Saturday, May 29th, 2021

Title: Nonhuman Animals in Sport: Are We Any Closer to Recognizing Their Plight?

Author: Melanie L. Sartore-Baldwin

Institution: East Carolina University

Keywords: Nonhuman animals, social justice, mascots, attitudes

Abstract:

Despite resistance by some, sport is and always will be part of the larger social justice discussion in the United States. Be it historical movements like Civil Rights and Women’s Liberation, or more contemporary movements like Black Lives Matter, sport and athletes are often important members of important social justice conversations. Within sport, one social justice issue that has long been discussed is the use of Native American as sport team mascots. Only recently has the discussion created change, suggesting that, perhaps the plight of some marginalized groups is being recognized. One group left out of the social justice discussion, however, is nonhuman animals. Despite their presence as athletes themselves, the symbolic use of their likenesses to convey ferocity and uphold tradition as mascots, the use of their body parts to create sporting equipment, and the consumption of their bodies at sporting events, nonhuman animals have received little recognition relative to their ethical use and inclusion in sport. Recognizing this shortcoming, the purpose of this work is three-fold. The first purpose is to assess whether nonhuman animals are recognized as a group worthy of social justice discussions by examining the relationship between social justice attitudes and attitudes toward animals. The second purpose is to examine the relationship between attitudes toward Native American mascots and attitudes toward nonhuman animals as mascots. The distinction between endangered and nonendangered species mascots will also be considered. Lastly, the extent to which one’s sport fan identity impacts these relationships will be assessed.

Key citations:

Breshahan, M. J., & Flowers, K. (2008). The effects of involvement in sports on attitudes toward Native American sport mascots. The Howard Journal of Communications, 19, 165-181. Doi: 10.1080/10646170801990987

Cunningham, G. B., Dixon, M. A., Singer, J. N., Oshiro, K. F., Ahn, N. Y., & Weems, A. (2019). A site to resist and persist: Diversity, social justice, and the unique nature of sport. Journal of Global Sport Management. https://doi.org/10.1080/24704067.2019.1578623

Jones, R. C. (2015). Animal rights is a social justice issue. Contemporary Justice Review, 18(4), 467-482.

Sartore-Baldwin, M., & McCullough, B. (2019). Examining Sport Fans and the Endangered Species Who Represent Their Affiliated Team Mascots. Society & Animals, 1, 1–19. Doi: 10.1163/15685306-12341605

Email: p20180435@goa.bits-pilani.ac.in

Institutional Affiliation: PhD Scholar, BITS Pilani, K. K. Birla Goa Campus, India.

Keywords: Jallikattu, Ritual Sport, Tamil, Media

Abstract: This paper critically examines the televised coverage of the debates and protests in the Indian national media pertaining to the ban on Jallikattu sport. Jallikattu is a ritual bull-sport conducted during the harvest festival of Pongal in the southern state of Tamil Nadu. The sport is held in an amphitheatre- like setting where a bull is left to run while contestants try to hold on to the bull’s hump for 15 seconds or longer. In 2014, the Supreme Court of India banned the sport after complaints of animal cruelty were raised by AWBI (Animal Welfare Board of India) and PETA. In the aftermath of the ban and failed attempts to reinstate the sport, widespread protests erupted in the state of Tamil Nadu between January 8 to January 23, 2017. The protestors argued that the sport celebrates mutual affection and respect between the bull and human beings. Following the protests and massive outrage on social media, the state government passed the Jallikattu Bill on January 23, 2017, allowing the sport to continue. The legal situation, however, remains unresolved. The Jallikattu ban and subsequent protests garnered a lot of attention in the national media, with panel debates on prime-time news discussing the issue at length. Analyzing the coverage of Jallikattu ban and protests on mainstream English TV news channels, I argue that the media coverage of Jallikattu exhibited a lack of understanding of lndigeneous sporting cultures. The unsympathetic coverage of a non-hypercommodified sport like Jallikattu, I argue, is symptomatic of the popular bias which privileges mainstream sport, resulting in pushing indigenous sport to the margins.

Key Citations:

1. Ravindran, Gopalan. "Jallikattu Uprising: Rhizomatic Spatialities, Protesting Bodies and Controls." Deleuzian and Guattarian Approaches to Contemporary Communication Cultures in India. Springer, Singapore, 2020. 15-31.

2. Singh, Java. "Jallikattu: Post-Humanistic Coefficients and Coloniality in South Asia’s Ergic Sport." South Asian Review 38.1 (2017): 29-48.

3. Kalaiyarasan, A. "Politics of jallikattu." Economic & Political Weekly 52.6 (2017): 11.

Coming to Wonder: How Sport Participation Can Induce Ethical Concern for Animals

McLaughlin, Douglas

California State University, Northridge

Keywords: animal ethics, intersubjective morality, sport participation

For some sports, participation is directly and acutely tied to place. An athlete’s participation in the sporting space goes much deeper than awareness of their own involvement and actions. An athlete can develop an appreciation for the preservation of that space, including others that inhabit the space. In important ways, sport participation can induce in athletes an ethical concern for the animals that inhabit their sporting space. This concern may not have developed otherwise and may consist of a deeper moral bond than would exist without participation in the space.

In this paper, I will explore how participation in sport can be understood as a coming to wonder in two senses. On the one hand, coming to wonder refers to an experience of participating in sport itself. On the other hand, coming to wonder refers to how that experience extends beyond sport into a deeper awareness of and ethical concern for others who share the space.

Important elements of this analysis will include how sport participation impacts animals, how ethical concern for animals can inform sport participation, and how direct involvement with the space and the lives of animals can lead to ethical conclusions that may be surprising and upsetting positions for those who do not have deep personal connections with sport, place, or animals.

Bugbee, Henry, and David W. Rodick (ed.). Wilderness in America: Philosophical Writings. Fordham University Press, 2017.

Kurlansky, Mark. Salmon: A Fish, the Earth, and the History of Their Common Fate. Ventura, CA: Patagonia Works, 2020.

Lachs, John. Intermediate Man. Indianapolis, IN: Hackett Publishing Company, 1981.

TITLE: Dogs and Tigers and Fish, Oh My! Sporting Captivity

AUTHORS NAMES: Elizabeth Foreman and Pam R. Sailors

INSTITUTIONAL AFFILIATION: Missouri State University

KEYWORDS: nonhuman animals, captivity, respectful paternalism

ABSTRACT:

In contemporary society, humans interact with nonhuman animals in a number of ways, many of which involve the captivity of the nonhuman animals involved. Nonhuman animals trained for sport (sled dogs, horses trained for dressage, etc.), nonhuman animals confined for human entertainment (zoos, aquariums, circuses, etc.), and companion animals are all held captive by the human beings who interact with them. However, the moral acceptability of these forms of captivity seems to vary widely; this variance isn’t only a function of the conditions of the captivity itself, but the reasons, attitude, and intentions of the captors. Martha Nussbaum’s conception of species-specific flourishing allows for what she calls “respectful paternalism” in the case of nonhuman animals, and in this paper, we will explore (a) what the “respectful” aspect of that paternalism involves by examining what it means for a captor to limit the autonomy of a nonhuman animal respectfully and (b) implications for our interactions with nonhuman animals in sport and entertainment environments.

KEY CITATIONS:

Lori Gruen. The Ethics of Captivity. Oxford University Press, 2014.

S.P. Morris. “A Moral Defense of Trophy Hunting and Why it Fails,” Sport, Ethics and Philosophy, 2020.

Martha C. Nussbaum. Frontiers of Justice : Disability, Nationality, Species Membership. Harvard University Press, 2006.

Title: Outdoor Recreation, COVID-19 and the Post-‘Anthropause’

Author(s): Bustad, Jacob (Towson University); Clevenger, Sam (Towson University); Rick, Oliver (Springfield College)

Keywords: COVID, outdoor recreation, animals, post-anthropocentrism

Abstract:

The early months of the COVID-19 outbreak resulted in a mass stoppage of different industries including sport, recreation, and tourism. One effect of this decreased amount of human activity, or ‘anthropause’ (Rutz, et al 2020) entailed animals reclaiming environments and habitats, with multiple media reports documenting creatures either returning to areas they had been forced from or encroaching within urban spaces. With the ongoing re-opening of the sport, recreation, and tourism industries, there is a need to understand the impact of this renewed human activity on animals and the temporarily-reclaimed environments. In this presentation, we critically examine a proposed second phase of the COVID crisis, by focusing on how increased participation in forms of outdoor recreation and leisure during the ‘post-anthropause’ have re-demonstrated the ecological impacts of human activity. As humans sought refuge and adventure in outdoor spaces during the prolonged pandemic, they also exhibited forms of environmental disturbance and damage, including the re-displacement of animals within national and state parks (Chow, 2020), and the enactment of policies aimed at making public lands and outdoor spaces available for resource production and extraction (Miller, 2020). This project is part of a broader research project (Clevenger, Rick, and Bustad 2020) exploring the pandemic as a ‘state of exception’ (Agamben, 2003), and post-anthropocentric aspects of COVID and sport and physical activity, specifically with regards to human and non-human interactions within the contexts of sport, recreation and leisure.

Key References:

Agamben, G. (2005). State of Exception. Chicago. The University of Chicago.

Clevenger, S. M., Rick, O., & Bustad, J. (2020). Critiquing Anthropocentric Media Coverage of the COVID-19 Sport “Hiatus”. International Journal of Sport Communication, 13(3), 559-565.

Rutz, C., Loretto, M. C., Bates, A. E., Davidson, S. C., Duarte, C. M., Jetz, W., ... & Cagnacci, F. (2020). COVID-19 lockdown allows researchers to quantify the effects of human activity on wildlife. Nature Ecology & Evolution, 4(9), 1156-1159.

Powers, participation and enhancement

Delon, Nicolas

New College of Florida

Keywords: Agency, Assent, Community, Dissent, Enhancement

I propose that sports involving animals are permissible insofar as (1) they respect and foster the agency of animals as participants or “domesticated partners” (Varner 2002); (2) they contribute to the construction of a community in which animals are seen and treated as co-equal members. The analysis appeals to normative powers—animals’ capacity to assent and dissent—from which derive certain rights, including to self-determination (Healey and Pepper 2020). Qua domesticated animals, sport animals are entitled to membership rights that extend beyond humane use: rights of equal codetermination of the community (pertaining to association, reproduction, control over environment, and what activities to engage in—e.g. work) (Blattner 2020; Donaldson and Kymlicka 2011), but also rights to codetermine the framework of the practice (e.g. how dog sledding, frisbee, horse-riding, etc., are played). In this light, sport could offer a microcosm of the broader political community.

If sports foster skills and dispositions essential for membership, and presuppose agency, cooperation, association, fair play, and other competencies, they can model participation in an interspecies community. But if community membership is good for animals, should we enhance animals to participate in sports, e.g. through “gene doping” (Neuhaus and Parent 2019)? What kinds of enhancement, if any, would be permissible per the above analysis? My tentative answer: enhancement is justified only if and insofar as is fosters the capacities required for equal membership and would, hypothetically, be endorsed by animals themselves. Accordingly, enhancement would set the bar higher for ethical sports by enhancing animals’ normative powers. This, I take it, is a welcome upshot.

References

Blattner, Charlotte E. 2020. Animal labour: Toward a prohibition of forced labour and a right to freely choose one’s work. In C. E. Blattner, K. Coulter, & W. Kymlicka (Eds.), Animal Labour: A New Frontier of Interspecies Justice?, pp. 91–115. Oxford: Oxford University Press

Donaldson, Sue, Kymlicka Will. 2011. Zoopolis: A Political Theory of Animal Rights. Oxford: Oxford University Press

Healey, Richard and Angie Pepper. 2020. Interspecies justice: agency, self-determination, and assent. Philosophical Studies. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11098-020-01472-5

Neuhaus, Carolyn, Parent, Brendan. 2019. Gene Doping—in Animals? Ethical Issues at the Intersection of Animal Use, Gene Editing, and Sports Ethics. Cambridge Quarterly of Healthcare Ethics, 28(1), 26-39. https://doi.org/10.1017/S096318011800035X

Varner, Gary. 2002. Pets, companion animals, and domesticated partners. In: D. Benatar, ed. Ethics for Everyday. McGraw-Hill, 450-75