{"id":65,"date":"2018-08-19T09:23:25","date_gmt":"2018-08-19T09:23:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.consistentantioppression.com\/?page_id=65"},"modified":"2021-12-10T23:20:01","modified_gmt":"2021-12-10T23:20:01","slug":"saviorism","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.consistentantioppression.com\/?page_id=65","title":{"rendered":"Saviorism"},"content":{"rendered":"
Just as the (mainly white) cis male hero is viewed as \u201csaving\u201d the movement, the movement is positioned as \u201csaving\u201d the animals. Saviorism is often exemplified by decentering nonhumans and invoking human-centric views towards oneself and the movement as saviors.<\/b> Activists often describe themselves as \u2018being the voice of the voiceless\u2019 (drawing on a poem by Ella Wheeler Wilcox from 1910<\/a>); however, this erases the fact that nonhumans have their own voices, communities, languages, and lifestyles very different from our own\u2019. We can\u2019t be certain about how other animals experience the world, but we can imagine what suffering, pain, and social isolation are experienced. Shouldn\u2019t our role be to ensure we bring attention to the abuses and exploitations done by humans rather than to assume we speak for them? While it could be claimed this phrase \u201cvoice of the voiceless\u201d is metaphorical, activists also fail to consider the ableism behind it. We could ask, \u201cWhy do we live in a society that privileges the human voice socially and politically?\u201d<\/h6>\n
For more information on why the term \u201cvoiceless\u201d is ableist, we recommend this excellent article<\/a>. In addition, \u00a0this article<\/a> explains some further issues with the term.<\/h6>\n
In addition, saviourism creates an either\/or approach to nonhuman animal oppression: \u00a0You are either working to save the animals or you are not. Sometimes, saviourism is used to protect people from putting in the work against other forms of oppression they have their hand in. When someone says \u201cThis is not OK, and this hurts me or adds to my oppression,\u201d the response that saviourism legitimates is: \u201cnothing you experience is like what nonhuman animals are experiencing.\u201d Or \u201cthere are so many nonhuman animals who need to be saved, I don\u2019t have time to think about your concern.\u201d Or \u201cthere are so many nonhuman animals who need to be saved, why are you distracting us?\u201d \u00a0It also results in comments such as \u201cwell, battered women can speak for themselves but nonhuman animals can\u2019t,\u201d so that the assumption that humans can and will be able to speak for themselves promotes ignorance of social oppression of humans. These responses are insensitive and ignore systemic oppression of marginalized humans. This in turn exemplifies a lack the compassion that we claim we want to bring toward nonhuman animals.<\/h6>\n
\u201cThere are so many animals to be saved; I need to be doing more and more \u2018saving\u201d is a mentality that can often lead to burnout, as the activist centers themselves and forgets that social justice work must be a community effort centered on the oppressed while taking care to not oppress others.<\/h6>\n
There is danger of viewing veganism as a pledge of moral purity that absolves one from taking accountability for their hand in other oppressions that affect marginalized humans. This attitude also decenters nonhumans because it fails to recognize that nonhuman oppression is interconnected to human oppression.<\/h6>\n
<\/h6>\n
Click here to continue reading the discussion – Simplicity of Theory<\/strong><\/a><\/h6>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Just as the (mainly white) cis male hero is viewed as \u201csaving\u201d the movement, the movement is positioned as \u201csaving\u201d the animals. Saviorism is often exemplified by decentering nonhumans and invoking human-centric views towards oneself and the movement as saviors. Activists often describe themselves as \u2018being the voice of the voiceless\u2019 (drawing on a poem … Continue reading Saviorism<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"parent":38,"menu_order":2,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-65","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry","without-featured-image"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.consistentantioppression.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/65","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.consistentantioppression.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.consistentantioppression.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.consistentantioppression.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.consistentantioppression.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=65"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/www.consistentantioppression.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/65\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":331,"href":"https:\/\/www.consistentantioppression.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/65\/revisions\/331"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.consistentantioppression.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/38"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.consistentantioppression.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=65"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}