Check the talk

In any conversation on serious issues such as animal rights we should automatically check all the time, to be sure we aren’t becoming too volatile, or that the conversation isn’t becoming too one sided (too much of my stuff and not enough of yours). If a person is left out they’ll feel put out, like they’re being lectured at.
Conversation needs to be interesting and worthwhile, disagreements notwithstanding. Most of us like to explore the pathways of one another’s thoughts and beliefs and, wherever our discussions take us, in the end we need to leave one another on a positive note. So we can resume at a later date.
For vegans, animal rights may be a deadly serious subject but it can give us a great deal of satisfaction and put meaning into our lives. But to get the most out of ‘talking about it’ we need to get good at it - learn details, become knowledgeable, be informative, and then there’s a chance we can jolt others out of their long held attitudes. But there’s a danger when we think we are right. We get careless with our arguments by leaning too heavily on the moral imperative. We think we can shock people into conversion, with stories about the horror conditions on animal farms and slaughterhouses. And sometimes it tips the scales and gets people thinking. But often the resistance is so fierce when people are not ready for a moral battering, that we need to let it rest and not try to go in even harder. Then we can live to fight another day. By not becoming too rabid about our subject we’re more likely to be seen as a selfless advocate, someone who is not in it to win personal kudos but simply to represent the need to protect animals.
However careful we are at presenting as animal guardians it won’t always sit well with everyone, and that can be a tough lesson to learn for vegans. If others don’t understand us we must nevertheless try to win their respect for what we are trying to do - to save animals and not ourselves. They may not agree with us but we need to keep on side with them, if only to show how reluctant we are to leave them behind.