The Emotional politics of images: moral shock, explicit violence and strategic visual communication in the animal liberation movement

Fernández, Laura

The Emotional politics of images: moral shock, explicit violence and strategic visual communication in the animal liberation movement

Citation

Fernández L. The Emotional politics of images: moral shock, explicit violence and strategic visual communication in the animal liberation movement. JCAS. 2020;17(4):53-80.

Abstract

Animal liberation activists regularly use visual communication to get their message across to the public. Explicit violent images are considered a potential tool to bridge the moral gap between activists and audiences. However, there is a strong debate regarding the effectiveness of different visuals. This paper aims to contribute to the discussion by examining to what extent these images may be effective means of raising awareness of speciesist beliefs and attitudes, as well as promoting changes in them. To this end, this paper reviews the most outstanding research on anti-speciesist visual communication strategies from an interdisciplinary approach, focusing on the concept of moral shock. According to the review, it seems reasonable to conclude that animal liberation activists can benefit from the strategic use of moral shock, but given the difficulty of drawing clear conclusions on the topic, more research on the issue is needed to obtain more accurate results.