Animal Production, Ag-gag Laws, and the Social Production of Ignorance: Exploring the Role of Storytelling

Abstract

In recent years, a number of so-called "farm protection" or "ag-gag" laws have been proposed and passed in state legislatures across the USA. These laws generally ban the undercover photographing or videotaping of industrial animal agricultural production and processing facilities. Proponents of the legislation suggest that such bills protect local farm economies and prevent misinformation campaigns by animal rights activists. Diverse sets of critics have argued against the bills, suggesting that they prevent whistleblowers from exposing animal cruelty and stand in the way of the public's right to know. This paper analyzes the debate by blending theory from science and technology studies regarding the social production of knowledge and ignorance with communication theory that explores the power of storytelling in shaping public understandings of social life. It investigates the stories told by three oppositional stakeholder groups-members of industrial animal agribusiness who defend the legislation, small-scale producers and consumers who believe the legislation prevents productive transparency, as well as animal advocacy and first amendment interests who believe the legislation masks fundamental flaws in the contemporary animal agricultural system. The paper provides insight into how competing mediated narratives frame ideological battles over the present and future of animal production processes. It demonstrates how fundamental and often opposing value systems construct what we consider knowledge and non-knowledge in the context of our contemporary risk society and in the digital media age.

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Reform, Justice, and Sovereignty: A Food Systems Agenda for Environmental Communication

“…Third, agriculture has been a leading theme in extant food-related communication scholarship, complicating the human and non-human relations of sustenance with which we participate. The ramifications of agro-industrial food production manifest in debates about genetic modification (Clancy & Clancy, 2016;Maeseele, 2010), policies governing the transparency (or protection) of animal agriculture interests (Broad, 2016b), as well as the complexities of sustainable agriculture (Motter & Singer, 2012;Spurlock, 2009;Van Gorp & Van der Groot, 2012). Agricultural practice can localize food system relationships, cultivating intimacy with ecosystems and communities.…”

“…Food justice is as much about grassroots tactics, policy, and action as it is about the cultural and communicative shifts needed to tackle all forms of injustice that intersect with food systems. Engaging food justice communicatively builds on the in-roads already made by scholars advocating for just sustainabilities (Agyeman, 2007), bridging social and environmental justice concerns (Opel et al, 2010), and nuancing competing visions of justice across communities (Broad, 2016a). Not only does a food justice perspective help us critically interrupt (Pezzullo, 2001) dominant food movement paradigms, but it also allows us to engage communities on the frontlines-from farm to food bank-in their struggles for more just futures.…”