Sune Borkfelt

The Guardian view on animal testing: we can stop sacrificing millions of lives for our own health | Editorial Editorial: New technologies can reduce our reliance on animal experiments. This isn’t just morally right, it could have scientific and economic benefits too

"Science is a slaughterhouse" is an interesting way to start an argument about reducing nonhuman animal suffering in science.

If something is bad enough to be the tenor of such a metaphor, maybe something should be done about that something.

www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

The Horror of Meat Americans don’t like to think about the gruesome reality of meat production. But in horror fiction, the suppressed truth returns in strange ways.

While this focuses mostly on film, and I focus mostly on literary fiction, this makes an argument not unlike (albeit shorter and far more superficial than) the one I make in chapter 7 of my book "Reading Slaughter" (2022).

www.currentaffairs.org/news/the-hor...

Shit mand. Det bliver nogle store bunker vi kan lave rundt om Axelborg, når næste pandemi rammer...

You need the smoked paprika. Then at least it tastes like SMOKED dirt 😅. (seriously, though, probably my most used spice).

Fun fact:

Scherfig's gravesite doesn't have any name or inscription.

The tombstone is, however, an animal statue (not an okapi, though).

Anyone can go to Assistens Kirkegård in Copenhagen to see if they can find it 🙂🐢

Uuuh. Hvad skal der til for at man kan komme på besøg dér?

A Poem by Ursula K. Le Guin About Cats “Entanglements” March 28 Black cat, amiable visitor, let’s give each other all the pleasure we can, quick, yes, sitting on each other in the sunlight and stroking each other with our hands and face…

“But you are making plans / without a future and my now / is twisted into your crying.” Read “Entanglements,” a poem by Ursula K. Le Guin about cats.

And he proposed farther, that by employing Spiders, the Charge of dying Silks would be wholly saved; whereof I was fully convinced when he shewed me a vast Number of Flies most beautifully coloured, wherewith he fed his Spiders;

Jonathan Swift, Gulliver's Travels (1735)

"Their business model is based on organized crime, so it would be unfair to ask them not to break the law."

And so f*cking what?

When did we decide that having a business model that relies on theft is okay?

Jeg har spist sojapølser siden 80erne. Dengang var ingen forbrugere i tvivl, og det er de heller ikke nu.

Det her er et resultat af lobbyisme, fordi plantebaserede produkter har vind i sejlene og den animalske industri vil lave benspænd for de virksomheder, der laver dem. Klimafodslæb. #suk

I suspect a double-edged sword here. At least, I remember when one of the most racist politicians in Danish history cited liking hummus as proof that his political views were not motivated by racism.

Jane Goodall's work insisting, with evidence from her brilliant and tenacious fieldwork, that we were not so separate from animals, and they were much more like us than the Eurocentric theorists asserted, was so important.

It's a great film. I often use it in teaching. For different reasons, incl. the way it redeems street dogs and, well, just for fun.

The Stupidest Speech in UN History Everyone's saying so!

billmckibben.substack.com/p/the-stupid...

Jeg havde for et stykke tid siden en god snak om dyr og fortællinger med @sofiegraarup.bsky.social.

Det var sjovt, og det er der nu kommet et podcastafsnit ud af, som du kan lytte til når og hvor du vil :-)

Soon all the pigs were calm and quiet, as they had never been in life. But that did not excuse the crime. Their betrayal.

Neil Astley, The End of My Tether (2002) #Animals #Literature #Novels #Slaughterhouse

Riding to Freedom: On the Importance of the Horse in Escaping Slavery The first time I met the horses and the fugitives, I wanted to speak with them directly. I wanted to know them better, to hear how they planned their escapes, what the moon looked like on the night…

“Horses were a part of the daily fabric of life for many enslaved Black people.” On the importance of the horse in escaping slavery.

What about the caged half-crazed
orang-utan who vomits because
he has nothing else to do?

Miroslav Holub, From "Collision" #InternationalOrangutanDay #Zoos #Animals #Poetry

The collared lizards cry at night
because El Paso is too hot
for their detachable blue tails.
The desert turtle stops and
waits as a cartel truck drives by
and dark houses illuminate
what is hidden there.

Ray Gonzales, From "El Paso" (2023) #WorldLizardDay

What makes a dog run away, then?
The desire to live.
You’ve never seen a dog trembling?
A dog trembles when he doesn’t know what to do.
Like us!
No, you tremble when you know what to do as much as when you don’t.
Fart off, dog.

John Berger, King: A Street Story (1999) #dogs #literature

"I refuse to bend the knee to those environmental alarmist Thoreau-lovers—and not just because I’m missing a leg."

All of which is to say: This whole thing shows at least as much about how f*cked up people's relations to companion animals is as it does about zoos.

It's been interesting to follow on Danish social media. Most comments are either something like "Great idea" or "Horrible. Sick. Not for my cat/dog/horse/rabbit".

Surprisingly few (but some) ask the perhaps most relevant question: Why would you kill a healthy pet?

Ah, the simple beauty and truth of an Allingham couplet. #animals #literaryanimalstudies #poetry

"Det er faktisk først på mandag". Ligner jeg måske en matematiker eller anden naturvid-person?!?!?

Tid er alligevel en kulturel konstruktion, hvilket grundlæggende invaliderer alle påstande om fødselsdage.

The way to all modern assembly lines started here, with disassembly lines.

Sinclair's novel has its issues, but remains an absolute classic and the first modern #slaughterhouse fiction. #animals #pigs

Godt forsøgt, men dette opslag er tydeligvis dit forsøg på at få (resten af) kultureliten til at kommentere og ønske dig tillykke med fødselsdagen.

Uheldigvis for dig er de fleste af os sådan nogle akademiker-typer, der i stedet giver os til at overanalysere og dekonstruere konceptet "fødselsdag".

Dét kunne man vel egentlig hurtigt afprøve på en eftermiddag, og sammenligne forskellige, især hvis man har adgang til de fulde versioner. Skriver det lige på min "for sjov"-to-do-liste :-)

Vi har i øvrigt også nogle resultater vedr. køn i de data om navngivning af dyr, som vi sidder og analyserer i øjeblikket. Glæder mig helt vildt til vi kan publicere det, men der går nok et stykke tid.