Animals and Women Feminist The

by Carol J Adams

  What is curious about the notion of killing a being with whom one identifies is that deep ecologists and other environmental writers maintain that the purpose of identifying with nature is precisely so that one will wish to avoid harming those beings with whom one identifies. How then, do deep ecologists and other proponents of the holy hunt deal with this contradiction? It is at this point that the spiritual teachings of native cultures are imported into their narratives to bolster the notion of the holy hunt.

  Deep ecologists and other environmental writers often contend that native cultures provide an exemplary model for ethical conduct toward the natural world (Devall and Sessions, Lopez, Nelson, Snyder, Shepard, and Swan). What is noteworthy about this contention is that these writers single out hunting as the activity with the greatest instructive value. Although native cultures engaged in myriad other practices (e.g., gathering, planting, cooking, weaving, singing, dancing), no other activity is seen to have the same moral relevance. Most of these environmental writers also ignore the vast cultural differences that existed among tribal people, referring to them as if they were a monolithic block. 26 But not all Native Americans hunted and not all showed “ respect ” for the animals they killed. 27

  After presenting this example of nonhuman hunting, Lopez goes on to refer to the hunting practices of Native Americans, whereby the death of the hunted animal is considered to be “ mutually agreeable. ” In a similar vein, Gary Snyder refers to the “ mutuality of death ” in which animals help humans flourish by “ giving ” their lives in exchange for humans promoting their “ fertility ” ( Earth House Hold , 120). 30 According to Snyder, the animal participates in this exchange on a willing basis out of “ compassion ” for the hunter. As he states, “ Hunting magic is designed to bring the game to you — the creature who has heard your song, witnessed your sincerity, and out of compassion comes within your range ” ( Earth House Hold , 120). In Snyder ’ s view, both “ human nature and mother nature are on a path in which all things can come to fruition equally and together in harmony ” ( The Real Work , 73).

  Holy hunters draw inspiration not only from tribal cultures, but from the science of ecology as well. Hunting and killing animals is seen as a means of actively inserting oneself into the food chain, thereby achieving a direct connection with the natural world. According to Shepard, hunting and killing “ confirm the hunter ’ s continuity in the complicated cycles of elements, in the sweep of evolution, and in the patterns of the flow of energy ” (A Theory of, 509). Similarly, in explaining his urge to live not only on an island but from an island, Richard Nelson explains that, “ In this way I can bring the island inside me, binding my soul and body more closely with this place. ” Nelson goes on to claim that “ the experiences of hunting and fishing are the most powerful ones for reminding me of my dependence and connectedness with the Earth ” (quoted in Leviton, The Island Within , 72).

  Holy hunters contend that their intent is not to conquer nature, but rather to submit to the ecological reality of the natural world. According to Holmes Rolston,

  The hunter feels not “ perfect evil ” (Krutch), but “ perfect identification ” with the tragic drama of creation, the blood sacrifice on which sentient life is founded, which both is and ought to be . In ways that mere watchers of nature can never know, hunters know their ecology. The hunter ’ s success is not conquest but submission to the ecology. It is an acceptance of the way the world is made. (92)

  For holy hunters, the spiritual aspect of hunting derives from an understanding of the principles of ecology — in particular, the necessity and reality of death. The hunter is merely an agent of death, simply following (nature ’ s) “ orders, ” an innocent participant in a drama not of his own making. It is not only hunting that is seen as a spiritual, ecological, and reciprocal activity; the act of eating the dead animal is perceived this way as well. As David Barnhill points out, for Snyder the question “ Where am I in the food chain? ” is a religious question, “ because ecological interdependence is the fundamental fact of the universe and the food chain is its basic physical structure ” (Indra ’ s Net, 25). Hunting and eating animals, according to Snyder, is a means of “ communing ” with nature and, therefore, is a cause for “ celebration. ” In his words, “ The evidence of anthropology is that countless men and women, through history and pre-history, have experienced a deep sense of communion and communication with nature and with specific non-human beings. Moreover, they often experienced this communication with a being they customarily ate ” ( The Old Ways , 13). Similarly, Paul Shepard cites with approval a statement made by Ortega y Gassett: “ The greatest and most moral homage we can pay to certain animals on certain occasions is to kill them with certain means and rituals, ” claiming that he would add “ and to eat them ” ( Tender Carnivore , 153). According to Shepard, “ eating animals is a way to worship them ” (Post-Historic Primitivism, 81).

  Although it is not possible to generalize about all native cultures, it appears that the hunters within some (although by no means all) Native American tribal cultures experienced feelings of ambivalence and guilt about the killing of animals. One of the ways some native cultures seem to have dealt with their uneasy feelings is by developing a mythology or worldview according to which it was believed that the animal “ gave ” her or his life as a “ gift. ” 28 Holy hunters have uprooted this notion of the “ gift ” from the context of native cultures and transplanted it into their own narratives of the hunt. 29 Thus, Richard Nelson repeatedly employs the teachings of the Koyukon elders to shed light on his own hunting experiences. He writes, “ Koyukon elders maintain that animals will come to those who have shown them respect, and will allow themselves to be taken in what is only a temporary death ” (The Gifts, 122). The animal ’ s death is viewed not as a personal conquest, but rather as a “ gift ” to those who are worthy and who demonstrate the proper attitude. If a hunter fails to kill an animal, this failure may be attributed to some impropriety in the hunter ’ s mental orientation. Given a proper attitude, it is argued, the animal willingly “ gives ” her or his life. Barry Lopez argues that a similar voluntary surrender of life occurs between nonhuman animals as well. Often this exchange between predator and prey is preceded by a locked gaze, whereby the prey animal conveys a willingness to give up her or his life. Lopez refers to this phenomenon as the “ conversation of death ” (94). According to Lopez, this constitutes a “ ceremonial exchange, the flesh of the hunted in exchange for respect for its [ sic ] spirit. In this way, both animals, not the predator alone, choose for the encounter to end in death ” (94).

  As is the case with hunting itself, eating animals is often described in language that contains sexual undertones. According to Snyder, “ intereating ” is both a cause for “ celebration ” as well as a “ giant act of love we live within ” (Grace, 1). More explicitly, Shepard claims that the sexual energy that men have historically directed toward women is channeled into all aspects of the hunt. In his words,

  The human hunter in the field is not merely a predator, because of hundreds of centuries of experience in treating the woman-prey with love, which he turns back into the hunt proper. The ecstatic consummation of this love is the killing itself. Formal consummation is eating . . . The prey must be eaten for ethical not nutritional value, in a kind of celebration. ( The Tender Carnivore , 173)

  Holy hunters have replaced the explicit notion of an inherently aggressive drive that must be contained through adherence to a code of good conduct with the blanket assertion that aggression does not exist. Holy hunters do not “ kill ” animals according to this worldview; rather, animals “ give ” their lives. Nor do the “ holy hunters ” perpetrate violence; instead, they are participants in an “ equal exchange. ” 31 In effect, the holy hunter claims to restrain his aggression to the point of nonexistence — at least within his own mind. However, the notion that the animal chooses to end her or his life for the benefit of the hunter has no more validity than the idea that
a woman who is raped “ asked for it ” or “ willingly ” gave herself to the rapist. In the end, despite the variation in language and conception, all three categories of hunters derive the morality of hunting first and foremost from their own mental and emotional state. Morality, thus, becomes a disembodied experience, with no tangible relation to the outside world.

  The Hunt for Masculine Self-Identity

  As we have seen, all three categories of hunters consider hunting to be an instinctive, sexually charged activity, which transports the hunter back to a primeval, animal-like state. The function of the hunters ’ ethical discourse is to set guidelines for how this aggressive, sexual energy might be discharged. Happy hunters do it in the name of recreation, holist hunters do it in the name of work, and holy hunters do it in the name of spirituality or religion. But despite these variations in language and emphasis, all three types of hunters include violence as an integral part of their ethical code, as long as it is restrained, renamed, or denied. What insights, then, can an ecofeminist analysis bring to bear on this phenomenon of violence and on the ethical discourse to which it is wed?

  A growing number of feminist theorists have turned to psychological theory in an effort to explain the unconscious motivations behind the production of abstract philosophical ideas. 32 If we subject hunters ’ ethical discourse to the same psychological scrutiny, what light can be shed? One of the recurring themes found in the narratives of all three categories of hunters is the notion that hunting relieves men from a state of alienation from nature. Hunting is seen as a return to the “ animal, ” a reversion to “ the primitive, ” or as an immersion in the natural world. According to object relations theory this state of alienation is not, however, endemic to human nature; it is, rather, a particular feature of the psychology of men. Object relations theory claims that both boys and girls experience their first forms of relatedness as a kind of merging with the mother figure. 33 The child then develops a concept of self through a process of disengaging from this unified worldview. Unlike girls, boys have a two-stage process of disidentification. They must not only disengage from the mother figure, but in order to identify as male, they must deny all that is female within themselves, as well as their involvement with all of the female world.

  According to Chodorow, since the girl child is not faced with the same need to differentiate her self-identity from that of the mother figure, “ girls come to experience themselves as less differentiated than boys, as more continuous with and related to the external object world and as differently oriented to their inner object-world as well ” (167). Girls, therefore, emerge from this period with a basis for “ empathy ” built into their primary definition of self in a way that boys do not. As Chodorow argues, “ girls emerge with a stronger basis for experiencing another ’ s needs or feelings as one ’ s own (or of thinking that one is so experiencing another ’ s needs and feelings) ” (167).

  Dorothy Dinnerstein extends this analysis to the masculine mode of interacting not only with women but with all of the natural world. For Dinnerstein, since a child ’ s self-identity is originally viewed as indistinct from the surrounding world, self-identity for the boy child, in particular, later comes to be founded not only upon an opposition to women, but upon an opposition to nature as well. This process of developing an autonomous self then brings with it ambivalent feelings of rage and fear, and longing to return to the original coextensive self. The rage is, in reality, a rage against the “ knowledge of fleshly transience ” (246).

  Simone de Beauvoir was the first to argue that women thus become for men the “ other, ” the objects against which masculine self-identity is formed. According to de Beauvoir, women are relegated to this status as a result of what is perceived as their immersion in the natural world by virtue of such processes as pregnancy, menstruation, and childbirth. Authentic subjectivity is achieved to the extent that one raises oneself above biological necessity, and hence, above the animal world. Historically, men have transcended the world of contingency through exploits and projects, that is, through attempts to transform the natural world. For de Beauvoir, the prototypical activities of transcendence (hunting, fishing, and war) involve both risk and struggle. As she explains, “ for it is not in giving life but in risking life that man is raised above the animal; that is why superiority has been accorded in humanity not to the sex that brings forth life but to that which kills ” (72).

  Paul Shepard also develops the theme of animals as the other. Shepard argues that animals, not women, are conceived as the other, and are necessary objects for the development of human identity. Shepard argues that children can come to understand who they are only by means of a negative identification with the nonhuman world, that is, by understanding what they are not. As Shepard states, “ identity formation grows from the subjective separation of self from non-self, living from non-living ” ( Nature and Madness , 125). Although Shepard writes in gender-neutral terms, object relations theory suggests that the need he identifies is not found in all humans, but rather in men.

  The transition of the boy child to adult masculine status is celebrated in initiation rites throughout the world. Many of these rites entail acts of violence toward both women and the natural world. Hunting and killing animals is a standard rite of passage out of the world of women and nature into the masculine realm. 34

  Having established a second and alienated nature, it appears that men then face a lifelong urge to return to the original state of oneness that they left behind. The return to an original undifferentiated state, however, is precisely what must be avoided, since such a return would constitute an annihilation of the masculine self. The conflict between these two drives may shed light on the hunter ’ s urge to kill. The pursuit of the animal expresses the hunter ’ s yearning to repossess his lost female and animal nature. The death of the animal ensures that this oneness with nature will not be attained. Violence becomes the only way in which the hunter can experience this sense of oneness while asserting his masculine status as an autonomous human being. By killing the animal, the hunter ritually enacts the death of his longing for a return to a primordial female/animal world, a world to which he cannot return. 35

  Echoes of this urge to return to a primordial oneness with nature can be found in the narratives of all three categories of hunters. The urge to connect with nature is — for the holy hunter, in particular — the major purpose of the hunt. The sense of merging with nature achieves its “ ultimate consummation ” for the holy hunters in the act of eating animals. According to Richard Nelson, “ when we eat the deer its [ sic ] flesh is then our flesh. The deer changes form and becomes us, and we in turn become creatures made of death (The Gifts, 125).

  Although there are some women who hunt and some who have glorified it as well, the vast majority of hunters are still men. Whereas hunters have experienced their deepest feelings of connection to other forms of life through the infliction of death, many women have had similar feelings not through inflicting death, but rather through the act of giving birth (see O ’ Brien, Hartsock, Ruddick). Some holy hunters seem to be dimly aware of this birth analogy. Paul Shepard makes passing reference to it when he explains that it is not necessary or even possible for modern humans to become hunter-gatherers in their everyday lives. What is recommended is that “ components ” of the life-style of hunter-gatherers be incorporated into the modern “ man ’ s ” life (Post-Historic, 79). One “ component ” that Shepard recommends is the experience of hunting, which he feels every man should have at least once in his life. In giving the rationale for his advice, Shepard explains:

  we cannot become hunter-gatherers as a whole economy, but we can recover the ontogenetic moment . . . the value of the hunt is not in repeated trips but a single leap forward into the heart-structure of the world, the “ game ” played to rules that reveal ourselves. What is important is to have hunted. It is like having babies; a little of it goes a long way. (Post-Historic, 86)

  Thus, for Shepard, kil
ling is seen as a transformational experience on a par with giving birth.

  To understand how men can experience both a feeling of connection and a sense of being fully alive through the infliction of death, we might recall that it is through killing animals that male hunters are symbolically reborn. 36 In the process of killing the animal, the hunter (re)establishes his secondary identity, that is, his masculine self. It is, in reality, the mental construct of masculinity that is fed by violence and death.

  One of the recurring themes in feminist and ecofeminist writing has been the notion of interconnection. According to Carol Gilligan, women ’ s ethical conduct and thought derive more from a sense of interconnection with others, and the urge to maintain relationships, whereas men ’ s derives more from the attempt to control aggression and conform to abstract principles and universal rules. 37 Many ecofeminists have seen in the notion of a sense of interconnection and caring for others the basis of a genuinely holistic ethic. What is of interest in the narratives of the holist and holy hunters is that although they emphasize, along with ecofeminists, the importance of a sense of interconnection, they seek to attain this state in a peculiar way, namely, through the infliction of death. According to Shepard:

  to be kindred . . . means . . . a sense of many connections and transformations — us into them, them into us, and them into each other from the beginning of time. To be kindred means to share consciously in the stream of life. (Searching Out, 87)

  Needless to say, for many ecofeminists, killing and eating another living being is not the best means of “ sharing consciously in the stream of life. ”