Direct Action Everywhere (DxE) is an international grassroots network of animal rights activists founded in 2013 in the San Francisco Bay Area. DxE uses disruptive protests and non-violent direct action tactics, such as open rescue of animals from factory farms. Their intent is to build a movement that can eventually shift culture and change social and political institutions. DxE activists work to "put an end to the commodity status of animals."
History
Founding DxE was founded in 2013 in the United States by a handful of people in the San Francisco Bay Area who decided to protest inside restaurants and stores, rather than outside, which was more typical of animal rights protests. DxE co-founder Wayne Hsiung investigated slaughterhouses for ten years prior to founding DxE with the goal of scaling up open rescue and other forms of non-violent direct action.
DxE's first action occurred in January 2013. Six activists demonstrated in front of a meat counter at a Sprouts Farmers Market, contending that the items being sold there behind the counter were not food but "the torment and suffering of billions of our friends in factory farms and slaughterhouses."
Growth DxE continued organizing protests inside restaurants and stores, citing the Southern Christian Leadership Conference and ACT UP as influences. In August 2013, DxE activists organized the Los Angeles side of an international multi-city protest, The Earthlings March. Approximately 40 cities and varied activist groups participated in the march.
In October 2013, in response to a viral video produced by Chipotle called The Scarecrow, DxE organized in-store "die-ins" at three San Francisco Chipotle restaurants. DxE argued that the ad, which advertised Chipotle's purported efforts to create a more natural and humane food system was "humanewashing", which animal rights activists describe as marketing efforts intended to disguise the inherent violence of using and killing animals for food. Within a few weeks, similar demonstrations were executed in Chicago, Los Angeles, Phoenix and Philadelphia. DxE responded by creating a platform for coordinated global days of action under the "It's Not Food, It's Violence" message.
DxE has continued with internationally coordinated monthly days of action. In addition to Chipotle, activists have also targeted other grocery stores, restaurants, clothing stores, zoos, circuses, and labs. The original actions were organized around the San Francisco Bay Area. By December 2014, DxE's network had grown to at least 90 cities in 20 countries.
DxE hosts an annual Animal Liberation Conference (ALC) for grassroots, peaceful animal rights activists. The ALC is a full week of talks, trainings, and socials all aimed at empowering activists.
Whole Foods campaign DxE selected U.S.-based natural foods grocery store Whole Foods Market as the target of the investigation because the company is allegedly "actively shaping the public's view of animal agriculture with false marketing."
The activists selected Certified Humane Whole Foods egg supplier Petaluma Farms in Petaluma, California, as the target of the initial investigation. At one point, activists encountered a diseased hen who had collapsed and was struggling to breathe and removed her from the farm. They named her Mei Hua (Chinese for "beautiful flower") and made her recovery a centerpiece of the ensuing campaign and imagery. Another farm owned by the same company was later the subject of a similar video filmed by a former employee. When asked for comment about that particular break-in after DxE's release of their initial video, the Sonoma County Sheriff's Department stated that a full investigation was underway, but that the farm appeared to be performing at "industry standards".
DxE released a 19-minute video of the investigation, "Truth Matters", on YouTube and Facebook in January 2015 and received coverage in several international media outlets, including The New York Times and Mother Jones. For several weekends following the investigation, and every month thereafter through early 2016, DxE chapters in several dozen cities organized protests inside Whole Foods stores, challenging the company's "Values Matter" advertising campaign. Whole Foods announced new egg-laying standards shortly after the release of the investigation video.
Over the course of 2015, a larger team of activists investigated Diestel Turkey Ranch, one of only three companies, out of over 2,000, to achieve a 5+ rating on the 1–5 scale used by the Global Animal Partnership, Whole Foods's animal welfare rating scheme. Activists recorded video reportedly at a Diestel-owned farm in Jamestown, California, showing filth, overcrowding, and birds dying as infants.
DxE released another investigation in November 2016 into Jaindl Farms, a Whole Foods farm that has supplied the White House with Thanksgiving turkeys since the 1960s rated in the 98th percentile of animal welfare according to an animal welfare audit. The activists released footage of birds with mutilated beaks, struggling to walk, and crowded to the point of repeated trampling. The video footage from the farm that DxE released shows birds with mangled beaks, broken legs, missing eyes, open sores and facial lesions. In one scene, turkeys peck and nibble at a young bird's festering wound. In another, a decaying carcass rests on the floor among live animals. Two Huffington Post reporters visited the farm on invitation of Jaindl's owner and found that while severe injuries were uncommon, some turkeys had visible sores. In response to DxE's video, the group was accused of ecoterrorism by Jaindl's legal counsel in a letter to Wayne Hsiung, who also stated "This criminal activity fostered by your organization is reprehensible, and cannot be overlooked."
On May 29, 2018, several hundred DxE activists held a protest outside Cal Eggs Farm in Petaluma, California, which is a supplier to Whole Foods. Some of the activists entered a barn and carried out live and diseased birds. 40 of the activists were arrested for misdemeanor trespassing. DxE activists see "open rescue" as establishing "the right to rescue" animals legally in the future.
After numerous protests inside the Whole Foods store in Berkeley, California, Whole Foods obtained a restraining order against DxE activists in September 2018, prohibiting Wayne Hsiung and 150 other unnamed DxE activists from entering that particular store or its parking lot.
Liberation Pledge In November 2015, DxE became one of the most visible backers of a new action known as the "Liberation Pledge", with co-founder Wayne Hsiung authoring a piece in the Huffington Post announcing the pledge. According to the website liberationpledge.com, it is defined by the following three points:
The pledge was considered controversial upon release, including criticisms regarding food justice concerns and by potentially isolating vegans who take the pledge. Several prominent figures in the animal rights movement, including Anita Krajnc of the Toronto Pig Save and Keith McHenry of Food Not Bombs took the pledge, with McHenry declaring, "We must stop the eating of animals." Wanyama Box creator Nzinga Young defended the Liberation Pledge, writing, "when I spend time in safe spaces with sacred people, I don't want to see carnage."
Costco campaign Following the Farmer John investigation, DxE activists repeatedly interrupted LA Dodgers baseball games to protest the team's touting of Farmer John's "Dodger Dogs" hot dogs. Activists in LA, Colorado, and the San Francisco Bay Area jumped on the field during plays at several games with banners declaring "Dodgers Torture Animals" and "Animal Liberation Now". The activists tied their protests to Farmer John, protesting the promotion of "torture and death of animals".
DxE followed up its Farmer John investigation by investigating a cage-free egg supplier to Costco. Costco had been a key leader in the 2016 trend of food companies committing to shift to a cage-free egg supply, but, according to DxE, the investigation raised questions about the state of animal welfare after that shift. DxE released a video that shows dead birds on the floor and injured hens pecked by other chickens. One bird had a piece of flesh hanging off its beak. In response to the video released by DxE, the supplier claimed that the activists had committed a "break-in and trespassing" and that "The video does not show what truly goes on in our barns and appears to be staged for production effect". The group did not seek permission to enter the farm, Lead Organizer Wayne Hsiung said, but he argued that the group had not broken any laws because they had suspected animal cruelty and that gave them a right to enter the property. All birds inside the farm were destroyed due to the contamination risk the activists had introduced into the farm, according to the supplier. The two DxE organizers who conducted the investigation were initially charged with felony commercial burglary and subsequently pleaded no-contest to a reduced charge of trespass. The defendants were then ordered to pay restitution of $331,991 to compensate the farm owner based on his assertion that he was forced to slaughter all chickens in the barn. The defendants claim that the "depopulated" chickens were in a barn they never entered.
Direct Action Everywhere staged a protest at the SoMa location of Costco in San Francisco. Direct Action Everywhere activists forcibly occupied the store's meat section and held a "die-in" near an entrance that involved activists covering each other with fake blood and pretending to eat each other. The protest involved Costco suppliers' controversial treatment of hens. Activists from the organization claimed that many of the "cage-free" farms were housing the chickens in crowded cages and violating principles dictated by the "certified humane" label. They released undercover footage of the farms showing the poor conditions. Another protest was held at a Costco store in New Berlin, Wisconsin.
Open rescue expansion
In December 2016, DxE open rescue projects began expanding beyond the Bay Area when members in Toronto released an investigation of a pig farm. The project was followed up by an internationally coordinated rescue with animal advocates in Sweden, Germany, and Australia. In April 2017, DxE activists in Colorado conducted an investigation of Morning Fresh Farms, a cage-free chicken egg supplier.
In 2017, activists with DxE entered Smithfield Foods-owned Circle Four Farms in Utah and performed an open rescue of two piglets subsequently named Lily and Lizzie. Their rescue triggered an extensive multi-state FBI hunt for the two baby piglets. DxE released a virtual-reality video that takes viewers into barns at Circle Four Farms and shows sows with bloody and mangled teats; pregnant sows gnawing on the bars of the narrow stalls they live in until they give birth; and piglets clambering over and nibbling dead siblings. A video taken by DxE that coincided with the open rescue at Circle Four Farms has been called inaccurate by a spokesman for Smithfield; the video purports to show mistreatment and abuse of animals at Circle Four Farms. In November the same year, a group of DxE activists, which included actress Alexandra Paul, claimed to expose animal cruelty and neglect at Zonneveld Dairy, a Land O'Lakes dairy supplier based in California, which included "young calves living in filthy hutches, unprotected from record low and high temperatures between 19 and 110 degrees Fahrenheit, suffering from pneumonia, diarrhea, open sores, maggot infestations, and infections." The team of activists performed an open rescue on one sick calf, later named Roselynn.