A LEADING academic was forced to withdraw from presenting a thought-provoking research paper promoting improved wild dog controls after being confronted with social media death threats and “hate speech” by extreme animal rights activists.
University of Southern Queensland ecologist and conservation researcher Dr Ben Allen was stood down from delivering his new research report at a conference on sustainable wildlife practices held in Brisbane this week.
His paper - Creating Dingo Meat Products for South East Asia; potential market opportunities and cultural dilemmas - was designed to promote scholarly discussion about the practical benefits and ethical considerations of enhancing wild dog controls by exporting potential food products into accepting Asian countries.
But the controversial premise of his work sparked significant backlash and ignited several social media petitions aimed at having the conference presentation aborted.
A petition on CommunityRun which claims to be “powered by GetUp!” attacked conference sponsors - the Sporting Shooters Association of Australia (SSAA) and the Queensland Government - and demanded Dr Allen’s “dingo meat market conference session be cancelled”.
“Most Australians find the eating of canines to be disgusting and indeed the eating of dogs is not legal in Australia,” it said.
“It is disturbing that a major public institution, the University of Queensland, is now involved in promoting commercial harvesting of native wildlife.”
Another petition on an environment/wildlife website urged an email and letter “storm” on the University of Southern Queensland, saying Dr Allen’s presentation to sell dingo meat to Asia “must be pulled” as it was “unacceptable in Australia”.
An online letter on that petition written by Marie-Louise Sarjeant for the Action Days for Dingoes attacked Dr Allen’s “ill-thought out repugnant, disregard at any humanity proposing a trade in dingo meat to Asia”.
“Most Australian would be completely outraged if this was ever implemented as this sinks to an abysmal depths of depravity with no moral compass,” the letter said.
“By placing it on the table of an established conservation forum gives credibility to this incredible, unethical, repugnant scheme.”
The conference’s Twitter feed was hijacked yesterday by an account named “Shelly” which claims to be a “compassionate vegan” and a “voice for the voiceless” in trouncing Dr Allen’s academic proposal.
“First they ignore you - then they mock you - then they fight you – then you win – Gandhi,” one Tweet said.
NSW Upper House Animal Justice Party member Mark Pearson re-Tweeted some of the account’s posts including one highlighting an item from the “Fight Dog Meat” Facebook page claiming a campaign victory due to cancellation of the report’s presentation.
The Facebook post said “Victory - animal activists scare the speaker off from turning up at the 'dingoes for dog meat' conference”.
Another petition ventilated on change.org naming Dr Allen said “Australia’s reputation may soon hit an all-time low if it decides to go ahead with the unspeakable idea of exporting dingo and wild dog meat to China”.
Dr Allen has been gagged by the University from making any further media comment on the controversy but issued a brief statement confirming his withdrawal from the event.
Dr Allen said his research paper used a fictitious and hypothetical wild-dog meat export industry to illustrate the value of using a multidisciplinary research and development process, designed to stabilise supply chains of any wildlife product.
He said the role of academic researchers like him was to discuss difficult issues like the sustainable use of wildlife.
But on this occasion his paper was withdrawn to alleviate community fears over its content which had, “unfortunately been grossly misrepresented”, he said.
“Conservation through the sustainable use of wildlife is a much-debated topic with strong and worthy arguments on both sides,” he said.
"There are many wildlife conservation needs in Australia and internationally and finding ways to improve the prospects of threatened wildlife remains an important research priority.”
The SSAA also issued a strong statement saying academic debate had been stifled following “concerted efforts” by extreme animal activist groups to stop Dr Allen presenting his unseen paper to peers.
The SAAA said hate speech and fear had prevailed over science and facts after the academic’s presentation was halted “following threats and targeted attacks”.
The SSAA said the targeted campaign had also seen threats directed at other University staff and Dr Allen; including defamatory posts on social media and a spam email campaign.
SSAA National President Geoff Jones said he was outraged that academic debate had been interfered with due to a misleading campaign.
“The emotion-charged campaign has seen public debate sunk to new lows including personal attacks and threats towards a well-respected researcher,” he said.
“The result is that science and freedom of ideas has been suppressed and that is never a good thing.”
Save Fraser Island Dingoes, which has been critical of Dr Allen in the past, took to Facebook today to deny any direct involvement in the campaign that led to the retreat on Dr Allen’s presentation.
“Although we are more than happy to hear this talk has been pulled, I would like to make it clear that our organisation did not participate in any name calling or personal abuse of the scientist involved,” the post said.
“There are legitimate ways to protest without posting disgusting personal attacks and abusive language all over social media.”
Cheryl Bryant of Save Fraser Island Dingoes told Fairfax Agricultural Media her group contacted Dr Allen to ask what his paper consisted of and “that was the extent of involvement”.
“Our secretary and president have been overseas for the past three weeks and not even aware of any campaign,” she said.
“We were not involved in any way with any campaign.
“Our position was to listen to the talk and then counter his argument on a scientific and cultural basis.
“We are working with government and scientists from USC so these kind of personal attacks are counter-productive to everybody.”
NSW Liberal Democratic Senator David Leyonhjelm said universities were rapidly becoming refuges for bigots who not only choose to disagree, but also silenced those with whom they disagreed.
“This is the direct opposite of the longstanding tradition of universities as centres of intellectual debate, where free speech is treasured and controversial ideas can be presented and challenged,” he said.
“Unfortunately there is a culture emerging that is intolerant of speech unless it is consistent with the views of the listener.
“Voltaire’s famous saying, ‘that I may disagree with what you say but I will fight to the death for your right to say it’, has long been forgotten.”
Dr Allen’s presentation was also set to examine other alternatives for potential protein supply into food insecure but growing Asian markets, through sustainable wildlife programs, with 1.5 million kangaroos harvested per year, 200,000 possums culled and 10,000 camels.
Ahead of the Brisbane conference Dr Allen told ABC Radio he wasn’t even proposing to create a dog meat industry and didn’t know anyone else who was.
He said he was only talking hypothetically about the R&D approach needed to develop any wildlife product which was made clear, leading up to the conference.
“The cultural issues when it comes to wildlife use are really quite obvious,” he said.
“One man’s trash is another man’s treasure and when we talk about wild dogs and dingoes this is Australia’s sacred cow.
“You can’t speak ill of a dog but in other countries it’s completely normal for them to eat dog.
“And on the flip side of that we’re more than comfortable with eating sheep and cattle but in other countries they don’t eat sheep or cattle.
“So it’s those cultural issues that really stand out when it comes to trying to develop a wildlife product.”
Dr Allen said wild dogs were already being killed in government control programs designed to protect livestock farming from feral pests - that also inflict cruelty on other animals - and therefore the core ethical question was whether those culled dogs should be sold, rather than left to rot in paddocks.
“If such a wild dog industry was set up and was making lots of money and people paid through the nose for tinned dingo meat that would free up millions of dollars spent on wild dog control for wildlife conservation,” he said.
Dr Allen said the reaction to his proposed talk at the conference had been ill-informed as he’d only publicised its title which had then been incorrectly associated with animal cruelty, in other countries.
“I laugh because this is what social media does – it takes an inch and runs a mile,” he said.
“I actually had one person call me up and say “I hear you’re planning to take dingoes form Fraser Island and live export them to the dog meat festival in China so they can be bashed’ and I thought, ‘hmmm no you’re quite a way off target there’.”
Dr Allen said such issues were meant to be raised at conference were people from “both sides of the table” could come and hold mature debate.
But he said some people in the debate, or some community sectors, believed a topic like the one outlined in his research report that’s perceived to be taboo, should not even be discussed by academics.
He told Fairfax Agricultural Media recently Australia has wild dogs that are being culled and left to hang on a fence but millions of people would be happy to eat them.
“Well, 30 million dogs are eaten in South East Asia every year, so presumably there might be a market,” he said.
“We’re only shooting 10,000 to 15,000 a year; if we can only supply that and they’re eating 30 million we’re never going to be a big player.”
RSPCA Australia’s Chief Scientist Bidda Jones also presented at the conference along with Bryce Johnson and Teresa Dent from the United Kingdom’s Game & Wildlife Conservation Trust.