Justin will discuss how animal agriculture on every scale involves exploitation and suffering, as well as how efforts to come up with “better” ways to farm animals exposes the roots of speciesism underlying all forms of violence towards animals.

Justin Van Kleeck, PhD is a freelance writer, educator, and community organizer. In 2014, Justin and his wife Rosemary founded the Triangle Chicken Advocates microsanctuary in North Carolina, which inspired them to start The Microsanctuary Movement later that year. He also founded and contributes to the radical vegan blog, Striving with Systems. Justin currently serves as the Sanctuary & Microsanctuary Advisor for A Well-Fed World.

Adam will discuss the law and ethics of responding to false vegan advertising; the law and ethics of vegan conscientious objection in employment, education, and incarceration based on religion; the vegan ethics of keeping obligate and opportunistic omnivorous animal companions; and the vegan ethics of having or not having children.

Adam P. Karp is a Martindale-Hubbell AV Preeminent-rated lawyer who practices animal law throughout Washington, Oregon, and Idaho. In his 19th year practicing law, Adam estimates having evaluated and/or handled over 6000 animal law cases to date and authored Understanding Animal Law, published by Carolina Academic Press in 2016. He teaches law at the University of Washington School of Law and Seattle University School of Law and received the American Bar Association Excellence in the Advancement of Animal Law award in 2012.

Karen will debunk the claim that consuming poultry harms the environment less than eating beef and explains why the environment that chickens and turkeys are raised in makes them, and consumers of poultry products, sick.

Karen Davis, PhD is the founder and President of United Poultry Concerns, a national organization that promotes the compassionate and respectful treatment of domestic fowl including a sanctuary for chickens in Virginia. Elected to the National Animal Rights Hall of Fame for Outstanding Contributions to Animal Liberation, Karen is the author of Prisoned Chickens, Poisoned Eggs; The Holocaust and the Henmaid’s Tale, and other groundbreaking works revealing the plight of poultry and advancing conceptual and strategic approaches to effective farmed animal advocacy.

John surveys memoirs written by middle class white women about leaving careers to take up animal husbandry, as a way (they claim) to empower themselves as women and to realize an “authentic” connection with animals and the land. John shows how, by uniting mothering and fertility with frank, violent sadism and death fetishism, “femivores” are playing a pivotal ideological role in legitimating speciesism and stabilizing meat as a “natural,” “humane” commodity.

John Sanbonmatsu, PhD is associate professor of philosophy at Worcester Polytechnic Institute in Massachusetts whose works probe the nature of speciesism as a mode of production, particularly as it intersects with capitalism. His current work focuses on “locavorism” and “humane” meat discourse as a new strategy for legitimating animal exploitation and stabilizing meat as a “natural” commodity. Among his many publications, John is the editor of Critical Theory and Animal Liberation and a blogger for The Huffington Post.

Hope will discuss the latest scientific research on fish and how these sentient sea creatures experience pain, fear, joy, and friendship. We will learn what our ocean cousins think and feel and how we can help protect them.

Hope Bohanec has been active in animal protection and environmental activism for over 20 years and is the author of The Ultimate Betrayal: Is There Happy Meat? She is a nationally recognized leader and speaker in the animal advocacy movement, and the Projects Manager for United Poultry Concerns. Hope is also the Executive Director of Compassionate Living, a Sonoma County, California-based vegan advocacy organization and the primary organizer of UPC’s annual Conscious Eating Conference at UC Berkeley as well as the Sonoma County VegFest.

Clifton Roberts, history’s first U.S. Presidential Candidate who ran on a platform to protect non-human animals, shares a candid view of the only political party dedicated to the rights of all living beings, including its origins, current activities, and a simple strategy for the future. Clifton also shares his experience as a 2016 presidential candidate, his current bid for the U.S. Senate, and the upcoming 2020 presidential elections.

Clifton Roberts is a vegan of two decades, Humane Party Volunteer, speaker, 2016 U.S. presidential candidate, and 2018 candidate for the U.S. Senate. Clifton is passionate about protecting the most innocent beings on the planet, the deteriorating health of human beings, and the preservation and revitalization of our air, land, and water resources. Clifton also works for the world’s largest semiconductor producer in the company’s Global Ethics & Compliance Office.