Last week, I gave a talk at my department’s Pathways Human Dimensions of Wildlife Conference in Oxford with my colleagues from Humane World working on fur farm bans, and I was surprised to see that very few people showed up. Here was a conference dedicated to human and animal wellbeing, where experts flew in from all over the world to discuss wildlife protection from unnecessary killing and cruel treatment. Yet very few people were talking about the millions of wild animals we allow to be confined in barren cages, deprived of their natural behaviors, and killed- often through electrocution- with almost no government oversight.

Fur farming is, after factory farming for meat, dairy, and eggs, one of the greatest contributors to human-caused animal suffering around the world due to the numbers involved and the cruelty throughout their lives. While activism by animal advocates and shifting consumer preferences have reduced the demand for fur (particularly in Western markets), every year, tens of millions of animals- including mink, foxes, raccoon dogs, and chinchillas- are still bred, confined, and killed in fur farms. Internationally, momentum for reform has accelerated, as more than 30 countries have either banned fur farming, prohibited the farming of certain species, or have introduced stricter regulations that have ended the industry.

However, the United States still falls far behind in addressing this issue. There is little to no government oversight of fur farms in the U.S; fur farms are not regulated under the federal Animal Welfare Act or the federal Humane Slaughter Act, so basic welfare standards for animals are not mandated or enforced. While some cities in Massachusetts, Michigan, and Florida have banned new fur sales, California is the only state to enact a comprehensive ban on the sale and manufacture of new fur products. The United States remains the third largest importer of new fur products in the world (behind only Russia and South Korea) and is still a significant producer of mink pelts in the world; in 2024, U.S. farms produced at least 771,200 mink pelts valued at nearly USD 28 million. Much of the fur sold in the United States comes from unregulated farms in China and Russia. There is also very little reporting or tracking of fur farms in the U.S., with only a voluntary survey of mink fur production conducted every year by the U.S. Department of Agriculture. It is unknown how many fur farms exist in the U.S. for other commonly farmed species such as foxes, rabbits and chinchillas.

The One Health Impacts of Fur Farming

Fur farming is a One Health issue, meaning it sits at the intersection of animal welfare, public health, and environmental sustainability. This provides policymakers and members of the public with a myriad of reasons for banning fur production and the sale of products coming from fur farms.

The animal welfare concerns alone are overwhelming. Research reviewed by Warwick and colleagues (2023) identified at least sixteen major categories of welfare problems associated with fur farming, including severe spatial restriction, environmental and enrichment deprivation, inability to perform natural behaviors, social isolation, high rates of morbidity, and inhumane killing methods (e.g., live skinning and electrocution). Animals are typically housed in barren wire cages that prevent running, digging, climbing, exploring, or engaging in other species-specific behaviors. Scientific studies have concluded that the welfare needs of species such as mink and foxes cannot be adequately met in commercial fur-farming systems. For example, Mason et al. (2001) used an obstruction experiment and measured physiological responses to examine the welfare impacts of minks living in wire mesh cages in commercial fur farms. They found that in their experiment, minks were willing to expend significant energy to open a door to access a water pool and engage in their natural behavior of swimming, even though they had been bred in captivity without access to swimming for generations. The researchers also measured excreted cortisol in urine. They found that minks released the same amount of the ‘stress’ hormone cortisol when they were prevented from swimming as when they were denied food. This study suggests that the environmental and enrichment deprivation that minks face in fur farms causes the equivalent stress and suffering as food deprivation.

Fur farming also poses a significant public health threat. Fur farms have been linked to at least eighteen pathogens and diseases with confirmed or potential zoonotic implications. Mink are highly susceptible to coronavirus; during the COVID-19 pandemic, mink in 400 fur farms across eight countries in the European Union became infected with SARS-CoV-2 (the coronavirus responsible for COVID-19), and the virus subsequently spread between farmed mink and humans. Fur-farmed mink are now also testing positive for highly pathogenic avian influenza, which has caused widespread mortality in birds and economic losses to the poultry industry and has significant zoonotic potential. The conditions common on fur farms- high stocking densities, confinement of wild carnivore species, and close contact among animals and between people and animals- create ideal environments for disease emergence, mutation, and transmission. In an era still grappling with the consequences of global pandemics, preventing future zoonotic outbreaks should be a priority for anyone concerned with public health.

Fur farming also imposes significant environmental costs. Fur animal manure generates disproportionately high levels of greenhouse gas emissions compared with many other livestock systems. Runoff from fur farms contributes to eutrophication, damaging aquatic ecosystems and reducing biodiversity. Escapes and releases from fur farms have also contributed to the spread of invasive species throughout Europe and elsewhere, and it is now estimated that between 15% and 38% of all invasive mammal species originate from fur farming. American mink and raccoon dogs, both commonly farmed for fur, are now recognized among the most problematic invasive mammals in Europe.

Economics and Public Perspectives

Fur farming fails even when evaluated on economic grounds. A recent full-cost accounting study of the European Union fur industry by Griffen Carpenter found that fur farming in the EU generated only €183 million in annual sales in 2024 while imposing an estimated €226 million in environmental costs and €211 million in public health costs. The EU fur farming industry receives public funds in the form of compensation for lost sales (e.g., for the depopulation of mink from Covid-19) and funding for business development. Given this, the industry generated negative gross value added, meaning it actually reduced rather than contributed to the EU economy even without accounting for environmental, public health, or animal welfare costs. When environmental and public health damages were included, the sector’s total contribution to society was estimated at negative €446 million annually. The study also found that fur farming now accounts for less than 0.003% of EU employment and has declined dramatically over the past decade.

The public is also opposed to fur farming, around the world and in the United States. A 2020 poll found that 71% of Americans oppose killing animals for their fur. A peer-reviewed study my colleagues and I published in 2025 found that the U.S. public is receptive to statewide bans on the sale of fur coming from fur farming. In a survey of more than 2,000 residents from Connecticut, Massachusetts, New Jersey, and New York, we found that 59–61% of respondents supported fur bans without background information. After learning more about the animal welfare, environmental, or public health impacts of fur farming, or the growing public concern over fur, public support rose to over 64-66% across the region. We found that educational messages were particularly effective at increasing support for fur sales bans among politically independent respondents. Interestingly, we found that approximately 40% of respondents incorrectly believed that fur farms in the US are regulated to ensure basic animal welfare standards are met, suggesting a need for public education on how unregulated the industry is.

Moving Forward in our Fight Against Fur Farming

It is time that we invest more in the fight against fur farming here in the United States through legislation, public outreach, and even ballot initiatives. California is still the only U.S. state that has enacted a comprehensive ban on the sale and manufacture of new fur products. In 2025, Ohio legislators introduced a new bill requiring regulations for fur farming following an investigation into a fur farm charged with animal cruelty, while Massachusetts lawmakers are currently considering fur-ban bills. At the federal level, the Mink VIRUS Act (H.R.2185) was introduced in 2025, which would prohibit the farming of mink for their fur beginning one year after the bill’s enactment and establish a compensation program for fur farmers. The fur team at Humane World and other non-profits continue to lobby for this and other legislation.

If we as a movement cannot ban the sale of fur coming from fur farms at the federal level, we must at least work to create federal animal welfare standards and licensing and inspections for these facilities. At the state level, we can aim for bans on the sale of fur coming from fur farms as well as bans on fur farm production, or at least stricter regulations on the fur farming industry. Fur farm production bans could be targeted at the states with known fur farming industries but could also be focused on preventing new fur farms in states without known industries. In 2024, the states with most mink farms according to the USDA’s voluntary reporting were Wisconsin and Utah: in 2024, Wisconsin, the largest mink producing state, produced 438,710 pelts. Utah, the second largest producing state, produced 95,230 pelts. However, fur farms have also been identified in Ohio, Idaho, Minnesota, Oregon, and Washington. And at the local level, we can continue fighting for municipal ordinances to ban fur sales; my colleagues at Humane World developed an excellent guide for activists seeking to end fur sales in their city.

Anti-fur campaigns are a staple of the animal activist movement. While these campaigns have successfully led to a decline in the fur industry, the work on this issue is not yet done. Here in the U.S., we are still one of the world’s top three consumers of new fur, and we have our own fur farms, unregulated, in our own backyard. While all of us in the movement have so many animal protection issues to work on, we can’t forget about the millions of mink, foxes, and other animals living in wire cages waiting for us to end this industry.

Alexis’s article focuses on gestation crates, which are individual metal enclosures used in industrial pig farming to house pregnant breeding sows. These crates typically measure about 2 feet by less than 7 feet, which is barely larger than the animal’s body and thus prevents the sow from turning around or walking. Sows in these systems are impregnated repeatedly and confined for each pregnancy, typically totaling several years. Currently, Oklahoma has over 400,000 breeding pigs living in gestation crates. Gestation crates are associated with a rise in industrial hog farming and a decline in family farms in the state. Due to the cruelty of this practice, many states and several countries have banned the use of gestation crates, and some states, like California and Massachusetts, have banned the sale of pork products coming from gestation crates.

Misinformation #1: Gestation crates meet pigs’ needs across the Five Domains of Animal Welfare

The first piece of misinformation that Alexis shares is that gestation crates meet sows’ welfare needs. She writes that that hog barns that use gestation crates “are designed to meet pigs’ needs across all Five Domains of Animal Welfare: nutrition, environment, health, behavioral interactions and mental/affective state.”

However, if she were to describe and cite the Five Domains Model, it would be quite clear that there is no possible way in which gestation crates fulfill the needs described by this framework. The Five Domains Model is a scientific framework used to assess animal welfare that was developed by Professor David Mellor and Dr. Christopher Reid. The domain “behavioral interactions” refers to an animal’s likely perceptions of their external circumstance and their interaction with the environment, other animals, and humans. Another domain of this model is the “mental/affective state,” which refers to an animal’s subjective emotional and mental experiences. Dr. Mellor himself, when describing these two domains, states that: “Close confinement and isolation of social animals in threatening and/or barren environments may lead to experiences that include various combinations of anxiety, fear, panic, frustration, anger, helplessness, loneliness, boredom and depression.” In other words, the scientist who created the Five Domains Model (which Alexis used to justify gestation crates) specifically wrote in a peer-reviewed publication that the conditions created by gestation crates lead to negative welfare.

Additionally, the domain of mental/affective states of animals is often measured by the presence of stereotypic behaviors. Stereotyped behaviors are repetitive, abnormal actions, such as pacing, swaying, or self-grooming that primarily develop in captive or restricted environments. Scientists perceive these behaviors as indicators of stress, boredom, and the inability to perform natural behaviors. Studies have found that among pigs in intensive farming operations, those that are tethered or kept in stalls (i.e. gestation crates) are more likely to engage in stereotyped behaviors, like bar biting, sham chewing, and head weaving, than pigs allowed free movement, indicating the presence of negative welfare states in stalls.

Misinformation #2: Sows prefer gestation crates

A second piece of misinformation that Alexis shares is that sows prefer gestation crates, so gestation crates must create a positive welfare experience. Alexis writes: “Peer-reviewed research has not demonstrated turning around improves welfare outcomes. In hybrid housing systems where sows can choose between stalls or open pen space, they consistently choose stalls. Even in group housing with electronic feeders, sows often try to lie in the protected feeding stall, so frequently a bar is added to prevent them from blocking other animals.” Interestingly, she doesn’t cite her sources.

What Alexis is referring to is research on preference testing. Preference or aversion testing is an experimental method where animals are exposed to different external stimuli, and it is assumed that the animals choose external stimuli that enhance their wellbeing or avoid or try to escape the stimuli that lead to low welfare. However, the most recent and scientifically rigorous study to date showed that sows prefer open space with the option of accessing gestation crates temporarily. In a 2024 study published in Nature Scientific Reports, Thomas Ede and co-authors conducted a preference test over 7 days where trios of pigs had free access between individual self-locking stalls (i.e. gestation crates, ~ 1.2 m²) and a shared open area allowing 2.8 m²/animal. They found that the median percentage of time that the pigs spent outside the crate was 95%, and 21 of 29 of the pigs in the experiment exhibited a significant preference for the shared open area over the crate. A smaller portion of the pigs developed a preference for the crates- especially at night time- but still utilized both the crate and the shared open area.

In a 2025 study, also published in Nature Scientific Reports, researchers examined how motivated sows were to leave gestation crates. They placed 16 sows in gestation crates with an apparatus that enabled monitoring of the force that the sow applied to its back gate to try to escape the crate. They found that all pigs exerted some level of force on the stall, trying to escape. The authors write that their findings suggest “a negative affective state associated with confinement” and that “confinement – even for a short period – is most likely an unwanted experience.” Their results support other peer-reviewed research which found that sows display motivation to exit their stall for exercise opportunities.

Misinformation #3: Gestation crates are fine because sows can stand up and lie down

An additional misleading statement that Alexis shares in her op-ed is that gestation crates are adequate housing systems because these crates allow sows to stand up and lie down. Alexis writes, “the claim that sows are “immobilized” in gestation stalls is misrepresented and inaccurate. Gestation stalls provide each sow with her own protected access to feed and water without competition, along with room to stand, lie down and stretch.”

However, just because a pig can stand up and lie down doesn’t make it okay that they can’t turn around or walk for most of their life. Dr Temple Grandin, one of the most well-respected animal husbandry experts in the world, told me that “sow gestation stalls are like living in an airline seat and you are not allowed to walk in the aisle.” No one would want to be stuck there for more than a few hours. Brent Hershey, a hog farmer for over 40 years, converted his operation away from gestation crates because he said he and other hog farmers around him “started to realize we couldn’t defend it.”

In addition to all the research and expert opinion outlined above on the negative welfare implications of sow confinement, studies have found that the public is vehemently opposed to gestation crates. A study we conducted across the United States found that 90% of respondents would be supportive of law in their state requiring that all farming operations provide sufficient space for pigs to stand up, turn around, and stretch their legs. Other polling has found that 91 percent of Oklahomans support policies that require sufficient space for farm animals to stand up, turn around, and stretch their limbs in any cage, crate, or pen.

At the end of day, Alexis seems to be one of the only people who thinks that gestation crates are defensible. Let’s see your sources, Alexis.

When discussing bear management in Colorado, for example, agency staff and hunters will often argue that Colorado Parks and Wildlife (CPW) uses a strict adaptive management framework that implements harvest limits, quotas, and monitors sex ratios to ensure the overall population remains stable. Wildlife advocates, on the other hand, will argue that no statewide population surveys have been conducted despite increased bear hunting, heavy hunting pressure disrupts the reproductive cycle of bears, and that there have been population declines in areas like Durango where bears have been more carefully monitored.

This pattern plays out, time and time again: agency staff and hunters and trappers share what they think is sufficient evidence to indicate that wildlife populations are not threatened by current levels of hunting and/or trapping. Advocates share studies indicating that populations may not be fine or that current monitoring approaches are insufficient at determining true population sizes. Both sides say we need to use more science-based management. But the conflict over how we manage wildlife never seems to subside.

This conflict continues because the two sides are arguing about biological science, but biological science (i.e. population data) can’t tell us what we want to achieve through wildlife management. What the two sides are really in conflict about is what objectives we should have for wildlife management, which is a value-based question. For example, is the primary objective of wildlife management to maximize hunting opportunities while maintaining a minimum sustainable population? Or should the objective be to maximize wildlife populations and minimize human-caused animal suffering and death when possible?

State wildlife agencies are often managing wildlife primarily to serve the domination values of traditional stakeholders, like hunters and trappers, who view wildlife as a resource for human benefit and consumption. The implicit management objectives in a domination-oriented framework include: 1) maintaining sustainable populations of a species, 2) representing the interests of traditional, consumptive stakeholders by ensuring hunting and (depending on the species) trapping opportunities, and 3) reducing human-wildlife conflict.

However, a growing portion of the public in the United States holds mutualist values, which emphasize the importance of wildlife for ecological, ethical, aesthetic, and/or relational reasons. In fact, social science studies show that in the United States, more of the public has mutualist values than traditional domination values. Mutualists- and the wildlife advocates that represent them- want to see more than the three domination-oriented management objectives. They want to see wildlife managed in a way that represents their interests, which includes: 1) benefiting the broader ecosystem and the environment, 2) representing the interests of non-consumptive publics (e.g., those who enjoy wildlife for its existence and for wildlife viewing), and 3) reducing unnecessary individual animal suffering. These three mutualist-oriented management objectives should be just as legitimate as the three domination-oriented objectives that agencies currently manage for, especially since a greater portion of the public holds these mutualist values.

The constant debates over the science of population monitoring that I’ve observed fit within the status quo by only focusing on one objective of wildlife management. Wildlife advocates are having to justify their own mutualist interests within the narrow domination-oriented framework that agencies currently use. There is only so much change wildlife advocates can make when trying to be heard in a decision-making framework that doesn’t consider many of their values.

If we are going to make wildlife management more inclusive, we must shift the Overton window. Rather than just debating population data, we must demand that agencies manage wildlife to accommodate a plurality of values. Through legislation or rulemaking, we must mandate that every species management plan not only focus on how management will maintain wildlife populations, benefit consumptive users, and reduce human-wildlife conflict, but also on how it will improve the ecosystem and environment, reflect the interests of non-consumptive publics, and help reduce unnecessary individual animal suffering. Such a change would enable progress beyond the never-ending debates over biological science and population data by ensuring both domination and mutualist values are considered. Because at the end of day, wildlife management is guided by values, not just biological science. Those who say values have no place in management are doing so because their values are currently being privileged in decision-making. Progress will be stalled if we continue to work within a framework where only a portion of the public’s values are perceived by agencies as legitimate.

My investigator and I were on the property representing the state of Colorado’s Bureau of Animal Protection. Through the state’s agricultural statute, my team and I had the authority to assist law enforcement with criminal animal cruelty cases and implement a variety of civil remedies to address animal mistreatment. These included the power to obtain an administrative warrant to investigate mistreatment and remove animals that were deemed to be mistreated to the degree that their life and health was in danger (pursuant to a court order for livestock). Law enforcement was there with us to assist but didn’t feel like they had the resources and expertise to take on this cruelty case without us.

But even though I was a state authority, it turned out that applying these civil remedies around animal mistreatment was quite difficult. My first challenge was finding a veterinarian, since obtaining a warrant and success in court hinged on a veterinarian providing their expert opinion on the case. However, the state veterinarians were busy working on the HPAI crisis. All the local veterinarians I called were stretched thin due to the veterinary shortage; they were booked up for weeks and couldn’t make the time to help us investigate this case. Additionally, private practice veterinarians were quite concerned about getting pulled into ongoing court proceedings.

And then there was the challenge of figuring out where these animals would go and how we would transport them. Who would take these enormous pigs and how would we even get them out of the closed trailers they had been living in their whole life? How would we get all the goats and horses out of their makeshift pens past fields of car parts and debris? And how would we move them? We didn’t have a trailer at the time. In fact, resources were so limited that for one case, I had to put a pig and a dog in crates in the back of my personal Toyota Tacoma to drive them six hours to rescues that would take them. And who would take the sick rabbits and dogs? A local rescue wanted to help but didn’t have the resources to take all these animals.

Even the administrative warrant we got so that we could investigate the property was due to a stroke of luck. An inspector for our state’s Pet Animal Facilities Act (PACFA) program had visited the property after hearing that the owner had many animals there without a PACFA license, which is required in Colorado for owners with more than 15 dogs and/or cats. We had a photo of a horse that was emaciated from the road and were able to use that to show that there was evidence of neglect to obtain our administrative warrant to enter the property. But having an expert inspector learn about potential mistreatment, and getting enough evidence of a mistreated animal from outside the property to obtain a warrant to enter the property, was a rare occurrence.

Eventually, we were able to obtain our warrant and then a court order that allowed us to remove the animals. Bobbi Priestly and her team at Colorado Humane Society, a non-profit organization, were able to provide us with access to their veterinarian and help us remove the animals and find housing for many of them. A local resident lent us her property for a night to keep some of the animals until we figured out a more long-term solution. We worked with a local animal sanctuary to house some dogs and a local sale barn to house many of the farmed animals, since we couldn’t find any farmed animal rescues who had space and were willing to take in the animals.

In the end, after multiple grueling days, we removed 35 birds, 15 companion animals, 30 small animals, and 77 farmed animals in living conditions that presented a threat to the animals’ health. But my view on what it took to address animal cruelty and neglect was forever changed. I realized that having a good animal cruelty law on the books was only the first step to addressing cases of mistreatment. We could not have saved these animals if it wasn’t for the help of a non-profit and individual community members who volunteered their time and resources. Our ability to enforce state laws shouldn’t have to depend on the kindness and availability of volunteers.

Addressing animal cruelty nationwide: what the research says

Several years later, my colleagues Bobbi Priestly, Claire Vaiden, Lori Kogan, and I conducted a series of research studies to examine whether our lived experience addressing cruelty cases was similar to the experiences of others running animal cruelty programs throughout the nation. We conducted 50 interviews with investigators, prosecutors, veterinarians, social workers, and policy experts from 14 states with leading animal cruelty programs and laws. We wanted to know what works in addressing animal cruelty cases, what barriers remain, and what additional resources or policies are most needed.

The overwhelming takeaway from this research was similar to my personal experience at the Bureau of Animal Protection: we found that effectively addressing animal cruelty required much more than just having a strong state animal cruelty law. Those running animal cruelty programs throughout the nation were faced with numerous challenges enforcing these laws, including a lack of resources for housing and transporting animals, a lack of access to veterinarians and expert humane investigators, prosecutors not being able to prioritize animal cases, and a lack of resources for preventing or addressing the underlying drivers of cruelty and neglect.

Additionally, the challenges to enforcing cruelty laws didn’t just impact the animals being mistreated, but the people in charge of addressing these cases. Law enforcement and stakeholders working on animal cruelty cases suffered from burnout, high turnover, compassion fatigue, and vicarious trauma when they didn’t have the support to address the cases they were investigating.

Based on this research, we identified numerous resources that were effective at ensuring state animal cruelty laws are enforced. These included:

1) Facilities and funds to help with animal removal, housing, and care: One of the most desired resources nationwide for enforcing animal cruelty statutes was more facilities and funds to help with animal removal, housing, and care. Many respondents discussed the need for a statewide holding facility for animals coming from cases, given the challenges of finding facilities that can take in large numbers of animals. There was also a need for funding to help cover the costs of animal care, particularly since once animals are relinquished, those costs fall entirely on the impounding agency/organization. Additionally, respondents discussed the need for vehicles for transporting animals from cases, especially livestock trailers. Once my team and I received a trailer at the BAP, for example, this had a significant impact on our ability to address cruelty cases.

2) Partnerships with human health organizations/experts and resources to prevent neglect among struggling pet owners: Respondents discussed how preventing animal cruelty and neglect and recidivism was just as important as addressing ongoing cases. Law enforcement officers consistently discussed the need for community resources to prevent animal neglect among those struggling to care for their animals (e.g., community education programs, spay and neuter, pet food, low cost veterinary care, and temporary foster care). This is why, after leaving the BAP, I co-founded the organization People and Animal Companions Together, a non-profit that helps struggling pet owners care for their pets in Colorado. Respondents also discussed the need for human health resources to address the underlying drivers of animal cruelty, to ensure the people involved in cruelty cases get the help they need and reduce recidivism. For example, my team and I advocated for the BAP to hire a social worker who could go out on cruelty cases and address the underlying mental health drivers of animal cruelty.

3) A special prosecutor on animal crimes: There are currently state-level animal cruelty prosecutors in several states, including Washington, Georgia, Oregon, Florida, and Virginia. In Oregon, where the state’s cruelty prosecutor was originally funded by the Animal Legal Defense Fund, a 2023 law made the position permanent and state-funded within the state’s Department of Justice. These special prosecutor positions make a significant difference in addressing cases, as they can step in on complicated cases, in low resourced areas, or when local prosecutors don’t want to pursue charges. They also help apply state cruelty laws to wildlife cruelty cases.

4) A veterinarian in a state position or a network of paid veterinarians focused on cruelty cases: Many respondents mentioned the need for a veterinarian or a network of veterinarians trained in animal cruelty cases and veterinary forensics. Similar to my own experience, veterinarians were seen as an essential resource for successful investigations and prosecution. However, respondents discussed how state veterinarians are typically not a reliable resource for cruelty cases, as they focus on managing disease and often have limited capacity for assisting with cruelty cases. Therefore, respondents believed that a veterinarian in a state position or in humane societies solely dedicated to cruelty cases was essential. For example, after the case described above, the BAP was able to hire a dedicated cruelty veterinarian who helped immensely with future cases.

5) Dedicated state and/or non-profit humane investigators: More than 30 states have passed laws granting officers/agents employed by non-profits or municipalities the power to enforce anti-cruelty statutes. Having access to these humane agents/officers is critical because law enforcement officers typically don’t have the resources, time, or expertise to address animal cases on their own. State or non-profit agents or animal control officers help conduct initial welfare checks, conduct investigations, write reports, and testify using their specialized expertise in animal cases. Since the case I described above, Colorado Humane’s investigations program was cut significantly, reducing the number of humane agencies that can help with cruelty cases throughout the state. Successful investigations require these expert investigators.

6) Proactive regulation of individuals with large numbers of animals: State programs that regulate animal shelters, rescues, commercial animal facilities (e.g., boarders, breeders), and individuals with many animals can ensure basic standards of care are being met to prevent neglect. These regulatory programs can also facilitate inspections to better detect and address cruelty/neglect. For example, Colorado’s Pet Animal Care and Facilities Act (PACFA) program requires that individuals with more than 15 combined dogs and cats obtain a PACFA license and pass inspections to ensure animal care standards are met. When I was working at BAP, I saw how this program facilitated the detection of cruelty for companion animals, especially for collecting (i.e. “hoarding”) cases, as PACFA inspectors had the authority to inspect properties with large number of companion animals. I also saw how much harder large-scale cruelty cases were to address when companion animals weren’t involved. For example, at the BAP, we had numerous large-scale horse neglect cases, but we often found it difficult to get on properties to investigate these cases because there are no licensing or registration requirements like PACFA for equine facilities.

If we are serious about addressing and preventing animal cruelty, we must ensure every state has access to these resources. Because addressing animal cruelty is not just about having a law on the books; it’s about making sure our law enforcement officers and agencies tasked with enforcing these laws are supported every step of the way.

These cross-cutting impacts provide an opportunity for advocates: rather than just communicating about animal suffering, advocates can connect with the public by talking about the impacts of their work on the environment or personal or public health. Animal protection organizations have been using this opportunity to try to reach a larger audience: organizations have discussed how foie gras consumption may have personal health impacts, how fur farming impacts the potential for zoonotic disease spread, how commercial octopus farming can have negative environmental impacts, and how hunting of mountain lions could negatively impact ecosystems.

But is reframing animal protection to focus on these other impacts effective at galvanizing public support? On one hand, such reframing may appeal to the values of a greater portion of the public. If some people don’t care about animal suffering, they may still care about the environment or their own health. Reframing may therefore motivate this otherwise unengaged audience to support animal protection policy. On the other hand, our own research has shown that most people already do care about animal suffering, so reframing may be distracting people from what they value most. Furthermore, the links between animal protection issues and other impacts are sometimes tenuous or uncertain, so overselling these associations may reduce trust in the movement.

What does the research say?

We conducted a series of studies to try to figure this out. Specifically, my colleagues and I experimentally examined the impacts of message framing on public support of policies addressing three different animal protection issues: fur and fur farms, commercial octopus farming, and foie gras. For each of these studies, most participants received one of several different informational messages describing the animal protection issue, while some randomly selected respondents (i.e. “the control group”) received no message at all. Those who received an informational message were randomly assigned to a message emphasizing animal welfare, environmental, public health, or other impacts (e.g., economic) related to the issue. In each of these studies, after messaging, we measured public support for policies addressing the issue. We conducted regression analyses to examine whether the type of message received impacted public support for policies compared to a no-message control. Because we used randomized experiments, each messaging group had the same characteristics that would impact support for animal protection policy, allowing us to determine the causal impact of the message. Additionally, our studies were different than message testing that is often done in the animal movement, which involves providing respondents with various messages and asking whether their views would change in response to the message. Such self-reports of message impacts can be influenced by cognitive biases, such as anchoring bias or cognitive dissonance. The experimental design avoids this by testing whether support is influenced by messages across comparable groups, rather than asking people how messages affect them.

From these experiments, we found that in some contexts, messages focused on environmental, public health, or other impacts can boost public support for animal protection policy. But generally, messages emphasizing the animal welfare impacts were the most effective. Here are the details:

· In our 2026 messaging experiment of over 5,600 residents across 10 states in the United States, we found that messages only focused on animal welfare impacts were the most effective at increasing support for bans on foie gras production and sales. These messages could increase support by up to 12% points. Adding arguments related to the potential public health impacts of foie gras consumption, the limited economic impacts of bans, or social norms against foie gras consumption did not increase support for bans compared to the message only focused on animal welfare impacts.

· In a 2025 study of over 2,000 adults across four U.S. states, we found that animal welfare messages had the greatest impact on public support of fur sales bans, although messages highlighting the environmental impacts of fur farms, the public health impacts (e.g., zoonotic disease spread), and social norms against fur were also effective at building support.

· In a 2025 study of over 14,000 respondents across 13 European Union Countries and the United Kingdom, we found that messages focused on octopus sentience and welfare were the most effective at increasing public support for bans on octopus farming, but environmental and public health messages also boosted support.

· In both the fur farming and octopus farming studies, messages discussing economic impacts did not impact public support.

What about changing public behaviors, not just enhancing public support?

It’s important to note that the studies we conducted all focused on what influences public support for animal protection policies. Changing the public’s behaviors- such as animal production consumption- can often be more difficult and complex. The research on how message framing impacts animal production consumption has had varied and inconclusive results, likely because personal behaviors are strongly influenced by contextual, social-psychological, and cultural factors. Gunther et al (2023), for example, found that frames focused on animal cruelty in factory farms were more likely to result in a willingness to decrease meat consumption compared to frames focused on public health threats (i.e., zoonotic disease transmission). Grundy et al. (2022), in a meta-analysis of 12 studies, found that messages highlighting the environmental impact of meat consumption may reduce meat consumption. Providing information on health consequences, emphasizing social norms, and reducing meat portion sizes also appeared promising, albeit with more limited evidence. A study my colleagues and I conducted in 2021 found that all the messages we tested (animal welfare, environmental, personal health, public health, and worker safety) did not impact public intentions to reduce their meat consumption. More research is needed on whether message framing can influence public behaviors related to animals, and in what contexts.

Appealing to public values through animal welfare focused messaging

Moving forward, our results suggest that when conducting outreach to build public support for an animal protection policy, focusing on animal sentience and welfare may be the most effective messaging strategy, at least when discussing farmed animals, which were the focus of our studies. This finding makes intuitive sense, given our prior work which has shown that the public is generally concerned about animal suffering, but they don’t feel knowledgeable about animal protection. For example, in a 2024 national survey of over 2,000 U.S. respondents, my colleagues and I found that more than half of respondents are “very” or “extremely” concerned about the suffering of different types of animals. More than 65% of respondents believe that government programs or policies to reduce suffering are “very” or “extremely” important for farmed animals, animals used in research, native wildlife, and animals in zoos and aquariums. However, only 15% of respondents reported that they felt “very,” or “extremely” knowledgeable about which types of animals in the US are suffering the most. Furthermore, only 10% of respondents reported that they felt “very,” or “extremely” knowledgeable about US federal laws protecting animals. Messaging focused on highlighting the animal welfare impacts of certain practices appeals to these pre-existing values and addresses these knowledge gaps, leading to increases in public support. While highlighting environmental, public health, or other impacts can also be influential in certain contexts, honing in on animal welfare- especially in the context of farmed animals-should always provide a win.

Right after the election, activists discussed why voters had turned against Proposition 127: maybe wild cats weren’t as charismatic as wolves or bears, or perhaps people were scared of mountain lions, or it could be that voters didn’t understand how cats were hunted or their roles in ecosystems. As a social scientist, I saw this as an opportunity to systematically study what happened and identify lessons for future animal protection initiatives.

About a month after the election, my colleagues from the Center for Human Carnivore Coexistence and I set out on a road trip around the state to conduct intercept sampling. We approached people in public locations (e.g., grocery stores, dog parks, gyms and gas stations), in six different rural and urban locations throughout the Front Range and Western Slope of Colorado. We asked people if they had voted in the last election, and if they had, whether they voted for or against Proposition 127, and why. We chose this approach because the issue was highly salient to Colorado voters and to reduce the risk of non-response bias which is common in mail, phone, and online surveys.

We interviewed over 300 voters. We found, surprisingly, that the primary reason why people voted against Proposition 127 did not have anything to do with wild cats specifically. Rather, people were against Proposition 127 because they believed we should avoid “ballot box biology;” that is, they believed wildlife management decisions should be left to the experts within Colorado Parks and Wildlife (CPW), they trusted that CPW manages cats well, and they didn’t think the public should influence wildlife management via ballot initiative. Relatedly, many believed that ballot initiatives introduce “emotion” into what should be a “science-based” decision. They also viewed ballot initiatives as unfair, arguing that they enable the urban majority to impose their values on the rural minority who are living with wildlife.

The finding that opposition to Proposition 127 was driven by these “ballot box biology” narratives rather than anything related to cats surprised me. I wanted to know if it was just a Colorado phenomena or if “ballot box biology” was affecting voters nationwide. My colleagues and I decided to conduct a follow-up study where we recruited a national sample of over 2000 demographically representative adults via the survey recruitment company Prolific. We conducted a messaging experiment, in which a portion of randomly selected respondents were assigned to read the “ballot box biology” narrative that impacted Colorado voters. Another portion of respondents were given different narratives about the need for ballot initiatives to advance wildlife protection, while the remaining were not given any message about ballot initiatives. We found that those who read the “ballot box biology” narrative were significantly less likely to support ballot initiatives that provided greater protection for native carnivores. Furthermore, those who received the “ballot box biology” narrative were more likely to believe that wildlife management decisions should be left to the experts and less likely to believe that the public should have a greater say in wildlife management. In other words, when exposed to “ballot box biology” narratives, people across the nation are less likely to support wildlife protection initiatives.

Where did this “ballot box biology” narrative come from?

The anti-Proposition 127 campaign was led by Coloradans for Responsible Wildlife Management, an organization of sportsmen spearheaded by Dan Gates, a prominent predator hunter and trapper in Colorado. Dan was able to convince national sportsmen groups that the Colorado fight was an inflection point for all hunters and that stopping Proposition 127 could prevent future wildlife protection initiatives throughout the nation. He therefore was able to recruit the Washington D.C.-based Congressional Sportsmen’s Foundation, the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation, Safari Club International, and Wild Sheep Foundation to help fund the campaign, and hire the long-time legislative architect of the National Rifle Association to develop messaging. These groups were able to reproduce the ballot box biology narrative via key, trusted spokespeople, such as the former president of the Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies, the former Colorado Parks and Wildlife director, and even Joe Rogan. They created yard signs and billboards and ads that could be seen throughout the state, such as a common yard sign stating “Vote No on 127: Wildlife Deserves Better.” Interestingly, these groups think they won the opposition campaign by appealing to voters’ fears of mountain lions, when our data show that’s not the case.

Why was the “ballot box biology” narrative so effective?

Colorado is a blue state, and our prior work has found that political party affiliation is one of the strongest predictors of support for wildlife conservation initiatives, including the 2020 initiative to reintroduce wolves. Thus, defeating Proposition 127 would require appealing to liberal voters and persuading them to oppose what would typically be seen as a democrat, value-aligned initiative. The ballot box biology narrative does this well. First of all, it appeals to liberal values of fairness and reducing harm. Social science research on moral foundations theory suggests that liberal voters tend to make policy decisions predominantly based on the moral foundations of achieving fairness and reducing harm, while conservatives tend to value loyalty, authority, and purity. The ballot box biology narrative appeals to fairness and harm reduction values by discussing how unfair it is to allow the urban majority to vote on a policy decision that will most impact the rural minority and how doing so will harm people and wildlife. Additionally, political science research suggests that those who identify as liberal tend to be more trusting of science, experts, and institutions; thus, appealing to these values by emphasizing how wildlife decisions should be left to biological science and experts may be particularly effective. This value-based appeal helps explain why the ballot box biology narrative is so effective; it persuades liberal voters who might otherwise support wildlife protection initiatives, to oppose them by appealing to core values of reducing harm, achieving fairness, and trust in science, institutions, and experts.

The future of wildlife protection initiatives depends on combatting ballot box biology

Overall, our results suggest that the ballot box biology narrative is likely to be a significant barrier to any future wildlife protection initiatives that involve citizen engagement or voting. To date, the animal protection movement has focused primarily on developing initiative specific messaging campaigns that highlight the negative impacts of current carnivore hunting and trapping practices, the benefits of carnivores to ecosystems, and the science supporting greater carnivore protections. However, our research findings suggest that this messaging about carnivores will likely be insufficient at building public support for carnivore protection initiatives if the movement doesn’t also specifically combat ballot box biology narratives. Therefore, increasing the likelihood of success of future initiatives will require a nationally coordinated, overarching campaign that directly counters ballot box biology messaging by appealing to liberal values in ways that support carnivore protections.

Inoculating against “ballot box biology:” a new national narrative

The ballot box biology narrative rests on two fundamental myths that must be challenged through an inoculation campaign: 1) the way wildlife is traditionally managed is devoid of values and based solely on biological science; and 2) decisions about wildlife are made by scientific experts and devoid of politics. Below, I outline these myths, provide arguments and evidence for why they are incorrect, and provide example messages to inoculate the public against these myths.

Combatting myth 1: The way wildlife is traditionally managed is devoid of values and politics, and solely based on biological science

The ballot box biology argument states that wildlife management decisions should be based solely on biological science, not public values. The narrative states that the way wildlife agencies have been managing wildlife is based on biological science, and ballot initiatives would threaten this science-based approach by imposing the values and emotions of the public. However, this argument is flawed, as wildlife agencies already manage wildlife to achieve specific goals shaped by their own values. The challenge is that the public’s values related to wildlife management are no longer aligned with those guiding agency decisions. This is why the public is turning towards ballot initiatives - to have their values considered.

The claim that agencies manage solely based on biological science is a fallacy because biological science alone cannot determine the goals of wildlife management. While biological information can provide insight into how individual animals, populations, species, and ecosystems interact and change, biological science cannot tell us whether we, as a society, want certain animals within a landscape or which animals we want to protect. Biological science also can’t tell us if we want to manage wildlife populations solely for consumptive use (i.e., hunting and fishing) or if we also want to protect wildlife for their intrinsic value, wellbeing, and ecological value. Additionally, biological science cannot tell us if we want to allow animals to be killed in certain ways (e.g., trapped, chased with dogs, poisoned) for certain reasons (e.g., commercial fur trade, trophy, or meat). These are all value-based questions that are currently determined by wildlife management agencies, policymakers, and/or the public.

The guiding principles of the North American Model of Wildlife Conservation, which provide the foundation for management decisions carried out by state fish and wildlife agencies, are based on “domination” values towards wildlife and nature. These values prioritize human well-being over wildlife well-being and primarily focus on the management of wildlife for human benefit. Managing wildlife under a domination value framework prioritizes maintaining sustainable populations of wildlife, minimizing conflict with people, and facilitating sustainable hunting and trapping. These domination values drive state agencies’ decisions about wildlife management, evidenced by the fact that these agencies are funded through the sale of recreational hunting and fishing licenses and a federal excise tax on firearms, ammunition, and archery equipment; are guided by commissions primarily comprised of traditional, consumptive stakeholders (e.g., hunters and trappers); view hunting, fishing, and trapping as fundamental uses of wildlife to be managed in trust for the public; and tend to have staff with predominantly domination values.

However, a growing percentage of the public do not hunt or fish, nor hold domination values. Rather, an increasing portion of the public hold mutualist values towards wildlife (i.e., view wildlife as part of their social community and deserving of rights and care). Approximately 35% of the United States population has mutualism values, compared to 28% who have domination values. Mutualism values have been associated with increased support for animal protection and reduced support for traditional lethal forms of wildlife management, such as carnivore hunting and trapping. Mutualists believe wildlife management should focus on protecting animals from unnecessary suffering or killing, rather than just maintaining sustainable populations and maximizing human benefits.

Initiatives like Proposition 127 reach the ballot because they are often the only way for mutualists to have their values considered in wildlife management. Wildlife protection issues typically only end up on the ballot after mutualists have tried to have their voices heard through public comment, testifying, rulemaking, and legislative attempts. When these other routes fail to produce change, the ballot becomes a means of ensuring that wildlife is managed in ways that represent the values of the broader public, not just the minority holding domination values.

Combatting myth 2: Decisions about wildlife are traditionally made by scientific experts and devoid of politics.

The second myth that the ballot box biology narrative promotes is that all wildlife decisions are currently made by scientific experts in a process devoid of politics. Ballot initiatives therefore are problematic because they take wildlife decision-making away from the experts, put them in the hands of the uninformed public, and make them political. However, this is a myth because most decisions about wildlife in the U.S. are made by governor-appointed commissions or boards dominated by hunting, fishing, and agricultural interests. At least 75 percent of all available seats on state wildlife commissions in 2021 were occupied by consumptive users (i.e. hunting, fishing, and agricultural interests). In 42 states, commissioners are not required to have any scientific expertise. While agency biologists will often share their studies with commissions, ultimately, these politically appointed commissions made up of consumptive users- not scientists- are the ones making the decisions. Additionally, a large percentage of state wildlife agency staff are focused on law enforcement, and many state wildlife agency directors come from a background in law enforcement rather than science.

Even in states where commissions have been reformed, trophy hunters and trappers and their powerful lobbyists have a disproportionate influence on decision-making. Legislators representing these special interests design and pass bills to advance and support their objectives and mandate that wildlife commissions uphold those laws through regulations and season setting. The views of reputable wildlife experts are often ignored, muted or negated, rather than placed at the forefront of designing and implementing the best available science-based wildlife management. For example, one study of 84 scientists who have published peer-reviewed studies on wolf management found that about two-thirds of respondents supported relisting of wolves. About 80% disapproved of Idaho and Montana’s wolf management plans and believed that they pose a threat to wolf populations in the western United States. Yet, these views of the majority of scientists are being ignored in favor of the views of special interest groups.

Moving Forward:

Moving forward, the animal protection movement needs a coordinated campaign to combat the myths of ballot box biology. Such a campaign must emphasize the role of values, not just biology, in guiding wildlife management, highlight how many of those currently making decisions aren’t true “experts,” address the lack of fairness and representation of all voices throughout the history of wildlife management, and expose the power and funding of special interest groups (i.e. hunters and trappers). Organizations like Wildlife For All have already begun developing messages and resources to support this effort. Without a coordinated proactive education campaign to inoculate the public, our findings suggest that future wildlife protection initiatives are likely to fail in the face of the ballot box biology narrative.

For me, finding and expressing this understanding, compassion, and love for all creatures as a scientist was not always easy. But Jane- and other scientists and activists like her- helped guide me there. Today, I want to share a little bit about that journey.

It started when I was 10 years old. It was the first time I saw an animal die in front me. It was a fish I had caught while camping and fishing in Alaska. Our fishing guide reeled it in, pulled it off the hook, and laid it on the shore. I remember the way that it writhed in the air, flopping around the cold snowy shore, gasping for air. I watched its last few tail jerks and gasps as it finally met its end. As I watched, I felt that feeling- that all encompassing grief of understanding another creature’s suffering. I began to cry, but the guide told me that it’s just a fish. That humans need to eat. I pushed down the feeling of empathy, told myself that no matter how much I cared about animals, that feeling wasn’t valid.

I went to university and eventually got my PhD to study conservation, because I had always loved animals, and I was told that being an ecologist was a valid, legitimate way to try to protect animals. In university, my professors, the scientific articles I read, the talks from experts I listened to, they all explained that individual animal lives don’t matter; conservation was about species, populations, and ecosystems. Ecologists told me that we can kill as many insects or fish we need in a scientific study in whatever way we wanted to better learn about their populations and evolution. Wildlife managers said we have to kill wolves and bears in the intermountain west to protect livestock and that’s okay, as long as there are still some wolves and bears left. Biologists said trophy hunting of elephants, lions, and other animals on game reserves in Southern Africa was good, because it helped fund conservation and conserve species. Conservationists said we could poison cats, possums, and other invasive mammals with 1080 in New Zealand because we were protecting native birds.

Caring about species, populations, ecosystems and people’s economic interests- that was science. But caring about individual animals and the suffering they experienced- that was emotion.

So, I suppressed that emotion I felt- that empathy for the individual- for so long.

But there was a piece of me that couldn’t forget that feeling of watching that fish suffer or the many other animals I’ve seen suffer over the past several decades. It is this deep knowing- that I think we are all born with- that an individual animal’s life does matter. Their fear and suffering matters.

Why don’t we try to protect them from suffering in the same way we protect our ecosystems from pollution or species from extinction?

Jane once said, “You cannot share your life with a dog or a cat, and not know perfectly well that animals have personalities and minds and feelings.” Today that’s true, more than ever. 70% of US households now have pets and more than 80% of people living with pets consider them members of the family. And that trend, along with Jane and others’ work demonstrating animal sentience, has created a shift in the way we see animals. I’ve now shifted my career away from just conserving species towards also trying to end individual animal suffering. I research the way people think about and relate to animals and use my research to inform animal protection policy. And through this research, I’ve found that most Americans now see animals as deserving of rights and better protection. And this holds true for wildlife, not just our companion animals.

Jane fought every day against her critics who argued that her work “falsely” projected human emotions onto animals. In the face of these criticisms, she didn’t back down. Instead, she collected detailed data to demonstrate the complex social and emotional lives of chimps. She gave the animals she worked with names when everyone was saying they were numbers. She showed that you can be a meticulous scientist and feel empathy for other creatures’ suffering and take action to reduce that suffering.

I’ve been told time and time again- including by some of my own colleagues at Colorado State University- that as a scientist I shouldn’t be an advocate. Jane helped me realize that science and advocacy go hand in hand. In fact, all scientists are advocates. We are all doing science for a purpose, whether that’s to improve the environment, human lives, ecosystems, economies, or public health. It’s just that historically, doing science to improve animals’ lives was not seen as legitimate, because the very concept that animals should be protected from pain and distress challenges powerful industries and institutions that fuel our society. A good portion of scientific funding going into universities can be traced back to industries that benefit from animal suffering. And this is why I and many others were told to ignore that suffering.

But we have an opportunity for change. Jane’s legacy has catalyzed a whole field of study into animal sentience and protection.

We now know, for example, using scientific metrics, that the fish out of water that I observed when I was a kid was indeed suffering. A group of scientists published a manuscript in the journal Scientific Reports examining this. They found that the twisting and turning I observed when the fish is left out of water starts after just 5 seconds of air exposure and triggers a neurochemical response associated with extreme discomfort in the fish. The gill structures of fish that exchange oxygen for carbon dioxide stick together when in air rather than in water, causing CO2 from respiration to build up. This triggers the body’s alarm system, causing the fish to gasp in response. Eventually, asphyxiation occurs from the elevated CO2 levels which acidify the animal’s blood and cerebrospinal fluid. The intense pain experienced by the fish during this time can last up to 22 minutes.

That instinct I felt- and that we all felt as a kid- to empathize with an animal’s suffering was right. It shouldn’t have been dismissed by scientists, by policymakers, by industry representatives, by our teachers or fishing guides. And thanks to Jane’s legacy, more and more people are recognizing this and reconnecting with that feeling that so many of us were asked to suppress.

When I read the news these days here in Colorado, stakeholders and government officials opposing animal protection policies often use the phrase, “keep emotion away from wildlife management” (or veterinary medicine, or disease management, or agriculture). This argument is why Colorado Parks and Wildlife continues to allow unlimited hunting and trapping of coyotes, bobcats, and other native wildlife for fur in Colorado. It’s why they also still allow hundreds of mountain lions to be chased with dogs until they are treed and killed in our state each year. It’s why Colorado still doesn’t have a comprehensive ban on the sale of fur coming from commercial fur farms where foxes and minks are kept in wire cages their whole lives. It why our Department of Agriculture here in the state continues to allow Ventilation Shutdown (VSD) to be used, which is a technique for mass killing of chickens during disease outbreaks where the chickens are boiled and suffocated to death, slowly. It’s why next door in Oklahoma, we still have hundreds of thousands of pigs living in gestation crates where they can’t turn around or stretch their legs for most of their lives.

But I still have hope, and Jane gives me hope. Because I believe that those folks who are upholding policies that promote animal suffering know, deep down, that they are wrong. They all have felt the feeling I did while watching the fish suffer. And the public is increasingly taking action on behalf of animals. My work has shown over and over again, that people want a change. They want policymakers and governments to help reduce animal suffering. And the science is on our side now, thanks to the work of Jane and many others who have demonstrated animal sentience. The argument that we can’t care about individual animals’ lives is increasingly seen as outdated, callous, and unscientific.

I truly believe now is a time when we can make a great difference for animals. We can stop eating animals, we can volunteer and donate, we can help a struggling neighbor care for their pet, or help rehabilitate an injured wild animal. And we can follow in Jane’s legacy and keep telling our policymakers and government agencies that they must work to reduce individual animal suffering.

Because as Jane once said, we must “hold on to hope and never give up. Together, we can create a better future for all living things.”

If so, let me assure you, you are not alone. Research conducted at the Animal Human Policy Center suggests that people tend to underestimate how much others care about animal suffering. This hinders animal protection advocacy and has significant implications for public discourse and policy around animal protection.

This phenomenon, called pluralistic ignorance, has been studied by social psychologists for several decades now. Pluralistic ignorance (sometimes called collective illusion) occurs when people mistakenly believe that others have different opinions, feelings, or actions than they do. Social psychologists Prentice and Miller were some of the first to document how pluralistic ignorance influences people’s attitudes and behaviors. They found that college students tend to overestimate how much their peers want to drink alcohol. This misperception can drive increased alcoholic consumption to try and fit in and make drinking alcohol more normative than it actually is.

The same mechanism operates across domains. Geiger and Swim, for example, found that people underestimate the level of concern the public has about climate change, which leads to what they call a spiral of silence. Because people incorrectly believe that no one else cares about climate change, they are less likely to speak up. Correcting pluralistic ignorance by showing that most of the public does, in fact, care about climate change increases people’s willingness to discuss it with others.

The same dynamic is now documented for animal protection. In a study recently published in Human-Animal Interactions, colleagues and I surveyed a demographically representative sample of over 2,000 Americans about their policy priorities. On average, respondents rated reducing animal suffering a 5.4 out of 10 in importance compared to issues like immigration, inflation, healthcare affordability, and crime. But when asked to estimate how the general public would rank the issue, their average guess was significantly lower — 4.30. We also examined actual versus perceived public support for specific animal protection policies, such as banning the use of gestation crates for pigs in factory farms or requiring limits on the number of carnivores that can be killed by a hunter in a year. For each of these specific policies, we found an approximate 20-30% gap between actual support and perceived public support. In every case, people felt that others were less supportive than they actually were.

This underestimation of public support for animal protection in the United States may be reducing the amount of civic and policy action occurring on these issues. This is because, as Geiger and Swim’s research suggests, if people think others don’t care about animal protection policies, they are less likely to speak up on behalf of animals to policymakers and those in their social network.

The good news is that pluralistic ignorance is correctable. Research on climate change shows that simply informing people that most of the public does, in fact, care meaningfully increases willingness to speak up. The same approach can work for animal protection. A few principles for putting this into practice:

· Share the majority opinion: Use messages like the following and insert specific numbers showing majority support when possible: “You may think you are alone in caring about animals, but in reality, most people care deeply about reducing animal suffering [or a specific animal protection issue], they just don’t know what they can do to help. Speaking up and sharing small actions that people can take to help animals can make a big difference.”

· Avoid framing that reinforces the fringe narrative: Minimize tactics and messages that make the animal protection movement seem fringe, or counter normative. For example, telling people that only vegans care about animal suffering only contributes to pluralistic ignorance, given the small minority of Americans who are vegan. Instead, emphasize the growing number of people working to reduce their consumption of animal products and the majority that support animal protection policy.

· Be strategic about which battles to fight: When running initiatives, consider focusing more narrowly on what is likely to win, rather than broader initiatives that could lose. Each time a ballot initiative loses, it contributes to pluralistic ignorance, because it fuels the narrative that the public doesn’t support animal protection. This enhanced pluralistic ignorance makes it harder for future ballot initiatives to succeed because people will be less likely to express their support for animal protection. For example, in Colorado, hunting and ranching industries are using the public’s rejection of two recent animal protection ballot initiatives to fuel the narrative that the public doesn’t want reforms for animals. Our own research shows that more narrowly defined initiatives (e.g., banning the use of dogs for mountain lion hunting or unlimited trapping of bobcats) may be more likely to pass than broader initiatives (e.g., banning all hunting of wild cats). Achieving more narrow wins can correct pluralistic ignorance, creating a positive feedback cycle of enhanced public engagement and support for future initiatives.

The animal protection movement has a genuine majority on its side. The challenge is not persuasion, it is visibility. When people discover that their values are widely shared, they will stop self-censoring and start acting. Correcting pluralistic ignorance is the mechanism by which a quiet majority can become a vocal and effective one.

Today, under Colorado state law, hunters and trappers can kill an unlimited number of coyotes, bobcats, foxes, badgers, beavers, pine martens, and other “furbearer” species, and sell their pelts for profit. This means that, after purchasing a $35 permit, any Colorado resident can hunt or trap an unlimited number of these animals and then sell their fur commercially. Each year, many thousands of furbearers are killed in Colorado, and the Colorado Trappers and Predator Hunters Association hosts a fur auction in Hugo to sell their pelts. Some pelts, such as “high-quality” fur from Colorado’s bobcats, are sold for export to the international market, often China and Russia.

Unlimited killing for commercial fur raises two important questions: Is it grounded in science? And does it reflect the values of Coloradans?

On the science side, the answer is troubling. Little to no population data are recorded for most of the state’s furbearers, making it impossible to accurately track population trends. Surprisingly, there are no reporting requirements for 16 of the state’s 17 furbearer species, also making it difficult to accurately determine how many animals are killed each year.

Perhaps most concerning is that the commercial sale of wildlife violates basic tenets of wildlife management established in the U.S. nearly a century ago. Indeed, with the glaring exception of furbearers, the commercial sale, trade, or purchase of native wildlife is illegal in Colorado, including for all other “game” species such as deer, elk, and waterfowl. Allowing the commercial sale of wild fur ties wildlife management to fluctuating global markets. When prices rise, incentives to harvest increase, regardless of whether population data support it.

In short, unlimited market-driven hunting and trapping of furbearers in Colorado, without mandatory reporting or population tracking, simply does not meet the standard of science-based wildlife management that we should expect here in the state.

What about public opinion?

Numerous scientific studies have examined public perspectives on hunting and trapping and have found that while most people support hunting for food, they are against killing wildlife for hides or trophies. In a 2024 peer-reviewed study published by the Society for Conservation Biology, more than 75% of Colorado respondents disapproved of hunting large carnivores for hide or fur. The public wants to see reforms on this issue. For example, in a study of over 2,000 US adults, published in the journal Human-Animal Interactions, more than 80% of the public supports a state law limiting the numbers of carnivores that can be killed by a hunter in a year.

In other words, the majority of the public supports reasonable limits and conservation-based oversight.

So why does unlimited fur trapping continue?

Part of the answer lies in influence. Organized trapping and predator-hunting groups are active participants in wildlife policy discussions, and they have every right to be heard. However, hunting and trapping furbearers is allowed not because it’s a vital management tool for these species in the state, but rather because it provides a recreational and economic opportunity for a very small minority of Colorado residents. According to CPW’s 2024-2025 furbearer harvest, individuals who bought a permit to hunt or trap furbearers account for just 0.08% of the Colorado population. When a small, economically invested minority has disproportionate influence, policies can drift away from broader public values and scientific best practices.

It’s time for change.

This is not about attacking hunting traditions or dismissing rural livelihoods. It is about ensuring that wildlife policy reflects transparent data, sound science-based management, and the values of the broader public. Democratic governance requires listening to the majority of Coloradans.

Luckily, we have an opportunity to start that change now. The Colorado Parks and Wildlife Commission will consider a petition to ban the sale, barter, and trade of wildlife fur at its March 4-5 Commission meeting in Denver. Speaking on behalf of myself, as a private citizen, with decades of experience researching wildlife management and implementing animal protection policy for the state, I believe this is our chance to bring wildlife management more in line with science and public sentiment.

If you can, show up to the commission meeting in March, and make your voice heard. Colorado’s wildlife belongs to all of us. Decisions about its future should be guided by science, data, and the shared values of the people who call this state home.

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