Freedom of Species

On Friday 20th September 2019, hundreds of thousands of Australians joined the Global Climate Strike. We took along a recorder to get a sense of how people were thinking about animals and agriculture in relation to the climate and climate action.

Martin Stringer is a nature photographer & videographer who has become personally involved in crowd-funded tropical rainforest protection & restoration projects, both in Australia's Daintree and in the Amazon.  He explains these inspiring conservation programs and the huge benefits they're having on wildlife and carbon storage.   Halfcut www.halfcut.orgRainforest Trust www.rainforesttrust.orgRainforest Rescue www.rainforestrescue.org.au

We are joined by Nikki Viveca, a Melbourne-based performer who brings a touch of theatre to stand-up. Nikki has performed solo shows, such as Asexual Healing, was most recently performing in the Comedy Festival improv show Completely Improvised Potter (which is great!) and won the 2019 Midsumma Poetry Slam.Nikki will tell us about her new fringe show Wasp Movie. When Nikki moved into her cute new house, she was looking forward to turning it into the home of her dreams. She wasn’t counting on the wasps who also wanted to make it their dream home as well. In Wasp Movie, Nikki pools her creative talents to pay homage to one of the world’s least loved animals - the Wasp.You can find out more details about the show and buy tickets at the Melbourne Fringe website - Wasp Movie.Another show about animals that you might want to check out is Creatures Lost

This is a presentation given by Terry Hurtado, an environmental & animal rights activist in Colombia, at the Decolonizing Animals conference in New Zealand in July 2019.  "Colombia had a very strong welfareist tradition linked to dog and cat shelters, and to some extent, the welfare of horses used for pulling wagons. New generations took reasonability to fight against spectacles in which non-human animals were used, like bullfights, horse parades and circus displaying new ways of advocacy, and bringing in innovative discussions for the country. The new ways of advocacy, as activism, brought a shift in how organization members perceived their role. The way the public and the media saw organizations that worked for animals, changed as well."Decolonizing Animals conference  https://aasa2019.org/Photo credit:  Alejandro Sánchez Lariccia

We’re joined by social philosopher Paul-Mikhail Catapang Podosky who discusses his academic work exploring the way the meat-eating industry uses the term “humane” to avoid the questioning of the killing of animals.You can follow Paul-Mikhail Catapang Podosky on Twitter @PPodosky and you can view his publications, including the article ‘A Linguistic Method of Deception The Difference Between Killing Humanely and a Humane Killing’, which we focus on in this show, here: http://unimelb.academia.edu/PaulMikhailCatapangPodosky

In this weeks show we hear a talk by Laila Kassam titled, ‘How can we build a powerful mass movement for animal justice.’ Laila Kassam is a part of the Animal Think Tank Collective. You can find resources and more about the collectives work on their website.

Reem Lascelles from EVER Sanctuary is in the studio, talking about the devastating plight of rabbits farmed for meat in Australia and why they are largely invisible in our society.  She describes the appalling conditions that they are subjected to, from birth to slaughter, and the physical and psychological impacts that such conditions have on a highly sensitive, social, and intelligent animal.  Reem also explains the many different degrees of welfare protection that may be applied to this single breed, the New Zealand White, and how she follows a campaign path that incorporates both incremental reform and abolition.  EVER Sanctuary  www.eversanctuary.orgEVER Sanctuary on Facebook  https://www.facebook.com/eversanctuaryberry/Aussie Farms  www.aussiefarms.org.au

We’re joined by PhD candidate Melissa Laing who discusses her research on social workers standing up for companion animals, in addition to their human clients.You can follow Melissa on Twitter @ylaingylaing and you can also hear her talk Encountering Interspecies Homelessness: Stories of Social Workers’ Resistance to Anthropocentrism, plus other talks from the Sociology and Animals session at the 2018 ‘Precarity, Rights and Resistance’ conference by The Australian Sociological Association (TASA) here: https://archive.org/search.php?query=subject%3A%22TASA+2018%22

On this show we’re joined by Mary Merkenich, a member of Socialist Alliance and writer for Green Left Weekly, who discusses links between capitalism and the oppression of animals. We also play a talk by Dilan Fernando, Co-Founder of Young Voices for Animals, from the event Animal Liberation and Capitalism, which Mary Merkenich also spoke at, as well as Kristin Leigh, President and Campaign Director of Vegan Rising. You can listen to audio of this event here: https://archive.org/details/animalliberationandcapitalism You can also read Mary Merkenich’s article ‘Capitalism’s abuse of animals degrades us all’ at the following link (note that the picture used for this show is taken from this article): https://www.greenleft.org.au/content/capitalism-abuse-animals-degrades-us-all?fbclid=IwAR3zk5RMMKPGaQeehC-24oveX8LeNuFwDqrOuMwju0pXVknONowPsXtV8WQ

We hear from Sue McKinnon & Peter Roberts, both of the Kinglake Friends of the Forest community group which is going head-to-head with the government-owned logging company VicForests, to save the little-known greater glider from extinction.Sue & Peter explain how, despite the greater glider's threatened status, VicForests continues to clearfell coupes throughout the native forests of Central Highlands and Gippsland where greater gliders are known to inhabit.  They also describe the bold direct action and careful surveys that the dedicated members of Kinglake Friends of the Forest have undertaken, in defence of the greater glider.  And how the Victorian Government have deliberately prioritised the economic interests of the logging industry over the survival of the greater glider and a safe climate.  Kinglake Friends of the Forest https://www.facebook.com/Kinglake-Friends-of-the-Forest-449764088934522/