humanewash

English

Etymology

humane +‎ wash, following the established pattern of greenwash, pinkwash, and similar forms (which came ultimately from the figurative-extension sense of whitewash as "to slap a paintjob over the truth to hide it and to give a specious nice appearance"); this form also rhymes with brainwash, as does sustainwash.

Verb

humanewash (third-person singular simple present humanewashes, present participle humanewashing, simple past and past participle humanewashed)

1. To engage in the humaneness (animal welfare) analogue of greenwashing.
   • 2021 January 19, Lisa Held, “Are Some Animal Welfare Labels 'Humanewashing'?”, in Civil Eats‎^[1], retrieved 2021-09-13:

     Now, a new report from the anti-factory farming group Farm Forward seeks to outline the differences between independent and industry animal welfare labels and expose what it calls “humanewashing” among both types of groups. Like the now widely recognized practice of “greenwashing,” Farm Forward says that companies use humanewashing to deceive consumers who care about animal rights, leading them to believe animals were raised according to their expectations of humane treatment even when they were not.