Why is it, we must ask, that the microbes that have existed for ages s — Steven Best

"If physical force is needed to save an animal from attack, then that force is a legitimate form of what I call "extensional self defense." This principle mirrors US penal code statutes known as the "necessity defense," which can be invoked when a defendant believed that an illegal act was necessary to avoid great and imminent harm. One only needs to expand this concept slightly to cover actions that are increasingly desperate and necessary to protect animals from the total war against them."

"Like humans, pathogens do not respect species boundaries. Overall, nearly eight billion people, many with advanced technologies and rapacious appetites, are tearing ecosystems apart and within these ecosystems live millions of different kinds of viruses, bacteria, and other pathogens. As observes in her book Pandemic, society operates with an erroneous paradigm of disease, treating diseases as foreign invaders into our territory (a mentality she describes as “microbial xenophobia”), when in fact we are the invading species encroaching on the habitat and communities of animals and ecosystems. It is wrong to say that these diseases are happening to us, rather they are the unintended results of what we are doing to the natural world. Speculations about accidental laboratory origins of outbreaks and COVID-19 conspiracy plots of bioterrorism draw attention away from actual systemic structures and dynamics of human exploitation of nature, especially as driven by the growth-addicted world system of capitalism. Hardly unexpected or accidental, viral outbreaks are the inevitable consequences of human growth and expansion. All too often, we are the causes, not effects, the culprits, not victims, of pandemic-inducing pathogens."

"There is a tremendous irony, hypocrisy, and disabling contradiction at the heart of movement, for, with regards to oppressed nonhuman animals, social justice activists are exclusive, not inclusive; homogenous, not pluralistic; and discriminatory, not "progressive," or "enlightened" in any deep or consistent way. The climate justice movement represents only one animal species – Homo sapiens -- to the systematic exclusion of millions of others, known and unknown. The overwhelming majority of living species on this planet are gravely affected by capitalist domination, expansionism, climate change, and human exploitation generally -- including “radicals” and “progressives” who believe the proper place for many animals is on their dinner plate or a fast-food menu. Not surprisingly, moreover, in social justice writings generally one finds little mention of the rapid acceleration of a , this one caused by humans, not natural forces. This mass extinction event, along with runaway climate change, defines a rupture in Earth and human history. It is a fundamental defining aspect of the Anthropocene epoch, a key cause of system ecological breakdown today, and fundamental to the "existential crisis" threatening all humanity."

"One of the key contradictions of capitalism is that its expansion rates are so rapid and vast that the system consumes ever more of the life systems necessary for humans to survive. Capitalism destroys its own conditions of reproduction – the biological foundation of life on which it parasitically depends."

"The desperate and tragic migration of oppressed people throughout the world, involves not only a humanitarian crisis testing the moral resolve of developed nations, but also a calamity for wildlife and ecological systems. The most simplistic response to immigration is to seal borders, while never addressing the root causes of human movement. But barriers, fences, and walls not only thwart human traffic, they impede the natural flow of nonhuman animals and plants and directly affect their migration routes and reproduction. This threatens the survival of nonhuman communities and contributes to the growing problems of and . This in turn affects human interests in crucial ways, and the erection of barriers along borders has a systemic impact on all communities of life – humans, animals, and ecosystems."

"A civil war is unfolding — one between forces hell-bent on exploiting animals and the earth for profit whatever the toll, and activists steeled to resist this omnicide tooth and nail. We are witnessing not only the long-standing corporate war against nature, but also a new social war about nature."