the word by dr. lauren corman professor of sociology (critical animal studies) brock university The irst time I saw images from the industry, I was at a punk show and happened to glance over at an information table: My eyes slammed into a video of a monkey screaming, her teeth bared, as she frantically twisted to free herself from a metal restraint. A couple days later I found myself standing in a small ofice of an animal advocacy group, facing a wall of pamphlets, each stack detailing different forms of nonhuman animal use. My hand gravitated to one labeled “Vivisection,” and I turned to ask a volunteer what the word meant. He said something about experiments on live animals, and then… sound evaporated. The free-loating image from the video shifted from a random act of violence into an image of a much larger and more horrifying institutional practice: Vivisection. The word felt cool and impenetrable: Animals’ experiences in labs laundered through technical discourse. Yet, the persistent personal and ethical concerns can’t be scrubbed away, as shown throughout the stories of Maximum Tolerated Dose. I didn’t learn the word vivisection until I was seventeen, which, looking back, seems really late given the pervasiveness of the practice and my regular support of it, through purchase of animal-tested shampoo and other products. The term comes from the Latin words vivus (“alive”) and section (“cutting”). It’s speciically deined as “the cutting of or operation on a living animal usually for physiological or pathological investigation,” and broadly deined as “animal experimentation especially if considered to cause distress to the subject.” In a sense, the detachment of the industry is sown into the word: Vivisection deines the action done by the human vivisector, who cuts the animals, not the experience of the animal who is cut. The terms animal experimentation or animal research, generally preferred by scientists, seem to dull the edges of the industry’s practices. Yet, when we consider the experience of vivisection from the point of view of nonhuman animals, no amount of linguistic obfuscation or scientiic rationalization can justify the harm we inlict. The most precious thing that animals have—their lives—is completely appropriated, placed without consent in service of someone else’s interests. Although naturalist Charles Darwin established over a century ago that differences among animals are differences in degree rather than kind, the vivisection industry operates as if there’s some morally signiicant difference between the beings on either side of the cage. Each criterion we cling to that supposedly separates “us” from “them” (such as tool-making, language capacity, abstract reasoning, etc.) has been proven continuous between ourselves and other species. While these insights are scientiically evidenced by cognitive ethology (study of animal minds and behaviour), they are also veriied by direct experiences with the feeling and thinking animals in our own lives. Yet even if we could ind some elusive difference that could deinitively distinguish us from all other animals, as lawyer and philosopher Gary Francione (1996) has long argued, why should that difference bear on whether someone is imprisoned, harmed, and then killed? That is, what relevance do these criteria have to whether someone is treated as property? Nonetheless, this faulty logic is so entrenched that many understand our treatment of other animals as natural, and even inevitable. As a part of this skewed perception, we’re stuck in a limited ethical framework of “animal welfare” that suggests that the most we owe animals in labs is the minimization of their pain and suffering, not their own lives and rights to selfdetermination (Francione, 2008). In the word vivisection, we hear an echo of physical violence, the cutting of the living being. As such, society maintains we address the physical harm inlicted through experimental procedures. In Canada, the Canadian Council on Animal Care (CCAC) is supposed to monitor animal use in research, but this national body was founded by vivisectors and is populated by those with a stake in the industry. For public institutions, compliance with CCAC inspections is voluntary, while private institutions aren’t subject to any inspection (Sorenson, 2010). As sociologist John Sorenson argues, “The CCAC is simply a front group for the vivisection industry, providing a veneer of legitimacy while ensuring that researchers can conduct their activities in secret, free from interference from the public who fund them” (p. 137). According to the CCAC code of ethics, as long as the experiment has a “reasonable expectation” of contributing to knowledge, it’s allowed. With language so vague and open to interpretation, any experiment can be justiied. Shockingly, explicitly painful procedures are permitted if the experiment passes an internal review—one conducted by other vivisectors. Canada, a supposedly animal-loving nation, is as lax and sometimes even more so than other countries in its regulation of animal experimentation. Understandably, when exposed to the realities of vivisection, we want to believe that our laws protect animals in labs, but most often they don’t. Even when basic welfare conditions are met, this baseline is grossly inadequate when considered alongside the overwhelming evidence that animals have the capacity for rich emotional and social lives, as Maximum Tolerated Dose powerfully demonstrates. Even in cases when we can completely anaesthetize the physical pain, no amount of anesthetic erases the terror, loneliness, emotional deprivation, destruction of social bonds, and various other forms of psychological stress and trauma that animals in labs endure. The physical harm enacted through surgery and other forms of experimentation is only a narrow slice of the larger bandwidth of their experiences, ones not encapsulated by the word vivisection. In fact, some animals can spend decades of their lives languishing in labs, afraid and alone. Some exhibit sterotypies (repeated mechanical repetition of a movement), develop severe anxiety and fear, or vacantly retreat into themselves. Or, equally disturbing, their lives are cut short, stripped of the possibility of future pleasure and relationships with others (see Balcombe, 2006). In other words, in addition to the pain from operations and other painful and tormenting forms of experimentation, animals in labs experience (often solitary) coninement and death row, conditions similar to those reserved for people convicted of heinous crimes. We might be acquainted with the images of animals writhing in pain during experiments, like the monkey struggling against her restraint, but those moments represent only one aspect of their desolate and terrifying existences. Unless rescued by activists or by human workers at the lab, most animals used in experimentation do not retire in sanctuaries, though some might be “lucky” enough to be bred for zoos. Last year, people around the world rejoiced when an anti-vivisection protest turned into a spontaneous rescue of forty beagles from Green Hill, an Italian breeding facility for dogs used in testing. Similarly, the underground Animal Liberation Front (ALF) movement and aboveground groups such as Animal Equality/Igualdad Animal work to document conditions and free animals from labs and associated facilities. Many animals also resist their captivity and treatment, and some even manage to escape. In 2003, for example, twentyfour rhesus monkeys broke out of the Tulane Regional Primate Center in Covington, Louisiana (Hribal, 2010). That same year, another rhesus monkey escaped from the National Primate Center in Davis, California (Hribal, 2010). While these sorts of incidents offer dramatic illustrations of animal resistance, there are also subtler and daily ways animals ight back and assert themselves in labs, from barking and scratching to seeking comfort with cage mates. Two macaques, huddled and clutching each other at the back of cage, are trying as best they can to survive and to resist in their own ways. In one of the industry’s recent cruel ironies, rats in a University of Chicago study (Ben-Ami Bartal, Decety, & Mason, 2011) demonstrated empathy, in which they repeatedly freed distressed lab mates from a restrainer tube that could only be unlocked from the outside. Instead of prompting the psychologists to reconsider animal experimentation and themselves empathize and liberate the rats they held captive, they concluded that empathy is likely part of humans’ biological inheritance, and thus they completely failed to appreciate the deep hypocrisy of their research. Unfortunately, the vivisection industry also pushes back against animals’ assertions. For example, beagles (who are used for their size, docility, and loving disposition [Potter, 2011]) and other dogs are sometimes debarked, which involves cutting or crushing their vocal cords (see Luke, 2007). In a way, this procedure speaks to the dogs’ agency, a sense of will that must be actively suppressed. Yet despite such efforts, there are ways that animals in research emotionally affect at least some who work with them. The techniques of experimentation, which help distance technicians or scientists from their “research models” (such as using numbers instead of names to differentiate the animals), may only desensitize to a certain degree or not at all. As Maximum Tolerated Dose poignantly illustrates, the psychological toll on human workers can be profound and lasting. Much like the ethical issues surrounding slaughterhouse labour, we need to ask ourselves what we ask of others when we support the industry. The numbers of lab animals used each year is staggering. In Canada in 2006, over two and a half million animals were used (Sorenson, 2010). Just almost a decade before, in 1997, one and a half million were used. Approximately 127 million were used globally in 2005 (Knight, 2005), although current exact numbers are dificult to assess because use is not always reported and, in countries like the United States, mice and rats are not counted in oficial statistics. In tandem with the numbers of animals used, and the breadth of experiments conducted (such as repeated dose toxicity, skin corrosivity, brain injury trauma, chronic stress, etc.), the proits generated through the industry are likewise enormous. Many people, such as breeders and instrument manufacturers who don’t directly experiment on animals, nonetheless have inancial stakes in the industry. When capitalism meets animal welfare, animals always suffer. It’s hard to fathom that each lab animal around the world has a personality and a will to live. Each longs to be free and to experience a full life. Ultimately, we must realize that nonhuman animals are used simply because they aren’t members of our species, and this form of discrimination is as arbitrary and repugnant as other forms (see Francione, 2008). We take what is most valuable to animals for our own purposes because we can, despite now looking back on examples of human vivisection (e.g., Kristof, 1995; Micah Publications, 2012) with horror. That we ended up on this side of the cage is just a matter of luck. Although the word vivisection can feel opaque, it’s a door that once opened, leads us into a world replete with subjects who need our help. As leading cognitive ethologist Marc Bekoff (2007) asks scientists, “Would you do it to your dog?” (p. 164). If our answer is no, then we must demand that the industry stops. references Balcombe, J. (2006). Pleasurable kingdom: Animals and the nature of feeling good. New York, NY: Palgrave Macmillan. Bekoff, M. (2007). The emotional lives of animals: A leading scientist explores animal joy, sorrow, and empathy – and why they matter. Novato, CA: New World Library. Ben-Ami Bartal, I., Decety, J., & Mason, P. (2011). Empathy and pro-social behavior in rats. Science, 334, 1427-1430. Francione, G. (1996). Rain without thunder: The ideology of the animal rights movement. Philadelphia, PA: Temple University Press. Francione, G. (2008). Animals as persons: Essays on the abolition of animal exploitation. New York, NY: Columbia University Press. Hribal, J. (2010). Fear of the animal planet: The hidden history of animal resistance. Oakland, CA: AK Press. Knight, A. (2005). 127 million non-human vertebrates used worldwide for scientiic purposes in 2005. Alternatives to Laboratory Animals, 36(5): 494-496. Kristof, N. (March 17, 1995) Unmasking Horror. A Special Report; Japan Confronting Gruesome War Atrocity. New York Times. Retrieved from http://www.nytimes.com/1995/03/17/world/unmasking-horrora-special-report-japan-confronting-gruesome-war-atrocity. html?pagewanted=all&src=pm Luke, B. (2007). Brutal: Manhood and the exploitation of animals. Champaign, IL: University of Illinois Press. Micah Publications. (2012). Human Experimentation: Before the Nazi Era and After. Retrieved from http://micahbooks.com/human-experimentation-33.html Potter, W. (2011). Green is the new red: An insider’s account of a social movement under siege. San Fransciso, CA: City Lights Books. Sorenson, J. (2010). About Canada: Animal rights. Winnipeg, MB: Fernwood. links Animal Equality / Igualdad Animal http://www.animalequality.net/ Animal Voices http://www.animalvoices.ca/ Beagle Freedom Project http://www.beaglefreedomproject.org/ Critical Animal Studies, Department of Sociology, Brock University http://brocku.ca/social-sciences/undergraduate-programs/sociology Institute for Critical Animal Studies http://www.criticalanimalstudies.org/ Jason Hribal http://www.jasonhribal.com/ Jonathan Balcombe http://jonathanbalcombe.com/ Marc Bekoff http://www.psychologytoday.com/experts/marc-bekoff-phd Occupy Green Hill https://www.facebook.com/OccupyGreenHill maximum tolerated dose: a user’s guide by karol orzechowski, director introduction 00:00:00: A clip from “Animals For Research - Establishing and Maintaining a Disease-Free Colony”, a ilm released by the U.S. Army, 1957. 00:01:40: An introduction by Lynda Birke, with a collage of footage from various moments in the ilm. 00:03:44: Opening Credits 00:04:40: An introduction to some of the human subjects of the ilm. 00:07:54: A collage of images illustrating some of the ends for which animal experiments are the means. This sequence also includes some shots of the exteriors of animal testing facilities. i: separations 00:09:28: Act I is introduced by Lynda Birke, discussing some concepts from her book (co-authored with Mike Michael and Arnold Arluke), entitled The Sacriice, speciically sections of Chapter 1, “Enter the Lab Animal” and Chapter 2, “The Animal Model and Scientiic Practice.” 00:12:35: Sarah Kite reads from her book Secret Suffering, a journal of her 8-month stretch as one of the irst undercover investigators to expose the cruelties of Huntingdon Life Sciences (then known as Huntingdon Research Centre). Her reading is accompanied by images shot at an abandoned research facility in an undisclosed location in the Southern United States. All of the equipment pictured, and all of the buildings and rooms you see were previously used for animal experiments. 00:14:14: The images from the abandoned laboratory continue as we hear the story of Isabelle, a former commercial lab worker from Canada, who worked with mice, dogs, and primates. The interview with Isabelle was conducted before MTD was oficially a project, and this interview was one of the inspirations for the creation of the ilm. 00:17:38: The irst appearance of Rachel Weiss, a longtime lab worker whose story is woven throughout the ilm. A few of the images you see in this section were taken from “Poisoning for Proit”, an undercover investigation of Covance laboratories in Germany, conducted by the British Union for the Abolition of Vivisection (BUAV) in 2003. 00:19:28: Rachel presents some of her own photographs from inside a university laboratory where she worked in the early 90s. This is followed by a sequence of “photos of photos”, sourced from the abandoned lab referenced above. ii: mice like us 00:21:19: A ghostly image of rats on an automated wheel, an outtake from a U.S. Army ilm called “Animals in Rocket Flight”, 1953. 00:21:39: Lynda Birke introduces Act II with a cultural analysis of the use of rats in experimentation, drawn from Chapter 1, “Enter the Lab Animal” and Chapter 2, “The Animal Model and Scientiic Practice”, from The Sacriice. 00:23:16: Home video from Erika Sullivan, a veterinarian and former guardian of Ms. Peepers, a rescued laboratory rat. This is video taken from inside her college residence room, as she was studying to become a vet at the Ontario Veterinary College at Guelph University in Canada. A side note: Erika was one of the irst students to graduate from her program without killing animals to fulill her curricula, as part of Guelph University’s “alternative stream” for vet students. 00:24:47: Statistics taken from The Canadian Council on Animal Care, UK Home Ofice, and European Commission websites. The U.S. government does not keep statistics on rats and mice at publicly funded institutions, and private companies do not generally release statistics on their use of animals. 00:25:13: Dr. Ned Buyukmihci describes his experiences as a member of an animal use committee at UC Davis during his career. Ned was a professor at UC Davis for many years, where he challenged the university’s use of dogs and cats from shelters for research and teaching. He was also the founder of the Association of Veterinarians for Animal Rights. 00:28:04: After the pictures of Ms. Peepers at rest, we see hidden-camera footage from a veterinary training course in Europe, shot in 2011. 00:30:28: Eric Thomas Bachli, a former research scientist in the private sector, describes his early experiences with rats. He has, by his own admission, worked with some of the biggest research irms in the U.S. and at the time of this interview, Eric was still involved with animal research, but was experiencing severe symptoms of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. Since MTD was released, Eric left his job and animal research, and is now pursuing a different career. The images that accompany Eric’s testimony are taken from “The Ugly Truth About Botox”, a BUAV investigation into Wickham Laboratories in the UK in 2009. 00:32:53: As Erika resumes her stories about Ms. Peepers, we see footage from “Motivation and Reward in Learning”, an instructional ilm produced by Yale University in 1948, which oddly echoes some of Erika’s descriptions. The sequence then transitions back to show Ms. Peepers and her friend Gabby exploring Erika’s bed top, and also shows Ms. Peepers enjoying her favourite food - pumpkin seeds. iii: man’s best friend 00:35:22: A snippet of a commercial produced by Huntingdon Life Sciences, one of the biggest private animal testing contractors in the world. 00:35:50: Lynda Birke introduces Act III with analysis drawn from Chapter 3 of The Sacriice, “Representing Animals: Unsung Heroes and Partners in Research”. 00:37:30: Sarah Kite reads further from Secret Suffering, this time reading parts of her journal that document her move from rodent toxicology to the dog unit, with her own photos accompanying the text. 00:38:43: Isoquimen / Harlan Interfauna in Sant Feliu De Codines, Spain, is a large facility that is part of an international network of Interfauna breeding facilities, designed to supply the global animal research industries with a steady supply of “standardized animals.” In addition to dogs, the facility also breeds cats, ferrets, mice, rats, guinea pigs, and rabbits. 00:40:02: Along with Isabelle (Act I), Dr. John Pippin was one fo the original inspirations for beginning production of MTD. In 2010, while working on the Animal Voices radio show in Toronto , I interviewed John about research alternatives, in his then-role as a media representative with the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine. During that interview, the story of his work with dogs (and his simultaneous homelife with dogs) was revealed, and in addition to Isabelle’s story, became my impetus for exploring the subject further. 00:41:26: Sarah Kite reads further from her investigation journals, and we see two more of her heartbreaking and poignant photos from her time at HRC. 00:42:58: The majority of the old footage from this section comes from a 1940 Russian ilm called “Experiments In the Revival of Organisms”, which documented the decapitation of dogs and efforts to keep them alive with an artiicial blood pump after their heads were removed. The images uncannily match some of John’s story, as he describes the compartmentalization of his ethics and actions. 00:44:55: The rescue of 36 dogs from the facility in Sant Feliu De Codines was a unique event in terms of animal rescues. The group of Igualdad Animal (IA) supporters did not act through instructions or orders from the group, but rather acted autonomously and sent documentation of their work anonymously to IA at some later point. After the rescue, the organization followed up with a large demonstration in the small town where the facility is located. 00:46:51: “Rita” is not her real name. Because of the nature of the rescue as an illegal action, her name was changed to protect her identity, and that of her human companions. These scenes were ilmed with careful attention to any identifying details that would expose them and where they live. 00:48:38: John details the moment he left his academic research position, and decided to pursue a similar career, but without the use of any animals. 00:49:47: More footage of Rita, and details about how she has healed extensively since her rescue. The anonymous narrator also explains how adopting Rita has allowed him to personalize the sometimes abstract focus on numbers and statistics within animal rights campaigns. 00:51:01: Sarah closes her remarks with an emotional promise to the animals she left behind. Shown onscreen, the iconic picture of the dog with the cone collar was also a front-page photo across the UK when the investigation broke publicly, and HRC became infamous overnight. iv: true costs 00:52:38: Lynda Birke introduces Act IV with analysis from Chapter 4, “Becoming a Biologist”, and Chapter 5, “The Division of Emotional Labour” from The Sacriice. The title for this section is meant to acknowledge the hidden consequences of animal research. The animal research debate often concentrates on abstractions, or on the moment of an animal’s death or a particularly brutal kind of experiment; Act IV is meant to portray the “true costs” of animal experimentation, which encompass the entire lives of individual non-humans. 00:54:47: In 2008, as part of their ongoing investigations into the primate trade for animal experimentation, the BUAV sent an investigative team to Cambodia where they documented the wild trapping of long-tail macaques for use in the international animal research industries. 00:57:54: In December of 2011, the MTD crew travelled to South East Asia to document the practice of monkey farming for export to animal research institutions all over the world. The MTD team contributed a full report of our indings as well as our footage to the BUAV’s ongoing campaign against the international trade in primates for animal research, and our footage was used for the “Caged Cruelty” video produced by the BUAV. For the ilm, we combined our footage of monkey farms with the harrowing wild capture footage to present a fuller picture of what the life of a macaque destined for a life of research entails. 01:00:17: More BUAV footage, showing the shipment and transport of monkeys from monkey farms to institutions all over the world. BUAV has been at the forefront of campaigning for airlines to stop shipping primates and other animals for use in vivisection. 01:01:03: Darla’s story is one of the most stunning documented examples of the emotional, psychological, and physical toll that animal research can take on an individual. The footage from this section is a mixture of relevant footage from the BUAV’s “Poisoning for Proit” investigation, our own macaque related footage from the abandoned laboratory in the U.S., some clips from our SE Asia investigation, and footage of Darla shot on a rainy day at Fauna Sanctuary. Because of the inclement weather during production, we were unable to show the expansive outside area that Darla and her friends in the Fauna monkey house have access to all year round. 01:05:59: Another anachronistic clip from the U.S. Military animal testing program, showing a distressed macaque with two researchers. v: letting go 01:06:15: Lynda Birke introduces Act V by returning to some themes covered in Chapter 2, “The Animal Model and Scientiic Practice”, speciically on the subject of replicability of research and results, from The Sacriice. 01:08:39: The story of Rachel Weiss and Jerom (also known as “C-499”) is the centrepiece of the inal chapter of the ilm, and was an extremely important story for us to feature in MTD for many reasons. When Rachel left her job at the Yerkes National Primate Research Center (part of Emory University in Atlanta) in 1996, the university went in to damage control as Rachel told her story (and Jerom’s story) publicly. From that point, Rachel and a few others established the Laboratory Primate Advocacy Group, which served as a organization advocating for primates in labs, and as an online group for current and former lab workers to tell their stories and ind peer support. The LPAG website contains a wealth of information, including Rachel’s journals from her time at Yerkes with Jerom. The footage from this section is a visual blend of archival material drawn from various sources, mixed with shots of foliage around the perimeter of the Yerkes main campus research station in Atlanta, Georgia. This section also features several clips from the 1952 ilm Monkey Business, starring Cary Grant and Marilyn Monroe, in which a scientist (played by Grant) seeks to create a “fountain of youth” elixir and tests his concotions on captive juvenile chimps in his laboratory. closing sequence 01:18:12: We return to the main musical motif of the opening sequence of the ilm, this time taking a more kaleidoscopic view of some of the themes covered and footage presented in the ilm. Many of the voices presented in the ilm return to offer inal thoughts. 01:22:42: The ilm ends with a message to current and former lab workers and researchers to reach out if they need support. We include it here again, and encourage anyone watching the ilm or reading this user guide to pass it on: if you are a current lab worker or researcher looking for support to stop experimenting on animals, or if you are a former lab worker looking for emotional support or someone to talk to, please reach out. the laboratory primate advocacy group and maximum tolerated dose provide resources and an outlet for current or former lab workers and researchers to tell their stories, and those of the animals they worked with. lpag.org maximumtolerateddose.org