Animal Instincts: Race, Criminality, and the Reversal of the “Human”

In 2007 Atlanta Falcons’ quarterback Michael Vick was arrested for owning and operating the Bad Newz Kennels, a large interstate dogfighting ring. As the facts of the case unfolded, Vick was publicly attacked by animal rights groups, who were outraged by the abuse perpetrated at the kennels, particularly the violent “execution” of the dogs after fighting by torture, electrocution, drowning, and hanging. While the term execution typically refers to the realm of human death, its use in the context of the Vick case suggests that something more than animal abuse was at stake. This article uses the Vick saga to interrogate the often invisible, and often racialized, intersections of animal and human rights discourse.