Soya the Cow
6th July 2019
Drag performance artist Daniel Hellmann posted this short video to highlight the parallels of the fictional story The Handmaid's Tale by author Margaret Atwood, and the television adaptation, with the dairy industry. Set in a dystopian future The Handmaids Tale tells the story of women who are able to conceive and give birth to offspring - these women are slaves to men, and are disposed of when they aren't useful. Daniel Hellman uses his drag character Soya the Cow to explicitly state that the fate of the women in The Handmaid's Tale is seen in cows raised for dairy. Cows are systemically forcibly inseminated, and separated with the children they bear, then slaughtered when they can't produce enough milk the industry demands. This reference culture jams current popularity of the television series and the trauma the women go through and applies the exact same narrative to the reality of the dairy industry, which is hoped garners the same horror.
Other animal rights organisations have used this cultural reference in demonstrations, such as DxE Brisbane.