I was recently shown a link to an interesting
academic paper about racism and
animal abuse in an historic context. The paper,
"Racial Prejudice and the Performing AnimalsControversy in Early Twentieth-Century Britain" by David A. H. Wilson of the
University of Cumbria, makes an interesting argument for the way racist ideas were common among both critics and defenders of
animal trainers. Amid the all-too-familiar arguments on both sides we note that there are also the usual racist arguments heard today. Fear of losing work to immigrants is just below the surface of certain protestations. This, however, is combined with the bigotry common at the time. For example, species of animals are compared to different races of people and being post-World War I Germaphobia is a hot tactic. Interestingly animal rightists, who these days tend to cite the odd notion of
speciesism as an extension of racism, also make a distinction between foreign trainers, who they consider to be cruel, from British trainers.
