Thread by @_CarolJAdams

Let’s take a moment to remember the #suffragists who were #vegetarian, a thread. They recognized how oppressions were connected. Some of the information is from my book, The Sexual Politics of Meat now celebrating its 30th anniversary of publication. #suffrage /1

Let’s be clear: Susan B. #Anthony was NOT a vegetarian. She was happy to get to Delmonico’s in Manhattan after staying with the #Grimke sisters, who were. She did attend a vegetarian banquet in 1853, where the toast was to “Total Abstinence, Women’s Rights, & Vegetarianism.” /2

Matilda Joslyn #Gage, a radical activist & co-editor of the 1st 3 volumes of “The History of Woman Suffrage” with Elizabeth Cady Stanton & Susan B. Anthony, was a vegetarian. She was later written out of the history for her radical views. See the work of @Swagner711 /3

Another vegetarian was the suffrage milliner who, at the National American Women’s Suffrage Association meeting of 1907 challenged the leaders wearing hats w/ bird feathers on them. They challenged her back—didn’t she eat meat? Who was she to criticize them? #suffrage #veg /4

Her name was Flora T. #Neff. She was the Indiana State Superintendent of Mercy, Women’s Christian Temperance Union. Many #WCTU suffrage activists were also veg. For instance, most famously, #FrancesWillard. /5

Flora T. Neff replied when she was asked, didn't she eat meat, by the bird-feather wearing suffragists: “Nothing would persuade me to eat a chicken, or to connive at the horror of trapping innocent animals for their fur." #suffrage #vegetarian #vegan /6

She continued, "It causes a thrill of horror to pass through me when I attend a woman’s suffrage convention and see women with ghastly trophies of slaughter upon their persons.” You won't find this in "The History of Women's Suffrage." /7

She asked, “Why can’t we be rounded out reformers? Why do we make one reform topic a hobby and forget all the others? Mercy, Prohibition, Vegetarianism, Woman’s Suffrage and Peace would make Old Earth a paradise, and yet the majority advocate but one, if any, of these." /8

In #Toronto, there was a #vegetarian restaurant run by suffrage workers in 1910. /8

The Vegetarian Magazine of the early twentieth century carried a column called “The Circle of Women’s Enfranchisement.” /9

Many British suffragettes also were vegetarian. Atlas Obscura covered this topic two years ago:
atlasobscura.com/articles/what-… /10

They drew on the fabulous work of Leah Leneman, who sadly died, soon after “The awakened instinct: vegetarianism and the women's suffrage movement in Britain” was published. She also was the author of vegan cookbooks. tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.108… /11

Actor Elsa Lanchester recalled how her mother, “Biddy” Lanchester was a feminist, suffragette, socialist, pacifist, and vegetarian. Her mother insisted on calling meat “offal.” /12

30 years ago when "The Sexual Politics of Meat" was published I said it was hard 2 determine how many feminists of the past were vegetarian bec so many of their biographers & historians covering this activism failed to discuss their #vegetarianism. bloomsbury.com/uk/the-sexual-… /13

Just as #feminist #vegans aren't single-issue activists now, it is important for us to acknowledge that neither were our #foremothers. The vision of a world w/o violence toward animals is not a new one. Today I will think about Flora T. Neff. #suffrage #suffragehistory #19th /13

Here I am (10 years ago now), at the grave of #vegetarian #feminist Matilda Joslyn Gage in upstate New York. photo by @Swagner711 /14