White normativity, animal advocacy and PETA’s campaigns

Abstract

In this article, I argue that some of the campaigns that People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) carried out in the USA are white normative and that the presence of this normative whiteness is symptomatic of the same larger problem in animal advocacy. I contend that PETA’s campaigns are white normative for two sets of reasons. First, PETA’s campaigns promote racist hierarchies; second, their campaigns contribute to black people’s disengagement from animal justice, undermining the pursuit of black justice. Further, I argue that, even though PETA’s campaigns are symptomatic of how many animal advocates are white normative, this does not need to be the case, for there are advocacy alternatives that resist normative whiteness.