FrogFish's strong response to Jason Scorse, amplified by David Roberts, GreenEngineer and Bottleman, and adumbrated on the other threads by a number of other writers, is reasonable and welcome.  I cannot agree with him in every detail -- e.g., about how the earliest human beings were predators on East African savannahs, like lions, and therefore so our we, and therefore it is vain and futile to look for ethical development regarding human carnivory -- , nevertheless his basic point is sound.

That said, I admire Jason for his initial strong challenge.  So far as human responsibilities toward animals go, he has wonderful things to say.  But so far as requiring environmentalists to repair their moral "deficiencies" regarding the treatment of animals, I am not ready to follow him that far.

Perhaps he has not yet articulated his position as fully as would satisfy all his readers.  I look forward, therefore, to anything more he has to say.

I entirely agree with David's remarks about activists in progressive interest groups, who impede their hopes of success by directing indignation at all they may find impure, including fellow travelers and allies.  I do not think I would use "quixotic," though.

In his report on hunters, Bottleman quotes a term of insulting dismissal, used to refer to animal-rights activists: "wackos."  Given the tactics and the angry public demeanor of some of them, I suppose the term is understandable.  Certainly, sitting in trees for weeks and months looks quixoticoid, at least.  And that notorious episode of releasing minks, all at once, all in one place, amounted to a liberation out of the frying pan and into the fire.

(On the other hand, in "E.T.," young Elliot's liberation of the frogs was one of the most glorious moments in movie history.  Still, what did Spielberg imagine would happen to them then?  Did they take hold in Elliot's LA suburb as an unwanted invasive species in fact, and kill off the local wildlife?)

My guess is, probably most members of ALF, and many if not most members of PETA, can be pretty annoying to talk to sometimes.  But I wonder, of what they actually do, how much deserves to be considered "wacko"?

And how often has that term been used of other disruptive protesters?  Was Gandhi called "wacko" for going on hunger strikes?  Were Martin Luther King and other civil rights activists called "wacko"?  Were anti-Vietnam-War protesters called "wacko"?  In the 1980s, many of us disapproved of the tactic of the anti-apartheid pro-divestment protesters who blockaded our university classroom hall, even as we agreed with their ends.  But nobody called them "wacko."  Similarly, in the same decade, the ACT-UP people, enraged at the general neglect of the HIV/AIDS epidemic, did some very outrageous things, including desecrating the Eucharist at NYC's Catholic cathedral.  But nobody called them "wacko."

So why do animal-rights activists deserve that term of dismissal?  I am just wondering out loud; I know Bottleman did not himself use that term.

I do not really know PETA all that well.  They are consistently plugging veganism, I know, but I wonder how many of their sympathizers feel bullied against their will to accept it.

I find the Humane Society of the US and Greenpeace to be much more balanced and open-armed, in which both animal-rights activists and biodiversity-conserving environmentalists can find a place.  Also, WWF, the National Wildlife Federation, and Defenders of Wildlife.  Perhaps Audubon, Ocean Conservancy and Andrew's group, Oceana, are tipped more toward environmentalists, but not necessarily, given how charismatic most birds are, and many marine animals, such as cetaceans and sea turtles.

Audubon's great writer Ted Williams has in fact written on Bottleman's subject, the reconciliation of environmentalists and hunters.  In that connexion, it should be understood that not all animal-rights supporters attribute gospel-like authority to Disney's "Bambi."

It is on record, in the blogs of the Greenpeace people pursuing the Japanese whalers earlier this year, that they were motivated both by the environmentalist concern, to conserve dimishing species of cetaceans, and by the animal-welfare concern, to report the horrifying manner in which the whales were slaughtered.

So I would suggest that, whether or not it requires all that much ancient Jedi wisdom, there already exist many people who happily find themselves in both groups, who consort happily with members of either group, and who keep the few inevitable contradictions compartmentalized, without allowing them to be disruptive.

Chickens are our cousins! So are other sensitive animals! Enough is enough! No more factory farms!

I do think ARA's and environmentalists have a lot in common.

In fact, I consider myself both. I have a hard time separating the two. My interest in protecting the environment came before my interest in protecting animals. When I found out that CAFOs and other modern animal exploitation (over-fishing of the oceans, anyone?) were wreaking havoc on our environment, it was clear to me that I could no longer eat the way I had been.

I probably could have found a slightly more environmentally sustainable way to continue eating animals, but seeing them treated as commodities at CAFOs opened my eyes to the notion that these are thinking, feeling creatures mankind was exploiting. I knew that, if I could be vibrant and healthy without them or their eggs or milk, then I had to stop consuming them.

You can say it was for the animals, but I also like to think it was for myself. Over these past four and a half years of living and advocating vegan ethics, I have become a more aware and active person all around. See, when I stopped supporting an industry based around killing, I started embracing life, and that has strengthened my interpersonal relationships, my citizenship, my humanitarianism, and my environmentalism.

"The choice thoughtful people face is not between helping humans or helping other animals. One can do both." -- Tom Regan