Omnivores are not stupid

588:

Can I be really honest here? Isn’t it true that we, as vegans, hit out at the omnivore consumer (that’s almost all adult people). We know that it’s the ordinary consumer who stands in the way of progress on this issue, so we want to pay them back a bit for supporting the Animal Industries as they do.

We’d like to give them a good shake, but can’t, because that would be assault. Instead we do it by showing disapproval. And even if we only raise an eyebrow, we show it. No one likes being disapproved of. We may not say it straight out but we imply scorn, and omnivores see it. It’s like being told, “If you eat anything ‘animal’ you’re as good as killers”.

When we (vegans) do this, we know exactly what we’re doing. We might make a bit of a joke of it, but they know we’re serious, and if we get into a real discussion of issues, it’s hard to argue our case generously or with any grace. It’s likely we try to trap them or force them to see things our way.

By wandering into our trap they know we mean to jolt them into awareness, and people don’t usually like being jolted. We, however, think we are justified in doing that, even though we employ a small violence in the process. I’ve seen myself do it and then think it’s okay. I argue to myself that if my intentions are ‘good’, fighting the ‘good fight’, etc, that I’ll be excused using rough tactics. But because there is such a huge weight of normality in human use of animals, my opinion, approach and tactics aren’t usually appreciated. And worse. We’ve all been ‘assaulted’ by religious evangelists who come to our door and most of us know how to handle them. It’s probably the same when handling vegans who get too enthusiastic.

We vegans may not knock on doors but we will try to bring the conversation around to the subject of animal abuse. And we often don’t do it very subtly, so we’re easily spotted, but we keep on doing it until we start to look a bit desperate. It’s probably going to be a long drawn-out business trying to repair our own previous proselytising and finger-wagging and disapproving, and convincing people that we don’t want to lose friends or take our revenge.

If people are willing to give us a chance to put our case, what a waste it would be if we blew it. What a waste, once we’d actually sparked an interest, to then seem either threatening or pathetic.