Alice Crary and Lori Gruen, "Animal Crisis: A New Critical Theory" (Polity, 2022)

·1 hr 2 min·5 clips

Alice Crary and Lori Gruen argue that dismantling human supremacism is essential to transforming the current animal crisis.

This episode of New Books in Philosophy features an interview with Alice Crary and Lori Gruen, authors of 'Animal Crisis: A New Critical Theory'. Host Sarah Tyson introduces the book's focus on reinvigorating animal ethics through critical theory. Gruen shares her background in animal activism and shift from utilitarianism to feminist philosophy. Crary discusses her philosophical influences, including Cora Diamond's response to Peter Singer. The authors explain their collaboration, motivated by the sixth mass extinction and events like Australian wildfires. They use the orangutan case to illustrate how capitalism and colonialism devastate both human and animal lives. The conversation delves into ideology critique, using pigs in slaughterhouses to show how practices hide animal mistreatment. Gruen critiques utilitarianism through the story of Norma the cow, highlighting issues with replaceability and social structures. Crary discusses octopuses in 'My Octopus Teacher' to argue for engaged perception in understanding animal minds. Gruen examines rats as symbols of dehumanization and the importance of dignity in linking animal and human liberation. The authors address hypervisibility and invisibility in zoos and media, using parrots as an example. They conclude with ticks and mosquitoes to explore ecofeminism and ethical encounters with catastrophe. The interview ends with updates on their current projects, including critiques of effective altruism.

As heard by us

A clear, affecting animal-ethics discussion finds its force in the story of Norma and Nina.

Alice and Laurie take up the uneasy question of how animal lives are measured inside ethical systems built largely around human priorities. Their discussion of utilitarianism moves into the moral problem of killing, but the episode lands most sharply with Norma, a mother cow on…

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Why you'd press play

You want animal ethics to step out of abstraction and stand beside Norma, Nina, and the worker Norma hurt when Nina was being taken away.

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