Even the most politically correct and progressive have a blind spot when it comes to our attitude towards animals. It's time to acknowledge it and get over it, writes Katrina Fox.

Two hundred dolphins were lured into a cove at Taiji in Japan last month. Most were brutally slaughtered while others were chosen by marine park officials to spend the rest of their lives in captivity to entertain people.

The killing is planned to continue until March.

Four thousand sheep from Western Australia died on a ship destined for the Middle East on January 16, where temperatures on the boat were so high, the animals were baked alive.

And just last week Marius, a 18-month-old giraffe, was killed, butchered and fed to the lions at Copenhagen Zoo in front of a crowd, including children to allegedly prevent inbreeding.

These atrocities are but the most recent examples of the horrendous cruelty inflicted on non-human animals. Sadly, they are a mere drop in the oceans of bloodshed for the benefit of people. Between 50-150 billion land animals are estimated to be killed each year worldwide for food alone, while the bodies of about 250 million female cows are exploited so we can consume their milk, and as many as 115 million animals are used in vivisection lab tests.

All this violence is a result of speciesism.

The term was coined by psychologist Richard Ryder in 1970 and refers to a prejudice similar to sexism or racism in that the treatment of individuals is determined by their membership of a particular group. Just as less value is placed on certain people based on their sex, gender, race, sexual orientation or other defining characteristic, so too are animals afforded even less consideration and moral worth based on the fact they are a species other than human.

In short, speciesism is taking place whenever we justify the violence and exploitation of other beings by saying "they're only animals".

So insidious is the nature of speciesism that even otherwise progressive individuals and groups are guilty of it without recognising it. Speciesism in action is when:

- My fellow feminists decry rape culture and the control of women's reproductive systems while simultaneously posting pictures of the (now barely recognisable) abused and tortured bodies (or body parts) of non-human animals they've eaten for lunch, or consume dairy products that are created by the hijacking of the reproductive systems of female cows.

- An ad like this, featuring a woman's bottom depicted as a hamburger bun is banned for being "exploitative and degrading to women", while the once living, breathing, sentient animal whose body was turned into the actual burger is forgotten. She or he has become so objectified and turned into a something instead of a someone that their suffering does not even warrant consideration, let alone outrage.

- We call someone who has committed heinous acts that we disapprove of an "animal".

- We hold a sausage sizzle to raise money for a dog shelter, or a high-end meat-laden dinner to generate funds for marriage equality.

- Businesses that tout themselves as being "conscious" or "ethical" because they have developed outstanding standards in their relationships with staff, customers and suppliers and perhaps even implemented some environmentally responsible initiatives, have practices that involve animal exploitation or cruelty.

- You are horrified at another culture that mass slaughters and serves up cats and dogs for dinner but do not have the same reaction when it comes to cows, pigs, sheep, hens or turkeys.

Our excuses for speciesism range from "they're not as intelligent as us therefore are not deserving of moral consideration" and "other animals eat other animals so why shouldn't we?" to "animals are accidently harmed in the making of everything" and "plants are sentient too and we eat those".

Yet in a new film, Speciesism: The Movie, which makes its Australian debut screening in Sydney this month, director Mark Devries puts the case for debunking these arguments. In a fast-paced helicopter ride over the subject, the film features sound bites from an eclectic group of people, including luminaries in the animal rights movement, academics, medical doctors, lawyers, farmers, a holocaust survivor and a member of America's Nazi Party.

The film has been criticised in some quarters for its Michael Moore-inspired style and the age of the director (Devries was 20 when he started the project six years ago). Yet, ironically, it's more than plausible that many such criticisms are due to the deeply ingrained speciesism of its detractors.

In much the same way that campaigns for the rights and liberation of various oppressed groups of humans were ridiculed throughout history, so it is with speciesism. The very concept is so foreign to most people that they generally react in two ways: with anger or amusement. I have had friends who are passionate about and active in human-based social justice issues tell me how "sweet" or "adorable" my concern for animals is, yet would no doubt consider it patronising for their causes (of which I am supportive of) to be referred to in such a way.

Those who rail against the concept of speciesism often accuse its proponents of anthropomorphism (falsely projecting human qualities onto animals). Yet the sentience and complex emotional lives of animals has been well documented – from books such as When Elephants Weep and The Pig Who Sang to the Moon by Jeffrey Masson, Pleasurable Kingdom by Dr Jonathan Balcombe and The Cognitive Animal and The Emotional Lives of Animals by Professor Mark Bekoff.

Even if you can't spare the time to read these books, if you have any doubts as to whether animals feel emotions, watch this video of cows playing in a field or these bears, freed from years living in a concrete put at a US bear park.

We have run out of excuses for our inhumane treatment of animals. According to Professor Steve Garlick, President of the Animal Justice Party, 80 per cent of decisions made by parliaments in Australia affect animals, yet their interests are rarely considered. It's time to acknowledge the final frontier of social justice and refuse to be complicit in the exploitation and brutality of others – all others.

With 2014 touted as the Year of the Vegan, a good question to ponder is one posed by Edgar's Mission farm animal sanctuary in its tagline: If we could live happy and healthy lives without harming others, why wouldn't we?

Katrina Fox is a freelance writer and editor-in-chief of The Scavenger. View her full profile here.