Truss section.

And crucially, this isn't just them saying be be nicer.

They back it up with hard biological evidence, right?

Evidence of shared complexity that makes denying sentience harder and harder to justify.

5:37

Oh absolutely.

The genetic link alone is pretty staggering.

We share about 98.7% of our genes with chimpanzees. 98.7.

Yep, 97.7% with gorillas, 96.4% with orangutans.

I mean, that statistic by itself just makes the idea of some maximum unbridgeable gap look kind of absurd, doesn't it?

5:57

It really does.

And the similarities go deep physiologically, too.

Chimps in humans can actually exchange blood transfusions if the types match.

Apes can catch all our contagious diseases and it just reinforces this deep shared biological foundation.

OK, but here's where it gets really fascinating, I think on the brain side, proving that complex thinking isn't just a human thing, the sources mentioned a specific finding about Broca's area.

6:22

Yes, from Cantalupo and Hopkins back in 2001.

They found that chimpanzees, bonobos and gorillas show the same asymmetry in Broca's area in the left cerebral hemisphere that humans do.

OK, so why is that specific detail so important?

6:37

What is Broca's area do again?

Well, in humans, Broca's area is critical for a language and speech production.

Now, apes haven't developed complex spoken language like ours, mostly because of physical differences in their larynx and vocal tract.

But the fact that they have that same brain lateralization, that same asymmetry, it's strongly I suggest that the fundamental cognitive machinery needed for complex communication and thought is much more shared than that old reductionist science ever wanted to admit.

7:04

So the potential is there neurologically speaking.

Exactly.

The sources emphasize this point.

If you see an ape child acting in a way that we'd describe as sad or maybe happy, the burden of proof is really now on the skeptic to prove that the chimp child isn't feeling sad or happy.

7:20

We share this foundation of emotional and cognitive depth.

That just completely refutes the old convenient view, doesn't it?

Yeah, that animals are just unthinking machines reacting to stimuli.

Totally.

And that's why the authors frame the problem as one of like, willful denial, not just simple ignorance.

7:37

The evidence shows they have complex minds.

They can think abstractly, remember, make choices, adapt.

This scientific validation becomes the bedrock for the 10 trusts, which essentially act as this new moral charter, right?

With trust, like, respect all life, that's trust 2.

7:52

And be wise stewards of life on Earth.

Trust 5 demanding action based on this proven sentience.

Precisely, it sets the stage for everything else.

OK, so let's dive into the heart of the book.

Now we can use these intersectional lenses like we do for urban spaces, but apply them here to understand the sheer depth of animal experience and consequently, the profound ethical failures of humanity.

8:16

Let's start with a feminist gender perspective, focusing on kinship care, those deep emotional bonds that just defy the idea of animals as disposable things.

Yes, and the evidence for fierce love and agonizing grief is perhaps the most visceral proof of animal personhood you can find.

8:36

These aren't just survival instincts playing out, they're profound emotional connections.

Give us an example.

OK, think about the intensity of maternal bonds.

They describe this elephant mother in Thailand, Pangsu Thong.

She was chained to a tree, but when her calf, Lamyi, fell into this deep, suffocating mud pit, thanks Soy Thong threw herself against that chain repeatedly, over and over until the tether finally broke.

8:58

She then rushed to the mud, used her trunk, her feet, everything she had to pull the calf out.

The vet who was there said the calf was safe simply because of the power of love.

Wow, that's incredible.

Isn't it?

And the flip side of that powerful love is, of course, genuine grief.

9:13

The sources illustrate this across multiple species, and it's devastating.

There's the really harrowing, well documented account of Flint, the young chimpanzee after his mother Flo died.

Flo was a really central figure in the Gombe research.

Right, I remember reading about Flo.

What happened to Flint?

9:30

Well, three days after Flo died, Flint, who had already become really lethargic and withdrawn, climbed high up into a tree near where she died, and he just sat there, looking down the empty sleeping nest they used to share.

Oh, deliberately seeking out that shared memory?

It seems like it as the days went on he just got Gaunt visibly wasting away.

9:47

He stopped eating entirely, avoided all contact with others, he got severely ill, and his very last journey, just pathetic really, was back to the stream where Flo had died.

He collapsed there and died himself.

Oh my God.

And Goodall concludes this section with the profound statement.

10:03

I believe he died of grief.

She's convinced it wasn't just, you know, failure to thrive physically.

It was a psychological crushing depression after loss.

And that kind of morning, it's not just limited to primates, is it?

Not at all.

The source describes this video footage from researchers watching humpback whales.

10:19

One whale was seen repeatedly nudging the dead body of a companion back towards the surface.

Like trying to help it breathe.

Exactly.

A clear instinct, maybe a mother or just a companion trying to help it take a breath.

And then it embraced the body with its huge pectoral fins for five hours.

10:37

Five hours.

The researcher titled the video aptly, I think No Greater Love.

That's heartbreaking, yeah.

But this deep connection, this loyalty, Yeah, it's exactly what humans exploit sometimes, isn't it?

Tragically, yes.

The sources give this gut wrenching story of Lobo the Wolf from the naturalist Ernest Thompson Seton's work.

10:56

Seton killed Lobo's mate Blanca with just extreme brutality, straining his horses in opposite directions until she died.

Horrific.

And then to capture Lobo himself, who was brilliant and elusive, they dragged Blanca's body across the trap lines.

They knew his overwhelming grief and loyalty would make him follow her scent, exposing himself to capture.

11:14

Using his love against him.

The calculation involved the ability of humans to exploit an animal's emotional fidelity like that.

It's just a profound ethical failure.

And these complex emotions, they aren't just about family or grief, right?

11:30

The sources mentioned things like embarrassment.

Yeah, self consciousness, embarrassment, things that indicate a level of self-awareness, maybe even a basic theory of mind.

They mentioned Freud, the chimpanzee.

He tried a big showy display like his alpha uncle Figgin, but he messed up, fell down.

11:47

Oops.

Right.

And he immediately checked to see if Figgin had noticed, then just quietly withdrew to fee like he was embarrassed.

OK, yeah, I could picture that.

And similarly, Sasha the Malamute, she got her lip injured by a playmate but tried to hide her wince, kept playing but kept glancing over her shoulder.

12:03

Clearly didn't want her friend Woody to see she was hurt or vulnerable.

So it's about social standing too.

It suggests a social awareness, yeah, concern for their status within the group that goes way beyond simple programmed behavior.

Okay, let's shift lenses now thinking about a queer theory perspective which often looks at non normative relationships and visibility.

12:24

How does that apply here beyond typical biological explanations like kin selection?

Well, the sources are actually full of examples of animal relationships that really defy that Reductive Selfish Gene explanation.

How so?

These are relationships that offer no obvious genetic benefit, no immediate you scratch my back, I'll scratch yours.

12:44

Reward.

There's the story of a bitch, a female dog who started lactating for an orphaned kitten.

Really.

Nursing a kitten?

Yeah.

Or another feral bitch who travelled for weeks with a troop of vervet monkeys carrying an infant monkey clinging to her belly just like it was her own puppy.

13:01

Wow, across species like that.

Exactly.

And one of the most sort of unlikely friendships they mentioned involves Grizz.

He was a 560 LB orphan grizzly bear at a rehab center.

Grizz shared his food, a big chicken dinner with Cat, the starting little kitten who just wandered into his enclosure.

13:17

A grizzly bear and a kitten sharing food?

Yep.

They became inseparable.

Apparently Cat wouldn't let humans near her unless Grizz was right there for protection.

This just challenges the whole idea that altruism has to be limited to your own relatives or even your own species.

13:35

So it messes with those traditional evolutionary theories.

It really does.

The authors use these examples to talk about the limitations of theories like kin selection, you know, helping relatives and reciprocal altruism.

The tit for tat idea, right?

Those theories just struggle to explain things like the famous guide dog who, after being set free during the chaos of 9/11, went back into the World Trade Center to find and save his owner.

13:58

Incredible.

Or Jethro, the dog who nursed Bunny, a little rabbit, back to health for two weeks.

Instead of, well.

Instead of eating Bunny, which he easily could have done, Jethro apparently also brought a stunned bird to his human companion, totally unharmed.

The authors argue these animals moved way beyond simple tit for tat.

14:15

These look like acts of pure selfless compassion.

Care.

An inherent moral capacity, maybe.

We have to see these actions in a larger light, as the source puts it.

Exactly.

When you acknowledge these cross species acts of devotion protection, it forces you to recognize that animal morality is way more complex than we thought and that any scientific model reducing all behavior to immediate genetic self-interest is just flawed.

14:43

Deeply flawed.

OK, now let's apply the class socio economic perspective.

This feels like where we get into the truly staggering scale of exploitation, consumption, and resource disparity, especially driven by industrialized agriculture.

Oh absolutely, this section really exposes the economic engine behind so much animal suffering and also global resource misuse.

15:04

The sheer volume of factory farming.

It's a violation of trust to respect all life on just an incomprehensible scale.

Give us the numbers again.

In the US alone, you're looking at least 93,000,000 pigs, 37 million cattle, and nearly 10 billion chickens and turkeys slaughtered every single year. 10 billion chickens and turkeys.

15:22

Annually, the sources put it, globally, it works out to something like 250 animals killed every second.

Wow, this industrial slaughtering machine.

It basically requires A deliberate process of, well, dehumanization or maybe de animalization to even function without causing a massive moral crisis for everyone involved.

15:40

And the conditions before Slayer, they're horrific too, right?

Nightmarish hens kept in battery cages so small they literally cannot spread their wings of fundamental natural behaviors.

This forced immobility leads to severe health problems like painful osteoporosis, and it's compounded by the unnatural rate they're forced to produce eggs.

15:59

Maybe 300 a year now compared to like 170 back in 1920.

Five and the end.

Yeah, the slaughter itself.

Often brutally violent, The source points to documented cases backed up by undercover investigation.

Things GAIL Eisenitz wrote about illegal, torturous mishandling, skinning, dismembering fully conscious cows in slaughterhouses.

16:21

Yeah, hens and turkeys often shocked, scalded, drowned in electrified water baths.

And the process frequently fails, meaning many animals are fully conscious through the whole ordeal.

Beyond the direct suffering of the animals, factory farming creates massive environmental problems.

Too right?

And waste, which probably hits poorer communities harder.

16:39

Definitely.

Meat.

Animals in the US produce upwards of 2 billion tons of waste each year.

That's about 10 times what humans produce, and a lot of that just filters directly into water supplies, creating these huge lagoons of toxic runoff. 2 billion tons.

16:54

And then there's the huge issue of resource inefficiency.

This connects the meat heavy diets in wealthy countries directly to global hunger.

Oh.

So.

While the stats are stark, it takes about 16 lbs of grain to produce just 1 LB of beef. 16 to 1.

17:10

Yeah, the grain currently fed to livestock just in the US, it could feed over a billion people, like the entire population of India, for example.

So while some have abundant meat, others don't have basic grain.

Exactly.

Irvin Laszlo, who cited in the Source, makes this powerful moral case.

17:26

He argues that a diet based on heavy meat eating is actually immoral.

Strong word why?

Because it indulges a personal preference, a consumer convenience at the expense of depleting resources.

Land, water, grain that are absolutely essential to feed the entire human population.

17:44

Converting grain into beef essentially wastes 6 sevenths of the nutritional value.

So the economic system prioritizes cheap meat for us over global food security.

And ethical treatment, Yeah, it's all connected.

Which feeds right into our next lens.

Yeah, the migrant racial justice perspective, looking at how resource conflicts and habitat destruction disproportionately impact both animals and marginalized human communities globally.

18:10

Yes, the authors draw this direct, painful line harm done to the environment in the name of progress, often for the economic benefit of those who are already wealthy, versus the desperation of the poor who sometimes have to damage the environment just to survive, like cutting down trees for crops or hunting Bush meat because there are no other options.

18:27

The sheer pressure of the growing human population and resource scarcity forces the terrible choices.

And there are specific immediate resource conflicts driving extinction crises, aren't there?

Like the bushmeat trade?

Absolutely.

The bushmeat trade, which tragically threatens pretty much all great apes with extinction within maybe 10 to 15 years in Central and West Africa.

18:50

It's directly fueled by logging companies.

How do logging companies feel it?

They build roads, roads deep into previously inaccessible primary forests, especially in the Congo Basin that's mentioned under the Fifth Trust.

These roads open up pristine habitats to hunters, and the logging companies are often foreign.

19:08

They're clear cutting destroys habitats, and they create these new pathways for resource extraction that devastate local ecosystems and wildlife.

And it's not just logging, it's mining too, like for our electronics.

Yes.

Consider coltan.

It's a mineral essential for capacitors in our cell phones, laptops, all that stuff, right?

19:25

It's easily mined, apparently just with a shovel.

A lot of it comes from Cahuzi Viega National Park in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

The mining activity there is directly responsible for a 50% reduction in the endangered eastern lowland guerrilla population, and it's virtually wiped out elephants in that area too.

19:43

Also fifth trust material.

So buying a new phone, it has these direct, devastating consequences thousands of miles away, often in places with histories of exploitation.

Our consumer choices have immediate life and death impacts.

It's sobering.

19:59

There's also the legacy of colonialism, isn't there?

Introducing species that wreck ecosystems.

Oh yes, the.

Source Highlights clear examples where human convenience or sport led to biological devastation.

Mongooses brought to the Virgin Islands to kill snakes, but instead they wiped out the eggs of ground nesting birds.

20:17

Oops again, big oops.

Fox is introduced to Australia just so wealthy men could hunt them on horseback like in England.

But now the foxes are dangerously threatening small native marsupials, pushing them towards extinction.

It reflects this attitude, doesn't it?

Viewing ecosystems as just resources to be messed with for human benefit, with no respect for the existing natural balance.

20:38

Exactly.

A failure of stewardship.

OK, finally, let's look through the ableism, disability, justice perspective.

This seems to focus on the extreme exploitation and vulnerability of animals when they're treated purely as tools or research subjects just for human benefit, no matter the cost of the animal.

20:56

Yes, the domination is absolute here.

As the source puts it, we don't just use animals, we often force them into service.

Beasts of burden, Animals in war, elephants, dogs in battle.

Training them for entertainment, but the exploitation of their physical abilities, their cognitive abilities for human utility.

21:13

Particularly troubling because it basically turns sentient beings into disposable modified tools.

Like the capuchin monkeys example.

Exactly.

They're taking from their mothers, often have their teeth pulled out so they can't bite, and then subjected to harsh training regimes to become helping hands for people with paralysis.

21:30

That's in the second trust discussion.

So their whole life, their body Co opted for human utility.

It's a form of forced lifelong servitude.

And the section on animal experimentation That sounds like maybe the most shocking display of this violation, particularly Trust Three open our minds to their suffering.

21:49

The scale is just immense.

Over 70 million animals used every year in research in the US alone.

And crucially, remember this 95% of those research animals?

Rats.

Mice birds are not protected under the federal animal welfare.

22:05

Act, the 95% have no protection.

Virtually no regulatory oversight, no required standards of care for the vast majority of animals used.

And the experiments themselves.

Some military experiments are documented as being highly invasive, incredibly painful, and often done without any pain relief at all.

22:22

Animals subjected to chemical weapons, radiation, high power microwaves in Department of Defense labs.

About a fifth of all animals used in experiments known to cause pain receive no anesthesia. 1/5 That's horrifying.

The sources cite the Defense Nuclear Agency forcing unanesthetized monkeys who had received lethal radiation doses to run on a treadmill until they physically collapse.

22:44

When questioned, the spokesman claimed the animals experienced no pain.

The authors rightly call that wishful thinking, molded perhaps by a guilty conscience.

Unbelievable.

And these tests, they're not even always scientifically valid, are they?

That's the added insult.

The Dre's test putting irritants in rabbit's eyes for cosmetics testing causes immense suffering for days, but the results are notoriously difficult to actually apply to humans.

23:08

So pointless cruelty.

Largely, and even worse, is the LD50 test, the lethal dose 50% test.

It's meant to find the dose that kills half the test animals.

This test has been proven scientifically invalid for predicting human safety.

Invalid, but it's.

Still used.

It has been widely used.

23:25

The source gives this chilling example.

Paraquat, a common herbicide based on rat LD 50 tests.

It was deemed safe for humans OK, but it's subsequently killed over 400 people because the actual safe human dose was vastly smaller than the anomer test suggested.

23:41

Oh my God, so the test gave a false sense of security that killed people.

Exactly.

Despite these scientific failures, despite the the immense animal suffering, the multibillion dollar research industry just continues largely unchanged.

And there's one more example related to industry Premarin, the drug made from mare's urine.

24:00

Yes, a potent example of how industrial scale drug production dictates systematic cruelty.

Mare's are kept pregnant in tiny stalls, often for six or seven months straight, restricted from even lying down comfortably, often suffering stiff joints.

24:15

Why keep them like that?

To collect their urine for the estrogen, they're often intentionally deprived of water for long periods to make the urine more concentrated, maximizing the drug yield.

Deprived of water.

And if they get sores or infections from these conditions, they're often not treated with antibiotics because the drugs would contaminate the urine product.

24:33

So their health is secondary to the product.

Completely, and once the foals are born, they're often just considered a waste product of the industry continuing the of abuse.

It's an institutionalized violation of the animal's most basic well-being and freedom, all for a human pharmaceutical product.

24:49

OK, wow.

We've laid out the evidence for sentience, the scale of the ethical failures across so many areas, research, food resource use.

But the book is called The 10 Trusts.

It's not just about the problems, right?

It's about the need for well conscious, intentional design, an ethical framework to guide how we act.

25:09

Precisely the source material really validates the need for intentional, non dominant action that comes through strongly in the fifth trust.

Be wise stewards of life on Earth.

Be wise stewards.

Yeah, the authors fundamentally challenged that old idea of dominion, which people often take to mean ownership or domination.

25:27

They redefine it as enlightened stewardship.

And they argue, pre forcefully, that our abuse of the planet and its creatures proves we have utterly failed to be wise stewards.

We desperately need a new design, a new way of interacting with the nature.

And the connection goes both ways, doesn't it?

Which supports creating intentional spaces that foster that connection.

25:45

Like the third Trust, Open Our Minds reminds us about the healing power of animals and nature for humans.

Absolutely.

We see that reciprocal relationship everywhere.

Mentally disturbed patients finding calm watching fish in an aquarium.

Studies showing dogs reduce stress, lower blood pressure in kids and adults.

26:04

It's mutually beneficial.

As the authors say, touching and petting a dog can be calming for both the human and the dog.

So creating intentional, safe natural spaces like maybe a feminist park aims to be.

It serves both species.

That connection to life is inherently healing for us, too.

26:21

Definitely.

And this is where the Jane Goodall Institute's Roots and Shoots program offers such a great blueprint for holistic, ethical design.

It's not just about one thing, it's a 3 pronged approach, focusing equally on animals, the human community and the environment.

All three together.

26:37

Yes, the whole movement started because some secondary school students in Tanzania were just fascinated to learn about how complex chimps were, and that helped them realize, hey, there isn't this sharp moral line dividing humans from the rest of the animal Kingdom.

And that realization led to.

It fostered immediate compassion for their own local environment and their own community.

26:56

The program teaches that you really can't effectively help animals or the environment without also helping the surrounding human community.

It's all interconnected.

Which really highlights the urgent need for creating intentional connection and education, especially in places where people are cut off from nature.

27:12

There's that poignant story about Peter.

Oh, Peter, the 12 year old boy from a really difficult background, he confessed to an educator.

I don't know what a rabbit is.

Just think about that.

No concept.

No images of rabbits in fields, no B for Bunny in his alphabet book, just the rough edges of his impoverished urban life.

27:32

It took the intentional, gentle introduction to an actual, experienced rabbit brought into his school to breakthrough his initial fear and indifference.

That kind of intentional, compassionate design and education, it's absolutely critical if we want to nurture new generations of stewards who actually understand their place in the biological web.

27:51

And the power to make this happen, it comes down to individuals, right?

That's the 8th's trust.

Have the courage of our convictions.

Change starts with personal conviction leading to action, Yes.

We see this principle working in the growth of ethical movements.

The authors mentioned the vegetarian movement getting a huge boost in the UK because of two specific pigs, Butch and Sundance.

28:14

Their plight during a culling event just captured people's hearts.

Two individual pigs made a difference.

Yeah, a spokesman for the Vegetarian Society said the intense public outcry over those two specific pigs got people making the connection to eating meat in a way they hadn't before, even though millions were slaughtered routinely.

28:32

So personal choice becomes activism.

Exactly.

The source explicitly states that individual consumer choices like boycotting Premarin or refusing to buy phones made with that conflict.

Colton can actually change business faster than laws in our consumer society.

28:48

It's powerful.

We don't have to buy cosmetics tested on animals.

We don't have to support products made through profound cruelty.

Think about Rachel Carson publishing Silent Spring.

She faced immense pressure, threats even from the petrochemical giants.

29:04

But her accurate science and her personal conviction?

She went ahead and she changed the world.

We have to dare to stand up.

Make our voices heard, even if it's just by choosing organic food, which benefits insects, birds, the whole ecosystem's health.

Every choice matters.

OK, so this deep dive, it really presents a significant challenge, doesn't it?

29:23

How do we overcome this human tendency towards, well, moral denial?

You hear all the time when these topics come up.

The factory farms, the labs, the exploited mayors.

Right.

The classic response is I really don't want to hear about it.

I hate cruelty or I'm just too sensitive to listen to this.

That denial, that deliberate choice to put up blinders, as the book calls them, Yeah, that's exactly what allows the systemic cruelty to continue, isn't it?

29:46

It is ignorance, and maybe the fear of feeling guilty allows this vast machine of propaganda and industrial slaughter to shield the public from the real consequences of their choices.

But there's hope, right?

The book emphasizes hope.

Awareness is growing.

30:02

It is, and the authors highlight how globalization and technology, especially the Internet, are connecting people who are struggling for change.

All around the globe, tiny local efforts suddenly realize they're not alone.

They're part of this huge interconnected movement.

So that feeling of helplessness can shift.

30:18

Exactly a single student writing about an ethical problem online realizes, wow, others care too.

Helplessness turns into hope.

That's the core message of The Ninth Trust.

Have hope.

This global connection empowers us, the authors noted, even back when the book was written, the increase in web searches, hits for animal protection and conservation issues.

30:38

It suggests A trend maybe towards caring more, demanding more accountability.

The ultimate ethical failure, they argue, lies in our silence.

The coda of the book really drives this home.

The title says it all.

After all is said and done, silence is betrayal.

Silence is betrayal.

30:55

If we are the most powerful beings on earth, if we have the sophisticated brain capable of understanding and empathizing with suffering, which is something other animals often acting out of biological necessity, don't possess to the same degree, then our silence about systemic cruelty becomes inexcusable.

31:12

They give that example of the Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City.

Right.

Planning to feature rodeo as a celebration of American culture, the authors and others protested, pointing out the inherent inhumanity horses stimulated with electric prods having their testicles cinched just to make them buck violently for show.

31:30

And the irony.

The irony was thick.

The Olympic mascots were a coyote, a hair and a bear.

Yet at the same time, coyotes were still being killed for bounty in Utah, the appeals to reconsider the rodeo fell on deaf ears.

That hypocrisy, sentimentalizing animals as mascots while allowing their systemic abuse in our sport, our food, our research, That seems to be the central moral failure they're pointing to.

31:55

It is.

The challenge isn't just some abstract concept of cruelty out there.

It's our willing complicity, our silence, that maintains the status quo.

So the final provocative thought we want to leave you with, drawing from this deep dive into the 10 Truss, is really this how do you how do we replace mindlessness with mindfulness in our daily choices?

32:14

Yeah, do you choose to really look to acknowledge the suffering, the chimpanzee in the barren lab cage, the mayor in that tiny stall, the factory farmed pig?

Do you acknowledge their silent plea for help?

If that growing number of people interested in ethical issue really is leading towards lasting change, then the core task seems clear.

32:33

We have to move beyond just passive awareness, beyond fleeting sentimentality towards.

Courageous, consistent action.

Action that truly honors the lives of our animal kin.

This knowledge is a tool really, a tool for seeing your city differently and potentially for helping to change it.

32:49

It's been a really insightful deep dive.

I think this document provides such a vital framework, especially for projects like the Feminist Park Project that are trying to build something fundamentally different.

It shows just how interlinked urban design and social justice are.

It really does, but it also shows the scale of the challenge right?

33:06

It requires sustained effort, real commitment and a genuine willingness to shift power dynamics in how cities get made and managed.

Definitely.

It makes you think about how we ensure those voices, the ones that have been excluded, are actually heard and centered.

There's another quote from Sarah Ahmed in the Handbook that feels relevant here.

33:25

Go on, she says.

If you have to shout to be heard, you are heard as shouting.

That's powerful.

It makes you ponder, doesn't it?

How can the design of public space itself work differently?

How can it amplify the voices of those who've been historically silenced, ensuring their needs are met without them having to shout just to be noticed?

33:46

How can design itself listen?

That's a really provocative thought to end on a.

Lot to think about.

Indeed, thanks for joining us for this deep dive.