Grounding the Predicament and the Possibility to Re-Orient, Unknown Pig

Abstract

This visual essay explores confronting the question of banal everyday exploitation of non-human animals through critical question-posing and, especially, by juxtaposing a video and text in an awkwardly confrontational pairing. Speciesism is a way to bypass emotions on a societal level. The article aims to open new possibilities for reconsidering this separation between humans and nonhuman animals. It is proposed that the virtualization of pictures of animals is a form of exploitation that creates a distance between us and the cruelty. The question is, have we become all too human altogether, and what is the essence of this human exceptionalism from non-human animals? The essay concludes by proposing a more relational ontology that is needed to get closer to the ethical relations with non-human animals.