The epistemology of ignorance is the examination of the complex phenomena of ignorance, which has as its aim identifying different forms of ignorance, examining how they are produced and sustained, and what role they play in knowledge practice. … Ignorance is often thought of as a gap in knowledge, as an epistemic oversight that easily could be remedied once it has been noticed. It can seem to be an accidental by-product of the limited time and resources that human beings have to investigate and understand the world. While this type of ignorance does exist, it is not the only kind. Sometimes what we do not know is not a mere gap in knowledge, the accidental result of an epistemological oversight. ... [A] lack of knowledge or an unlearning of something previously known often is actively produced for the purpose of domination and exploitation. –Shannon Sullivan and Nancy Tuana, "Introduction," Race and Epistemologies of Ignorance
Vegan education is usually understood as addressing a gap in knowledge regarding the exploitation of other animals. Therefore, all that is required is to produce and distribute information about the exploitation of nonhuman animals in order to fill in these gaps. However, there is a problem with seeing this as the only form of ignorance.
Obscurantism is one of the ways a lack of knowledge is produced and sustained. In terms of nonhuman animals' exploitation, obscurantism is a deliberate opposition to our knowledge of the oppression of other animals. It is used as a strategy for sustaining the structure of human supremacy.
The term "farm animal" is an example of obscurantism because it limits our knowledge of certain nonhuman animals. Through this term our knowledge of these animals is limited to their farmed existence – their exploitation. Similar terms include, "lab animal," "game animal," "fur bearing animal," "circus animal," "rodeo animal," and "companion animal." These are only a few of the terms that identify nonhuman animals with their exploitation and therefore as inherently exploitable. So it's not that there is a gap in our knowledge of the exploitation of these animals, but that we lack knowledge of them existing apart from this exploitation. This lack of knowledge, which is produced by reducing other animals to their exploitation, obviously serves the purpose of exploitation.
Another term that keeps us from acknowledging the oppression of other animals is the use of "reform" when referring the promotion of new methods for exploiting other animals. The term "reform" avoids acknowledging that other animals are in fact still being exploited under alternative methods for breeding, enslavement, transportation, slaughter, and so on. Yet again, a lack of knowledge is being produced for the very purpose of exploiting other animals – a lack of knowledge that bolsters human supremacy.
Now consider the term "farm animal reform," the combination of terms works to reinforce the overall lack of knowledge about the oppression of other animals. It's not that there is a gap in our knowledge that a structure of human supremacy exists. In fact, both terms draw attention to that structure. That is, both "farm" and "reform" denote the very structure of human dominance. What these terms do instead is present that structure as inevitable by opposing knowledge outside that structure. Basically, these terms work together to structure our (lack of) knowledge for the purpose of human dominance and the exploitation of other animals.
This lack of knowledge outside of the system of human supremacy is why one of the most common questions vegetarians get is, "What do you eat?" (Another questions vegans get more generally is, "What would happen to all these animals if we didn't use them?") So, raised as nonvegetarian we lack knowledge of diet without flesh, eggs, and milk. That is, our knowledge of diet is limited to the structure of oppression.
Likewise, as self-identified "farm animal reform" advocates when we are challenged on our advocacy of new methods for exploiting other animals we usually characterize these challenges as "all or nothing." The subtext being that if we don't support "farm animal reform" we'll end up with "nothing." Similar to being raised nonvegetarian, from our training in "farm animal reform" we lack knowledge of practicing nonhuman animal advocacy without supporting the structure of human supremacy. Thus, as a form of obscurantism, "farm animal reform" works as the deliberate opposition to our knowledge of the oppression of other animals.
