Sanctuary: Counter-oppressive Relationships with Farmed Animals as an Ecopsychological Imperative

Consumers are intentionally shielded from and often misled about the process of breeding, raising, and slaughtering animals for consumption. By confining most farmed animals to warehouses in rural areas while the majority of humans are sequestered in urban areas, we have effectively created a world where humans do not have to contend with the sense of interconnectedness that arises when witnessing and being witnessed by a farmed animal. Within industrial slaughterhouses, the physical act of killing is minimized to just a fraction of the workers, so that even those who are responsible for rendering a once living being will never encounter a live animal (Pachirat, 2011). While Ecopsychology has historically uplifted ecotherapy modalities that reinforce a species hierarchy, there is another way of relating to the nonhuman animal world that challenges the power dynamics and oppressive systems that perpetuate humans’ disconnection from the natural world. The “Sanctuary” model is one that intentionally creates sacred spaces of community, connection, and resistance against the dominant culture and does so through radical interdependence and compassion (Pachirat, 2018).