Break-out and persuasion

1100:

We all do what people have always done; we’ve no need to think about such basic things as to what food to eat.  The pattern has been set long ago.  But now, perhaps, there emerges a break-away generation, no longer willing to accept what others do just because they do it.  They aren’t content to eat fast food, and meet an early death, nor identify with the stereotypical, non-thinking person.  The very act of breaking away has something rewarding about it, despite becoming part of a minority. Vegans experience the buzz of a clear conscience and the energy-giving, healthy quality of a plant-based diet.

Now enter the persuader, someone who has broken away and is wanting others to join, to change the minority into a majority. In considering how to be an effective persuader (to help build our numbers whilst sticking to the no-use-animal principle) we have to make a stand; but, in doing this we often opt for an aggressive-look, a strong look. We say that look is legitimate, because people have chosen to relate to their ‘hard’ side; we can match their lack of compassion with forthrightness. We reckon to shock them into submission, to make them see more clearly what they’re condoning, by being meat eaters.  “The gloves are off”, we say. “We’re angry. We must take it out on the meat-eaters”. That might be courageous, confronting and clear, but it doesn’t help the animals. It just polarises enemies.

What we really need is more connection.

         

A passionate promotion of Animal Rights isn’t the only way to educate people who don’t want to listen. Doing something to shock people, by being outspoken, will attract the Media, and give prominence to our arguments.  And that’s exactly what will happen, but only for a very short while.  What good does it do to win a few newspaper headlines one day only to have it all evaporate when the news is stale by the next?  Protests and demonstrations might tweak people’s conscience but they never address issues deeply enough to inspire or permanently touch the heart.  If we do connect with people we might get them to want to hear things from our point of view.