Animal Exploitation is a Feminist Issue

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Animal exploitation can only be fully understood and explained by feminists, as believed by the ecofeminist movement, as both feminism and veganism are combined to create a unified whole. Whereas animals lives and bodies are taken advantage of on a daily basis due to the popularized western diet, in a similar facet, women's bodys are objectified and sexualied by society. Thus, both women and animals endure a similar objectification, thus making the exploitation of animals a problem that many feminists undertake.

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The exploitation of animals can only fully be understood and solved by feminists because both feminists and non-human animals endure similar hardships, thus, it becomes the responsibility of the feminist to speak for the voiceless. According to Ko, there are five main reasons why the exploitation of animals is solely a feminist issue. These include that animal bodies are also objectified, animal bodies are used to normalize rape culture, domestic violence harms animals, intersectionality must include all suppressed groups and our society also spreads lies about animals (Ko). To elaborate, the bodies of animals and women are alike in the way that they are objectified by the masses in order to make a statement and to sexualize them. The paralleled struggle between women and animals is illustrated by their similar fight for liberation and for human understanding. To further perpetuate this issue, “the woman is measured by the value the man gets out of her, the animal is measured according to the value the human gets out of it” (Webber). Furthermore, both women and animals are used as props by mankind and the exploitation that nonhuman animals endure can only fully be comprehended by ecofeminists because they are simultaneously enduring a similar struggle when it comes to being exploited by men.

Milk is a feminist issue because it is the product of the exploitation to female reproductive rights (Sourced from Google Images)

Ecofeminists are the individuals who possess the ability to understand animal exploitation to its full extent and progressively work to reverse and minimize the effects of this issue. There is “an intentional consciousness of the ways in which the oppression of women and the exploitation of nature are intertwined”

(June, 101). Women are oppressed by the societal expectations held before them and by the sexualization of their bodies, whereas the environment is deteriorating and animals are being exploited by humans because of animal agriculture. Therefore, due to both women and animals enduring similar struggles it makes the most sense that feminists who are aware of these issues have the largest scope of knowledge surrounding both animal exploitation and the oppression of women, and can thus take the problem into their own hands and make it known. Ecofeminists see the problem of animal exploitation as an issue that is their responsibility to undertake because they rationalize it on a personal level and already fight for their own rights on a day-to-day basis. Thus, speaking for the voiceless is one addition that makes their current fight even stronger.