Ambassadors for animals

1539: 

For me, being vegan and going public is a bit like how a legal advocate must feel, representing a client.  I like to think I’m following the instructions of the animals themselves, acting with their approval.  Only, I have to guess at that since they are 'voiceless'.

As animals themselves aren’t gratuitously violent, I imagine they wouldn’t encourage me to be hostile with my adversaries.  I like to think animals know the human better than humans know themselves, since they’ve seen the very worst of human behaviour and learnt how to survive it.  I like to think they’d advise me to work on my fellow humans in a slow and steady way.  To win them over with my demeanour rather than my smart arguments.  

Without our going to the extremes of Animalitarianism, which assumes that animals are endowed with superior moral qualities to human beings, I think we can learn a lot from animals.  They don’t draw attention to themselves so neither should I, especially when I’m dealing with hardened meat-eaters.  I would try to wait, as animals do.  I'd prefer to encourage dialogue by letting others have their say first, if only because I need to learn how they see things, and then earn their go-ahead to have my say.

Why be so indulgent?  I’d say, because they constitute 99% of our population, most of whom need to be brought on-side, as soon as possible.  Most of them still love their animal foods, and their leather shoes and many other animal-based goods and services.  Omnivores aren’t going to roll over easily, and are even less likely to if we try to corner them.

It’s easy to forget just how aggressive otherwise-peaceful people can be when it comes to this subject.  But it’s understandable.  None of us likes being placed ‘in the wrong’, which is precisely what we are doing, however careful we are with the words we choose.  I find myself doing just that whenever I’m trying not to, when talking to non-vegans about using animals.  I feel I have no other option, although to be absolutely truthful, ‘putting people right’ is partly me showing off, implying that, in this one way, I do consider myself ‘superior’. 

Even though I’m sure I have watertight arguments, it’s so easy to speak too fluently, too intelligently, too passionately, and therefore to put peoples’ backs up.  It’s likely they’ve never even heard of ‘abolition-ism’ before.  When I explain, it takes them about two seconds for the penny to drop and for them to feel uneasy. Inevitably, they react negatively, as a first line of defence.  I have to understand why this is, and get past the shock of this, and try to understand the insult they feel - we are, after all, turning what has been, up to now, an accepted part of their life.  We are turning a large part of their lifestyle into something wrong.  Their reaction shouldn’t surprise us, since for them there’s nowhere else to go.  They can’t get past the ugly facts, and there are very few good arguments with which they can defend their position.  So, they feel uncomfortable and cornered, and often they take umbrage and storm off.

If this happens, we might think we’ve won the day, but in truth we've done the greatest damage, and added to the likelihood of losing them altogether.