The Antidote

1955:

To fix our collective pessimistic views, vegans argue that the switch can be flipped, by boycotting. By convincing others why they should boycott, we highlight what is most destructive in our society, namely apathy. People are submissive to those who govern us, they work for them, spend the money they pay them on goods sold by them. They comply with the exploitative production methods, support the very worst systems, and keep quiet about anything they don’t like.

Once I dropped my own participation in all this I found I was also dropping my pessimism. There was some personal cost at first, for it meant I had to avoid buying things I might have always enjoyed before. But it was a small price to pay, to reverse my compliance and help to reverse so much dangerous destruction. It isn’t the only price – we realise that by letting go of so many popular food items (and having such a clear ethical reason for doing so) we pit ourselves against most people’s attitudes towards ‘the use of food animals’. The pessimism, the drabness of conventional attitude, the de facto cruelty people are associated with, all this is reversed by a simple boycott of products. As difficult as this may seem, I’m sure it’s the antidote to a very entrenched illness amongst humans.