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I have looked through the three AfDs and, as I am sure you all know, the results were Delete, Delete, No consensus.
I think a move to another name might be acceptable to WP policy but this page is exactly the kind of thing that WP:NEO was intended to avoid. The reasons that I am going to propose deletion again are:
One editor says the article is just about the word 'carnism'. That is what Wiktionary is for; we do not have articles on just words in WP.
Some people think that carnism is about the reasons that we eat some animals and not others.
I think (based on what I believe to be Joy's own remarks) that carnism is just a name for meat eating, the opposite of veganism, as she puts it. Martin Hogbin ( talk) 15:53, 31 July 2015 (UTC)
I am not the only one to call the term pejorative, another editor in the last AfD called it, '.. topic that was named by opponents of Carnism for use as a disparaging term'.
'Carnism' is a name designed to make a point; that is not what WP is for. Martin Hogbin ( talk) 15:53, 31 July 2015 (UTC)
The more sources using the word 'carnism' the article cites the more biased it becomes. Martin Hogbin ( talk) 15:53, 31 July 2015 (UTC)
The problem is that with this title there is no way the article can be made NPOV. Those who want to keep an article on the subject of opposition to meat eating should look to move it to a neutral title, where a much wider range of sources can be used Martin Hogbin ( talk) 15:53, 31 July 2015 (UTC)
Sorry people. I know you have put much effort into this article but you have done so in the full knowledge that some editors find the article NPOV. If you want to save your work I suggest that you look for a neutral home for the subject.
We need a final and definitive answer to whether this article should be here or not. I suggest an AfD where we try to get the widest possible community participation so that the matter can be settled once and for all. All previous AfD participants should be asked for their opinions. Martin Hogbin ( talk) 15:53, 31 July 2015 (UTC)
I don't know much about move discussions, so I'll just give you all information to work with.
This book, reliably attested to be a mainstream compilation of contemporary sociological meat research, doesn't mention "carnism". Here's my own list of a few recent highly-cited sources discussing very closely related topics without using the word:
Comparing these papers' citation counts, using Google Scholar's tools, to those of papers like Freeman on television 'carnonormativity shows that scholars using the carnism model are the minority; Connor 2001 (a paper, not a book) has 126 citations, and Adams 1990 on feminism and meat has over 900, while Why we love dogs only 92 so far.
See User:FourViolas/sandbox/Meat. There's a depth of research on a wide range of topics: the meat paradox, why steaks & burgers are associated with masculinity, how contamination scandals affect people's perceptions of meat. Psychology of vegetarianism is another big, growing topic with extensive literature: see Ruby 2012 and Janda 2001. There are also many papers, such as Allen 2000 and Povey 2001 which directly compare veg*ns' and omnivores' psychology.
There are several articles to be made here. If we all work very hard to AGF and treat each other civilly and respectfully, we'll be able to do so.
Even ignoring things like https://www.tumblr.com/search/carnism or http://www.reddit.com/r/vegan, the bookends of the reliable literature are clear: the primary source of the idea (Joy) and the only tertiary source Gibert/Desaulniers agree that the concept of carnism as a discrete ideology should be used to "question" the practices involved. As Snow said above, there's lots of research in this area, and little of it mentions carnism: if I'm not mistaken, "carnism" is only ever discussed in the context of veg*nism, so it's apparently only germane to a limited area of meat research (namely, meat vs. meatless research).
I'll let those with better knowledge of WP:ARTICLETITLES figure out the implications of this. FourViolas ( talk) 21:47, 2 August 2015 (UTC)
Martin - from what I can tell, you are entrenched in renaming this article or deleting it. I believe you are in a minority in this - 4V and Rob seem undecided, but the remainder of the editors here, I believe, wish the article to stay. Please drop the stick, or raise yet another RfC or AfD where I suspect there will be a resounding "keep". People are getting fed up with this wall of words. Sorry.DrChrissy (talk) 22:02, 2 August 2015 (UTC)
People want to delete carnism because they don't like it and it makes them uncomfortable. There is a raging POV problem in these comments alone--people are covering up, with fancy language, that they don't like the theory. In reality, this theory is very similar to many other theories which have a wiki entry. This fancy anti-carnism POV which we are passing for neutrality is carnism at work, ironically. Meta-proof itself that we should keep the article. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.127.13.222 ( talk) 13:27, 9 August 2015 (UTC)
My point exactly for how we should proceed. This should avoid extended debate about semantical points and instead require focus on the article content itself. So, who wants to bring the first case to Talk:Carnism#POV_sentences? Dr Crazy 102 ( talk) 10:24, 11 August 2015 (UTC)
Given the statement by 4V above, I now believe there is consensus for removal of the non-neutrality template, therefore, I have removed it.DrChrissy (talk) 11:29, 11 August 2015 (UTC)
Just asking since it is set to auto-archive after 7 days, and yet we still have Talk:Carnism#Time_to_delete_.27carnism.27 and Talk:Carnism#Time to go (part 2) both with comments that stop after 3rd August. We are (at time of writing) on the 13th August and yet the threads are still there? Help Dr Crazy 102 ( talk) 23:48, 12 August 2015 (UTC)
Moved comments into separate section due to specific nature Dr Crazy 102 ( talk) 01:43, 12 August 2015 (UTC)
Just a note about the term ideology. Of course meat-eating is an ideology. People can argue whether Joy and others describe it accurately, but to imply that it might not be an ideology would be odd.
Once again, the issue is that there's an enormous amount of reading to do, and people are trying to write without having done it. That situation was caused in part by the AfD; editors scrambled to save the article, so something had to be written quickly. But there's lots of time now to do the research. Doing the reading will make these distinctions clearer: what's meant by ideology in this context; how the psychology and sociology of meat-eating are closely related (and in fact can't be written about separately), how the concept of carnism fits in, and so on.
Normally it wouldn't matter so much that the research be done in advance of starting to write, but where you're making decisions about content forking, and where it's not clear that the title or parameters are correct, it's important to gain a good overview before moving ahead. Sarah (talk) 16:37, 11 August 2015 (
I think it would be an uphill struggle to write a meat psychology article well without some background knowledge in the humanities, sociology or psychology.
It's not a question of who agrees that it's an ideology. Meat eating is an ideology, pretty much by definition. There are writers who approach it that way, and writers who don't; writers who unpack what that means, and writers who assume a basic level of knowledge. But to take a rigid approach of "meat eating as an ideology" versus "meat eating as the object of research by psychologists" versus "meat eating as something sociologists study" or "meat eating as something anthropologists study" doesn't really make sense.
What would make sense is to create Meat eating and write an article on how academics view it as a practice. Carnism would be a summary-style sub-section.
Re: the policies, the way they're being referenced on this page isn't always correct, and it's causing confusion, particularly about how to identify and use primary and secondary sources. Sarah (talk) 16:24, 12 August 2015 (UTC)
Please bring forth the perceived POV sentences so that they may be judged by consensus. This will hopefully help to allow editors to focus on the issue of NPOV in the article's content and not get into semantical debates about the article itself. Please list each example as a new sub-heading. Appreciated, Dr Crazy 102 ( talk) 10:24, 11 August 2015 (UTC)
Although scientists accept that human beings do not need animal protein, the belief that it is required persists. [1] [2]
References
- ^ Piazza, Jared; et al. (August 2015). "Rationalizing meat consumption. The 4Ns". Appetite. 91: 114–128. doi: 10.1016/j.appet.2015.04.011.
{{ cite journal}}
: Explicit use of et al. in:|author=
( help)- ^ "How people defend eating meat", Lancaster University, 15 May 2015.
The source supporting this:
For example, one popular belief related to the necessity of eating meat is the idea that one cannot maintain a diet that contains enough protein without consuming at least some meat. Although scientists, including the American Dietetic Association (ADA), America's leading organization of nutritionists, have released numerous publications showing that this is not the case (see e.g., American Dietetic Association, 2009, Rand et al, 2003 and Young, Pellett, 1994), the belief is persistent.
This is a weaker claim: it is nutritionally possible for humans to get enough protein without eating meat. Our version is concise, but I think it implies too much. After all, we don't currently have infrastructure in place to feed everyone without animal protein, and the article only mentions meat—not eggs and dairy, which are also "animal protein". I propose we change the wording to:
Although scientists have shown that humans can get enough protein in their diets without eating meat…
FourViolas ( talk) 11:08, 11 August 2015 (UTC)
These beliefs are reinforced by various institutions, including religion, family and the media. [1] [2]
References
- ^ Piazza, Jared; et al. (August 2015). "Rationalizing meat consumption. The 4Ns". Appetite. 91: 114–128. doi: 10.1016/j.appet.2015.04.011.
{{ cite journal}}
: Explicit use of et al. in:|author=
( help)- ^ Singal, Jesse (4 June 2015). "The 4 Ways People Rationalize Eating Meat", New York Magazine.
I know it's annoying to keep checking ourselves like this, but the mere assertion that these beliefs exist is in dispute. Piazza (merely copy-pasted in the NYM) says (my emphasis):
Joy proposes that the 3Ns are widespread beliefs that are reinforced through various social channels, including family, media, religion, and various private and public organizations.
So:
These beliefs are said to be reinforced by various institutions, including religion, family and the media.
FourViolas ( talk) 11:54, 11 August 2015 (UTC)
Another central feature of carnism is the tension between the desire of most people not to harm animals, and their embrace of a diet that does harm them. This is known as the meat paradox. [1] [2] [3]
References
- ^ Loughnan, Steve; et al. (2010). "The role of meat consumption in the denial of moral status and mind to meat animals". Appetite. 55 (1): 156–159. doi: 10.1016/j.appet.2010.05.043. PMID 20488214.
{{ cite journal}}
: Explicit use of et al. in:|author=
( help)- ^ Fawcett, Anne (2013). "Euthanasia and morally justifiable killing in a veterinary clinical context," in Jay Johnston, Fiona Probyn-Rapsey (eds.), Animal Death, Sydney: Sydney University Press, p. 215.
- ^ Loughnan, Steve; Bastian, Brock; Haslam, Nick (2014). "The Psychology of Eating Animals", Current Directions in Psychological Science, 23(2), April, pp. 104–108. doi: 10.1177/0963721414525781
These sources don't mention "carnism" (
here's Fawcett). I think the
"meat paradox" and "ascription of limited mental capacity" should live at
Draft:Psychology of eating meat (which will be in mainspace soon), and be replaced with an author who talks about how these ideas relate to the "ideology" of meat eating, such as
Benz-Schwartzberg (which I don't have access to) or Gibert. Keeping them here is OR; the sources do not directly support
the statement that "the meat paradox is central to carnism". I think most of these psychologists do not accept the idea that meat eating is an "ideology": in any case, they don't say it is, and we shouldn't cite them as though they do.
FourViolas (
talk)
11:35, 11 August 2015 (UTC)
People who value masculinity, enjoy meat and do not see it as a moral issue, and find dominance and inequality acceptable are most likely to consume animals. Perceiving animals as highly dissimilar to humans and as lacking mental attributes, such as the capacity for pain, also supports meat-eating. In addition to these beliefs, values, and perceptions, the act of eating meat triggers psychological processes that regulate negative emotions associated with eating animals.
FourVoilas, the draft is problematic, both in terms of writing style and the selection of sources. I grabbed a sentence at random: that "meat consumption is widely perceived to correlate with masculine muscle development." The first source is a 1989 PhD thesis. The second is better, but what it says is a lot more sophisticated, and it would be better to use that source's sources (Frazer, Adams, etc).
I don't dispute that this is a valid topic. But (a) to do it well would require an enormous amount of reading; and (b) it can't be created as a POV fork to get rid of carnism. That's just the wrong attitude, and it has hampered the development of both articles. Sarah (talk) 15:50, 12 August 2015 (UTC)
Maybe I haven't had enough coffee yet, but after reading the section I still don't understand the punctuation in this section heading. Has this been discussed before? valereee ( talk) 12:18, 16 August 2015 (UTC)
Hi! Clicked her doing research for another article, and I'm a little concerned about the captions on the photos. "The dogs themselves would be considered food animals in other cultures" seems non-NPOV and western-centric. "Where both are food animals" seems obvious, as they're hanging side by side in a butcher's shop, so calling it out seems like WP:UNDUE. These are editiorial statements that to me seem to be trying to POV push: "All you people who think your own animal-eating choices are normal, look at this! Other cultures eat dogs! Is that really okay with you?" :) I don't think we need either of these statements. valereee ( talk) 02:57, 14 August 2015 (UTC)
Okay, and you're all going to either laugh at me or shoot me...but without the reference in the caption to dogs being eaten, the main photo no longer illustrates the article well. I don't really think the answer is changing the caption back, but I wonder if the cooked dog and poultry photo would be a better main image? Or if that's too stark for a main photo, maybe the cow? Apologies if this has already been discussed. valereee ( talk) 12:23, 16 August 2015 (UTC)
Lead images should be selected to be of least shock valueand
Lead images are not required, and not having a lead image may be the best solution if there is no easy representation of the topic. FourViolas ( talk) 13:34, 16 August 2015 (UTC)
no easy representation of the topicand go lead-image-less. FourViolas ( talk) 11:46, 17 August 2015 (UTC)
It's not quite ready for the big time (I just invited WP:PSYCH to comment), but I've put in quite a bit of work at Draft:Psychology of eating meat. I invite you all to take a look. In the course of researching and writing it, I've convinced myself that this article should not be merged there.
Snow Rise is correct that there is extensive literature on scientific meat psychology, which predates Joy by at least a century. Sammy is correct that most of it is consistent with the facts Joy cites to make an argument for meat eating being an "ideology". I have found that, in the sixty-odd sources I cite (not cherrypicking; I found them in review papers), there is exactly one mention of "carnism" or meat-eating as an "ideology", in Rothgerber 2014. In context:
For critics of meat consumption, actual behavioral change is the most socially preferable dissonance-reducing option. However, this alternative is unpopular partially because people report liking the taste of meat too much to abandon it (Rothgerber, 2012), and abstaining from meat may not be possible because of a lack of environmental resources or social networks (see Ruby, 2012) – Festinger (1957) himself identified satisfying behaviors and behaviors not possible to change as contributing to resistance to behavioral change. As a result of this and the prevailing carnist ideology (Joy, 2011), vegetarianism remains a relatively infrequent practice in the United States, accounting for 4% of the population (Stahler, 2012).
That's it: one quasi-parenthetical nod to Joy, in the limited context of meat opposition in the U.S. It's not a true secondary source, and the other 66 sources never mention the term or concept. Clearly, discussing the "carnism" paradigm on that page would be badly UNDUE.
I have incorporated the subsection on " Ascription of limited mental capacity" into the new article. I believe it is more appropriately in context there, as none of the sources it cites mentions "carnism" or "ideology". I believe the parallel section on this page should be replaced with a brief WP:SUMMARYSTYLE sentence or two, with a {{ main}} hatnote. FourViolas ( talk) 16:48, 10 August 2015 (UTC)
The usage and topic of Psychology of eating meat is under discussion, see DRAFT TALK: Psychology of eating meat -- 67.70.32.190 ( talk) 06:15, 18 August 2015 (UTC)
What is the purpose of the multi-image of meat, eggs and cheese? This needs a caption to indicate its relevance. Is it important that it is Cheddar cheese or would "Cheese" be sufficient?DrChrissy (talk) 21:49, 16 August 2015 (UTC)
significantly and directly related to the article's topic. We
should always be watchful not to overwhelm an article with images by adding more just because we can, but I don't think we're at that point yet. FWIW, the image information says it's a stock photo of cheddar cheese. FourViolas ( talk) 13:47, 19 August 2015 (UTC)
There are many activist sources on the other side that we haven't been including. I don't think it's reasonable to assume that the authors of respectably-published academic sources are biased, and therefore should be balanced with something from an industry lobby group. I take it that was the thinking here. -- Sammy1339 ( talk) 03:28, 30 July 2015 (UTC)
Opinion pieces in The Huffington Post, The Conversation, The Statesman, and The Drum praised the idea, saying it made it easier to discuss, and challenge, the practices of animal exploitation. An article in the beef industry publication Drovers Cattle Network criticized the use of the term, saying it implied that eating animal foods was a "psychological sickness".
Kingofaces43, a practicing research scientist, agrees the source is reliable for the cited comment (and beyond). Sammy and I were in agreement about this, too. I believe it is obvious (and that Sammy and DrChrissy agree) that information on the word's usage outside of academia is pertinent to the article. I further believe, with Sammy's apparent support, that a selection of opinion pieces in fact-checked publications, giving due weight to each, is an appropriate path forward on this.
SlimVirgin, your threat to unilaterally remove this material if reinstated, and your questioning my faith rather than requesting explanations for my actions, feel to me as though they disrupt the cooperative environment of this talk page. I'm sure you're being reasonable, but please make sure your tone reflects your willingness to cooperate. FourViolas ( talk) 02:03, 16 August 2015 (UTC)
I'm adding the quote I set forth above (properly cited, of course). DrChrissy and I support it as relevant and constructive; Kingofaces43 is "plenty fine with it" as "documenting a major point of view in this topic"; Sammy1339 thinks it's "not horrible" and would like to add to it; and SlimVirgin opposes on the grounds that the Drovers Cattle Network is not a reliable source, even for the opinion of a pro-meat interest group. I consider this to be consensus in favor of addition, and I ask that the edit not be reverted until this consensus is changed. FourViolas ( talk) 02:33, 19 August 2015 (UTC)
Vegetarians and vegans may use the idea that meat eating is part of an ideology, and not merely a dietary choice, in advocating for vegetarianism. Joy wrote that framing the discussion in this way could help to "challenge the foundation upon which meat consumption stands".
“ | Carnism and flexitarians
Like meat grown in a laboratory, genetically engineered vegetables are tangible. [this has to do with the previous section.] Words, although intangible, have as much or more power thanthe material world to change the way people think of vegetarianism. A story in the Washington Post says, "What exactly is a vegetarian? The term is so liberally applied that it can describe a wide variety of eating patterns, from semi-vegetarian s or occasional meat eaters to hardcore vegans who won't let any type of animal product cross their lips. Some vegans (pronounced vee-gans) are so strict that they won't eat honey." Vegetarians know the importance of language in their daily interactions with meat eaters and in advocating vegetarianism. Melanie Joy, PhD, EdM, professor of psychology and sociology at UMass, Boston, and author of Strategic Action for Animals, says people generally use defense mechanisms that distance themselves from the reality of meat eating. "This is because people typically need to maintain a positive moral sense of themselves; in other words, everyone needs to believe that he or she is leading a moral life." Most people do not consider themselves to be violent, and yet eating the bodies of animals is clearly an act that is based on violence. When our actions and practices are incompatible, we experience an internal dissonance or incongruence. People typically respond to this inner conflict in one of two ways: They change their behaviors to coincide with their beliefs (e.g. stop eating animals), or they change their perception of their behaviors to coincide with their beliefs. The latter relies on a variety of defense mechanisms that serve to distance one from the reality of one's actions. Such defenses depend on language to sustain them. For instance, by referring to a nonhuman animal as it rather than she or he, we are better able to treat her or him as the object suggested by our language. Accordingly, when we refer to meat as having been something, rather than someone, we increase rather than decrease the distance between the reality of meat and the mis-represented end product of slaughter. [the following is from Joy, in an email interview with the author] Carnism is the word I coined to refer to the ideology of meat production and consumption, with carnists being those who choose to eat animals. I created this word because, contrary to popular belief, meat consumption is a social norm whose prevalence conceals its ideological foundation. Mear eating is therefore seen as a given, rather than a choice that is based on the belief in superiority and that it is ethical and appropriate to eat nonhuman animals, Yet, eating meat, though the norm, is reflective of nothing more that a widely held opinion that is not espoused by everybody. Typically, it is only those beliefs which run counter to the dominant culture that are labeled. For instance, rather than name those who do not eat meat "plant eaters" or "herbivores", we have labeled the ideology beneath these practices because it is understood that vegetarianism is not merely a dietary practice, but a philosophy in which the consumption of nonhuman animals is seen as unethical, unjust, and unnecessary. By naming vegetarianism but not its opposite, we reinforce the assumption that eating animals is an ideologically neutral and inevitable practice. When we label the beliefs beneath the behavior, however, we are in a much better position to raise awareness of individuals' choices as consumers, and to challenge the foundation upon which meat consumption stands. This restructuring of language can help illuminate the reality that corpses are not necessarily synonymous with cuisine, and that thefocus of the vegetarian movement is not merely the elimination of meat consumption, but the abolition of carnism. |
” |
de-archived 22:12, 20 August 2015 (UTC) re-de-archived 15:32, 31 August 2015 (UTC) I've found a few foreign language academic books that seem highly valuable. One is Le végétarisme et ses ennemis by Renan Larue, which seems rather close to the hypothetical "Carnism in World History" that I lamented not having in an earlier discussion with DrChrissy. Presently I only was able to cite an interview with the author of the book. The others are German: Mahlke and Ferrari & Petrus. It would be great to have these. I'll be asking at WP:RX. -- Sammy1339 ( talk) 20:05, 6 August 2015 (UTC)
Hello all, and Happy Xmas to those who want one.
A few months ago, there was a lot of controversy on this page, and I spent a lot of time trying to reduce what I saw as an anti-meat POV. The primary problem, in my opinion, was that there are very few RS which discuss "carnism", and most are partisan, so it's difficult for editors with differing views to come to agreement. After a while, I decided it would be more productive to write about the psychology of eating meat (more broadly than the "carnism" paradigm) because there's a great deal of peer-reviewed literature on the subject, as well as a lot more empirical data, making the topic as a whole less prone to argument.
I researched and wrote a large draft, but various impediments kept it from being published. Now that I'm on break, I'd like to give it another go. Since there's currently a redirect from Psychology of eating meat to this page, we need to discuss the matter here.
I believe the material for "Carnism" and "Psychology of eating meat" are almost entirely separate. I'm assuming that proper material for "psych of" is anything reliably published by a psychology researcher about meat, and proper material for "carnism" is anything reliably published discussing "carnism" (because it's a neologism and not widely accepted in the psych literature, I believe it's OR to say, "oh, clearly these papers belong in the 'carnism' article" if the paper doesn't use the term or reference Joy). The only overlap is in the Piazza paper, which doesn't use the term but does adapt Joy's "N's" terminology, and in one paper by Hank Rothgerber where the word "carnist" appears. I think it would be better to move those to the "psych of" article, but would be happy leaving them and the whole "meat paradox" section here—it's not a big deal.
I propose to publish the draft, making any changes necessary to comply with the core content policies.
Pinging those who have offered feedback so far: Klbrain, Maproom, Tokyogirl79, 209.211.131.181, Drcrazy102, LaMona, SlimVirgin, DrChrissy, Sammy1339. Best, FourViolas ( talk) 19:28, 25 December 2015 (UTC)
It has almost twice as many references as this article as is much better written. Publish it already. Jonathunder ( talk) 18:18, 28 December 2015 (UTC)
The two tags on this article are frivolous and were added by the same editor who created the merge discussion and then WP:FORUMSHOPped it into a deletion discussion (while still only proposing the same merge). User:SlimVirgin attempted to remove them on Dec. 20. Since then, a few editors have claimed that the article fails GNG and is entirely synthesis, but no actual example of synthesis has been mentioned, nor has any credible reason been brought up why the numerous secondary sources do not constitute significant coverage. In fact, those arguing for the merge have not even claimed this - they have all said that the material should be merged into the book article. I think the tags should be removed. -- Sammy1339 ( talk) 07:21, 1 January 2016 (UTC)
Per what Borock wrote in the AfD, it is actually a huge problem that this article appears to be about a word, not about its actual subject. It's not consistent with the way it's used in our sources, which all accept that carnism is a thing that exists, not a putative fringe theory. I'll give some quotes showing this. To quote myself from July:
Here are some other excerpts showing how it has been used.
Rothgerber [9] (2014):
As a result of this and the prevailing carnist ideology (Joy, 2011), vegetarianism remains a relatively infrequent practice in the United States, accounting for 4% of the population (Stahler, 2012).
Packwood-Freeman & Perez (2012): Uses carnism throughout and one of the research questions is identified as
How do the government and journalism construct America's identity as a meat-eating public? To what extent do they challenge carnism versus support carnism?
A couple more quotes:
As Joy notes, when media maintain the invisibility of animal suffering, it perpetuates the view of American carnism as "normal, natural, and necessary."
Other examples of a discursive challenge to carnism include when President Clinton acknowledged that the birds each have different personalities.
Braumsberger [10] (2014): Uses the term throughout. Some quotes:
Considering the hostility that is often displayed in carnist-vegan interactions, it is timely to ask why carnists often display such a high degree of aggression and resentment toward vegans.
Speciecism has been embraced by the dominant group in the U.S., namely carnists, and it is of interest to this group tomaintain a status quo that promotes the belief that it is necessary, ethical, and appropriate to consume the meat of certain animals.
None of the academic sources dispute that such an ideology exists. This view is also strongly supported by sources that don't use the term, especially Mizelle, Brett (2015). "Unthinkable Visibility: Pigs, Pork and the Spectacle of Killing and Meat," and also the various works of Rozin who is one of the authorities on the subject.
On the other hand it is distinctly referred to as a term by a beef industry magazine and a food critic known mostly for writing about meat: [11], [12]. However, these are lower quality opinion sources.
However I think we should stop pretending that the existence of the ideology called carnism is a putative, novel idea. The sources accept that it is a real thing, and the subject of the article should be that thing. I would like to go back to the opening more or less as it was in this version. Pinging SlimVirgin, FourViolas, DrChrissy, who were the main contributors. -- Sammy1339 ( talk) 07:44, 2 January 2016 (UTC)
Some of this article's critics are actually right when they say there is a lot of chaff in here. Does anyone mind removing some of the stuff which is just background, like all the statistics? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Sammy1339 ( talk • contribs)
I shared a Care2 post as an example of use of the term in non-academic, (popular) sources - it was reverted with the edit summary "not a RS"? I don't understand the rational and I wish to have it back. [13] Yogesh Khandke ( talk) 03:36, 9 January 2016 (UTC)
Yogesh Khandke added material cited to a care2.com petition relating to the Anita Krajnc case. Although the petition uses the term "carnist society", I do not believe it is an RS; there is no apparent editorial oversight. It would be possible to write reams of material sourced to such primary activist sources (cf. https://www.tumblr.com/search/carnism), but that would be inadvisable and unencyclopedic. FourViolas ( talk) 03:38, 9 January 2016 (UTC)
Much better article than it appeared. There's a core of on-topic material that was hidden before - and some of the edits during the AfD brought things out and vastly improved this. This may be weird coming from me, but so long as we can keep the focus, I could see this as a good article with just a little work. Adam Cuerden ( talk) 18:42, 10 January 2016 (UTC)
A lot of material not really on topic here had a distinct different topic, the meat paradox; I've spun it off to there, and added it to the links. This, and a few minor cuts (e.g. a complete history of thought on vegetarianism). has tightened up this article and focused it on what was always the claimed subject. I think it's a lot stronger, and a fairly decent second article was fairly readily pulled from it. I think all remaining content is, at least, fairly strongly connected to the subject, while still going a bit beyond the book, with justification for inclusion.
I'm not so sure we couldn't merge it, but it's less of an issue now that some cleanup revealed this article's actual strengths. Adam Cuerden ( talk) 10:05, 10 January 2016 (UTC)
There's only two major cuts that weren't spun off to meat paradox, One might be salvageable with sources actually connecting it to this subject, the other almost certainly isn't:
"Saved from the slaughter" narratives lack a firm connection to carnism. I think that, if Joy talked about them, you could probably justify it, but, as it stands, it's a separate topic - possibly workable as a stand-alone topic - that doesn't have any obvious connection to the two main articles.
The History of vegetarianism was way too much. If the material isn't in history of vegetarianism I'd grab it and put it there, but it's way off topic here. Carnism isn't the culmination of vegetarian ideas.
Other than that, I've not removed anything significant without putting it in an appropriate article. Adam Cuerden ( talk) 10:14, 10 January 2016 (UTC)
Honestly, I think, now that it's de- COATRACKed, there probably is enough here to justify the article, but it really needed the off-topic material removed for that to be clear. Adam Cuerden ( talk) 10:20, 10 January 2016 (UTC)
The discourse generally conveyed that the president pardoning a Thanksgiving turkey is as traditional, joyful, and natural as Americans eating one. This maintains the hegemony of a carnistic culture, thereby avoiding spoiling America’s appetite or its humane identity.
How about this: I've reviewed the history section, this paragraph seems useful to both summarise and focus the discussion:
“ | Analyzing the history of vegetarianism and opposition to it from ancient Greece to the present day, literary scholar Renan Larue found certain commonalities in what he described as carnist arguments. According to him, carnists typically held that vegetarianism is a ludicrous idea unworthy of attention, that mankind is invested with dominion over animals by divine authority, and that abstaining from violence against animals would pose a threat to humans. He found that the views that farmed animals do not suffer, and that slaughter is preferable to death by disease or predation, gained currency in the nineteenth century, but that the former had precedent in the writings of Porphyry, a vegetarian who advocated the humane production of animal products which do not require animals to be slaughtered, such as wool. [1] | ” |
I'll add it in now. I think we could possibly use a sentence or two for context before that, but wouldn't go much further. Adam Cuerden ( talk) 15:07, 10 January 2016 (UTC)
References
I'm happy to see that the article has been streamlined somewhat, but I'm still a little puzzled by the "non-academic reception" section. The section seems pretty atypical for an academic subject (imagine a "non-academic reception" section in an article about a plant genus or a form of literary criticism) and doesn't seem to contain much information of value- a few websites/newspapers have published opinion pieces in which the concept is praised (reliable sources, yes, so any information of value could be incorporated elsewhere into the article?) and a meat industry website isn't keen. I went ahead and removed the section, but was reverted on the grounds that " It's useful to show notability." Leaving aside the question of whether these sources are necessary to determine the notability of this subject, notability is not about article content; once notability is established, we don't need to panic about including things just to show or prove that a subject is notable, surely? Am I interested to hear the views of others on the inclusion of this section. Josh Milburn ( talk) 23:17, 12 January 2016 (UTC)
I can completely understand why this registered a false positive on some users' hoaxometers, but actually, the inclusion of the meat paradox information was not original research - in fact, it's arguably the central point of the topic. Gibert & Desaulniers devote a fair amount of space to it, and Mannes place it front and center as the core issue. What's happening is that different research groups are using different terminology to refer to exactly the same thing. If you think I'm making this up, look at this Psychology Today article from a couple weeks ago. It's actually a review of a video by Joy aimed at a popular audience, and the reviewer identifies the "meat paradox" as the main topic.
So basically, while the edits may have streamlined the article, they had the effect of removing some of the core ideas. I also have to question FourViolas' invocation of WP:BOLD in making these edits, since just a few days before I had suggested we go to mediation over exactly this issue.
I don't actually want to go to mediation, and the compromise I propose (not because I think it's the perfect outcome, but because I don't want to be editing this article this time next year) is to put "meat paradox" into its own article as Adam Cuerden suggested, and to write a more lengthy summary at the top of "Features" which links to it - basically following Mannes' presentation of the topic. This would enable us to present the ideas without delving into the details of the experiments, which could go in the main article. I am concerned that the meat paradox material occupies too much space in Psychology of eating meat and should probably be split anyway. -- Sammy1339 ( talk) 03:14, 13 January 2016 (UTC)
In this edit FourViolas restored "and vegan activist" saying it was supported by the interview. I don't see this. Joy's activism, such as it is, consists essentially of publicizing her work, and I don't think that she was an activist at the time. The term was coined in 2001, and the interview has her saying she was getting ready to launch an activist group in 2010. In fact I don't even have an RS that says she was vegan at this time (although I think she probably was.) In the 2010 interview she's described as "a social psychologist and a professor of psychology and sociology at the University of Massachusetts", not an activist. Am I looking at the wrong source? -- Sammy1339 ( talk) 00:49, 29 January 2016 (UTC)
I recall that the existence of such sources was a point of contention here at some point. FourViolas ( talk) 03:57, 25 July 2016 (UTC)Theoretically, those higher in RWA or SDO are more likely to regard vegetarian ideologies as threats to the dominant status and traditional norms of a “carnist” ideology, which in turn foster speciesism and meat consumption.
Should there be a distinct page for CEVA, the Center for Effective Vegan Advocacy? and 'Beyond Carnism'? MaynardClark ( talk) 14:00, 26 July 2020 (UTC)
Shouldn't this page be a candidate for deletion? This is an article for a made up word that's not in common usage. Ergzay ( talk) 13:00, 30 December 2019 (UTC)
Just because you don't like a certain thing, Ergzay, does that mean it shouldn't exist? Pretty much, this is used a LOT by Vegans to try and usurp Omnivores, like most people on this earth, into not eating meat and adding percieved animal cruelty into the mix. ZL3XD ( talk) 10:27, 4 August 2020 (UTC)
It is used as a slur akin to nigger and kike (I officially apologize for using those fowl terms, but I wish to explain how offensive it is). Even the person who coined the term admits to it's current use as one. I don't understand why nobody has mentioned this in the article. Arglebargle79 ( talk) 22:06, 23 November 2018 (UTC)
Hi all, just a quick suggestion that the line in the opening - "This classification is culturally relative, so that, for example, dogs are eaten by some people in Korea but may be pets in the West, while cows are eaten in the West but protected in much of India.[1]" is factually incorrect. There are many happy dog owners in Korea and Vietnam (where they also eat dog), living in a country that eats dog does not exclude you from having dogs as pets, perhaps similar to the fact that many people all over the world keep fish as pets but eat fish. Also, the idea of cows being protected in India is very problematic as India has a huge dairy industry that contributes greatly to the suffering of cows and in general cows are not well treated in practice but only on paper.
![]() | This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page. |
Archive 1 | Archive 2 | Archive 3 | Archive 4 |
I have looked through the three AfDs and, as I am sure you all know, the results were Delete, Delete, No consensus.
I think a move to another name might be acceptable to WP policy but this page is exactly the kind of thing that WP:NEO was intended to avoid. The reasons that I am going to propose deletion again are:
One editor says the article is just about the word 'carnism'. That is what Wiktionary is for; we do not have articles on just words in WP.
Some people think that carnism is about the reasons that we eat some animals and not others.
I think (based on what I believe to be Joy's own remarks) that carnism is just a name for meat eating, the opposite of veganism, as she puts it. Martin Hogbin ( talk) 15:53, 31 July 2015 (UTC)
I am not the only one to call the term pejorative, another editor in the last AfD called it, '.. topic that was named by opponents of Carnism for use as a disparaging term'.
'Carnism' is a name designed to make a point; that is not what WP is for. Martin Hogbin ( talk) 15:53, 31 July 2015 (UTC)
The more sources using the word 'carnism' the article cites the more biased it becomes. Martin Hogbin ( talk) 15:53, 31 July 2015 (UTC)
The problem is that with this title there is no way the article can be made NPOV. Those who want to keep an article on the subject of opposition to meat eating should look to move it to a neutral title, where a much wider range of sources can be used Martin Hogbin ( talk) 15:53, 31 July 2015 (UTC)
Sorry people. I know you have put much effort into this article but you have done so in the full knowledge that some editors find the article NPOV. If you want to save your work I suggest that you look for a neutral home for the subject.
We need a final and definitive answer to whether this article should be here or not. I suggest an AfD where we try to get the widest possible community participation so that the matter can be settled once and for all. All previous AfD participants should be asked for their opinions. Martin Hogbin ( talk) 15:53, 31 July 2015 (UTC)
I don't know much about move discussions, so I'll just give you all information to work with.
This book, reliably attested to be a mainstream compilation of contemporary sociological meat research, doesn't mention "carnism". Here's my own list of a few recent highly-cited sources discussing very closely related topics without using the word:
Comparing these papers' citation counts, using Google Scholar's tools, to those of papers like Freeman on television 'carnonormativity shows that scholars using the carnism model are the minority; Connor 2001 (a paper, not a book) has 126 citations, and Adams 1990 on feminism and meat has over 900, while Why we love dogs only 92 so far.
See User:FourViolas/sandbox/Meat. There's a depth of research on a wide range of topics: the meat paradox, why steaks & burgers are associated with masculinity, how contamination scandals affect people's perceptions of meat. Psychology of vegetarianism is another big, growing topic with extensive literature: see Ruby 2012 and Janda 2001. There are also many papers, such as Allen 2000 and Povey 2001 which directly compare veg*ns' and omnivores' psychology.
There are several articles to be made here. If we all work very hard to AGF and treat each other civilly and respectfully, we'll be able to do so.
Even ignoring things like https://www.tumblr.com/search/carnism or http://www.reddit.com/r/vegan, the bookends of the reliable literature are clear: the primary source of the idea (Joy) and the only tertiary source Gibert/Desaulniers agree that the concept of carnism as a discrete ideology should be used to "question" the practices involved. As Snow said above, there's lots of research in this area, and little of it mentions carnism: if I'm not mistaken, "carnism" is only ever discussed in the context of veg*nism, so it's apparently only germane to a limited area of meat research (namely, meat vs. meatless research).
I'll let those with better knowledge of WP:ARTICLETITLES figure out the implications of this. FourViolas ( talk) 21:47, 2 August 2015 (UTC)
Martin - from what I can tell, you are entrenched in renaming this article or deleting it. I believe you are in a minority in this - 4V and Rob seem undecided, but the remainder of the editors here, I believe, wish the article to stay. Please drop the stick, or raise yet another RfC or AfD where I suspect there will be a resounding "keep". People are getting fed up with this wall of words. Sorry.DrChrissy (talk) 22:02, 2 August 2015 (UTC)
People want to delete carnism because they don't like it and it makes them uncomfortable. There is a raging POV problem in these comments alone--people are covering up, with fancy language, that they don't like the theory. In reality, this theory is very similar to many other theories which have a wiki entry. This fancy anti-carnism POV which we are passing for neutrality is carnism at work, ironically. Meta-proof itself that we should keep the article. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.127.13.222 ( talk) 13:27, 9 August 2015 (UTC)
My point exactly for how we should proceed. This should avoid extended debate about semantical points and instead require focus on the article content itself. So, who wants to bring the first case to Talk:Carnism#POV_sentences? Dr Crazy 102 ( talk) 10:24, 11 August 2015 (UTC)
Given the statement by 4V above, I now believe there is consensus for removal of the non-neutrality template, therefore, I have removed it.DrChrissy (talk) 11:29, 11 August 2015 (UTC)
Just asking since it is set to auto-archive after 7 days, and yet we still have Talk:Carnism#Time_to_delete_.27carnism.27 and Talk:Carnism#Time to go (part 2) both with comments that stop after 3rd August. We are (at time of writing) on the 13th August and yet the threads are still there? Help Dr Crazy 102 ( talk) 23:48, 12 August 2015 (UTC)
Moved comments into separate section due to specific nature Dr Crazy 102 ( talk) 01:43, 12 August 2015 (UTC)
Just a note about the term ideology. Of course meat-eating is an ideology. People can argue whether Joy and others describe it accurately, but to imply that it might not be an ideology would be odd.
Once again, the issue is that there's an enormous amount of reading to do, and people are trying to write without having done it. That situation was caused in part by the AfD; editors scrambled to save the article, so something had to be written quickly. But there's lots of time now to do the research. Doing the reading will make these distinctions clearer: what's meant by ideology in this context; how the psychology and sociology of meat-eating are closely related (and in fact can't be written about separately), how the concept of carnism fits in, and so on.
Normally it wouldn't matter so much that the research be done in advance of starting to write, but where you're making decisions about content forking, and where it's not clear that the title or parameters are correct, it's important to gain a good overview before moving ahead. Sarah (talk) 16:37, 11 August 2015 (
I think it would be an uphill struggle to write a meat psychology article well without some background knowledge in the humanities, sociology or psychology.
It's not a question of who agrees that it's an ideology. Meat eating is an ideology, pretty much by definition. There are writers who approach it that way, and writers who don't; writers who unpack what that means, and writers who assume a basic level of knowledge. But to take a rigid approach of "meat eating as an ideology" versus "meat eating as the object of research by psychologists" versus "meat eating as something sociologists study" or "meat eating as something anthropologists study" doesn't really make sense.
What would make sense is to create Meat eating and write an article on how academics view it as a practice. Carnism would be a summary-style sub-section.
Re: the policies, the way they're being referenced on this page isn't always correct, and it's causing confusion, particularly about how to identify and use primary and secondary sources. Sarah (talk) 16:24, 12 August 2015 (UTC)
Please bring forth the perceived POV sentences so that they may be judged by consensus. This will hopefully help to allow editors to focus on the issue of NPOV in the article's content and not get into semantical debates about the article itself. Please list each example as a new sub-heading. Appreciated, Dr Crazy 102 ( talk) 10:24, 11 August 2015 (UTC)
Although scientists accept that human beings do not need animal protein, the belief that it is required persists. [1] [2]
References
- ^ Piazza, Jared; et al. (August 2015). "Rationalizing meat consumption. The 4Ns". Appetite. 91: 114–128. doi: 10.1016/j.appet.2015.04.011.
{{ cite journal}}
: Explicit use of et al. in:|author=
( help)- ^ "How people defend eating meat", Lancaster University, 15 May 2015.
The source supporting this:
For example, one popular belief related to the necessity of eating meat is the idea that one cannot maintain a diet that contains enough protein without consuming at least some meat. Although scientists, including the American Dietetic Association (ADA), America's leading organization of nutritionists, have released numerous publications showing that this is not the case (see e.g., American Dietetic Association, 2009, Rand et al, 2003 and Young, Pellett, 1994), the belief is persistent.
This is a weaker claim: it is nutritionally possible for humans to get enough protein without eating meat. Our version is concise, but I think it implies too much. After all, we don't currently have infrastructure in place to feed everyone without animal protein, and the article only mentions meat—not eggs and dairy, which are also "animal protein". I propose we change the wording to:
Although scientists have shown that humans can get enough protein in their diets without eating meat…
FourViolas ( talk) 11:08, 11 August 2015 (UTC)
These beliefs are reinforced by various institutions, including religion, family and the media. [1] [2]
References
- ^ Piazza, Jared; et al. (August 2015). "Rationalizing meat consumption. The 4Ns". Appetite. 91: 114–128. doi: 10.1016/j.appet.2015.04.011.
{{ cite journal}}
: Explicit use of et al. in:|author=
( help)- ^ Singal, Jesse (4 June 2015). "The 4 Ways People Rationalize Eating Meat", New York Magazine.
I know it's annoying to keep checking ourselves like this, but the mere assertion that these beliefs exist is in dispute. Piazza (merely copy-pasted in the NYM) says (my emphasis):
Joy proposes that the 3Ns are widespread beliefs that are reinforced through various social channels, including family, media, religion, and various private and public organizations.
So:
These beliefs are said to be reinforced by various institutions, including religion, family and the media.
FourViolas ( talk) 11:54, 11 August 2015 (UTC)
Another central feature of carnism is the tension between the desire of most people not to harm animals, and their embrace of a diet that does harm them. This is known as the meat paradox. [1] [2] [3]
References
- ^ Loughnan, Steve; et al. (2010). "The role of meat consumption in the denial of moral status and mind to meat animals". Appetite. 55 (1): 156–159. doi: 10.1016/j.appet.2010.05.043. PMID 20488214.
{{ cite journal}}
: Explicit use of et al. in:|author=
( help)- ^ Fawcett, Anne (2013). "Euthanasia and morally justifiable killing in a veterinary clinical context," in Jay Johnston, Fiona Probyn-Rapsey (eds.), Animal Death, Sydney: Sydney University Press, p. 215.
- ^ Loughnan, Steve; Bastian, Brock; Haslam, Nick (2014). "The Psychology of Eating Animals", Current Directions in Psychological Science, 23(2), April, pp. 104–108. doi: 10.1177/0963721414525781
These sources don't mention "carnism" (
here's Fawcett). I think the
"meat paradox" and "ascription of limited mental capacity" should live at
Draft:Psychology of eating meat (which will be in mainspace soon), and be replaced with an author who talks about how these ideas relate to the "ideology" of meat eating, such as
Benz-Schwartzberg (which I don't have access to) or Gibert. Keeping them here is OR; the sources do not directly support
the statement that "the meat paradox is central to carnism". I think most of these psychologists do not accept the idea that meat eating is an "ideology": in any case, they don't say it is, and we shouldn't cite them as though they do.
FourViolas (
talk)
11:35, 11 August 2015 (UTC)
People who value masculinity, enjoy meat and do not see it as a moral issue, and find dominance and inequality acceptable are most likely to consume animals. Perceiving animals as highly dissimilar to humans and as lacking mental attributes, such as the capacity for pain, also supports meat-eating. In addition to these beliefs, values, and perceptions, the act of eating meat triggers psychological processes that regulate negative emotions associated with eating animals.
FourVoilas, the draft is problematic, both in terms of writing style and the selection of sources. I grabbed a sentence at random: that "meat consumption is widely perceived to correlate with masculine muscle development." The first source is a 1989 PhD thesis. The second is better, but what it says is a lot more sophisticated, and it would be better to use that source's sources (Frazer, Adams, etc).
I don't dispute that this is a valid topic. But (a) to do it well would require an enormous amount of reading; and (b) it can't be created as a POV fork to get rid of carnism. That's just the wrong attitude, and it has hampered the development of both articles. Sarah (talk) 15:50, 12 August 2015 (UTC)
Maybe I haven't had enough coffee yet, but after reading the section I still don't understand the punctuation in this section heading. Has this been discussed before? valereee ( talk) 12:18, 16 August 2015 (UTC)
Hi! Clicked her doing research for another article, and I'm a little concerned about the captions on the photos. "The dogs themselves would be considered food animals in other cultures" seems non-NPOV and western-centric. "Where both are food animals" seems obvious, as they're hanging side by side in a butcher's shop, so calling it out seems like WP:UNDUE. These are editiorial statements that to me seem to be trying to POV push: "All you people who think your own animal-eating choices are normal, look at this! Other cultures eat dogs! Is that really okay with you?" :) I don't think we need either of these statements. valereee ( talk) 02:57, 14 August 2015 (UTC)
Okay, and you're all going to either laugh at me or shoot me...but without the reference in the caption to dogs being eaten, the main photo no longer illustrates the article well. I don't really think the answer is changing the caption back, but I wonder if the cooked dog and poultry photo would be a better main image? Or if that's too stark for a main photo, maybe the cow? Apologies if this has already been discussed. valereee ( talk) 12:23, 16 August 2015 (UTC)
Lead images should be selected to be of least shock valueand
Lead images are not required, and not having a lead image may be the best solution if there is no easy representation of the topic. FourViolas ( talk) 13:34, 16 August 2015 (UTC)
no easy representation of the topicand go lead-image-less. FourViolas ( talk) 11:46, 17 August 2015 (UTC)
It's not quite ready for the big time (I just invited WP:PSYCH to comment), but I've put in quite a bit of work at Draft:Psychology of eating meat. I invite you all to take a look. In the course of researching and writing it, I've convinced myself that this article should not be merged there.
Snow Rise is correct that there is extensive literature on scientific meat psychology, which predates Joy by at least a century. Sammy is correct that most of it is consistent with the facts Joy cites to make an argument for meat eating being an "ideology". I have found that, in the sixty-odd sources I cite (not cherrypicking; I found them in review papers), there is exactly one mention of "carnism" or meat-eating as an "ideology", in Rothgerber 2014. In context:
For critics of meat consumption, actual behavioral change is the most socially preferable dissonance-reducing option. However, this alternative is unpopular partially because people report liking the taste of meat too much to abandon it (Rothgerber, 2012), and abstaining from meat may not be possible because of a lack of environmental resources or social networks (see Ruby, 2012) – Festinger (1957) himself identified satisfying behaviors and behaviors not possible to change as contributing to resistance to behavioral change. As a result of this and the prevailing carnist ideology (Joy, 2011), vegetarianism remains a relatively infrequent practice in the United States, accounting for 4% of the population (Stahler, 2012).
That's it: one quasi-parenthetical nod to Joy, in the limited context of meat opposition in the U.S. It's not a true secondary source, and the other 66 sources never mention the term or concept. Clearly, discussing the "carnism" paradigm on that page would be badly UNDUE.
I have incorporated the subsection on " Ascription of limited mental capacity" into the new article. I believe it is more appropriately in context there, as none of the sources it cites mentions "carnism" or "ideology". I believe the parallel section on this page should be replaced with a brief WP:SUMMARYSTYLE sentence or two, with a {{ main}} hatnote. FourViolas ( talk) 16:48, 10 August 2015 (UTC)
The usage and topic of Psychology of eating meat is under discussion, see DRAFT TALK: Psychology of eating meat -- 67.70.32.190 ( talk) 06:15, 18 August 2015 (UTC)
What is the purpose of the multi-image of meat, eggs and cheese? This needs a caption to indicate its relevance. Is it important that it is Cheddar cheese or would "Cheese" be sufficient?DrChrissy (talk) 21:49, 16 August 2015 (UTC)
significantly and directly related to the article's topic. We
should always be watchful not to overwhelm an article with images by adding more just because we can, but I don't think we're at that point yet. FWIW, the image information says it's a stock photo of cheddar cheese. FourViolas ( talk) 13:47, 19 August 2015 (UTC)
There are many activist sources on the other side that we haven't been including. I don't think it's reasonable to assume that the authors of respectably-published academic sources are biased, and therefore should be balanced with something from an industry lobby group. I take it that was the thinking here. -- Sammy1339 ( talk) 03:28, 30 July 2015 (UTC)
Opinion pieces in The Huffington Post, The Conversation, The Statesman, and The Drum praised the idea, saying it made it easier to discuss, and challenge, the practices of animal exploitation. An article in the beef industry publication Drovers Cattle Network criticized the use of the term, saying it implied that eating animal foods was a "psychological sickness".
Kingofaces43, a practicing research scientist, agrees the source is reliable for the cited comment (and beyond). Sammy and I were in agreement about this, too. I believe it is obvious (and that Sammy and DrChrissy agree) that information on the word's usage outside of academia is pertinent to the article. I further believe, with Sammy's apparent support, that a selection of opinion pieces in fact-checked publications, giving due weight to each, is an appropriate path forward on this.
SlimVirgin, your threat to unilaterally remove this material if reinstated, and your questioning my faith rather than requesting explanations for my actions, feel to me as though they disrupt the cooperative environment of this talk page. I'm sure you're being reasonable, but please make sure your tone reflects your willingness to cooperate. FourViolas ( talk) 02:03, 16 August 2015 (UTC)
I'm adding the quote I set forth above (properly cited, of course). DrChrissy and I support it as relevant and constructive; Kingofaces43 is "plenty fine with it" as "documenting a major point of view in this topic"; Sammy1339 thinks it's "not horrible" and would like to add to it; and SlimVirgin opposes on the grounds that the Drovers Cattle Network is not a reliable source, even for the opinion of a pro-meat interest group. I consider this to be consensus in favor of addition, and I ask that the edit not be reverted until this consensus is changed. FourViolas ( talk) 02:33, 19 August 2015 (UTC)
Vegetarians and vegans may use the idea that meat eating is part of an ideology, and not merely a dietary choice, in advocating for vegetarianism. Joy wrote that framing the discussion in this way could help to "challenge the foundation upon which meat consumption stands".
“ | Carnism and flexitarians
Like meat grown in a laboratory, genetically engineered vegetables are tangible. [this has to do with the previous section.] Words, although intangible, have as much or more power thanthe material world to change the way people think of vegetarianism. A story in the Washington Post says, "What exactly is a vegetarian? The term is so liberally applied that it can describe a wide variety of eating patterns, from semi-vegetarian s or occasional meat eaters to hardcore vegans who won't let any type of animal product cross their lips. Some vegans (pronounced vee-gans) are so strict that they won't eat honey." Vegetarians know the importance of language in their daily interactions with meat eaters and in advocating vegetarianism. Melanie Joy, PhD, EdM, professor of psychology and sociology at UMass, Boston, and author of Strategic Action for Animals, says people generally use defense mechanisms that distance themselves from the reality of meat eating. "This is because people typically need to maintain a positive moral sense of themselves; in other words, everyone needs to believe that he or she is leading a moral life." Most people do not consider themselves to be violent, and yet eating the bodies of animals is clearly an act that is based on violence. When our actions and practices are incompatible, we experience an internal dissonance or incongruence. People typically respond to this inner conflict in one of two ways: They change their behaviors to coincide with their beliefs (e.g. stop eating animals), or they change their perception of their behaviors to coincide with their beliefs. The latter relies on a variety of defense mechanisms that serve to distance one from the reality of one's actions. Such defenses depend on language to sustain them. For instance, by referring to a nonhuman animal as it rather than she or he, we are better able to treat her or him as the object suggested by our language. Accordingly, when we refer to meat as having been something, rather than someone, we increase rather than decrease the distance between the reality of meat and the mis-represented end product of slaughter. [the following is from Joy, in an email interview with the author] Carnism is the word I coined to refer to the ideology of meat production and consumption, with carnists being those who choose to eat animals. I created this word because, contrary to popular belief, meat consumption is a social norm whose prevalence conceals its ideological foundation. Mear eating is therefore seen as a given, rather than a choice that is based on the belief in superiority and that it is ethical and appropriate to eat nonhuman animals, Yet, eating meat, though the norm, is reflective of nothing more that a widely held opinion that is not espoused by everybody. Typically, it is only those beliefs which run counter to the dominant culture that are labeled. For instance, rather than name those who do not eat meat "plant eaters" or "herbivores", we have labeled the ideology beneath these practices because it is understood that vegetarianism is not merely a dietary practice, but a philosophy in which the consumption of nonhuman animals is seen as unethical, unjust, and unnecessary. By naming vegetarianism but not its opposite, we reinforce the assumption that eating animals is an ideologically neutral and inevitable practice. When we label the beliefs beneath the behavior, however, we are in a much better position to raise awareness of individuals' choices as consumers, and to challenge the foundation upon which meat consumption stands. This restructuring of language can help illuminate the reality that corpses are not necessarily synonymous with cuisine, and that thefocus of the vegetarian movement is not merely the elimination of meat consumption, but the abolition of carnism. |
” |
de-archived 22:12, 20 August 2015 (UTC) re-de-archived 15:32, 31 August 2015 (UTC) I've found a few foreign language academic books that seem highly valuable. One is Le végétarisme et ses ennemis by Renan Larue, which seems rather close to the hypothetical "Carnism in World History" that I lamented not having in an earlier discussion with DrChrissy. Presently I only was able to cite an interview with the author of the book. The others are German: Mahlke and Ferrari & Petrus. It would be great to have these. I'll be asking at WP:RX. -- Sammy1339 ( talk) 20:05, 6 August 2015 (UTC)
Hello all, and Happy Xmas to those who want one.
A few months ago, there was a lot of controversy on this page, and I spent a lot of time trying to reduce what I saw as an anti-meat POV. The primary problem, in my opinion, was that there are very few RS which discuss "carnism", and most are partisan, so it's difficult for editors with differing views to come to agreement. After a while, I decided it would be more productive to write about the psychology of eating meat (more broadly than the "carnism" paradigm) because there's a great deal of peer-reviewed literature on the subject, as well as a lot more empirical data, making the topic as a whole less prone to argument.
I researched and wrote a large draft, but various impediments kept it from being published. Now that I'm on break, I'd like to give it another go. Since there's currently a redirect from Psychology of eating meat to this page, we need to discuss the matter here.
I believe the material for "Carnism" and "Psychology of eating meat" are almost entirely separate. I'm assuming that proper material for "psych of" is anything reliably published by a psychology researcher about meat, and proper material for "carnism" is anything reliably published discussing "carnism" (because it's a neologism and not widely accepted in the psych literature, I believe it's OR to say, "oh, clearly these papers belong in the 'carnism' article" if the paper doesn't use the term or reference Joy). The only overlap is in the Piazza paper, which doesn't use the term but does adapt Joy's "N's" terminology, and in one paper by Hank Rothgerber where the word "carnist" appears. I think it would be better to move those to the "psych of" article, but would be happy leaving them and the whole "meat paradox" section here—it's not a big deal.
I propose to publish the draft, making any changes necessary to comply with the core content policies.
Pinging those who have offered feedback so far: Klbrain, Maproom, Tokyogirl79, 209.211.131.181, Drcrazy102, LaMona, SlimVirgin, DrChrissy, Sammy1339. Best, FourViolas ( talk) 19:28, 25 December 2015 (UTC)
It has almost twice as many references as this article as is much better written. Publish it already. Jonathunder ( talk) 18:18, 28 December 2015 (UTC)
The two tags on this article are frivolous and were added by the same editor who created the merge discussion and then WP:FORUMSHOPped it into a deletion discussion (while still only proposing the same merge). User:SlimVirgin attempted to remove them on Dec. 20. Since then, a few editors have claimed that the article fails GNG and is entirely synthesis, but no actual example of synthesis has been mentioned, nor has any credible reason been brought up why the numerous secondary sources do not constitute significant coverage. In fact, those arguing for the merge have not even claimed this - they have all said that the material should be merged into the book article. I think the tags should be removed. -- Sammy1339 ( talk) 07:21, 1 January 2016 (UTC)
Per what Borock wrote in the AfD, it is actually a huge problem that this article appears to be about a word, not about its actual subject. It's not consistent with the way it's used in our sources, which all accept that carnism is a thing that exists, not a putative fringe theory. I'll give some quotes showing this. To quote myself from July:
Here are some other excerpts showing how it has been used.
Rothgerber [9] (2014):
As a result of this and the prevailing carnist ideology (Joy, 2011), vegetarianism remains a relatively infrequent practice in the United States, accounting for 4% of the population (Stahler, 2012).
Packwood-Freeman & Perez (2012): Uses carnism throughout and one of the research questions is identified as
How do the government and journalism construct America's identity as a meat-eating public? To what extent do they challenge carnism versus support carnism?
A couple more quotes:
As Joy notes, when media maintain the invisibility of animal suffering, it perpetuates the view of American carnism as "normal, natural, and necessary."
Other examples of a discursive challenge to carnism include when President Clinton acknowledged that the birds each have different personalities.
Braumsberger [10] (2014): Uses the term throughout. Some quotes:
Considering the hostility that is often displayed in carnist-vegan interactions, it is timely to ask why carnists often display such a high degree of aggression and resentment toward vegans.
Speciecism has been embraced by the dominant group in the U.S., namely carnists, and it is of interest to this group tomaintain a status quo that promotes the belief that it is necessary, ethical, and appropriate to consume the meat of certain animals.
None of the academic sources dispute that such an ideology exists. This view is also strongly supported by sources that don't use the term, especially Mizelle, Brett (2015). "Unthinkable Visibility: Pigs, Pork and the Spectacle of Killing and Meat," and also the various works of Rozin who is one of the authorities on the subject.
On the other hand it is distinctly referred to as a term by a beef industry magazine and a food critic known mostly for writing about meat: [11], [12]. However, these are lower quality opinion sources.
However I think we should stop pretending that the existence of the ideology called carnism is a putative, novel idea. The sources accept that it is a real thing, and the subject of the article should be that thing. I would like to go back to the opening more or less as it was in this version. Pinging SlimVirgin, FourViolas, DrChrissy, who were the main contributors. -- Sammy1339 ( talk) 07:44, 2 January 2016 (UTC)
Some of this article's critics are actually right when they say there is a lot of chaff in here. Does anyone mind removing some of the stuff which is just background, like all the statistics? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Sammy1339 ( talk • contribs)
I shared a Care2 post as an example of use of the term in non-academic, (popular) sources - it was reverted with the edit summary "not a RS"? I don't understand the rational and I wish to have it back. [13] Yogesh Khandke ( talk) 03:36, 9 January 2016 (UTC)
Yogesh Khandke added material cited to a care2.com petition relating to the Anita Krajnc case. Although the petition uses the term "carnist society", I do not believe it is an RS; there is no apparent editorial oversight. It would be possible to write reams of material sourced to such primary activist sources (cf. https://www.tumblr.com/search/carnism), but that would be inadvisable and unencyclopedic. FourViolas ( talk) 03:38, 9 January 2016 (UTC)
Much better article than it appeared. There's a core of on-topic material that was hidden before - and some of the edits during the AfD brought things out and vastly improved this. This may be weird coming from me, but so long as we can keep the focus, I could see this as a good article with just a little work. Adam Cuerden ( talk) 18:42, 10 January 2016 (UTC)
A lot of material not really on topic here had a distinct different topic, the meat paradox; I've spun it off to there, and added it to the links. This, and a few minor cuts (e.g. a complete history of thought on vegetarianism). has tightened up this article and focused it on what was always the claimed subject. I think it's a lot stronger, and a fairly decent second article was fairly readily pulled from it. I think all remaining content is, at least, fairly strongly connected to the subject, while still going a bit beyond the book, with justification for inclusion.
I'm not so sure we couldn't merge it, but it's less of an issue now that some cleanup revealed this article's actual strengths. Adam Cuerden ( talk) 10:05, 10 January 2016 (UTC)
There's only two major cuts that weren't spun off to meat paradox, One might be salvageable with sources actually connecting it to this subject, the other almost certainly isn't:
"Saved from the slaughter" narratives lack a firm connection to carnism. I think that, if Joy talked about them, you could probably justify it, but, as it stands, it's a separate topic - possibly workable as a stand-alone topic - that doesn't have any obvious connection to the two main articles.
The History of vegetarianism was way too much. If the material isn't in history of vegetarianism I'd grab it and put it there, but it's way off topic here. Carnism isn't the culmination of vegetarian ideas.
Other than that, I've not removed anything significant without putting it in an appropriate article. Adam Cuerden ( talk) 10:14, 10 January 2016 (UTC)
Honestly, I think, now that it's de- COATRACKed, there probably is enough here to justify the article, but it really needed the off-topic material removed for that to be clear. Adam Cuerden ( talk) 10:20, 10 January 2016 (UTC)
The discourse generally conveyed that the president pardoning a Thanksgiving turkey is as traditional, joyful, and natural as Americans eating one. This maintains the hegemony of a carnistic culture, thereby avoiding spoiling America’s appetite or its humane identity.
How about this: I've reviewed the history section, this paragraph seems useful to both summarise and focus the discussion:
“ | Analyzing the history of vegetarianism and opposition to it from ancient Greece to the present day, literary scholar Renan Larue found certain commonalities in what he described as carnist arguments. According to him, carnists typically held that vegetarianism is a ludicrous idea unworthy of attention, that mankind is invested with dominion over animals by divine authority, and that abstaining from violence against animals would pose a threat to humans. He found that the views that farmed animals do not suffer, and that slaughter is preferable to death by disease or predation, gained currency in the nineteenth century, but that the former had precedent in the writings of Porphyry, a vegetarian who advocated the humane production of animal products which do not require animals to be slaughtered, such as wool. [1] | ” |
I'll add it in now. I think we could possibly use a sentence or two for context before that, but wouldn't go much further. Adam Cuerden ( talk) 15:07, 10 January 2016 (UTC)
References
I'm happy to see that the article has been streamlined somewhat, but I'm still a little puzzled by the "non-academic reception" section. The section seems pretty atypical for an academic subject (imagine a "non-academic reception" section in an article about a plant genus or a form of literary criticism) and doesn't seem to contain much information of value- a few websites/newspapers have published opinion pieces in which the concept is praised (reliable sources, yes, so any information of value could be incorporated elsewhere into the article?) and a meat industry website isn't keen. I went ahead and removed the section, but was reverted on the grounds that " It's useful to show notability." Leaving aside the question of whether these sources are necessary to determine the notability of this subject, notability is not about article content; once notability is established, we don't need to panic about including things just to show or prove that a subject is notable, surely? Am I interested to hear the views of others on the inclusion of this section. Josh Milburn ( talk) 23:17, 12 January 2016 (UTC)
I can completely understand why this registered a false positive on some users' hoaxometers, but actually, the inclusion of the meat paradox information was not original research - in fact, it's arguably the central point of the topic. Gibert & Desaulniers devote a fair amount of space to it, and Mannes place it front and center as the core issue. What's happening is that different research groups are using different terminology to refer to exactly the same thing. If you think I'm making this up, look at this Psychology Today article from a couple weeks ago. It's actually a review of a video by Joy aimed at a popular audience, and the reviewer identifies the "meat paradox" as the main topic.
So basically, while the edits may have streamlined the article, they had the effect of removing some of the core ideas. I also have to question FourViolas' invocation of WP:BOLD in making these edits, since just a few days before I had suggested we go to mediation over exactly this issue.
I don't actually want to go to mediation, and the compromise I propose (not because I think it's the perfect outcome, but because I don't want to be editing this article this time next year) is to put "meat paradox" into its own article as Adam Cuerden suggested, and to write a more lengthy summary at the top of "Features" which links to it - basically following Mannes' presentation of the topic. This would enable us to present the ideas without delving into the details of the experiments, which could go in the main article. I am concerned that the meat paradox material occupies too much space in Psychology of eating meat and should probably be split anyway. -- Sammy1339 ( talk) 03:14, 13 January 2016 (UTC)
In this edit FourViolas restored "and vegan activist" saying it was supported by the interview. I don't see this. Joy's activism, such as it is, consists essentially of publicizing her work, and I don't think that she was an activist at the time. The term was coined in 2001, and the interview has her saying she was getting ready to launch an activist group in 2010. In fact I don't even have an RS that says she was vegan at this time (although I think she probably was.) In the 2010 interview she's described as "a social psychologist and a professor of psychology and sociology at the University of Massachusetts", not an activist. Am I looking at the wrong source? -- Sammy1339 ( talk) 00:49, 29 January 2016 (UTC)
I recall that the existence of such sources was a point of contention here at some point. FourViolas ( talk) 03:57, 25 July 2016 (UTC)Theoretically, those higher in RWA or SDO are more likely to regard vegetarian ideologies as threats to the dominant status and traditional norms of a “carnist” ideology, which in turn foster speciesism and meat consumption.
Should there be a distinct page for CEVA, the Center for Effective Vegan Advocacy? and 'Beyond Carnism'? MaynardClark ( talk) 14:00, 26 July 2020 (UTC)
Shouldn't this page be a candidate for deletion? This is an article for a made up word that's not in common usage. Ergzay ( talk) 13:00, 30 December 2019 (UTC)
Just because you don't like a certain thing, Ergzay, does that mean it shouldn't exist? Pretty much, this is used a LOT by Vegans to try and usurp Omnivores, like most people on this earth, into not eating meat and adding percieved animal cruelty into the mix. ZL3XD ( talk) 10:27, 4 August 2020 (UTC)
It is used as a slur akin to nigger and kike (I officially apologize for using those fowl terms, but I wish to explain how offensive it is). Even the person who coined the term admits to it's current use as one. I don't understand why nobody has mentioned this in the article. Arglebargle79 ( talk) 22:06, 23 November 2018 (UTC)
Hi all, just a quick suggestion that the line in the opening - "This classification is culturally relative, so that, for example, dogs are eaten by some people in Korea but may be pets in the West, while cows are eaten in the West but protected in much of India.[1]" is factually incorrect. There are many happy dog owners in Korea and Vietnam (where they also eat dog), living in a country that eats dog does not exclude you from having dogs as pets, perhaps similar to the fact that many people all over the world keep fish as pets but eat fish. Also, the idea of cows being protected in India is very problematic as India has a huge dairy industry that contributes greatly to the suffering of cows and in general cows are not well treated in practice but only on paper.