People behaving badly

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There are those who don’t feel badly about behaving badly … condoning the abuse of animals for food and clothing, as if it’s of no significance. It’s as if they are impelled to (take a full part in the whole cruel system of animal abuse themselves) cause damage but don’t know how to pull back. Better behaved people can see better the part they play, moderate their urges and try to minimise damage.
As advocates for the animals we get disappointed by those pulling in the opposite direction and might want to give up on them, exasperated?
When I get talking to people who behave badly but may not seem to care, I nevertheless find they’re worth getting to know if only to find out how they justify their views on animals. I try to talk to them, ask them how they feel about ‘all this’. At the same time I try to make them feel at ease, by eliminating any hint of judgement from what I’m asking. I try never to show any trace of disapproval.
If we can ask questions of them, as if they were asking themself the same questions, then I think we have a better chance of influencing a change of attitude, without igniting ego-resistance.
If we can spend time with people who not only disagree with us but adamantly oppose the whole concept of ‘animals having rights’, we might get closer to the general point of view shared by very many others. On this subject of eating animals, people put them in a special category, where their own companion animals are much loved and ‘food’ animals are completely un-loved. However illogical their arguments may seem to us, our job as animal advocates is to get deeper inside that way of thinking. And that’s made easier the more we become familiar with their arguments. It’s easy for vegans to forget the rationale we ourselves might have used to justify our own eating (and clothing) habits of the past.