It is rare to encounter a book regarding farming or the (mis)treatment of animals that is for so many audiences at once. Transfarmation, by Leah Garcés, happens to be one of those books. Garcés is the president of Mercy for Animals. While this particular org is often quite good at bridging divides, I still expected this book to either lean towards something mostly vegans would go for (screaming to the choir in our void of despair where everyone ignores us (joking... sorta)) or one of those books that insultingly erases the most vulnerable individuals of all species involved in farming so that the reader doesn't have to feel bad (or responsible.) Transfarmation is both emotionally honest and intellectually rigorous. It is for the city dwelling vegan with a one-dimensional view of animal farming and for the rural residents whose exploitation and injury via animal agribusiness seems like an inescapable fact of life. It is for the person most moved by true stories that tug at their heartstrings and for the person who says, "show me the numbers." Possibly most importantly, it involves a plan: Tangible, attainable solutions to the current crises we find ourselves in. There is definitely a place for exposure of the absolutely heinous abuse of animal agribusiness alone. When paired with solutions though, it leaves the reader feeling less hopeless.

The writing and structure of this book is extremely well thought out. Every section has a central individual interest storyline (aka human interest, but since this includes other species I've made it more general.) It is well documented that this is the sort of story that causes most people to change their mind. You can tell people all day about the trillions of animals who die per year for food, slaughterhouse covid transmission statistics, how many farmers take their own lives, and so on. For most people though, this isn't enough to make it stick. As much as we like to pretend otherwise, we are not rational beings. To absorb the data, we need to relate to it. Garcés does this exceptionally well.

We first focus on the farmers themselves who are manipulated by industries who profit from their work while the farmers descend further into crippling debt and despair from the actions they must take against other animals and their community to meet this capitalist need. The titular name of the book refers to the Transfarmation Project which "provides resources and support to industrial animal farmers interested in transitioning their farms to plant-focused operations." After reading this book, it is clearly about much more than that. It is about forming relationships and bridging divides. I always knew that factory farmers likely weren't evil moustache twirling animal abuse fetishists, but I also didn't realize just how much they have been manipulated to fail and how that failure is basically a central tenet of the profit model of animal exploitation corporations.

"Farmers aren't factory farming because they love the idea of being under the thumb of corporate entities and picking up dead and dying chickens. They do it because they are trapped in debt and have few other economic options."

We learn next about farmed animals by focusing on a few who make up the miniscule minority who are rescued and can have their tales told. I particularly like that she focused on a chickens and cows exploited for dairy as agribusiness industries have lobbied hard to make these seem like less horrific options (they are not.) We learn of three chickens a farmer was willing to let go of and the bits of freedom they were allowed to experience before succumbing to the inevitable demise caused by industries who breed their bodies to be their own enemies. We learn of Norma the former dairy cow who was rescued after defending her calf Nina after so many forced inseminations she had experienced previously where her calves were stolen from her within a day. This story has a happier ending where we learn that both she and her calf were rescued and reunited. I also love that Garcés chose VINE Sanctuary as the focus for one of the stories as their collective liberation models of organizing and care are revolutionary. They fit well into the aims of the book to further the conversation to include the humans most exploited by these industries.

The narrative of the book is next expanded into the larger community, where we learn about the disproportionately low income BIPOC communities who find themselves surrounded on all sides by farms imprisoning pigs that spray literal feces into the air they breathe and the homes they sleep in. We learn about the lengths they have had to go to to literally organize for the right to breathe shit-free air when the county sheriff is also a hog farmer. We learn how even the BIPOC communities who have homes to hand down over generations find those homes and neighborhoods now uninhabitable. Following this, we move on to the immigrant communities- a large number of whom are undocumented or are still awaiting citizenship approval- who work in the slaughter facilities. We learn of the heinous lengths they go to to survive their trip into the country, only to be forced into a processing plant that demands impossible speeds of killing and dismembering animals, resulting in physical injuries, severe PTSD, disease, and death. We also learn of the refugee communities who may have more support, but who find themselves placed into and therefore harmed by the same job in order to gain any benefits from their refugee status. "Processing" plants rely on the vulnerability of these workers along with prison laborers paid 25 cents an hour. This means they are also often run by men who sexually harass and assault workers, who make threats and defy the already meager legal restrictions, and so on. We learn what it is like to be a mother forced to do a job bludgeoning baby pigs. We learn of the slaughter rate of 3 chickens per second allowed by both democrat and republican legislatures, causing immense pain for the workers and resulting in the birds who are not killed fast enough drowning in scalding water.

That summary may make it seem like a trauma dump, but I assure you that this book is not that. My already long review has its limits. We also learn of these peoples hopes, desires, and joys. We learn of the lives they could have- lives that are indeed possible with change. The book ends with a grounded and detailed section including solutions for every problem it presents which include further support for farmers to transition away from factory farming, animal welfare measures making animals lives slightly less miserable, unions and worker protection measures for those laboring in farms and slaughterhouses, and systemic economic changes. While I have not followed every single effort, I have generally found Mercy for Animals to be an org that understands how to mix welfarism with abolition (a long standing argument occurring between animal advocates.) However, I was not the biggest fan of how cage free eggs were spoken of. While she does acknowledge that the practice does not come close to eliminating suffering, she neglects the marketing aspect of these (predominantly also factory farming) companies that make well intentioned but misled people imagine chickens running around happily in the grass and dying of old age, when the reality is far more horrific. These corporations lack empathy but not cunning. They know how to market any loss to turn it into a win and we need to think of that. That said, if I was in a battery cage the size of a small closet with 7 other people and someone offered me a large, crowded, dank warehouse to die in instead, I would choose the latter.

If you will allow me a final moment for a more personal vent. The information in this book not only infuriated and hurt due to the horrifying nature of atrocity. It bothered me because I worry that, no matter how perfectly the information is presented, it won't be heard. The group I kept thinking of most throughout this book, were the non/anti-vegan leftists who use strawmen and tokenization to avoid taking a hard look at our relationships to these industries and their victims. This is likely because anti-vegan sentiment often hurts the most when it comes from a respected leftist turned reactionary, a skilled environmentalist turned agribusiness lobbyist, and so on. White, single issue vegans (like white single issue proponents of any movement) are in part to blame for the divide, and there are legitimate criticisms. But, I rarely find honest conversation. I find defensiveness and cognitive dissonance. It reminds me of the Rob Zombie quote, "Everyone "loves" animals until they hear the word 'vegan'. Then they'll argue tooth and nail why it's acceptable to abuse them." I would love to see non/anti-vegan leftists read this book. I want to hear what they have to say about farmworkers picking vegans' plants (who they only bring up when veganism is a topic despite most farmland going to animal agribusiness and feed,) after they read about the struggle of slaughterhouse workers (who they of course never mention.) I want to hear from the upper middle class white person who tokenizes BIPOC communities in these discussions (while simultaneously erasing them) explain to me why spraying pig feces on their homes for bacon is helping. I also want the vegetarians and the "humane" slaughter proponents to pay attention- not the ones who are just doing the best they can, but the "not like the other girls" subset who are hostile to animal rights and veganism. I want them to understand the cost of dairy and eggs and how it is often higher than the meat they abstain from for ethical reasons. I want them to read about what happens to these animals and the humans forced into hell with them.

I say this as someone who almost 19 years ago was a non-vegan. Most of us were not born with perfected leftist ideals making us immune to the world influence we grew up in. Many of us, including recovering teen edgelords like myself, were first hostile to the idea of animal liberation or criticism of various related systems. This vent isn't meant as a superiority thing. It's meant to lay bare that many of the arguments my usually otherwise like minded kin make against animal liberation and veganism are awful and self-contradictory. They are almost always a hard turn to the far right or doing the work of capitalism via tokenization. They are often bad faith and even recreate the oppression dynamics that we claim to be against. This hurts not just because the arguments are harmful, but because I don't think they believe them in their hearts. There is room for more. There is room for a better world for all of us.

Please read this book. Read it even if you think you and I have nothing in common. You may find that we do. I hope this book helps others create the kinds of relationships and successful transitions that the author and her fellow organizers have created. Despite how tough it was at times, it gave me more hope than I have had in a while.

This was also posted to my goodreads and blog.