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KEEP THIS ARTICLE

It's 2015 for fuck's sake, not 2011 and 2006, and humans STILL eat meat and support this vile industry? The fact that humans reject that carnism is a valid ideology that legitimately exists is fucking retarded. The vast majority of humanity is fucking retarded. Denying that carnism is real? SERIOUSLY? It's pure denial, plain and simple. This world is a overpopulated hellhole that may devolve into Idiocracy, and the least we can do to make it a better place is to put an end to the animal holocaust/genocide, which so many ignorant dumbfucks turn a blind eye to. I congratulate Melanie Joy for not being a complete brainwashed dumbfuck and actually QUESTIONING things in this corrupt world.

DO NOT silence this article because when you do, you are silencing the poor animals suffering in slaughterhouses, as well as their pain. Values shift and change with time. The English-language improves and evolves itself by modifying and coining new terms and phrases, or else the average human might know only four words, "EAT" "MEAT" "SLEEP" AND "SEX". So let's AVOID Newspeak.

Imagine if Misplaced Pages was invented in the 1800s, and people weren't allowed to create articles on "racism" and "sexism" because they "needed a source".

Also, the "You need a source" is such bullshit. It's 2015. EVERYONE uses the Internet, and print is going out of fashion. Just because something isn't written in ink on paper, we aren't allowed to put it on Misplaced Pages? The fuck? Humanity is so barbaric and out-of-touch.

I hope and pray for future generations to accept vegetarianism/veganism. I don't know when that day will be, but I will do whatever I can to end animal suffering. When you get down to it, carnism denial isn't really all that different from Holocaust denial.

174.2.98.24 (talk) 08:41, 3 July 2015 (UTC)

Rewrite

This is an excellent rewrite, Sammy. Thank you for taking the time to do it. Sarah 22:23, 4 July 2015 (UTC)

Dawkins

Sammy, I'm not sure that the summary of Dawkins on consciousness is correct, but I haven't read it and can only see a little of it on Google Books. The article said (I've made this passage invisible for now):

A modern theory similar to Cartesian mechanism is advanced by Marian Dawkins, who rejects the view that animals are conscious and instead defines animal welfare as "the state of an animal that is both healthy and has what it wants." She advocates prioritizing animal health and human self-interest.

1. ^ Elmwood, R. W. (2012). "Book Review: Why Animals Matter. Animal Consciousness, Animal Welfare, and Human Well-being". Animal Behaviour. 84 (4): 1081. doi:10.1016/j.anbehav.2012.08.006. {{cite journal}}: Unknown parameter |month= ignored (help)
2. Why Animals Matter: Animal Consciousness, Animal Welfare, and Human Well-being, 2012, Marian Stamp Dawkins

Dawkins seems to be arguing that, as no one can say what consciousness is, no one is in a position to decide who does and doesn't have it. For example:

If ... we acknowledge that we do not know whether consciousness is a property of the stupid or the clever, the emotional or the unemotional, the innate or the learnt, the immediate sensation or the foresightful plan, the language users or the grunters – if we acknowledge that we really don't know, then the possibility of consciousness in all sorts of species remains intact (p. 113).

I can see several similar passages, but nothing that suggests she leans toward nonhuman animals not being conscious. Sarah 23:18, 4 July 2015 (UTC)

Eh, maybe you're right about this. I'm reading into it a bit - she spends half the book asserting and re-asserting an agnostic position on animal consciousness, and it's pretty clear why. (If she thought there were a good chance animals were conscious, wouldn't that be a good enough reason itself to base welfare arguments on consciousness, in a Pascal's Wager sort of way?) But I guess I'm not entitled to interpret. The thing is, I only included her because the first body paragraph has so much about de-mentalizing animals and presents this as irrational; I thought for the sake of NPOV a contemporary author who actually takes the Cartesian position should be mentioned, but it seems like those ideas have vanished pretty rapidly in just the last few decades. --Sammy1339 (talk) 01:12, 5 July 2015 (UTC)

Other issues

I've added to the top of the lead that carnism is the invisible paradigm. That we identify certain amimals as food and treat them badly, and others as companions and treat them well, is an illustration of carnism, but carnism itself is the underlying ideology. Also, I changed "endorses" to "assumes" – "belief system that assumes the killing." Endorse implies that it's conscious and informed. The argument is that it's an almost unconscious assumption.

Minor thing: I'm following your citation style, but found I had to use {{rp}} for page numbers. I'd like to change that, but I'll wait to hear from you.

I also changed the image (sorry, I forgot to add that to the edit summary), but please feel free to change it back. Sarah 23:55, 4 July 2015 (UTC)

Don't mind about the image.

You obviously know more about wikitext than me, but I really hate putting page numbers directly in the ref because it makes it awkward to cite different pages of the same reference.

About the definition, almost all authors construct carnism a little more broadly than Joy. For example Gibert has "Carnism refers to the ideology conditioning peo-ple to consume certain animal products." No mention of the N's, which appear to me to be hypotheses to be verified (as in Piazza et. al.), and importantly, as not exhaustive of the alleged prejudices involved in eating meat. I also don't like repeating these words like a mantra. Changed "endorses" to "supports," hope that's okay by you. --Sammy1339 (talk) 00:58, 5 July 2015 (UTC)

Agree about page numbers. How I usually write them is, on first reference: John Smith, Name of Book, Publisher, 2015, p. 1. And thereafter: Smith 2015, p. 2. But that would mean introducing short refs, and I don't want to do that if you prefer not to.

Supports is fine.

Not sure I follow your other point, but if you want to re-copy edit I don't mind. I do think it's important to move from the general to the particular, as in: carnism is the underlying ideology, and here are some of the paradoxes it leads to, e.g. the meat paradox. But if you prefer to restructure, that's okay. Sarah 01:04, 5 July 2015 (UTC)

I confess I don't really know how refs work at all. I use ProveIt for everything.

About "general to particular" - I don't see that the sources support that these N's are really the underlying ideas; on the contrary, Piazza seems to indicate they are superficial rationalizations which attempt to resolve the meat paradox, so I don't think there's support for naming them as the foundations of carnism. --Sammy1339 (talk) 01:32, 5 July 2015 (UTC)

Defenses section

I've jumped in and added a section on formal arguments for using animals for human use. Sorry not to check in first, but I do think it's a needed step towards balancing everything RS say about the topic and it ought to help solidify the keep outcome. I think my auto-citations are in line with ProveIt's. Thanks for your work! FourViolas (talk) 01:47, 5 July 2015 (UTC)

@FourViolas: I'm not sure about this idea. It's essentially a criticism section, which we should try to avoid according to the guidelines, and taken together with the preceding "earlier ideas" section we now have a situation where half of the article is not actually about the topic. Conflating "support for meat" with "opposition to the implications of the carnism idea" is also slightly problematic - if we follow this route we end up rehashing the argument already at ethics of eating meat. Plus, one of the sources you added, the NYT opinion piece, is really weak. It's the result of an essay contest where the entries were required to support the proposition that eating meat is ethical and were limited to 600 words; the result was a really wishy-washy, unclear position.

What we actually could do instead is include the sources which are explicitly about vegan vs. carnist debates. I have a couple of those and if I'm not mistaken SlimVirgin discovered more in the AfD discussion. Maintaining balance is tricky, though, which is why I've left the "vegan discourse" section at a few sentences for now. --Sammy1339 (talk) 02:33, 5 July 2015 (UTC)

I agree that a criticism section is not a good long-term solution, per WP:CRITICISM as you say. However, these arguments need to end up in the article eventually somehow. The Hsiao paper is published in some kind of a peer-reviewed journal and directly takes on the fundamental argument at hand: is it moral to harm animals unnecessarily? (It's frankly hard to find anyone seriously making his argument, but non-vegetarians such as the majority of WP editors will object if they don't see their POV included somehow.) The NYT source is not written by an expert, but no less than Singer and Foer thought it was a worthy contribution to the debate, and it certainly as some novel positions. I think I made it clear that the NYT itself is not supporting the eco-moralist position.

As a more general note, this article is about a concept defined by vegans (so they could have something other than "normal" or "regular" lifestyles to contrast themselves to), and this gives vegan writers a jumpstart on the literature which uses this term explicitly. In order to present a neutral, balanced article about carnism it will be necessary to cast a slightly wider net to find appropriate pro-carnist sources to represent the actual balance among qualified thinkers and populations. Have faith that giving everyone a fair chance to speak will let readers make up their minds appropriately!

Hang on. Why are we assuming that "defenses of carnism" is a criticism of the page topic? That would imply that the real subject here is "Arguments against carnism", which isn't what the title implies. SInce this is a page about carnism itself, it would be better to integrate the "defenses" section into a more general debate over carnist ideas, and organize the debate the way the philosophers do, by arguments and their refutations and counter-refutations. FourViolas (talk) 03:00, 5 July 2015 (UTC); edited 03:32, 5 July 2015 (UTC)

I've changed the heading to "Defense of meat-eating" so that we're not implying anything about its relationship with carnism. I agree with Sammy that this takes the article in a different direction, but agree with FourViolas that people will expect to see it. By the way, I'm using American sp because I think that was there already, but I don't mind which we use. Sarah 03:55, 5 July 2015 (UTC)

Neutrality

I've added a cleanup tag for WP:NPOV, as this article is clearly non-neutral as it exists currently. In particular, the majority of the article has to do with arguments presented by people who do not support eating meat, even though the actual topic of the article is the philosophy by which eating meat is allowable. In other words, the majority of this article flirts with being one big controversy section. There needs to be substantial additions to the defense of meat-eating section, including possibly the health benefits of eating meat and arguments towards the "four N's" in more detail, in order for this article to be neutral. I also believe the defense of meat-eating section should probably be renamed and relocated towards the top of the article, as the arguments towards carnism define the philosophy itself, while the arguments against carnism represents a controversy section. ~ Rob 12:24, 5 July 2015 (UTC)

Agreed that the topic here should be "how do human omnivores try to resolve the cognitive dissonance between caring about animals and eating meat?" and that critiques of the various methods of resolution should not be over-represented. What if we treated the whole thing approximately as a philosophy textbook would, with an overview and sections based on particular arguments? A very rough-draft example of a possible arrangement:

• Lead carnism is the ethicspsychology and constructed morality of omnivory. Word coined by Joy.
• Overview presentation of the meat paradox, examples of carnism in society
• Resolutions of the meat paradox many (formal as well as subconscious) have been proposed, such as

• Differential categorization All these sources for "humans honestly discount the suffering and sentience of food animals"
• Moral community Can we find anyone using this argument specifically to resolve the meat paradox, eg admitting dogs into our community but not cows?
• Ecological morality Like in the NYT essay, a deep-time end run around considerations of animal welfare
• Traditional values Now I'm just making stuff up, but maybe someone has formalized the idea that "abandoning our grandparents' value system will lead to moral turpitude, so we should keep hogs like they did"
• Darwinianism or Joy's "natural": we're evolved to do it (mention controversy about that), therefore it's prima facie moral

Then criticism of each line of argument could be integrated as appropriate into each section. Almost all the material in the article could stay, somewhat moved around and supplemented with the arguments of carnism.

Again, I think the most proper subject for the article under this title is that described by Rozin (quoted in Loughnan): ‘‘Meat should be of special interest to psychologists, because it is a quintessential example of the interesting and important state of ambivalence.’’ If people come here wondering about their own dietary habits, they will be better served by an honest assessment of carnist thought and a link to veganism than by a reflection of vegan activism. FourViolas (talk) 12:57, 5 July 2015 (UTC); edited 17:17, 5 July 2015 (UTC)

Hi Rob, it isn't fair to try to have the article deleted, then when it's clear that won't happen, add the POV tag instead. That tag is meant to be used as a last resort.

Rob and FourViolas, the article isn't about the ethics of meat-eating, but about the psychology of it, namely what mental states lead to the behaviour the article discusses, and how the belief system became so ubiquitous that it goes unnoticed, despite its paradoxes.

You see a stark illustration of it in pet stores. There are adored animals walking around on leads, and the store stocks expensive coats, boots, hats, beds, treats, toys, jewellery and toiletries for them. Then there are shelves full of bits of other animals who were raised and killed, in horrible conditions, as food for human beings, with the nastiest bits going to the (otherwise) pampered ones. Whether you're for or against meat-eating, that situation is undeniably odd.

The concept of carnism was named to explore this strangeness. Adding a section on how eating meat is a good thing misses the point. It would be like adding a section to the article on patriarchy on how men dominating women is a good thing. Sarah 16:28, 5 July 2015 (UTC)

I agree, this article should be about the contradictions, the "ambivalence", and and how people deal with them psychologically. Vegans, philosophers, and psychologists (the groups who have published RS about this) agree that that's the interesting topic here.

That's why I'd like to build the article around the paradoxes and the various ways people negotiate them. Structurally, we should cover a) the situation (briefly); b) the contradictions and strangeness inherent therein; c) the ways people talk themselves into disregarding the strangenesses; and, finally, d) the criticisms—by the people (like Joy) who primarily use the term—of b) and c).

Because of the neologism status of the word, and the special circumstances regarding who uses the word, we have to make an extra effort to represent the first three stages neutrally lest we end up describing the background and the opposing schools in the (sometimes) tendentious or straw-mannish language of Joy et al. Although carnism has mostly been discussed by people criticizing it, it is a philosophy tacitly followed by billions of people and deserves due respect. We need to give it a chance for its arguments/apologias to be aired in its advocates' voices, not its enemies'.

Also yes, I was meaning to link to patriarchy and eurocentrism for ideas on how to treat pervasive dominant ideologies. And I agree that the POV tag is a little irritating, when we're already aware that there's reshuffling and rewriting to be done. FourViolas (talk) 17:17, 5 July 2015 (UTC)

It isn't a philosophy. It's an ideology that isn't explored by the people who engage in the practices at its core. They don't see it as a belief system; they don't see it at all. It is just the way things are: the sky is blue and human beings eat cows and love dogs (or vice versa, depending on the country). The idea that it deserves respect or disrespect again misses the point. That's like saying patriarchy does or doesn't deserve respect. The article should simply describe the belief system the way the psychologists describe it. Sarah 17:26, 5 July 2015 (UTC)

Certainly. I won't push to over-represent the little formal carnist apology there is, on the grounds that it presumably represents widespread lay opinion; I think it merits a little more airtime than it has now, in a slightly more logical structure, but when most RS criticize carnism most of the article should, too. Theoretical ethical attack and defense of carnist society doesn't even need much mention, period: we can focus on the best-RSed parts, the empirical psychology of the cognitive dissonance of carnistically differential treatment of species. What do you think of my structural suggestion? FourViolas (talk) 18:15, 5 July 2015 (UTC)

I'm unsure about the structure. At the moment we almost equate carnism with the meat paradox, when the latter is just an effect of it, so I think we should start with more theory. But I'd have to read the sources carefully first. I'm here only because of the AfD, so everything has been a bit rushed. Sarah 18:32, 5 July 2015 (UTC)

Same. I've been reading half the morning. A lot of sources are inaccessible for me, unfortunately. FourViolas (talk) 18:37, 5 July 2015 (UTC)

Me too. I've added at least one link (maybe two) to refs where the full article is available. Will keep looking for more of those. Sometimes academics upload their papers to their university's website. Sarah 18:41, 5 July 2015 (UTC)

Is it kosher to add academia.edu links, given the free (as in beer) registrationwall and the fact that papers there are usually not quite publication-ready? (I'd ask WP:RSN but I'm lazy and Sarah probably knows the answer.)

I'd like to redo the current "ethics" section into a more prominent section on the justifications, conscious and subconscious, for carnism. There's plenty to build it out of in the sources we have: eg, in the abstract of this non-free source, there's the list "avoidance, dissociation, perceived behavioral change, denial of animal pain, denial of animal mind, pro-meat justifications, reducing perceived choice, and actual behavioral change." Fleshing out those concepts with Gibert & Desaulniers, Joy, etc, could give a good idea of what goes through non-vegans' heads when they are forced to think about their carnism, and with an explanation of the omission strategy and a nod to more formal refutations like Hsiao's and Bost's I think the article would be proof against accusations of straw-manning or cherry-picking. Suggestions for the name of this section? FourViolas (talk) 21:36, 5 July 2015 (UTC)

I'm working on it now (please give me another 30min or so to set it out). I'm calling it "Justifications for carnism" and subsuming most of the "studies of the meat paradox" in a subsection about minimizing animal mind and sentience. Everything is always open to discussion and rearrangement.

@SlimVirgin: I've withdrawn my nomination for deletion and have no vendetta against this article. Multiple people have expressed neutrality concerns in the AfD, though, and the POV tag is warranted. ~ Rob 06:27, 6 July 2015 (UTC)

Defenses/Justifications section

There it is, take a look. There's a <!--'d part to be filled in in a month or so when I have access to Rothgerber (or earlier if one of you already does). I tried to give a fair hearing to the various RS-covered techniques people use to perpetuate this widely-accepted-as-strange/immoral/paradoxical situation. I will argue energetically, if necessary, that such discussion is highly relevant to the topic. Other than that, I welcome your picking apart any and all of my additions. FourViolas (talk) 03:36, 6 July 2015 (UTC)

Page numbers

It would be good to sort out the reference style so that we can add page numbers without these squiggles. Does anyone mind if we start using short refs on second reference? Sarah 17:57, 5 July 2015 (UTC)

I'm happy to take the opportunity to get familiar with them, if you don't mind cleaning up my newbie errors! FourViolas (talk) 18:15, 5 July 2015 (UTC)

@SlimVirgin: Sorry, it appears I failed to notice this question in the flurry of activity. I don't have deeply-held views about wikitext styles, and I don't mind if the ref styles are inconsistent. I do have a couple questions though:

• Most of the refs you add, on various articles, lack URL links. Is there an obstacle to including them with short refs?
• I often use page numbers to indicate where the relevant chapter appears in a book, or what pages of a journal an academic paper is (theoretically) published in. This means using the rp template to cite specific pages, which I think is much nicer than ibid. Will short refs require excluding the former information? And what happens when you want to cite different pages of the same source? --Sammy1339 (talk) 17:39, 10 July 2015 (UTC)

• Hi, page links can be added with short refs, yes. Re: your second question, short refs include the page number (Smith 2015, p. 1), and when citing different pages you just add a new short ref (Smith 2015, p. 2). But if you prefer the rp template, that's fine. I doubt I'll be editing the article anyway, but if I do I'll go along with whichever style you choose. Sarah 19:34, 10 July 2015 (UTC)

Denial of animal mind

IP, please discuss the title of this section. I think the sources are pretty clear that "denial of animal mind" is the correct terminology:

• "denial of mind…deny minds to…mind denial"
• "lowered mind perception…lacking the capacity for pain"
• "denial of animal pain, denial of animal mind…denied animal mind"

I'm willing to change my opinion, but only based on reliable sources. (The above are, imho, some of the most objective and respectable the article has.) See Talk:Veganism#Commodity status of animals for an example of how it can be frustrating and unproductive to try to argue about subtle connotations based on writers' intuition rather than simply accepting the language the sources use. FourViolas (talk) 18:44, 6 July 2015 (UTC)

"Animal mind" and "Animal sentience" are both correct, I just prefer sentience over "mind" because it's more specific. It's no big deal tho, so whatever. At the very least, I can just add it into the section. 174.2.98.24 (talk) 22:04, 6 July 2015 (UTC)

Great, thanks. Minor point. FourViolas (talk) 22:33, 6 July 2015 (UTC)

Piazza paper and ethics arguments

I'm going to restore the description of the Piazza study. As the only work which directly tests one of the main aspects of Joy's theory (4Ns) it's irreplaceable.

I also am not so sure about the last two subsections under "Attributes of carnism." The theories don't have a direct, clear connection with carnism, but rather are tangential philosophical arguments about eating meat. Hsiao in particular presents a very unusual position which is not likely to have influenced many people. (That is not to say he is wrong, but philosophical ideas which are novel as of 2015 are generally unusual.) The Piazza study also revealed that land ethics arguments do not figure at all in most meat-eaters' reasoning.

Academic ethical arguments don't usually address the main points of this article's topic. It's difficult to find someone arguing, from an abstract philosophical perspective, that it's ethical to slaughter a pig but unethical to slaughter a dog. Hsiao is a good example: he's in favor of meat, but his argument proceeds by denying the moral value of any animals, resolving the meat paradox in the opposite direction from the one vegans choose. This is not a typical feature of carnism.

There are also weight issues here: the arguments in the article now do not reflect the loudest voices in the meat ethics debate. We also should not allow this article to become a COATRACK for ethics of eating meat. I suggest that a possible compromise might be to split off a short summary section, one which has a few sentences summarizing the debate and a subheading like "main article: ethics of eating meat". Although, in line with the examples mentioned above, I do have to ask: would it be appropriate to include a section in patriarchy or sexism about moral arguments in favor of male domination? --Sammy1339 (talk) 18:50, 6 July 2015 (UTC)

I think the schools of Hsiao, Leopold, etc deserve some kind of presence as notable products and perpetuators of carnism, just as patriarchy (somewhat tendentiously) covers the suggestion that the patriarchy has a biological basis. The idea in general shouldn't be to justify (or attack!) carnism, but to present and interrogate the ways it manifests and perpetuates itself. That's why there are sections such as "Cognitive avoidance" which clearly aren't rational arguments in favor of the system.

It's a slippery task to pin down the difference between carnism (the belief system justifying meat and related exploitation) and the meat paradox (the differential concern for food and non-food animals). You're right that Hsiao doesn't address the meat paradox directly (you might extrapolate by OR from his discussion of cruelty or marginal cases), but his arguments and related ones are relevant to the foundations of carnist culture more generally. FourViolas (talk) 20:36, 6 July 2015 (UTC)

While the principles behind this idea make some sense, and I had a similar justification in mind for the inclusion of Descartes' theory, I'm not seeing any evidence that Hsiao's ideas, or others' environmental arguments, play any significant role in people's attitudes about meat. The Piazza paper actually gives some strong indications to the contrary. --Sammy1339 (talk) 22:17, 6 July 2015 (UTC)

Maybe we could tuck Hsaio, Leopold, and (neo)Descartism into some kind of "formal defenses" section? Again, avoiding rehashing ethics of eating meat while acknowledging that carnism isn't exclusively based on gut reasoning (pun intended). FourViolas (talk) 22:38, 6 July 2015 (UTC)

I really don't think that Hsiao and Leopold have any relevance to this article at all, though they could make useful additions to ethics of eating meat. Perhaps we should move them there?

As for "gut reasoning" - the 4N arguments are hardly unpersuasive (indeed, "natural," "necessary," and above all "normal" are some of the strongest endorsements you can give anything) and I've allowed them to appear without refutation, despite having several sources specifically about carnism which point ought the naturalistic fallacy, is-ought problem, and scientific consensus that vegan diets can be nutritionally adequate (e.g. Piazza actually says that the "necessary" argument is both the most strongly held and the easiest to refute, but I excluded this.) So I hardly think that section is unbalanced. --Sammy1339 (talk) 22:45, 6 July 2015 (UTC)

I believe that Hsiao is a student, his argument is odd, and his paper is about the ethics, so I'm not sure it should be here. This article isn't the ethics of eating meat article. This article is about the psychology of meat-eating, namely the mental states that have led to, and are caused by, the invisible ideology called carnism.

The previous lay-out (e.g. here), with the ethics section standing alone as a summary of the other article, was better, if it has to be there at all. It has now been merged in so that it's no longer clear what is different about this article. Sarah 23:34, 6 July 2015 (UTC)

Bear with me, I'm having an ambitious idea. I totally see the point that this article is about the pervasive ideology of animal exploitation, and that the "attributes" section shouldn't be primarily a list of defensive strategies and arguments (although those which deeply explain how the ideology perpetuates, like avoidance, are relevant attributes). I'm inclined to agree that Hsiao (who, yes, is not mainstream or highly respected) and land ethics belong at ethics of eating meat. Except…

The term "carnism", as the three AfDs demonstrate, only recently became a mainstream word (at least in academia) for the cultural belief system based on the exploitation of animals for human food, clothing, etc. But philosophers and psychologists have been discussing the ethicality of using animals for human ends for a long time. Typically their arguments have focused on the purest form of exploitation: killing animals and eating their flesh. But most of their discussion (the ethics page covers consciousness, pain, basic rights) applies equally to killing animals for leather or sport—in short, to the entire carnist worldview. Now that we have a word for "treating (some) animals as mere food and clothing", might it make sense to gather "ethicality of treating animals as food, etc" under that word?

I'm proposing a pre-merge discussion discussion for ethics of eating meat and carnism, with "ethics" to become a large section called something like "ethical discussion of carnism". This would have to be strongly supported by sources indicating that the meat-ethics debate has started adopting Joy's language and concepts. If this evidence is absent, the proposal should of course be tabled until it's clear that food philosophers accept the framing of the debate in terms of "carnism". What do you think? FourViolas (talk) 00:35, 7 July 2015 (UTC)

Carnist literature

Would it be worth mentioning Charlotte's Web, Fantastic Mr Fox and Animal Farm as carnist literature under "Earlier ideas"? I think it would be. I'm not aware of any other books/novels/literature that challenged animal slaughter as much as these two. I'd also like to nominate Watership Down and Chicken Run (yes, I know Chicken Run is a movie, but whatever).174.2.98.24 (talk) 01:00, 7 July 2015 (UTC)

Not unless you can find a reliable secondary source describing them as such. It will be hard, when discussing a big pervasive idea like this, to stick closely to what's already been said, but WP:OR is clear. FourViolas (talk) 01:17, 7 July 2015 (UTC)

What if something is TRUE, even if it has no sources for it? Carnism is a term coined in the 21st century, so of course there's not going to be a lot of research on carnist literature. I'd define carnist literature as literature where a core theme is "animals are in danger of being killed by humans for human consumption". If not here, then I'd like to create a separate article for it. 174.2.98.24 (talk) 01:51, 7 July 2015 (UTC)

If something is TRUE, but has no sources, it doesn't belong on Misplaced Pages. We have a "core content policy" of verifiability: everything we write must be supportable by some reliable published source. Iif we started allowing statements stand, especially controversial or non-obvious ones, just because some editor said they were true once, people would stop respecting Misplaced Pages as a reasonably accurate, balanced reference tool and start looking at it as another heap of Internet opinionating, a well-organized blogosphere. That's not what we're building: we're here to make an encyclopedia to present the information already published in reliable sources, easily and accessibly, to everyone. If that's not compatible with what you want to accomplish, we usually recommend you take your activity elsewhere. FourViolas (talk) 02:19, 7 July 2015 (UTC)

What counts as a reliable source? I feel like most institutions, colleges, and universities are responsible for brainwashing the masses. Seems a lot of people don't trust anything if it's not in some stupid research paper, in ink on paper, or said by someone in a business suit. For example, Charlotte's Web is *obviously* a book about carnism, and most people would agree. I feel like you care more about SOURCES than the actual CONTENT. Either way, I'd still like to create articles for books and movies about carnism. If we can have an article about films featuring DINOSAURS and ghosts, I don't see why we can't have a list about carnism. 174.2.98.24 (talk) 02:33, 7 July 2015 (UTC)

WP:IRS explains what we mean by "reliable", and WP:RS/N is where to go for opinions on the reliability of a particular source. Essentially, we ask that a source have editorial fact-checking or review structures in place, and a reputation for using them adequately. As the pages I linked above explain, these aren't my personal opinions: they're the bedrock principles of WP. FourViolas (talk) 03:00, 7 July 2015 (UTC)

To the IP: I hope you don't take FourViolas' comments too harshly. We were all unfamiliar with the policies at one point and some are a bit unintuitive. Basically the gist of WP:V is that, since humanity has not evolved to the point that most of us can convince eachother of things, we don't argue the truth; instead, we have the brass-tacks argument of what sources say. Sometimes this unfortunately results in people literalistically copying what's written in a source, especially in contentious areas. However, once you've seen a few people try to include things that are "obviously true" to them, but obviously not to you, you may begin to see the wisdom of this system. On another note, you've been editing a lot. If you plan to stick around, you definitely should pick a username. It's unfortunate but true that IPs are treated with heightened suspicion and lowered respect, by almost everyone. --Sammy1339 (talk) 12:13, 7 July 2015 (UTC)

Humans as non-food animals

Sammy, about "non-food species such as dogs or humans": most sources on the meat paradox proper don't go into human-centric speciesism, but I think it's reasonable for us to do so. We're summarizing carnism, and in that context I think sources like Joy and Gibert fully justify integrating "humans>animals" speciesism with "cats>pigs" speciesism. It's a bit surprising, perhaps, but appropriately so, because the concept of carnism itself will be unfamiliar to most people. FourViolas (talk) 16:56, 7 July 2015 (UTC)

Gibert-Desaulniers talks about the view of humans as being at the top of the species hierarchy on p. 295, and says that carnists likely endorse this idea, but says this in the context of discussing speciesism and the relationship of speciesism to carnism. (I think there is enough of that in the article right now, and it's obvious that almost everyone values humans over other species.) There is no talk, however of eating humans. People have fundamentally different views about eating humans versus eating dogs, and even in cultures that practice cannibalism, humans are only eaten in special contexts - Melanesian native women may eat their unwanted infants, Cambodian soldiers may eat their fallen enemies, or just their livers, to show disrespect, etc. Nobody thinks of humans as "food animals." Including this here is original research and fundamentally muddles the point. Carnism is mostly about discrimination between similar species based on a culturally-relative classification as food animals. Speciesism is about species-based discrimination in general. --Sammy1339 (talk) 18:26, 7 July 2015 (UTC)

Are you sure you aren't conflating carnism with the meat paradox? Carnism is the belief system in which eating certain animals is considered ethical and appropriate (Joy p.30), Carnism refers to the ideology conditioning people to consume certain animal products (Gibert p.1). The "certain" implies some kind of speciesism, but (as I read it) carnism is a fundamental worldview, not just a list of edible species.. Carnism is the entire ideology of exploitation, moral disenfranchisement, and objectification of animals in the service of humans. In contrast, Loughnan decribes the meat paradox thus: Most people both care about animals and eat animals. He's talking primarily about what SV discussed, the pet store with jeweled collars for cats and tins for tuna.

In any case, I wasn't suggesting that carnism endorses cannibalism; merely non-speciesistically specifying that humans are one of the species carnism classifies in the "not to be eaten" category. Whether one believes that category should include all animals, all chordates, all animals except a few dozen birds and ungulates, or only humans, the sentence is a true description of carnist principles.

But it's not a big deal. If you feel strongly that it's inappropriate to note that carnism forbids cannibalism, I'll drop it. FourViolas (talk) 20:35, 7 July 2015 (UTC)

I think the thinking underlying the prohibition (or endorsement) of cannibalism is much different from the way people think about eating any other animal. People can articulate all sorts of complex arguments for why they don't eat humans which don't apply to other species. It's a separate issue, and including it is original research. --Sammy1339 (talk) 21:04, 7 July 2015 (UTC)

A (veganist) peer-reviewed source (Joy/Adam Weitzenfeld) agrees with you: Carnism—a sub-ideology of speciesism that dichotomizes nonhuman animals into “edible” and “inedible” categorizations and legitimates the exploitation and consumption of animal others—presents an apt case study of speciesism. Site is blacklisted, search "An Overview of Anthropocentrism, Humanism, and Speciesism in Critical Animal Theory" FourViolas (talk) 19:36, 12 July 2015 (UTC)

The removal of referenced text

What in the words that were edited out at 10:40 hours today constituted synthesis? - Fartherred (talk) 13:44, 9 July 2015 (UTC)

The two sentences taken together made a claim not present in either source ("failed to recognize that" elderly people need B12.) On a different note your text also included criticism of one of the 4N arguments. I have many sources for such criticism but I am trying to exclude it for NPOV reasons right now, until I collect enough directly relevant sources to expand the article in a neutral way. Your solution, to balance such a criticism with a medical article that has no apparent relevance, is not a good one. --Sammy1339 (talk) 13:54, 9 July 2015 (UTC)

That the article failed to recognize that vitamin B-12 supplements from a pharmacy are not an option for many of the poor is a fact. The fact can be verified by reading the article, so it is indeed verifiable. I described the article in my own words which is required by Misplaced Pages policy forbidding substantial quotation in a case like this. If you find better criticisms of the four Ns idea you can add it to article. There is no reason to remove the text that I added until you are ready with your addition. There is no policy like that. The text I added is relevant because it further describes something discussed in the text. The fact that you do not like it is not a policy based argument. - Fartherred (talk) 14:22, 9 July 2015 (UTC)

Sammy, you reverted my addition to the article twice, but have not made a policy based argument for deleting it even once. When are you going to answer my argument? - Fartherred (talk) 14:41, 9 July 2015 (UTC)

You seem to be confused. You refer to '("failed to recognize that" elderly people need B12)' as a claim not in either source, but what I wrote was: "The article failed to recognize that vitamin B-12 supplements from a pharmacy are not an option for many of the poor." The fact that vitamin B-12 deficiency results from not eating meat is common knowledge, and so is the fact that the poor often cannot obtain pharmacy supplements. The fact that I gave a reference for poor people suffering vitamin B-12 deficiency should not in any way excuse the failure of the newspaper article referred to to note it. The newspaper did refer to a supplement of B-12 being needed by vegans, so it should have mentioned that poor people often cannot get this supplement. The relevance of the medical article is in documenting the vitamin B-12 deficiency in the poor. - Fartherred (talk) 15:06, 9 July 2015 (UTC)

It is clearly synthesis, for reasons you have explained above. --Sammy1339 (talk) 15:28, 9 July 2015 (UTC)

Specifically, you synthesized the fact that vegans probably need supplements with the fact that the poor are at higher risk for B12 deficiency, creating the logical inference that veganism is not an option for "many of the poor." As you observed yourself, this synthesis was not made by the sources. From WP:SYN: If one reliable source says A, and another reliable source says B, do not join A and B together to imply a conclusion C that is not mentioned by either of the sources. FourViolas (talk) 20:05, 9 July 2015 (UTC)

Definition is confused

I am still confused regarding the definition of carnism. The leading sentence states "Carnism is the prevailing belief system that supports the killing of certain species of animals for food and other purposes" I am fine up until "...and other purposes". If the term is not used for the purposes of eating only, then what is the difference between "carnism" and "speciesism". The use of "carn -" is presumably from the Latin, caro, meaning 'meat' or 'flesh'. If this is the case, why is it being used for "...and other purposes."? The dictionary definition is also confusing. It states "Carnism refers to the ideology conditioning people to consume certain animal products." Does "consume" mean "eat"? We are all consumers of animal products, but we may not be eating those products. I think the article needs to be much clearer on this.DrChrissy 21:25, 9 July 2015 (UTC)

The sources are not completely clear and I think there may not be a truly precise definition. However other reasons for killing animals I can think of that would definitely be considered carnist are fur and sport hunting; further reasons which may or may not be include animal research and euthanasia for minor injuries. Speciesism is much broader than just killing and opposition to "speciesism" may involve objections to things like abuse of animals in circuses, for example. The current definition is supported by sources, but I'll see if I can do some digging and give you a more satisfying answer. --Sammy1339 (talk) 22:48, 9 July 2015 (UTC)

To my mind, it really comes down to whether carnism relates only to eating animals - that's why I mentioned the derivation of Caro as meat. I actually don't see why the term carnist should apply to killing animals for fur - that practice, to me, is an example of speciesism. Looking forward to further discussion. DrChrissy 23:03, 9 July 2015 (UTC)

It's not clear to me. I think the concept is that the alleged prejudices that result from eating meat lead to thinking which justifies other forms of animal exploitation, and "carnism" refers to these patterns of thinking. I'll have to get back to you after I've looked through the sources more carefully to check the exact wording they use. Certainly most of the psychological studies have been about meat specifically, but at least one of the sociologists, Gutjahr, clearly construes carnism much more broadly. --Sammy1339 (talk) 01:27, 10 July 2015 (UTC)

Alright, here are some explicit definitions.

• Joy's book (2010): "Carnism is the belief system in which eating certain animals is considered ethical and appropriate. Carnists - people who eat meat - are not the same as carnivores. ... Carnists eat meat not because they need to, but because they choose to, and choices always stem from beliefs."
• DeMello (2012): "Melanie Joy coined the term carnism to refer to the belief system which supports meat eating."
• Gutjahr (2013): " identifies the normalization mechanisms that reproduce the violent system of meat consumption, as a perception and belief scheme, which is deeply internalized in the subjects (similar to an ideology), which she calls Carnism."
• Gibert & Desaulniers (2014): "Carnism refers to the ideology conditioning people to consume certain animal products. It is essentially the opposite of veganism." Several pages later they give us "How then are speciesism and carnism to be distinguished? First, speciesism is broader than carnism. For instance, you can be vegan and consider that no animals deserve to be exploited for food or leather but still morally value the life of a horse more than that of a cow because of their belonging to a hierarchically lower-ranked species. In this case, you are probably not a carnist but, in a sense, you are still a speciesist."
• Joy's website (2015): "Carnism is the invisible belief system, or ideology, that conditions people to eat certain animals. Carnism is essentially the opposite of veganism; “carn” means “flesh” or “of the flesh” and “ism” denotes a belief system. Most people view eating animals as a given, rather than a choice; in meat-eating cultures around the world people typically don’t think about why they find the flesh of some animals disgusting and the flesh of other animals appetizing, or why they eat any animals at all. But when eating animals is not a necessity for survival, as is the case in much of the world today, it is a choice - and choices always stem from beliefs."

The focus is clearly on meat, but Gibert & Desaulniers take a broader view and explicitly include leather. From the context of Gutjahr's paper it's clear she thinks that the "deeply internalized belief scheme" called carnism supports other kinds of violence, but she's a bit oblique. The "opposite of veganism" description, which is attributable to both Joy and Gibert-Desaulniers, and the fact that even the title of Joy's book references leather, makes me think that the products which carnism supports the consumption of are a bit more general a class than just meat. I wrote the current version, which makes meat the focus but doesn't specify the "other purposes", because this seems to be consistent with the sources. I don't think there's strong support in the sources for clarifying just what the "other purposes" are. --Sammy1339 (talk) 04:32, 10 July 2015 (UTC)

Thanks for gathering those definitions for direct comparison. We could tweak the last words to "…killing animals for human uses, particularly food" if that would help. FourViolas (talk) 10:57, 10 July 2015 (UTC)

Good research. I suggest you use Joy's definition as the first sentence of the article making it clear that the original meaning was related only to eating animals. Then, the second sentence could be, "Later interpretations have more broadly construed the term to mean other uses of animal products. Then, in the body of the article, you could have a separate section perhaps called "Interpretation" where you just about copy-and-paste the interpretations you gave above. I think that would keep everybody happy. When adding to the article, editors can write "According to ....." and we all know what we are talking about.DrChrissy 11:22, 10 July 2015 (UTC)

Reintroduction of "...for other purposes" is, IMHO, very unhelpful. With this phrase in place, I can see no difference between "Carnism" and "speciesism" and I would propose they be merged. If the scope of carnism is on consuming meat, it is a different story and the 2 deserve separate articles. At the moment, it is confusing for the reader to be told carnism is killing "...for other purposes" but then read about the "Meat paradox" (eating meat) and "Joy stated that she wrote the book to examine an apparent paradox in most people's behavior toward animals – that they exhibit compassion toward some species while eating others" (again, eating meat).DrChrissy 13:32, 10 July 2015 (UTC)

Alright, I've removed it. --Sammy1339 (talk) 13:35, 10 July 2015 (UTC)

It really reads better - we can expand on interpretations and a broadening of the meaning after we have a nice, tight definition.DrChrissy 13:38, 10 July 2015 (UTC)

Unlink "hegemony" ?

@User:Sammy1339 Hi. Why did you unlink "hegemony" in the article?

Because it's a metaphorical usage and the Misplaced Pages article hegemony is about international politics. --Sammy1339 (talk) 13:26, 10 July 2015 (UTC)

It is a very unusual word and if it is being use as a metaphor, it is likely to confuse. Readers will look it up in WP and will wonder what it means. Using it in this way so early in the article is very likely to lose readership of the article.DrChrissy 13:36, 10 July 2015 (UTC)

Granted, but if I clicked on that only to read about dominant relationships among nations, I'd only end up more confused. It violates at least the spirit of WP:EGG. --Sammy1339 (talk) 13:46, 10 July 2015 (UTC)

Sure. Perhaps you could explain what it is being used as a metaphor for? Maybe there is a more accessible word or phrase.DrChrissy 13:53, 10 July 2015 (UTC)

I'm not sure exactly. Pinging SlimVirgin, who added this phrase. --Sammy1339 (talk) 14:17, 10 July 2015 (UTC)

I understood it readily as the second definition given at wikt:hegemony, but I've spent a lot of time around feminists talking about hegemonic masculinity and the like. I'm convinced it's the most correct word, but I can see how you might also find it overly technical. Perhaps it could be moved later in the lead (with scare quotes and a citation), or (easiest solution) just wikt-linked as tricky words sometimes are. FourViolas (talk) 15:48, 10 July 2015 (UTC)

Third option: pipe it to cultural hegemony. FourViolas (talk) 15:50, 10 July 2015 (UTC)

I don't see how cultural hegemony is relevant. By stretching quite a bit, one might imagine "society" as consisting of, say, both humans and domestic animals, with humans being the "ruling class," so that human supremacism is a hegemony in the Marxian sense. But how is carnism one? Your comment about hegemonic masculinity is probably right on point: feminist philosophers tend to have Whorfian views and abuse language accordingly; the word carnism itself comes in part from a feminist-inspired attempt at re-framing the conversation about meat, as made clear in Joy's 2001 Satya article. It seems probable that "hegemony" is used here in a similar way, basically to say that carnism is a dominant ideology. I would classify this as a metaphor, and I don't think we can link to a definition that really fits. But I'll wait for SV's opinion. --Sammy1339 (talk) 16:28, 10 July 2015 (UTC)

I was just about to say it was much clearer now that I had read Cultural hegemony! I really think it is such an unusual word that it must be linked to something. Shall we wait for SlimVirgin's input.DrChrissy 16:34, 10 July 2015 (UTC)

Hi, responding to the ping, by all means remove it if it's confusing. I'm fine with that. Sarah 19:31, 10 July 2015 (UTC)

I've gone ahead and removed it, because the source uses "hegemonic" to describe the rhetoric of the meat industry. It may use "hegemony" deeper in the article; I'm currently only looking at the abstract, and don't have time to look further, so I've removed it to be safe. If someone wants to restore it, I don't mind. Sarah 04:15, 11 July 2015 (UTC)

I found a source and put it back with the wikt-link, because I do think it's the precise word which means "belief system endorsed by so many people that it's impolite to question it," but if anyone opposes go ahead and re-remove it—not a big deal. FourViolas (talk) 19:38, 12 July 2015 (UTC)

RfC concerning this article

There is an RfC concerning this article and the article on veganism. All editors here are invited to comment there. Martin Hogbin (talk) 20:38, 12 July 2015 (UTC)

Not neutral - I am commenting here since I don't think it makes sense to evaluate the articles together. Viewing this article as as someone with vegetarian tendencies and a huge supporter and donor to the Humane Society, I say with hopefully little bias that this article is not neutral. Examples: calling it an "unquestioned default", implications of animal cruelty, implying all or most meat eats suffer from cognitive dissonance which then must be "moderated", comparisons to vegans suffering from the same oppression as women/feminism, and generally no arguments "for" Carnism that are not cast in a negative light. 217IP (talk) 02:15, 13 July 2015 (UTC)

Thanks for your input! I'm currently working on addressing some of those concerns, please don't edit the article yourself for a few minutes to avoid a WP:Edit conflict. FourViolas (talk) 02:18, 13 July 2015 (UTC)

All right, go ahead and take your turn if you like. I will remove "unquestioned default" when I figure out which source(s) support it, as it implies that it ought to be questioned. I toned down some claims and backed off others, especially when sources did not directly support the wording. Almost all the sources cited which aren't intended as activism are scientific studies of the cognitive dissonance caused by the meat paradox, so I don't think we can leave that out while respecting the balance of opinions presented in reliable sources, but there, too, I hewed back to "negative emotions" instead of "moral conflict", and cut language ("attempt") implying most people actively experience moral unease about omnivory. I think it's fair to have a brief paragraph, clearly labeled as vegans' POV, saying "vegans think carnism is really bad, and compare it to what feminists call 'the patriarchy'". FourViolas (talk) 02:46, 13 July 2015 (UTC)

Hi Violas - I think you're doing a great job. I would mention however, that having a section specifically outlining vegan POV seems to fall under WP:UNDUE: "articles should not give minority views or aspects as much of or as detailed a description as more widely held views or widely supported aspects". It seems like this section can be removed and simply have a see also:Ethics_of_eating_meat since it is duplicating content anyway. I could see how it can be argued to include this if, like the ethics page, at least half the page discussed a non-vegan perspective. Since this article essentially doesn't include non-vegan POV at all, it seems especially egregious to include a vegan POV section. In my opinion, this article should really be focusing on the discussion of the word Carnism as a neologism rather than trying to replicate the ethics article. 217IP (talk) 03:18, 13 July 2015 (UTC)

@217IP: We have a lot of material on vegan opinions about carnism, and its place in vegan discourse. I kept this section extremely brief because of the type of concern you cite, but given its prominence in the sources we can't eliminate it altogether. Regarding "unquestioned default," that's not my language, but we have many sources saying essentially that and none contradicting it, so I don't see a problem. Our job is to represent what sources say, not what people expect to see, and we are already bending over backwards to avoid including criticism of the central "pro-carnist" ideas, like the 4Ns, which, please note, are not refuted despite that we have multiple sources, including academic papers with dozens of citations, criticizing these arguments harshly without mincing words. @FourViolas: I found your most recent edit a bit unhelpful as it mostly uses more qualified language to say the same thing, sacrificing flow and readability without changing the POV, and contrary to what you suggested on the other page it's not acceptable to violate WP:OR to create the appearance of neutrality. --Sammy1339 (talk) 03:53, 13 July 2015 (UTC)

I think it is important to keep WP:BIASED in mind for the sources used in this article. The sources are not required to be unbiased, but the way the article is written must remain unbiased despite the wording used in sources. In that particular example (unquestioned default) it would be much better for NPOV to include those words as a quote of an author and to not make it the second sentence of the article. The same would also apply to the implication of animal cruelty - that's a better example of something that really might be improved if quoted as WP:BIAS demonstrates.217IP (talk) 04:07, 13 July 2015 (UTC)

The sources in this article are mostly reputably published academic books and journal articles. WP:BIASED is about partisan sources. The only sources in the article that this guideline could be construed as applying to are The Center for Global Nonkilling, whose book is cited only for two very non-controversial claims, and Gary Francione's website, which is cited for opposition to the carnism concept (albeit from a different direction than some editors want to see.) The two things about you are objecting to are basically agreed on by all the sources, so it would make no sense to attribute them or put them in scare quotes. --Sammy1339 (talk) 04:17, 13 July 2015 (UTC)

Throwing in my two cents. As one of the people who's expressed neutrality concerns, I actually agree with Sammy that it would be silly to omit this. Acknowledging that this idea is prominent in vegan discourse and is mainly advocated by vegans actually helps check any undue weight given to vegan sources by acknowledging where these ideas come from. If anything, I'd like to see that type of language expanded (which was done a bit in FourViolas' recent copyedit). ~ Rob 04:09, 13 July 2015 (UTC)

I think it is fine to recognize vegan support of Carnism and the views they share. I don't think it's fine to have a sentence discussing how vegans view their plight in the same way feminists view the patriarchy and it doesn't make sense to me for the vegan POV to have it's own section when this is easily summarized elsewhere in a single sentence or two. 217IP (talk) 04:20, 13 July 2015 (UTC)

(edit conflict)Hi there, Sammy. I'll itemize, you (and everyone) can respond. I was well aware of WP:VALID, as you may remember from the AfD and elsewhere. However, as Rob explained, we're dealing with a word used exclusively by partisans, and so we need to make more of an effort to seek objective language (not pro-meat; objective) rather than rephrasing without changing the partisan tone.

And a moment of self-indulgent whining: I'd be feeling friendlier if you had left the parts you agreed with up and specified your concerns here, per WP:ROWN, so I'll take a break for now so I can edit when I'm at my best. FourViolas (talk) 04:21, 13 July 2015 (UTC)

1. Cite error: The named reference Loughnan2014 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
2. Waytz, Adam; Gray, Kurt; Epley, Nicholas; Wegner, Daniel M. (2010). "Causes and consequences of mind perception" (PDF). Trends in Cognitive Sciences. 14 (8): 383–388. doi:10.1016/j.tics.2010.05.006. Retrieved 13 July 2015.

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