Protests looking ugly

As vegans we may be convinced of our own non-violence, and then we ‘do’ an angry protest. To people who see us are we off-putting? The high moral platform gives us confidence … we are so obviously right!! We may not see how, drip by drip, our protest is sounding too harsh, even violent.
To be non-violent I think we activists (so-called!) do need to consider developing a level of control, where words are strong but not frightening and where voices are loud but not screaming or disapproving. Collectively we can get too big for our boots, and seem over confident or brash. The vegan public face is sometimes off-putting.
…Whereas, at home it isn’t like that at all. Here we’re okay, since we aren’t trying to impress anyone but our self. Lifestyle-wise vegans are pretty much fine examples of non-violence, and in many valuable and important ways. It seems a great shame if we wear our dark side in public, even when it’s just a one on one.
Privately of course, a more wonderful ‘at-peace’ spirit you’ll never find. That’s because vegans have low levels of “spending-violence”, i.e. buying, say, animal-stuff or guns or something supporting crime. At home vegans are cool and it’s only when we’re trying to be effective, outside home, we hit trouble. Like when we want to be ‘hot’ (passionate) and something goes askew.
It’s our appearance that lets us down. Vegans should of course feel utterly safe - why be nervous in ‘outside interactions? When we go up against the ‘big-bad-world’, face some opposition, face some curly questions, how do we handle it? How do we come across? Maybe we’re happy just to come across as peace-niks. Yes, even when that sounds a bit 1950s. ‘Peace’, afterall, is a timeless tag which never goes out of fashion.
In this one (obvious) way this is what veganism is about - a simple non-violent boycott and highly effective if many join in. Commodity-wise, the greatest act of violence is where we exert power – where we spend our money. Imagine, in the grocery, no one is watching, we can spend on whatever we please. If that support violence then our decision, at that ‘private point’, needs to be changed.
Certainly vegans can’t be accused of violence at this point; our stance here, mainly in regard to food, is that where there’s no replacement product we do without. For vegans that ‘do-without’ decision (rather than compromise our no-touch-animal principle) relates mainly to animal foods. We don’t do them. But it’s to do with other commodities too, because of what they contain.
I know an 18 years old (very attractive female), very into only vegan food, but she’s stuck on shoes. She loves shoes. What woman doesn’t? But there isn’t any alternative to leather fashion shoes. Here’s where she may want to NOT touch but touch them she does, by buying leather shoes (referred to as an ‘animal co-product’ since it is economically on a par with the food part of the animals).
Why does my ‘vegan’ friend wear leather on her feet? Maybe it’s the fear of social suicide - a beautiful dress, a magnificent everything else and it all falls to pieces if she wears canvas foot apparel.
Of course this usually isn’t so much of a problem for men, well not for me certainly but then I’m not 18 and not dating. And of course it doesn’t matter eventually because as soon as business opportunities appear for a different line of shoe, then a whole range of magnificent plant-based footwear will suddenly appear … and at competitive prices. The Chinese might be doing it already and can do not just because of lower labour costs but because plant fabric is cheaper. The world is moving towards cutting unnecessary costs by ‘going-plant’. It’s going that way and fashion will shift towards both non-animal foods and fabrics. However it all depends where we spend our money. If you join the boycott and sponsor alternatives, fashion changes. And it’s the fashion market which determines whether we get shoes, namely a switch over to the plant-based variety.
But back to my friend. She’s facing the compromise and tying her hands. It must be annoying to her that she can’t actively promote vegan principle or Animal Rights. Therefore, it has to be said, the peace initiative is in everything we eat or wear or think and a central tenet of vegan lifestyle and attitude.