“What happens to animals in animal agriculture is bad enough. We don’t need to resort to using offensive and upsetting terms for what happens to animals that could shock or trigger people.” Well, not really. I mean, I’d LOVE for it to be the case that people could just know what happens to animals and then change—but they do know what happens, and yet they don’t change. And guess what part of the reason for that is? Yep, you guessed it: language. The truth is, society and Big Ag have helped normalise and trivialise animal oppression by using the very terms that vegans who say the aforementioned quote are saying we should use. To say that “what happens to animals is bad enough” for us NOT to use serious terms undermines the power of language and just how it has played a crucial role in the oppression of animals. Simply put, the people who make money off the backs of animals know full well that if people don’t use serious terms, people don’t take things seriously. Want proof of how this works? Check out this statement where “triggering” and “upsetting” words have been replaced, and you’ll see for yourself: “I know several people who have been artificially inseminated. Black people were exploited by white people for hundreds of years. There was a cull of Jews in the 1940s.”

What do you notice? Notice that the above statement, perhaps, makes these things sound not as bad, as serious, as grave, as these things actually are/were? Notice, perhaps, that these terms downplay the seriousness of the atrocities? Perhaps you even feel that the way the above is phrased is INSULTING and trivialises the struggles of the victims in each case? But I thought what happens to rape victims, slaves, and holocaust victims is “serious enough for us to not have to resort to using potentially upsetting terms”, right? Once again, if only the human brain worked that way—truth is, it doesn’t. In fact, the industries don't WANT us to use these terms—they'd rather we actually used terms like “exploited”, “culled” or “artificially inseminated”. Ask yourself why that is. So now, tell me why on earth we would want to PLAY INTO THESE INDUSTRIES’ HANDS by using the VERY TERMS THEY WANT US TO USE! Bullshit to that. So let me be clear: what is happening to non-human animals is the largest ever HOLOCAUST in history! Farmed animals are RAPED en masse with steel devices to produce offspring to be packed onto SLAVE SHIPS and brutally murdered by the billion. And if you don’t think these atrocities require the most serious of terms—well then perhaps you’ve listened too much to the people who are trying to make you not take this seriously."

George Martin