Thread by @theAAG

Happening now at #AAGVirtual More-than-human geographies of COVID-19: Species, inequalities, vulnerabilities
tinyurl.com/tbeq4vb 1 of 9 sessions on #COVID19 this week made possible thru support of @aaas Science and Human Rights Coalition @LibbyLunstrum and panelists

.@LibbyLunstrum begins: What happens when we grasp the intimate character of our relation to more-than-human world, s/t dangerous intimacies? The web we have enrolled the more-than-human in, but also the way they (virsuses for ex.) have enrolled us? #AAGVirtual @aaas @AAAS_SRHRL

Dr. Rebecca Wong on the trafficking and serving of endangered wildlife. Many of these are offered off-menu, only to trusted patrons, or delivered to homes. #AAGVirtual @aaas @AAAS_SRHRL

Neel Ahuja of @ucsc, author of Bioinsecurities: Disease Interventions, Empire, and the Government of Species (@DukeU Press), discusses the interdependencies of transportation and trade networks and people's lives that inform the #COVID19 pandemic. #AAGVirtual @aaas @AAAS_SRHRL

Neel Ahuja: The many dynamics affecting, particularly agrarian populations is denial of the networked connectionality in the city, and attempt to 'lock it down' and enact zoonotic surveillance in rural areas--a new kind of inequality we may see. #AAGVirtual @aaas @AAAS_SRHRL

Neel Ahuja: The current racist narratives about a "Chinese virus" are masking our interconnectedness. I hope for discussion about how this ecological surveillance feeds into the racialist and national structures we should be fighting. #AAGVirtual @aaas @AAAS_SRHRL

Bruce Braun @UMNews on the danger of narratives that highlight unfamiliar practices or places as "dirty" "unsanitary" "improper" and then lead to remedies that also racialize an 'other.' Zoonotic diseases are part of our evolutionary past, not new. #AAGVirtual @aaas @AAAS_SRHRL

We can't give in to a "biosecurity fantasy" that is inevitably about reaching into other peoples' lives, but instead need to seek solutions for interacting with other species. What is transforming human-animal relations? #AAGVirtual @aaas @AAAS_SRHRL

We should look at patterns of reterritorialization, some of it driven by neoliberal patterns. There is massive opportunity over next 10 years: can we seize the agenda to address #climatechange and other issues? Bruce Braun of @UMNews #AAGVirtual @aaas @AAAS_SRHRL

Rosemary-Claire Cottard on colonization/capitalism's contrib. to the intensification of encounters & shrinking space for wild animals & its relation to 96% of earth's mammals 4% wild animals: "This is not an accident: It was the goal of colonization" #AAGVirtual @aaas @AAAS_SRHRL

Flip side: China imports 80% of the test monkeys to the US (paused now). Cottard highlights our reliance on test animals in times of disease. Reminds us that as she speaks, animals are being bred and deployed to be tested for a cure to #COVID19. #AAGVirtual @aaas @AAAS_SRHRL

Cottard: Test animals as "a kind of front line worker"--but with no choice. "Monkeys' habitats being emptied, they are deprived of family relations and brought to us for testing for illnesses our incursions and trade cause. What do they owe us? What do we owe them?" #AAGVirtual

Stephanie Rutherford: We have not been able to "suture borders" such as between animal and human, between biological and non-biological, and even political. #COVID19 #AAGVirtual @aaas @AAAS_SRHRL

Rutherford: It is important to avoid anti-human rhetoric and extremist storytelling "in favor of nature healing itself" esp. as current human power structures have not equally benefitted all people. #COVID19 #AAGVirtual @aaas @AAAS_SRHRL

Rather, the new visibility of some animal life in urbanized areas could be a signal for a replenishment of a shared life together. So, too, might be the shared grief we experience, a way of "relearning the world" #COVID19 #AAGVirtual @aaas @AAAS_SRHRL

Wong: Wet markets are common in China; it's a farmer's market. Sale of protected wildlife is less common, and is the problem. 'Shutting down wet markets' is a superficial and naive idea, shows lack of understanding. Many Chinese are outraged at these illegal sales+ #AAGVirtual

The "superrich" Chinese consumer does exist, but so do non-Chinese superrich buyers. More broadly, the reporting rarely focuses on the cruelty to animals, the cruel, inhumane conditions that lead to disease and other problems. --Wong
#AAGVirtual @aaas @AAAS_SRHRL