Groups Urge Associated Press to Update Animal Pronouns

“In an age struggling with industrialized animal cruelty, the sixth mass extinction of species, a climate crisis, and the exploitation of the natural world, the way we use language influences the way we see our relationship with our environment and the nonhuman animals we share it with.”

United Poultry Concerns is pleased to be a signatory to this Open Letter initiated by In Defense of Animals urging The Associated Press to update its pronoun recommendations for nonhuman animals from “what” to “who.” For decades, the AP’s Stylebook recommendations on the use of personal pronouns for nonhuman animals have cast animals as objects – “it,” “which,” and similar demeaning and inaccurate designations that influence media coverage and public perception. IDA is joined by more than 80 respected leaders and scholars in animal advocacy and conservation across the globe who support this change, including Jane Goodall.

Read the Open Letter:
Animals Are a Who, Not a What

To learn more about this campaign, see:
Animals Are Not Objects

See also:
Chicken or Broiler, Cow or Steer, Owner or Guardian?
- Liberating the Language of Animal Abuse

We are your kin, not your “things.”
Artwork by Nigel Burroughs, Nature’s Chicken