Open letter

125:

Dear Omnivore,
I hope you like us. We only want to talk to you ... about you-know-what. I know we need to earn your respect ... so you’ll trust us not to ‘frighten the horses’. Please excuse our tub-thumping and lack of good manners, it’s a bad habit. You see, we’re used to fast talking or at least thinking up-ahead ... and that can be so off-putting. And some of us don’t try to weigh both sides of the argument - we’re polemicists, we like talking morals and ethics.
Some of us have a lot to learn - we’re not selling soap powder, we’re selling an idea, so we need to be ... well what we don’t need to be is preachy. In the past we tried to make you feel bad about yourself, for not thinking about what you’re doing. When we’ve suggested you “go vegan” we’d forgotten how much you hate being told what to do ... and that you’d probably dig your heels in.
It’s no surprise if you wanted to chuck us out, ideas and all ... you’d be doing that to teach us, that it’s a long climb back uphill, to get back to where we were ... in our conversation ... which might have gone somewhere if we hadn’t blown it. We did push and shove and make value judgements. We admit it.
Hopefully we’ve learnt our lesson. And so, what happens now? I for one will try not to be a ‘judgemental type’. And if I do stray into this minefield I know I’ll have to watch out for signs of nervousness in you ... about being attacked ... on this matter of food.
To nip it in the bud I must be frank with you. I do have a difficulty, all animal advocates do, of wanting say something but not making you feel like a ‘cornered-rat’ when I’m saying it. How I say it, my face - just my smile ... me smiling at you when I speak. I mean to show you how friendly I am. I want you to think I am friendly and non-judgemental ... but my smile is masking my disapproval of you ... and you very understandably see it as the ugliest smile of all. If I’m not a really honest type I know you’ll see through me.
We vegans who think we know about food should realise that any omnivore knows food too, in as much as they know what they like and believe they are what they eat. We must try not to underestimate you. We have to see you as a fast-tracking, observant human being ... no schmuck. We need to bend over backwards, to show we realise how difficult animal issues are and be willing, no, enthusiastic to have our arguments critically assessed. We aren’t asking people to agree with us, we just want people to think about issues and arrive at their own conclusions.
Up here in the clouds we vegans can easily forget how we got up here ... and we end up thinking the change we made (going vegan, for instance) was all quite easy, and we go around telling everyone so.
Going vegan is simple and quick, err, no, not for some of us. It’s more like an alcoholic giving up the drink. For some of us it means making a massive decision about ourselves, a central, integral change, perhaps triggered by a realisation which might have been brewing for some time. Our own journey, post to post, stage by stage, might have been sparked by compassion. We try to hold onto that thought and that feeling while we’re mixing into the day-to-day world.
It’s like coming out of a movie feeling pumped by the whole emotional impact of what we’ve just been through, and then later on, as we walk home, the details fade. We can’t remember quite why, only a half-hour ago, we got so carried away.
With new ideas, attitudes and opinions, if we don’t examine and digest them thoroughly at the time, the power of them fades too quickly ... and nothing consolidates deeply enough. And with nothing solid forming, we don’t get around to making the big changes suggested by the big idea. We revert back to safe-old, lifestyle habits and attitudes.
I know we vegans seem to go on and on .... and on ... about the same old thing but we need your support. First we have to work out a way of getting the omnivore on board.
If we animal liberationists can inspire change, may they be permanent changes. It means our arguments have to be introduced carefully ... well, as carefully as you’d plant any seed in reasonably good ground. We must take care to argue non-violently and non-accusingly - talking issues by touching sympathy spots ... which will stick in the memory like any great message we see in a powerful movie or read in a book. We should promote liberation for what it is, not just welfare reforms or incremental stages of granting privileges to animals or fiddling with omnivorous diets, but in terms of abolition. No more use of animals.
Whew! This is a big letter but abolition is such a big thing. And it’s from abolition that all else flows, as it did with the abolition of human-slavery, where a great opinion change took place before slavery could be ended. Then the slaves were freed and only then did people see why it always had to be about outright abolition ... so there could be no back-sliding later, when things got a little tough. I suppose I’m edging towards the ultimate question then - during wartime conditions when there’s no food, and it’s a matter of kill an animal or die - vegans would probably like to give notice of refusal - of the invitation to dine. We’d probably like to sign a paper to say we’d sooner die than touch the stuff.
So, thanks but no-thanks. I just wanted to write to explain why we are as we are.