The Judgement Trap

1249: 

Most people know the way vegans see their world but don't know whether they're converters or not.  Best to avoid them just in case they want to preach.  You just don’t know if vegans will act like civilised people, or if they'll start to talk at you.

Me, if I think being vegan is how everyone else should be, if I think I’m right, morally (and health-wise), I might be looking around for opportunities to persuade others.  If I’m ‘in the right’ they'll have to listen.

For you, with a strong sense of your own free-will and on-side with so many others who lead a 'normal' way of life, a vegan's rightness is quite ignorable.  A vegan might be seen as quirky even charming but on the whole unrealistic and sometimes a pain in the arse.  On our present record, we are not to be taken seriously and certainly not to be feared.   It's like the playground, where the big kid is challenged to a fight by a little kid - the reaction is more amusement than anything else, at the audacity of the weakling, underestimating the strength of the opponent.

The Animal Industry, with all its persuasive power and money,  make their statements regularly and strongly.  They're everywhere with their message.  At the cricket, not only is there a huge KFC painted on the grass behind the wicket (so you see it every time a ball is bowled) but there are KFC stickers on each of the three stumps, at each end. KFC, along with all the other meat-corporations, are in your face on hoardings, TV, print media and radio.

So what pressure can we apply, as vegans, when we are up against a message that says today's KFC will be as good-tasting as the last one you had, and as inexpensive.  When corporations like KFC exert power, they KNOW how to do it without doing themselves damage.  They won't be phased by a few vegans getting cross about chickens.

Psychologically, the little boy in the playground, looking at his toy the bully has just smashed, feels huge frustration.  He wants to beat the bejesus out of the thug, but knows he'll come off second best.  But what can he do about the injustice?  And so it goes on, scenario after scenario, the bully winning, the shrimp in tears.

But not all is lost.  Whilst bullied kids often grow up to be bullies themselves (and most carnivore children bring up a new generation of carnivore children) some don't.  Some learn the lesson of dealing with the bully, not only to protect themselves but to protect other bullied kids.  They adopt a strategy that is less obvious, less knee-jerk, less doomed to failure.  It's not water tight and it not always stems from altruism, but there are other ways to handle the bully-mentality without resorting to violence.  Bullying comes in every imaginable flavour.  Kids at school versus bigger kids, third world countries versus The Wealthy Exploiting Country, vegans versus meat-heads.  The weaker minorities will always fight the powerful, and for vegans, we'll always be in a fight over the subject of bullied animals.  So, the less obvious approach is one where we appear confident but passive, immovable but not pushy, courageous in what we say but never judgemental.  For the bully, that is confusing, because we are so obviously not cowed by any situation we find ourselves in.

Probably most vegans will continue their lives, standing up for their principles, but we do have a problem, amongst ourselves. We never seem to quite grasp the nettle.  We relate everything we stand for back to non-violence but sometimes fail because we still use the old fashioned tactic of violent speech, and there are still angry thoughts behind the speech.  The result is a contradiction, which looks to the omnipresent omnivore as if we are teetering on the brink of a hissy fit.  And tantrums do nothing for persuasion.

So, I'm gradually coming around to the point of this blog - judgement.  This is what vegans have put on themselves, responding to their own double standards by disciplining themselves, and eventually becoming vegan.  This engine is driven by one single idea: if I can do it then so can you, which comes out as so should you; I am bringing the light to you, insisting that you let the light in, if not I will disapprove of you.  You will be unworthy of my respect.  My values will no longer be the same as yours.  You will be lost to me.

That's extreme of course, just to make the point, but feelings are felt, intentions obvious, and nothing is hidden because each of us has no trouble at all in reading the other's feelings.  (We broadcast feelings and they're received without difficulty).  So, it's important not to broadcast judgement.  How you do that is your art, your craft, your personality expressing something to another person, who reads it as your attempt to quell this one misconception: that you are in any way wanting to be judgemental.

If we can arrive at this point, then we won't be labelled 'preacher'.  And it's not just for the benefit of show either.  We have to understand how ineffective judgements are, and how badly they affect any intelligent discussion of this very difficult subject.

It's obvious that vegans have something they badly WANT to say.  Omnivores are on the lookout for the agitated vegan who tries to open up the subject of 'animals'.  They believe that all vegans are self-righteous, and that you can smell them a mile off.  To alter that perception we need to beware of the judgement trap.