Post ID 1926

Family of slain animal activist says “We will not rest until justice is served”

Regan Russell, a pioneer of Canada’s animal rights movement, was tragically killed June 19 while attending a vigil with Animal Save Movement at a Fearmans/Sofina Foods slaughterhouse in Burlington, Ontario. No charges have been filed; police are still “investigating.”

Regan, age 65, was struck and run over by the driver of a truck full of pigs who were themselves in the last moments of their lives – pigs she’d been comforting just moments before.

Regan first became an animal activist in 1979 at age 24 when she learned about the brutal slaughter of Canadian seals, according to her partner of nearly two decades Mark Powell. She brought a homemade sign saying “Stop the seal hunt” to a government building in downtown Winnipeg on a cold winter day, and after standing around for several hours, hoping officials had noticed her, she believed she’d done some good.

Regan Russell, 1955-2020

“She went home, freezing cold,” Mark told Canada’s CBC News. “She took a hot bath and thought, ‘There, that’s done. What’s next?’”

A great deal, as it turned out. Russell was active in many other social justice movements, and had attended a Black Lives Matter rally just days before her death. She and Mark famously disrupted a 2017 Bill Cosby event with t-shirts that read “We Believe the Women.”

Protestor rights and safety has been an ongoing issue at Fearmans. Save Movement founder Anita Krajnc was charged with criminal mischief in 2015 for giving water to pigs outside Fearmans, as Russell had been doing. Krajnc was acquitted in 2017 after a trial that made international headlines.

This peaceful act of comforting animals, witnessing and documenting their suffering, is now criminalized under the province’s Bill 156, passed only days before Russell’s death. This “ag-gag” bill specifically prohibits the very vigils Save Movement performs worldwide.

A fundraising campaign has been created to continue Regan’s work, repeal 156, and assist the family, and it’s in that campaign they bravely share their strong condemnation of animal agriculture – and make it clear who they feel is to blame for her death.

“First and foremost, we’d like to thank everyone the world over for their outpour of support for Regan and her family. It is truly beautiful to see compassionate people across the globe reach out, stand vigil, and ultimately join us in carrying Regan’s torch.

“What must be said is that Regan’s death was senseless, in that it was entirely preventable. For years activists have been attempting to engage these plants, and the ag industry’s complete and utter lack of compassion over the years has led to various incidents, some of which can be viewed freely online. While she championed many causes, Regan’s last moments were spent standing for what she most deeply believed in, alongside beloved friends supporting animal rights.

“Those aware of this struggle for the better treatment of animals will immediately think of Bill 156. If you are unaware, Bill 156 passed in Ontario days before Regan’s death; of this, NDP MPP John Vanthof said:

“People are going to get hurt because of this. They [the ag industry] read a lot more into this than a simple deterrent, and that is a problem…when someone’s badly hurt or killed, it’s going to be an issue here [Queen’s Park] again, and it’s going to be a much bigger issue for that family.”

(First session of 42nd Parliament, June 16, 2020)

“What Mr. Vanthof was trying to say was that legislation structured in this way, to suppress the speech of whistleblowers and make common acts of protest a crime, will not stop the activists and only embolden those who disagree with them. The struggle in a case like this is determining whether an accident or act of malice occurred, and if the latter did, can we actually seek justice? We are facing that struggle as a family right now, and we are grateful that the entire animal rights community joins us in the struggle to carry on Regan’s legacy. Rest assured we will not rest until justice is served.

“In pursuing justice, we have this to say; it does not end with a senseless death or a major meat distributor. This is not just a fight for vegetarians, vegans, and animal rights activists. This is a fight for the sanctity of our rights as free citizens to demonstrate for what we believe in. We seek to repeal Bill 156 in its entirety, and let it be known we believe Regan’s blood is on the hands of those that supported this vile legislation.”

Worldwide, supporters of Regan, her family, and her legacy, have paid her tribute in vigils.

Paul Watson, founder of Sea Shepherd Conservation Society, minced no words in calling her killing a murder.

“Three days ago, Regan Russell was murdered by a cold-blooded monster devoid of empathy and compassion. She was deliberately run down by a truck driver. His cargo were pigs stuffed into the truck in over-heated conditions and extremely stressed from thirst.”

Academy Award-winning actor Joaquin Phoenix, a fixture at local events for L.A. Animal Save, added his voice:

“While her tragic death has brought upon deep sorrow in the Animal Save community, we will honor her memory by vigorously confronting the cruelties she fought so hard to prevent by marching with Black Lives, protecting Indigenous rights, fighting for LGBTQ equality, and living a compassionate vegan life. The Ontario government can attempt to silence us with the passage of its Ag-Gag bill – Bill 156 – but we will never go away and we will never back down.”

For many Regan’s death echoed that of English activist Jill Phipps 25 years ago this year. Phipps was run over by a truck carrying calves intended for export by airline elsewhere in Europe.

Like Phipps, witnesses at Fearmans said the driver did not stop after hitting Regan.

You can sign a petition to repeal Bill 156 here. Like Regan said, “I don’t know if it does any good. But I know doing nothing does no good.”

Post ID 1921

The novel coronavirus which causes COVID-19 has been a challenge, to say the least, for all of us. It has been a particular challenge for vegans. This virus came from a live animal market in Wuhan, China, possibly from a bat or pangolin, at least that is what the experts believe at this time. Not from 5G electromagnetic waves, or Bill Gates’ desire to vaccinate us all, or the government taking away your right to party, or any other number of conspiracies that keep us from talking about the elephant in the room, or more accurately the cows, chickens, pigs, turkeys and goats, the land animals that we in the West consume. Ten billion of them every year in the United States alone.

And if the issue of COVID-19 is discussed in regards to eating and using animals, it is brought up in racist and xenophobic terms about “those” people who eat “those” animals in “those” unclean markets and farms – as if the factory farms and slaughterhouses in the U.S. are bastions of cleanliness and free of disease.

And it turns out that three out of four global pandemics have come from using, exploiting, encroaching on, and/or eating nonhuman animals. Some of the notable ones include Ebola, SARS, Swine flu (H1N1), avian influenza (H5N2) and AIDS. And this fact places vegans in a very uncomfortable position.

How do we advocate on behalf of nonhumans while the world is suffering intensely? How do we talk about the cause of COVID-19 and how we can prevent future pandemics without looking like we are insensitive? We know from previous experiences that the very last thing non-vegans want to hear is that their participation in the exploitation of others is not only harming themselves, the environment and the well over 75 billion land animals globally each year – confined, mutilated, sexually manipulated and violently killed, just for food.   

It’s never the right or appropriate time, vegans have been told over and over. Just as it’s never the right time to talk about gun control after someone has mowed down children in a school, for example.

And then the pandemic hit the slaughterhouses. And thousands of workers, mostly immigrants and people of color, got really sick and the slaughterhouses (not “protein plants”, a term the industry is attempting to rebrand them with) had to be shuttered. I love the word shuttered. I digress. And we were told by those who make billions of dollars that the food system is broken and they need billions more dollars in relief (that they are getting, to the tune of $16 billion) because their profits were being harmed by not being able to kill thousands of animals a day. These billionaires give zero fucks for workers who are sick, and zero fucks for putting their workers’ families in harm’s way, not to mention entire communities. Twenty-two slaughterhouses have closed or temporarily closed. Thousands have been infected while doing their jobs.

Yet they were, and are still, killing thousands of animals a day, only they use euphemisms like “depopulating” and “culling.” And they and non-vegans say ‘what a waste,’ because no one gets to eat the body parts of those exploited animals during a time of “food” shortages.

Instead the animals will be killed in a myriad of tragic and painful ways because the farmers do not want to feed and water and house those animals. It costs money to do so, and animals are things, not beings, and are for profit.

So hundreds of thousands of animals are being killed. And as a vegan it’s absolutely horrifying to read article after article about how these precious beings are being wood chipped, gassed, shot with rifles, hit over the head with blunt force, and more. It’s incredibly painful to read about the amount of death and the suffering of animals. And somehow this feels different. I don’t exactly know why.

And it’s awful to know that maybe 1.5 percent of your country actually cares. Cares that these are sentient beings who suffer, feel pain, feel emotions. And really, if we’re being honest, do non-vegans actually care about slaughterhouse workers getting sick and dying to provide non-vegans with animal body parts, when there is plenty of available food that doesn’t risk the life of another person, another family, another community? Are there large swaths of non-vegans who are going vegan in solidarity with those forced to go to back to work via Trump’s executive order under the Defense Protection Act, which mandated that slaughterhouses remain open? Mind you, he refused to use the DPA to produce ventilators, testing kits and PPEs for essential workers. The provision also provides liability protections in case the workers get sick and die – they can’t be sued.

And honestly, the only voices I have seen in support of the slaughterhouse workers have been vegan voices and the worker’s unions, of course. Vegans have been vocal, and yet are continually told that we don’t care about humans. Go figure.

It’s incredibly difficult for vegans to just sit back and watch this horror show and not say anything. If we felt like pariahs before the pandemic, I’m not sure how to describe how we feel now. As for myself, I feel incredibly sad. Sad for the millions of people who have had the virus and the hundreds of thousands whose lives have been lost. Sad that we have a narcissist leading the country into a greater number of cases and deaths with the premature opening of the country cuz capitalism. Sad for the animals whose lives are meaningless outside of how they taste and what they can provide for human pleasure. Sad that we have this moment in time where we can look at how our exploitation of nonhuman animals caused this and other pandemics, and how we have an opportunity to stop eating animals, and yet we won’t. Sad that we make selfish choices and don’t care how they impact other people. But mostly sad because I feel like I have no voice, no power to make the suffering better.  

Post ID 1858

I never really thought of myself as a vegan purist. Being an ethical vegan for the last 11 years, I always considered myself just a vegan, doing the bare minimum of trying to do the least harm possible in regards to nonhuman animals.

So when I heard about Impossible Foods testing their soy-heme on rats, back in August, I immediately stopped promoting and eating the Impossible Burger. It wasn’t a difficult decision for me, really. After all, as an ethical vegan, I have avoided all animal exploitation and use; for food, clothing, entertainment, and animal experimentation, to the extent of the choices I have available.

As the parent of an 11 year-old beagle named Frederick, who was rescued from an animal testing lab six-plus ago, I could not in good conscience continue to support, promote, or eat a product that had been tested on a fellow animal. As I am sure most of you have, I’ve seen plenty of undercover videos from testing labs. Marc Ching, who is known for going undercover in the dog meat trade in Asia, recently went undercover in an animal testing lab in China. He said that the lab was far worse than what he sees in dog slaughterhouses. He should know.

Using products that were tested on animals is generally not considered part of an ethical vegan lifestyle. If a brand of lipstick is tested on animals, no one would have a problem if I did not promote the company. But when it’s a trendy new food that is getting a huge positive buzz, suddenly people are willing to look the other way. I also wonder: if the Impossible Burger was tested on beagles like Freddie, rather than rats, would there be such vociferous vegan support? In case you’re wondering, the rats were overfed soy heme, monitored for any ill health effects, and then Impossible Foods killed the rats to study their internal organs. It’s easy for me to see those rats as dogs as cats as mice as cows as…you get the point. It’s confinement, exploitation, and violence – for the sake of a veggie burger.

Was I a little bummed because the Impossible Burger tastes good? Sure. So did sushi and brie. But ultimately, exploitation loses its flavor and appeal.

Now I’m seeing a lot of noise on the socials about “vegan purists” who have chosen to boycott and not promote the Impossible Burger as well, by the loudest and most popular voices in the movement. People are being attacked for “hurting animals” and accused of being hypocrites because we use cell phones, drive cars and use computers. As if there is an equivalency between eating a veggie burger, and, say, conducting business.

I happen to use my computer and cell phone mostly for my PR business in which I promote animal nonprofits and vegan for-profit businesses like Animal Place, Vegan Wines, and Wild Earth – shameless plugs for those working to save animals from exploitation.

I’ve even seen vegans taken to task for using medication because it was tested on animals. Do I really need to address that?

This doesn’t mean that I want to see Impossible Foods fail. If I were vegan king, I’d like to see vegans stop promoting and buying their products, but alas, I was not born with such a destiny. Of course I prefer that nonvegans order an Impossible Burger over the flesh of an exploited cow. That should be obvious.

However the reality is it doesn’t matter what I or any other vegans in this debate want, the Impossible Burger has taken off and will continue to do so, with or without our tiny community.

Yes, we live in a confusing, capitalistic world where vegan food products are going to one day all be owned by companies that exploit other animals. It’s inevitable. And everyone is going to have to navigate these murky waters by their own inner compasses – as some of us are doing today by avoiding products that were tested on animals.

It doesn’t make us purists because we choose not to support a company that willingly tested their product on animals, which the FDA does NOT require, and that refuses to commit to never test again. It just makes us…vegan.

Post ID 1843

Image by Lauren Mitchell

The #metoo movement is finally catching up to the animal protection movement, at least in the public arena. Over the past week, articles have come out exposing prominent men in the corporate animal welfare arena for bullying, abusing power, sexual abuse and harassment, and general disrespect towards women.

The first of these articles about an investigation into the conduct of HSUS CEO Wayne Pacelle appeared in the Chronicle of Philanthropy, the second by the same writer appeared in the Nonprofit Chronicles, followed by the Washington Post and Politico.

For some in the movement, it came as a surprise to read that Wayne Pacelle, Paul Shapiro, Nick Cooney, and Hugo Dominguez have been accused (some multiple times) of reprehensible behavior towards women. For many others, it was no surprise at all. There have been rumblings in the movement about these men, and others, for years, in fact.

They and many other prominent men in the community were and continue to be protected by a culture of patriarchy that is no different than the culture that eats and uses nonhuman animals, but let’s focus on one reason that women are silenced. I’m talking about women being told that if they come forward, if they speak up for themselves, or speak up for those who are abused by men in the movement – they are hurting animals.

We hear this refrain all of the time, in many contexts, sometimes simply to stifle any disagreement or “infighting.” It’s a tool used by those in power to remain in power. And it’s a statement that tends to be used by those with the loudest voices in the movement, and those with the biggest platforms, the biggest followings, who control the biggest budgets.

Those people tend to be men, of course.

What hurts animals is men bullying women, suppressing their voices and their power within the movement.

What hurts animals is an unhealthy environment where brilliant, dedicated women abandon the cause for their own self-protection. What hurts animals is losing the talent of women who have been bullied, abused, harassed.

What hurts animals is keeping the secrets of these men, pretending that sexism, unfair power dynamics, or sexual assault doesn’t exist in the movement. What hurts animals is paying lip service to intersectionality and inclusion while turning a blind eye to the voices of women.

What hurts animals is men pretending that because we love animals and fight for their equality and their justice we are above reproach, above scrutiny. What hurts animals is a culture of hero worship and a movement where male leaders have unprecedented power to manipulate female activists, both within these organizations and on the grassroots front lines.

What hurts animals is remaining silent when women, people of color, and those outside of privilege are oppressed and marginalized. What hurts animals is when all of us in this community, however one self-identifies, fail to take a stand not only for other animals, but for each other as well.

What hurts animals is a social justice organization or movement built on a foundation of sexism, violence, patriarchy, lies, secrets, and fear, a movement that does not truly reflect the values that we purport to stand for: compassion, kindness, empathy, equality, ethics, and fairness.

Exposing men who do these things, and holding them accountable, ultimately helps animals.

Keeping silent is hurting animals, and hurting women.

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Post ID 1823

Daiya Foods was purchased by an international pharmaceutical company, Otsuka, for $325 million last week. Otsuka tests on animals. As in vivisection.

When I heard the news, my immediate reaction was to say goodbye to Daiya forever and to switch to Follow Your Heart, a truly vegan company. And I thought this position would be clear to vegans. Boy, was I wrong!

Immediately I began to see vegans celebrate the news: ‘This is great for the movement, Daiya will be available in more markets, this proves that veganism is working.’ I forgot how tied into capitalism this social justice movement is. I forgot how many vegans think that animal liberation is going to come from the almighty dollar.

And then it got ugly. Vegans who were upset by this news, and said they would boycott Daiya, were attacked mercilessly. And with the same language that non-vegans use against us: ‘you purists, you hypocrites, you’re too militant, you shop at grocery stores, go to non-vegan restaurants, drive cars, use computers, your vegetables kill field mice,’ and on and on.

What? All because some of us don’t want to support a company that tests on animals?

Vegans aren’t allowed to follow our own ethics anymore? Only the loudest and most vocal of us get to have opinions on the issues of the day?

What’s with the title of my essay? Most of you know my wife and I have fostered several dogs from animal testing labs, including our own boys, Frederick and Douglass. Sadly Douglass passed in April 2016 because of a heart condition (he had too much love for one little heart). Frederick is still with us.

Just two days ago, we brought a new foster into our home. She most likely came from a laboratory in China and was sold to the meat trade before she was rescued by Animal Hope and Wellness Foundation. She has never lived in a home and everything, I mean everything, frightens her, including me.

Frederick has PTSD. He spent his first five years in a lab, being poked, prodded, and worse. He had never spent a moment outside, never played with toys, was never pet or loved. We don’t know the horrors he experienced, but the results are present.

This is the reality of animal testing. This is the reality of Daiya selling out to Otsuka.

Having raised these dogs, and known dozens more, I have seen this reality firsthand. And they are the lucky ones. In the U.S., it is believed that 61,000 dogs are used in laboratories each year, and tens of millions of other animals as well. Those animals never make it out of the labs; they are summarily killed. These experiments are brutal. They can and do last years.

One can make a case that selling out to Big Ag is different. In a nonvegan world, we can’t avoid being touched in some way by the meat industry. That’s just a fact. But one can avoid the animal testing industry. In fact, it is vulnerable. More and more consumers are moving towards cruelty-free products every day.

Do I take this issue personally? Hell yes. I don’t see how anyone could meet these two beagles, see their tails wag despite the fear in their eyes, and still berate me because I won’t support a company that tests on animals. It doesn’t make me a hypocrite to boycott Daiya, in fact, it would make me a hypocrite if I did not.

We are all allowed a viewpoint, even if it differs from the mainstream vegans who shout loudest. My dog barks louder than any of them.

Post ID 1746

Photo by Tara Baxter

Mark Hawthorne, author of Striking at the Roots and Bleating Hearts, is one of the movement’s best and most prolific writers. We last talked to Mark on the occasion of Bleating Hearts, and caught up with him again regarding his latest book A Vegan Ethic: Embracing a Life of Compassion Toward All.

Mark is also one of the smartest humans I know, and his new book proves it. Even longtime vegans will benefit from exploring the topics in A Vegan Ethic. And yes, I know I said that about Bleating Hearts too. (Consistency is a virtue.)

We sat down to talk about the new book and some of the issues it raises.

Intersectionality is a growing buzzword amongst the animal rights community. Can you describe what intersectionality is, and do you see this movement as a positive or negative for the animal rights community? There has been pushback from some activists who feel that animal rights is such a small movement to begin with and that we should keep our focus on the animals, or that it places more emphasis on human oppression than animal oppression.

The term “intersectionality” was coined in 1989 by Dr. Kimberle Crenshaw as a way to describe the way Black women experience multiple oppressions, and so it has a very specific definition for a very specific group. Unfortunately, some people in the AR movement have appropriated the term and applied it very loosely to mean the various ways that speciesism can be connected to racism, sexism, homo-aggression, classism, ableism, sizeism, and so on.

I see the value in having a more holistic approach to animal rights—indeed, that’s the point of A Vegan Ethic—but I think we need to be very careful to not alienate other groups and movements as we do this. Black people, for instance, have long been called “animals,” “monkeys,” “beasts,” and other dehumanizing names, and we need to be sensitive to their experience and recognize that for many of them, the idea of “animal rights” might be fraught with issues. How can we expect them to feel safe in animal rights spaces when they themselves are often not considered human?

In this book I argue that being inclusive in our compassion is the only course for us to take if we want to free nonhuman animals from exploitation—that victory for the animal liberation movement will only come through working for liberation for all marginalized groups.

And, yes, not everyone in the AR movement likes the idea of giving other non-dominant groups consideration. They argue that oppressions such as sexism and racism have nothing to do with speciesism and should not be part of any discussion about veganism or animal rights. I believe this view is woefully shortsighted and damaging.

We’ve all heard vegans refer to veganism as a “cruelty-free” lifestyle in the sense that our choices don’t cause cruelty. It may be true that it is free of animal cruelty, at least when it comes to food, clothing, entertainment and products tested on animals. However, our first-world lifestyle can certainly cause cruelty to other humans: the book mentions both the treatment of farm workers as well as workers in the chocolate industry. Explain why we should stop referring to veganism as cruelty-free.

This is one of many observations for which I credit my wife, lauren Ornelas. She’s always reminding people that just because something is vegan, that doesn’t mean it’s cruelty-free. Chocolate is a great example. A vegan chocolate bar might not contain dairy, eggs, or honey, but if the cocoa beans used to make it were grown and harvested in Western Africa—where 70 percent of the world’s cocoa come from—it is very probably the product of child labor and/or slavery.

Clothing is another example that people often don’t consider. You might find a perfect-fitting pleather jacket at a great price, but if it was made under sweatshop conditions—with workers earning shamefully low wages to toil in unsafe buildings six or seven days a week—the cruelty is sewn right into the fabric.

Other vegan products that might be the result of exploitation include bananas, Coke and Pepsi drinks, coffee, wine, and anything containing palm oil. I know it sounds like I’m being extreme, but we can still enjoy almost all these things provided we do a little research first. I hope your readers will visit the Food Empowerment Project site for more information.

You say in the book that undercover investigations in factory farms and slaughterhouses have “little or no positive impact” since they often result in the arrest only of low-level workers. However, the goal of an investigation is rarely to seek prosecution for animal cruelty – in many cases thanks to Common Farming Exemptions there is no illegal activity documented anyway. You and I could argue this for hours, but, in the interest of time, can you expand on your view?

Well, please let me be clear: I have great respect for people who do undercover investigations, and I believe their efforts to bring to light what goes on behind closed doors are very important. What I object to—and I say so in the book—is the naming and shaming of low-level workers featured in many of these investigations. It’s this public ridiculing that has little or no impact, because it doesn’t get to the root of the problem. Sure, it might feel good to punish those who harm animals, yet those caught doing it are themselves being abused in a structure supported by exploitation and domination.

Remember, no one wants to work in an abattoir. Many of these people are economic refugees who have immigrated to seek a better life. They are often tricked into coming to a new country with promises of a good-paying job. Once the worker arrives, slaughterhouse employers frequently take their documents and force them to live in substandard housing without running water or adequate toilet facilities. They exist in the shadows, with no access to health care or recourse from abuse. I am not saying we should ever excuse someone for tormenting animals—or even contributing to animal agriculture—but we can show a little humanity and try to understand their circumstances.

Moreover, we as a movement alienate ourselves from other vulnerable groups when we celebrate the arrest of immigrants, missing a chance to build alliances with them.

So let’s go after the owners and managers, who are responsible for forging a chain of violence, from the helpless, abused animals forced onto the kill floor to the low-paid, abused workers who end up venting their frustration on the closest being within arm’s length. Again, I think animal abuse is abhorrent, but let’s prosecute those with the structural power here.

Photo by lauren Ornelas

The chapter on human rights is quite extensive. You cover issues such as slavery, which is sadly alive and well, as many as 30 million across the globe, despite it being illegal in every country. You point out human slaves are “employed” in agriculture and mention slaughterhouse workers, how dangerous the job is and how for many of the workers, this is the only job available to them. You ask for a level of empathy for the workers and that our anger be directed towards the industry and not the individual worker. Yet many who work in slaughterhouses show a higher propensity towards violence towards their spouses and children. How does this jibe?

Part of the answer is in your question. Animal agribusiness begets a host of domestic and societal problems, from environmental destruction to the abuse of domestic partners, children, and companion animals. I am not suggesting that slaughterhouse workers who bring violence home are blameless.

Studies and common sense tell us that slaughterhouses have a profound psychological effect on those who work in them. As I said, no one wants to be there, and the emotional toll on people who kill animals for a living can lead to drug and alcohol abuse, withdrawal from society, and PTSD. Some workers take their frustration out on loved ones.

Yes, I am asking that we show compassion for these people, and I know that’s a challenge. I am not asking that we embrace these workers and pretend that everything is fine. I am not suggesting that their actions and crimes are in any way justified because they work in an abattoir or that they shouldn’t be held accountable. I am only asking that we try to understand their circumstances and feel a bit of compassion for them. These workers are part of a massive system whose only motivation is profit. They are often physically and verbally abused themselves, and they must force themselves not to care even as they participate in or witness unending horror every day.

The book does a fantastic job connecting animal agriculture with climate change and the environment. Most of our readers are familiar with the impact of eating meat, dairy, and eggs on the environment. What is rarely talked about is environmental racism. Recently a group of primarily African-American residents of eastern North Carolina filed a class-action lawsuit against Smithfield for its practice of spraying pig waste in the surrounding communities. Can you give us another example of environmental racism as it relates to animal farming?

Fecal lagoons like the ones at the center of the lawsuit you mention are used by factory farms all over the country, and so they impact communities across the US. Animal waste is a huge problem, and one “solution” now being implemented in Maryland is to burn chicken waste—manure, bedding, feathers, and spilled feed—and turn it into energy, fertilizer, and, even feed for chickens. But these so-called “poultry litter incinerators” are highly toxic, spewing vast amounts of carbon monoxide, nitrogen oxide, carbon dioxide, and particulate matter. And can you guess where most of the incinerators are located? Right. In low-income areas and in communities of color.

One area that was enlightening to me was ecofeminism, how we view environmental issues and gender issues. The stereotypical male urge to go out and “conquer” nature is similar to the male urge to conquer women. Please share more about ecofeminism, and how it connects to an animal rights and a vegan ethic.

There are many interpretations of what ecofeminism is, but at its core ecofeminism sees the environment as a feminist issue and links the oppression of women and the oppression of nature. More recently, some ecofeminists have gone further and said that the oppression of nature is also linked to people of color, LGBTQ, and other non-dominant groups. One way ecofeminism suggests we approach this link—the approach I discuss in the book—is to examine and dismantle the value dualisms that are used to divide the world into opposing pairs of concepts, where the first concept is given greater value than the second one, which is discriminated against: male/female, human/animal, mind/body, reason/emotion, and so on.

Through such thinking, nature is something men, especially white men, believe they must master, and these men also want to objectify and dominate women, people of color, and animals. So we have this “good/bad” logic being used to support systems of oppression beyond the exploitation of the environment to include sexism, racism, and speciesism. Men turn nature into a resource to be consumed, in the same way they treat women. Ecofeminism shines a spotlight on these dualisms and encourages us to think critically about humanity’s role in the systematic subordination of other humans and the environment.

I recommend that anyone interested in an in-depth discussion on this topic read Ecofeminism, edited by Carol Adams and Lori Gruen.

It’s widely noted, with your book being no exception, that the animal rights movement is chiefly led by white men even though the great majority of activists are predominantly white women. It is women who are frequently objectified in the name of fighting speciesism, and featured in sexist campaigns promoting animal rights. How would you like to see women’s roles shift in the movement?

I want women—all women—to be treated with the respect they deserve and not as sex objects or people whose opinions have little or no value. When we consider the early history of our movement, we see so many women at the forefront. Frances Power Cobbe, Caroline Earle White, Lizzy Lind-af-Hageby, Charlotte Despard, Anna Kingsford, and Annie Besant, to name a few. And most of these women saw the connections among oppressions; they were not only animal advocates, but agitators for suffrage and women’s rights, child protection, workers’ rights, and peace.

The role of powerful women continues today, of course. There are a lot of women leading animal protection organizations around the world, including sanctuaries, shelters, and humane societies, but I don’t see them being given the level of respect that male leaders receive. For her insightful book Women and the Animal Rights Movement, Emily Gaarder interviewed dozens of women, and she found a distinct gendered division of labor and leadership. She says many women are frustrated to be working behind the scenes, getting the job done, while the movement’s men take advantage of their male privilege and grab the limelight. Women often take a back seat while men dominate the “front lines” and are hailed as “heroes.”

I would like to see more women, especially women of color, given a more prominent role in animal rights organizations and conferences. At nearly every event we see the same speakers—too often white men—and this has got to change. On conference panels, I would like to see men not interrupt women or mansplain. Few things make a man look more like a jerk than this.

And related to this, I would like to see the men in this movement who sexually harass or assault women held accountable. There should be no place here for sexism, racism, homo-aggression, or other acts of violence and discrimination. Every animal protection organization should adopt and enforce a zero-tolerance policy on sexual harassment. We need to make it safe for women to speak out.

You write about single-issue activism, not in the sense of single-issue campaigns, but on only one social justice issue. Can you describe the difference, and why you see single-issue activism as so problematic?

Right. When we hear the words “single-issue activism,” most of us probably think of a campaign with a narrow focus. I have no problem with such activism. If someone is campaigning against the circus, for instance, it doesn’t necessarily mean they are OK with zoos or marine parks. I was recently part of a successful effort to get Whole Foods Markets to stop selling bunny meat. We weren’t saying that rabbits deserve protection over other animals; we were just trying to stop the company from adding yet another animal to the long list of animals they, like most markets, exploit. We realized that Whole Foods is a trendsetter, and if they continued, other companies would likely begin selling rabbits.

What I have a problem with are animal rights or vegan campaigns that are so single-minded that they blatantly ignore other animals or they alienate or offend other marginalized groups. A couple of the examples I give in the book are calls to boycott Canadian “seafood” until Canada stops killing seals, and using sexist messages in an anti-bullfighting campaign. The AR movement also has a bad habit of demonizing other cultures in their campaigns—China and Japan come to mind, though there are many others.

I think this type of single-issue activism is problematic because focusing on only one social justice issue ignores and marginalizes other people and groups, and it prevents us from building coalitions with other movements.

By the same token, shouldn’t environmental activists, feminist activists, LGBTQ activists, et al include animal rights in their respective agendas? Take the rape and exploitation of female nonhuman animals, particularly for eggs and dairy. Many of us wish to see this framed as a feminist issue, so that perhaps more women would be aware of the impact of their choices on female animals. Let’s just say bringing up this subject generally results in a beatdown, at least on social media. How should we ask those in other social justice movements for more consideration?

I fully endorse the goal of having other marginalized groups make the connection between the oppression they suffer and the oppression of animals, but we need to meet people halfway. More than halfway, in fact. Be a good ally and support another group’s agenda, not because you see an opportunity to advance the interests of animals, but because you genuinely see the injustice the other group suffers. Your values, including your veganism, will come through, so you don’t need to push it.

As activists, we need to temper our outreach with a heavy dose of understanding here. In the case of feminism, it’s important to recognize that some feminists regard veganism as ethnocentric or elitist. Also, animal-related words have historically been used to dehumanize women: “cow,” “bitch,” “beaver,” “chick,” “shrew,” and so on. So, the campaign for women’s rights was based in part on the premise that women were intellectual beings like men, not animals. Keep in mind, too, that many people equate the animal rights movement with the objectification of women and with tactics that use body shaming. Given all this, I think it’s easy to see why feminists might not be eager to embrace veganism or animal rights.

Although I get the connection between feminism and the products of cows and hens—what Carol Adams termed “feminized protein”—perhaps a better tactic would be to show feminists the links between animal rights and patriarchy … how the treatment animals parallels the treatment of women in this system of domination, beyond eggs and dairy.

I’d like to add here that the animal rights movement can be exclusionary, and one example is the way we present the egg-and-milk argument in persuading women to go vegan. The problem with this is that when we say women have a biological reason to support animal rights, we exclude and offend those trans people who identify as female but whose bodies do not possess female reproductive organs and mammary glands. There’s a recent article by Mahealani Joy that goes into more detail about this. It’s an example of something I am learning about, too.

Non-vegans like to make excuses for why they eat animals and their excretions. In the book you mention the four excuses that non-vegans make, also known as “the four N’s.” I don’t know if it’s the same study you cited, but it’s the same scientist, Jared Piazza, who showed non-vegans appear not to be motivated by moral or ethical considerations, and information doesn’t have much of an impact on them. Enough about a vegan ethic; please tell me you’ve come up with an ethical bypass for non-vegans. How are we supposed to make any headway if non-vegans don’t care about ethics or information?

Right, same researcher, but a different study. Jared Piazza—who is a vegan, by the way—does a lot of research around the public’s view of meat and animals, and he believes the answer to why more people aren’t vegan is that people really, really like eating meat, and this makes them less receptive to messages about farmed animals. After all his studies, in which he concludes most meat-eaters are especially sensitive to criticism and don’t want to change their habits, Piazza says that perhaps our best approach as advocates is to reach people before they are in a defensive state. This might mean pointing out all the wonderful meatless foods they already enjoy. He also suggests we not be overt in our persuasion tactics, as people generally don’t like to feel they are being persuaded.

The good news is that even diehard meat-eaters can and do transition to veganism all the time. I think the sweet spot in animal advocacy lies somewhere between compassionate, nonjudgmental outreach and helping people access the tools they need to prepare healthy vegan food. Once people don’t feel censured for their habits, they’re going to be more open to learning. And once they learn how delicious and satisfying vegan foods are, they will discover a world of choices they never imagined.

I wish had a better answer, since knowing the most effective way to get people to make the switch is pretty much the Holy Grail of animal activism, but I don’t right now. That’s why we have to keep working at it.

I learned a lot about compassion from reading your book. Who knew that there are studies that show that having compassion towards others increases our happiness and health, and makes us less inclined to be fearful of life’s pains? It also doubles your body’s level of DHEA (the anti-aging hormone). And here I thought a vegan diet was the reason we’re aging so well. To end on a positive note, tell us more about the importance of compassion.

Clearly, compassion motivates many of us to go vegan, because we do not want to cause any harm to animals. But it’s also important for us to feel compassion for other humans, even those who exploit animals. I know this is extremely challenging for us, but I believe absolutely that we will not achieve full liberation for nonhuman animals if we do not have compassion for all.

I’ll talk briefly about a couple of other studies I found when I was writing the book. One revealed that people who volunteer have longer life spans than those who don’t, but that longevity is only the result of volunteering for altruistic reasons, not self-serving ones. Another study demonstrated this on a cellular level. It found that people who have high levels of hedonic happiness, which we get from just having a good time, also had high levels of the cellular inflammation that promotes the growth of cancer cells and plaque in the arteries that can lead to heart disease. On the other hand, the study found that people who have high levels of what is known as eudaimonic happiness, which comes from living a life of purpose, had low levels of this inflammation.

One of the best ways I’ve found for nurturing compassion for those who are not vegan is to remember that almost all of us grew up eating animals, often three times a day. So put yourself in their shoes. Find common ground with people.

I think most activists practice compassion whenever they do outreach, and they may not even know it. Sharing vegan food, listening to a meat-eater’s point of view, giving someone a vegan cookbook—these are all examples of compassion in action. Thich Nhat Hanh—a Buddhist teacher who walks the talk by being vegan—put it beautifully when he said, “Compassion is a verb.”

How can my readers support your work?

I would love it if your readers would seek out and support the work of activists who recognize how all inequities are linked and are doing something about it. People like lauren Ornelas of Food Empowerment Project, pattrice jones of VINE Sanctuary, Dr. Breeze Harper of Sistah Vegan Project, Aph Ko of Black Vegans Rock, Brenda Sanders of PEP Foods, Dr. Lori Gruen of Wesleyan University, Carol J. Adams, and the late Marti Kheel. I have so much admiration and respect for these individuals, and I am trying to amplify their voices. Thank you!

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Post ID 1736

Ginny Messina, MPH, RD has written ten books for vegans including Vegan for Life, Vegan for Her, and most recently Even Vegans Die. She writes and speaks about vegan nutrition, preventing ex-vegans, and the importance of body positivity in the vegan community. She is co-author of the first vegetarian textbook for health professionals, The Dietitian’s Guide to Vegetarian Diets, and publishes articles on plant-based nutrition and soy nutrition in the medical literature.

Ginny is my go-to for all things vegan diet and health-related. Her work is focused on research-based information, not on what sounds best or will attract the most people through the health angle. While her background is in the field of health research, Ginny is an animal rights activist through and through. You can read my past interview with Ginny here where we discuss her book Vegan For Life. (She is also the source of one of my all-time favorite vegan quotes, about the insanity of some health vegans: “Ten billion animals live and die under the most horrible conditions imaginable in the United States every year. So obviously, our efforts should focus on getting people to consume less…olive oil?”)

Ginny’s latest book, Even Vegans Die, co-authored with Carol J. Adams and Patti Breitman, is an important addition to the animal rights literature. I cannot recommend this book enough. Ginny was kind enough to agree to an interview to discuss the book.

What was the motivation behind writing the book? How did such an A-list team of authors get assembled?

Carol, Patti and I go way back. Patti was my literary agent for my first book published in 1994. And I provided content for one of Carol’s books shortly after that. More recently, we collaborated on our book Never Too Late to Go Vegan, which is for vegans over the age of 50.

This new book, Even Vegans Die, took us in an entirely new direction, obviously. It came about largely because of worrisome conversations we observed on social media. In particular, we saw that many vegans have unrealistic expectations about the health benefits of a vegan diet, which gives rise to a whole host of problems in the vegan community. For example, it can deter vegans from making appropriate health care decisions for themselves. It also gives rise to shaming when vegans get sick.

And we also realized that while planning for the future – such as having a will – is relevant to everyone, there are some especially important considerations for vegans. Basically, we wrote this book because we believe that addressing these issues creates a stronger and more compassionate activist community right now, and it also helps vegans protect their legacies far into the future.

A lot of vegans believe that they are immune to getting sick, especially when it comes to heart disease, diabetes, and certain cancers. This is perpetuated by medical doctors and health “experts” in the plant-based medical world, and amplified by an even louder choir in the community saying veganism is a panacea for all health conditions. There is this notion that a plant-based diet is the “perfect” diet. You on the other hand talk about how this sets up veganism to fail. Can you talk to this, and a bit about the credible research behind vegan diets?

The evidence in favor of cutting back on animal foods and replacing them with plants is pretty impressive. But that points us toward a wide range of healthful plant-based diets including traditional Japanese and Mediterranean diets and lacto-ovo vegetarian patterns. We don’t have a whole lot of data showing that vegan diets have health advantages over other plant-based patterns. That’s okay, because a vegan diet is at least as healthy as these other diets and it has clear ethical advantages over any other dietary pattern in the world.

Many vegans aren’t satisfied with that, though, and want to ascribe curative powers to a vegan diet that just haven’t been seen in the research. Like the idea that a whole foods vegan diet guarantees that you won’t get diabetes or that eating this way can reverse cancer, or produce eternal youthfulness and boundless energy. Promoting these kinds of ideas undermines our credibility so it’s bad for the movement in general. And when people find out that a vegan diet may not actually provide all of the health benefits they expected, they are likely to view veganism as a failed experiment. It’s one reason that many people return to eating animal foods.

I’ve covered fat shaming in the community here, here and here. In the book you talk about disease shaming, which is shaming vegans for their illnesses and making them feel alienated from the vegan community. A lot of vegans are afraid to talk about their diseases for fear of veganism looking unhealthy to nonvegans. On the other hand, some vegans are afraid of talking about their health issues for fear of judgments from other vegans, such as you must not be doing it right, eating oil, sugar and salt, etc. Others are told to keep it to themselves or worse to stay away from activism because they make us look bad. Can you talk more about disease shaming?

Yes, disease shaming arises out of this false idea that we know exactly how to prevent every single disease – and therefore, if someone gets sick, it’s their own fault. In some ways, it reflects our universal fear of death. We want to believe that we have complete control over our health, and knowing a vegan who has cancer or some other serious disease challenges the whole idea of that control. So we deal with it by deciding that it won’t happen to us because that other person was doing something wrong. That is, they were eating the wrong kind of vegan diet. Their own actions and choices caused their disease.

This kind of blaming and shaming people for their illnesses is far too common in the vegan community. When we were writing this book, we spoke with vegans who had all types of chronic diseases and many of them told us how alienated they felt from other activists because of their illness. They felt embarrassed to admit that they were sick or that they were using conventional treatments for their condition. Some of them had experienced outright blame from other vegans and some said that other vegans insisted that they must have “cheated” and eaten meat.

Aside from the fact that these kinds of views about who can and can’t get sick are incredibly naïve, they are also extraordinarily unkind. We need to recognize that our knowledge about the causes of disease is imperfect. And that people who are sick – vegan or not –need compassion, not judgment.

What does an ethic of care look like and why is it important to the vegan community?

An ethic of care derives from feminist theory, and we suggested that a vegan ethic of care is central to animal activism. It involves first and foremost extending care and attention to anyone who is suffering. This includes both the animals for whom we advocate and also for other vegans. An ethic of care also includes activism of any kind – everything from leafletting to adopting rescued animals to creating good vegan food. It also asks us to accept our grief and acknowledge our mourning for animals which can be hard to do in a society that doesn’t value animals’ lives. It’s important to do this, though, because it helps legitimize our response to what happens to animals. Finally, a vegan ethic of care recognizes our interdependency. We need to view ourselves as those who offer care to others – animals and humans – and are also willing to receive care from others. These four components of a vegan ethic of care – attention to the suffering of others, activism, acceptance of grief, and acknowledgement of our interdependency – provide a framework for an effective animal advocacy movement.

You have some great advice in the book for when someone you love has a serious illness or is dying. In fact, you have 23 points. Maybe you can pick out the top three, and why they are so important.

I think that those 23 points can easily be condensed into three important ones. First, don’t shame or blame the person who is sick. This means, don’t try to figure out why they got sick, maybe pointing out the parts of their diet that weren’t (in your opinion) good choices. Don’t tell them how to get better. Saying “I know someone who cured their cancer with a raw foods diet,” translates to “you’d probably get better if you’d be willing to eat a raw foods diet.” This imposes blame on the person who, on top of having cancer, now has to feel guilty about not doing what you think they should do to cure it.

Second, don’t make this about you. When someone is seriously ill they need support and help. It’s not their job to provide you with insights about what it’s like to have a serious or terminal illness. It’s not fair to expect them to reassure you about how they are doing, or to offer you the opportunity for closure by visiting them. They may want you to visit, but that has to be up to them. You are there (or not there, depending on their wishes) to support and care, and the needs and desires of the person who is sick take precedence over your own needs.

Finally, offer whatever practical help you can. Sometimes it’s by providing direct help to the person who is sick and sometimes it’s by providing support for those doing direct care. You can bring vegan food for the caregivers, walk the dogs, take animals to the vet, do the grocery shopping, feed the colony of community cats who depend on the person who is sick, or mow the lawn.

In a nutshell, when someone is seriously ill, your responsibility is to put that person first, do whatever you can to help, and to take great care to avoid any kind of judgment or opinions about why they got sick.

We lost one of our movement’s best and brightest lights when Lisa Shapiro died of cancer. Thank you for including her story. Your chapter on how to cope when you have a terminal illness includes some points that are specific to vegans facing terminal illness. Can you share a few tips?

One particular dilemma for a vegan with a serious illness is that most available medications and treatments have been tested on animals. Since vegans take a strong stance against animal testing it might feel hypocritical to make use of those medications and treatments when we need them. But it’s not. Vegans strive to avoid all uses of animals wherever possible. When it comes to diet, clothing and entertainment, it’s nearly always possible to avoid products of animal exploitation because we have so many alternatives. But other areas are trickier. There are times when there is no vegan option and that’s often true in the treatment of serious diseases. It’s perfectly appropriate to take advantage of the only treatment available while also advocating for alternatives to animal testing in the hope that in the future, others will have the choices that you don’t have now.

I really enjoyed the chapter on mourning and grief. Grief is such an individual and mysterious experience. I like that you included a section on losing an animal companion, as well as how animals grieve. Losing a companion animal is one of the most difficult experiences we undergo. I think a lot of that is due to the closeness of the bond. Can you share your thoughts?

I think one hard thing about this particular grieving process is that our society doesn’t really give us permission to grieve the loss of a companion animal. We’re allowed to be sad, but expected to bounce back pretty quickly because “it’s only an animal.” We live in a society that doesn’t really honor the closeness of that bond. Grief feels that much harder when it’s not recognized.

And really, this is sort of an extension of what we experience as animal activists. We are more or less in constant mourning for the suffering and death of animals. In our book, we talked about the fact that we live and work in the midst of huge losses that touch us deeply, but that the rest of the world doesn’t recognize. Losing a companion animal may feel different –it’s a more personal and acute loss – from how we mourn for the suffering of animals in general, but the societal context is the same.

Non-vegans love their companion animals, too, of course, but their relationship to animals overall is different from ours. This is one reason why it is so important for us to support each other in the loss of an animal. Send a card, make a contribution in the animal’s memory, bring a vegan mac ‘n cheese casserole – all the things that people do when a human dies. It can help to assuage some of the loneliness involved in grieving for animals.

That brings up two key issues that are perhaps different for us compared to non-activists: protecting those companion animals and ensuring that we are leaving money to the organizations we care about. I recently read that 500,000 companion animals end up in shelters each year because they outlive their guardians – presumably no one stepped up to care for them. (We have a PetWill for Freddie.) Can you comment on why wills, trusts, and legacies are so extremely important for adults of any age with animals to care for?

Anyone who has ever worked or volunteered in an animal shelter knows how heartbreaking it is when an animal arrives because their guardian has died. It’s awful for the animals of course, and most likely the person who died would be devastated to know that their beloved animal ended up in a shelter. It’s absolutely crucial for anyone with companion animals or who cares for homeless animals to have a will and to include provisions for their animals in that will. This means identifying the person or people who will care for your animals and making sure they have the resources to do so. It’s not at all unusual to do this and there is actually standard legal language to cover the care of companion animals. This is one of many reasons why it’s important for vegans, no matter how much or how little money they may have, to have a will. It’s essential for all adults.

What one piece of advice would you like to hammer home to vegans, if they can’t or won’t lay hands on the book?

Anyone can get sick and we are all going to die. Our activism is strengthened and enhanced when we acknowledge this and act on it by extending compassion toward other vegans and by making plans to continue our legacy for animals after we die.

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Post ID 1723

Author and activist Jan Smitowicz’s recently released book Rebel Hell: Disabled Vegan Goes to Prison tracks his two years in an Illinois state prison, and exposes some of the corruption and idiosyncrasy of the American justice system. Following his first self-published animal rights-focused work at ten years old, he went on to publication in Earth First! Journal, Green Theory and Praxis Journal, Louisiana English Journal, and The Animals’ Voice magazine. Aside from a vegan and prison survivor, Jan is a longtime social justice activist, former undercover animal cruelty investigator, Hurricane Katrina relief worker, and “proud father of a vasectomy.” He is also the father of two novels, Orange Rain and Redwood Falls, and has a B.A. in English Literature and Creative Writing from UC Irvine, one of Gary’s alma maters.

We hooked up with Jan to discuss Rebel Hell and his work.

You’re known (to our readers, anyway) as an animal and earth rights activist, but you were popped on a drug-related offense during a transport you undertook for financial reasons. I think people will find it surprising that you weren’t arrested for, say, freeing 700 minks or tree spiking. Can you set that scene a little bit? I don’t want people to get the wrong impression, that your prison stint was connected to your animal or eco activism.

Well, the full story is more complex; it goes [far] beyond prosaic financial reasons and into the realm of actual survival. I’ve been disabled with a severe nerve pain condition since 2008, but got denied for Social Security Disability twice – despite the support of all my doctors. The goal of Social Security seems clear: not to help people who need help, but to find any way possible to deny that help. In other words, a typical “Bureaucrazy,” as I refer to them in the memoir; a social mechanism used to best control large numbers of people [made necessary by overpopulation!], one that I rage against thoroughly.

In the six months leading up to my fateful decision to accept that job hauling medical-grade marijuana cross-country – for which I’d be paid three times more money than I’d ever seen in my life – I struggled monetarily so much that I had difficulty even procuring groceries! Having done undercover animal cruelty investigations and other stuff, I’m supremely confident in my ability to act unfazed in high-pressure situations. Accepting the job was an easy choice.

I would like to point out, though, that I truly felt [and feel] my muling was a good deed: getting organic plant-medicine to people who otherwise might not be able to find it. Also, any time even one person substitutes animal-tested pharmaceuticals with organic cannabis, the animals benefit to some degree, right? And I surely helped hundreds of people do that, based on sheer volume and probability alone. Finally, the specific “crime” I was caught for may not’ve been directly related to animal liberation, but the memoir I painstakingly wrenched forth from the situation damn sure is!

Let’s talk a bit about prison life as a vegan. We’ve heard from Walter Bond and a few others who have done time, but we don’t get too deeply into the experience of surviving (I won’t say “living”) vegan inside. There are ample resources online on how to achieve a semblance of nourishment, but what social impacts did you experience?

For you kids out there, those are records.

My being vegan only furthered the already-wide social chasm between myself and most other prisoners [given how relatively educated and politically experienced and well-read I am, et cetera]. Differences that also include my white skin. Because – as I try desperately throughout the book to examine and conclude why/how American prisons maintain their stupendous racial disparities – black people comprise only about 15% of Illinois’s civilian population, yet they make up some 60 percent of the state’s prisons!

Anyway, in my experience, being vegan was actually one of my most insignificant difficulties. AFTER the initial month, at least; I spent the first two weeks in County Jail and then two more in a 24-hour-lockdown supermax-type prison, where we festered in unthinkable misery waiting to be transferred to a proper longterm facility. I shriveled down by 19 pounds during that 27-day period – meaning I sloughed off two pounds every three days. Once I survived that, though, it was a relative vegan-cakewalk. The worst part was probably how I had to claim a relevant religion and meet with the chaplain before I could start receiving the designated vegan tray. So absurd: you couldn’t get it for health or ethical reasons, but only if this or that antiquated fantasy-text supported it. Socially, guys seemed to view vegetarianism and veganism as the behavior of either a total kook or a religious zealot [if you can tell the difference], and therefore outside their realm of true understanding. I did have profound, even life-changing impacts on the few people I considered legit friends. One guy had his entire worldview blasted apart when I helped open his eyes to the ghastly, horrific world imposed upon animals by humans and our greed, gluttony, and sheer numeric excess.

At least once that stands out to me, you liken the prison transfer experience moving from cage to cage to factory farming, with the caveat that animals who go through this are entirely innocent. I’m sure there is more you can say on this, so, now’s your chance.

Every single day, 99.999 percent [if not more] of nonhuman animals live in conditions more appalling than anything that’s ever happened at Abu Ghraib, North Korean prison camps, and – yes – places like the Warsaw Ghetto and Treblinka. As the great and heroic Jewish writer Isaac Bashevis Singer wrote [paraphrasing for reasons of time and laziness]: To animals, all men are Nazis; for them, it is an eternal Treblinka. At the core though, American prisons and factory farms operate on the same basic principles – willfully, even desperately disregarding the individuals’ personhood and then “processing” as many of them as possible, as quickly and efficiently as possible – no matter what abominable suffering it causes.

This also happens to be the entire industrial/bureaucratic model of civilization in a nutshell, and I don’t think that’s a coincidence. Every act of control and dominance is inseparably entangled. Which is why human liberation is animal liberation is earth liberation [or is it the other way around?].

You and I primarily connected through antinatalist circles because we are both passionate about the impact of overpopulation on animals and the earth. According to the very credible 2013 survey of vegans by M. Butterflies Katz only 13 percent of us are now raising, or have successfully raised, vegan children. At the other end of the spectrum, almost 39 percent of us are childfree and plan to stay that way, while about 33 percent said they are undecided about having children in the future. For those who are on the fence – that 33 percent – help me sway them against breeding more humans, and towards adoption if they feel moved to become a parent.

It should be the easiest thing in the world for vegans to understand: “Don’t Breed or Buy While Shelter Animals Die” is more than equally applicable for creating new humans. Maybe “Don’t Breed or Try While Adoptable Children Cry”? Still trying to perfect that one.

Anyway, we have an ethical duty to reduce our collective harm on animals; overpopulation [and consumption, as the two are inextricably linked] is their worst enemy. Every new first-world human birthed is another acre of wild land – animals’ homes – that gets bulldozed for housing, industry, and agriculture. Plus there is of course no guarantee kids will stay vegan. There’s a Facebook page called Vegan Army Fails documenting countless examples. Meanwhile, there are kids already here and yearning for a loving forever home; 415,000 foster children in America alone. Adoption seems like a sort of measuring stick for how much you truly love kids. You might even save a child from ghastly situations of physical/sexual abuse! Do the math. It’s not calculus, but basic arithmetic.

I might be one of those people you say should walk the plank but I’m not a fan of recreational marijuana. As for medical marijuana, I’d like to see a bigger emphasis on the “medical” part, but that speaks more to the current permissive system in many states for self-diagnosing and self-dosing, and speaks less to the medical value of the drug itself. And I beg for better standards to measure impairment. For example in Washington state, fatal car crashes caused by driving while high doubled after legalization. Can you give a quick primer on marijuana laws, and for skeptics like me, do you see ways this system can be improved?

There’s a very important problem here I want to address first: The information in that link is questionable at best. Marijuana can stay in your system for weeks, even months depending on usage. It’s not like alcohol, where you can perform a breathalyzer or other test and find how much alcohol is in a person’s system and thereby directly approximate the quantity consumed that day, the amount of impairment in that moment. Alcohol and marijuana are two wildly different drugs, and cannot be treated otherwise.

In any case, of course more fatal car crash drivers had weed in their system – it’s legal and easily available there now! But as I demonstrated above, having detectable marijuana in your system means little to nothing. I wonder how many of those people with detectable pot were also drunk? Because if they were, and I’d bet vital parts of my anatomy that a majority of them were indeed, alcohol impairs most people in ways incomparable to marijuana.

Okay. So pot is illegal, and remains stigmatized, due in large part to the perfervidly aggressive campaigns of 1920s and ’30s Americans driven to hysteria by the sensationalist “Yellow Journalism” of William Randolph Hearst’s newspaper empire. His fortune, not at all coincidentally, was also built in part on the obliteration of ancient old-growth forests for the timber – Hearst saw hemp, and by extension marijuana [read: the two are variations of the same plant species, and back then “hemp” was the most common term for cannabis in political discourse], as a direct threat to his unimaginable fortune.

Enter Harry Anslinger, a racist scumbag moron of the “highest” order [NPI – No Pun Intended]. He was the first commissioner of the U.S. Federal Bureau of Narcotics, a spot he transitioned into straight from the Department of Prohibition when that ended. Strangely, he’s on record as saying marijuana is all but harmless – but then alcohol prohibition ceased and he needed a new target. He changed his tune rather dramatically, saying pot was “More hellish than heroin” and falsely linking it to 200 gruesome crimes. He also placed large emphasis on the perception that weed was popular with blacks and other minorities; in one article, he wrote, “Colored students at the Univ. of Minn. partying with (white) female students, smoking [marijuana] and getting their sympathy with stories of racial persecution. Result: pregnancy.”

Marijuana and other drugs are utilized by the mangled insatiable maw of the “Justice” System and Prison-Industrial Complex as a convenient mechanism – a weapon – with which to target and incarcerate people of color, mostly black men. I show this pretty damn conclusively in Rebel Hell, but for now I’ll just provide two facts: [1] blacks and whites use drugs at the same rate, but blacks are more likely several times over to be arrested and locked up on nonviolent drug charges; [2] blacks receive far harsher punishments on average for those same nonviolent drug crimes.

As far as the medical cannabis system goes, the DEA and lawmakers ultimately deserve 100 percent of the blame for whatever problems exist therein. If marijuana were legal and regulated like alcohol [or at the very least decriminalized], most of these problems would evaporate. To be honest – even though I’m disabled and drug abuse directly impacts my ability to smoothly receive proper health care – I have no real issue with people who don’t quite need pot medicinally, yet work the system to acquire cannabis cards. Why? Because medical marijuana functions in part as a sort of stopgap measure to counteract America’s bullshit drug policies and systemic racism; I celebrate its existence for those reasons alone. They would be justification enough for me.

But on top of all that, there are legit hordes of people with medical issues who eschew animal-tested pharmaceuticals in favor of those lovely flower buds. I assure you this is true. Like my wife’s father, who took anti-seizure pills for 30 years but still had regular grand mal episodes…until medical pot was legalized and he started growing/smoking it, after which he had zero seizures for the final 15 years of his life. The system has its flaws – just like every other system within our unsustainably populated human world – but it’s a damn sight better than the alternative of total prohibition. This society needs to get off its pseudo-puritanical trip and let adults enjoy their bodies however they want as long as it doesn’t harm others!

Given your past, do you ever butt heads with the straight-edge vegan community? Do you have a ‘read’ on the SxE contingent vis-à-vis health, activism, advocacy?

It’s happened. Not often though, I’d guess primarily because my wife and I are misanthropes of the highest order [pun definitely intended], mostly preferring the company of each other and our two perfect doggers to any human – though we do utterly adore our handful of close friends, most if not all of whom also partake in the devil’s lettuce. I have had many straight-edge friends. I’ve protested with many others. The only problem I have is that some of them can be absurdly dogmatic – looking down on you just for enjoying the occasional intoxicant. It’s silly.

There were a few very very hardcore straight-edge people I protested alongside quite often back when I first started about a decade ago; the topic came up and I expressed my personal hatred for alcohol. But I’ve always worn my bong on my sleeve, if you will [a conscious choice taken by myself and other vegan friends to play a part in normalizing others to marijuana usage]. Even though I totally agreed with them about alcohol, they somehow saw me as a hypocrite because I didn’t eschew pot as well.

It comes down to this: Just leave adults alone about their personal choices! We have bigger battles. Let’s fight those together first. The animals and their planet don’t have time for petty human drama – let’s achieve some serious shit for them, and then maybe our personal differences will matter a little. Maybe.

Speaking of subcultures, let me call out the phrase “disabled vegan” in the title of your book. Most readers know my husband has cerebral palsy and while we haven’t talked a lot about ableism in the AR movement per se, we have talked a lot about general body-shaming. It has even compelled Gary to wonder if, given his physical limitations, body-shamers consider him a liability to the cause because he lacks that “perfect, healthy vegan body.” As another disabled vegan, what is your perspective?

First I just need to say that I love this question, and so appreciate your asking it! My opinion is the animals need everything and everyone possible on their side. If anybody thinks their body is best for veganism, I have two suggestions for them: [1] Go liberate some animals if you’re so physically gifted instead of sitting around stroking your ego; [2] Get fucked. “It takes all kinds,” as a friend always says.

In fact, it’s pretty obvious to me that having every sort of body type involved in animal rights is an overwhelmingly positive thing. Don’t we want EVERYONE to be vegan? It’s like my dear personal friend Bob Linden of Go Vegan Radio says [paraphrasing with my more creative words]: Americans seem to gravitate toward obesity, so he wants to show that you can be vegan and still keep the fat on.

Personally, my disability has made me far more conscious of yet further atrocities perpetrated by the American Bureaucrazy – and hence even more critical of it. It’s no accident or marketing ploy that Rebel Hell’s subtitle contains the words Disabled and Vegan. I attempt to demonstrate how prison is actually a stunningly accurate microcosm of the “Free World.” The discrimination and neglect I experienced in regard to my medical condition inside the razor-wire fences was almost identical to what I’ve been through outside, except completely out in the open and unambiguous in prison. This memoir highlights the seminal importance of language and words – what we choose to say, when and how and where, the context – and part of all that is how precisely we choose to advocate for those who have little to no voice. People with severe disabilities – like me and several close Facebook friends and [I imagine] like Gary – struggle just to get by on a daily basis, far more than most people probably realize.

Social justice issues benefit greatly from having such people on board; we prove that you can face monumental personal challenges yet nonetheless thrive on a vegan diet [similar to gluten-free and soy-free vegans’ devotion]; even more significantly, we show how you can still advocate for others’ rights while simultaneously fighting for your own rights – and even survival! How is this anything other than a win-win?!

This isn’t necessarily connected to the book, but you’ve said your experience volunteering after Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans was seminal to your activism. Can you give us a glimpse into this?

Jan and dogger Jamie

It was politically the first real thing I did for the sole sake of doing something good and right. The situation there – its shocking poverty, the near-nonpresence of federal aid even six months after the storm, and how it all connected so clearly to the area’s black-majority population – unlocked and opened the door to my political radicalization. We Common Ground volunteers protested a property owner who was illegally and unethically evicting tenants who’d been displaced by the storm. My very first protest. Outside the bar owned by that slumlord where we protested, the National Guard stood nearby holding M16s. They weren’t protecting local residents from being illegally evicted, but they were protecting that rich guy’s property! Another microcosm of American society.

It may sound strange, but in Rebel Hell I explain how my volunteering trips to New Orleans after Katrina would’ve never happened if I hadn’t gone vegetarian earlier that year [2005]. Becoming vegetarian gave me the courage and self-confidence to do anything I set my mind to [which naturally included going vegan in early 2006], no matter how ostensibly daunting. Katrina fueled the decision to devote my life to activism.

We’ve got a link below to your website, but aside from that, how can readers best support your work? Also, if there are any deep green, deep antinatalist, or deep AR references you’d like people to know about, now’s the chance to spill.

I desperately need the support of my peers if I’m ever gonna be able to take my uncompromising messages to a larger, non-niche audience. Check out the different titles I have available on Amazon [if you simply search “smitowicz,” the only results are my material], post reviews on Amazon and/or Goodreads, subscribe to my author newsletter via my website, and [this one may be most important of all] spread the word! A groundswell of grassroots support could elevate Rebel Hell into the stratosphere – where I and many others believe it belongs.

In terms of other works, Terrorists or Freedom Fighters and Igniting a Revolution – which are, respectively, animal liberation- and earth liberation-related collections of essays by activists and/or academics, edited by Steven Best and Anthony Nocella – are without question two of the most critically important, necessary books out there. As activists, we need to be much more well versed regarding movement history. How can people who don’t know a lick about the history of animal rights form any sort of respectable, informed opinion on strategy? If you don’t know about people like Henry Spira, Rod Coronado, Marius Mason, Jeff “Free” Luers, and the SHAC7, you’re doing the animals a disservice; you’re hindering your ability to fully grasp the historical and potential efficacy of various tactics and strategies. Green is the New Red by Will Potter, Free the Animals by Ingrid Newkirk about the ALF, Endgame by Derrick Jensen, My Name is Chellis and I’m in Recovery from Western Civilization by Chellis Glendinning, and Flaming Arrows by Rod Coronado are also way up high in importance. I also have a few quick and little-known but very very critical movie recommendations, most if not all of which can be found on YouTube: Lethal Medicine [still the best documentary ever about animal testing], PickAxe from CrimethInc., Sharkwater, and Testify! Ecodefense and the Politics of Violence. Having said that, I respectfully but vehemently implore you to read more – I promise you can find the time if you try, and your life will be far better for it.

For more from Jan, and to follow his blog, visit http://jansmitowicz.com.

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Post ID 1694

Constantin Philippou is a self-taught vegan street artist better known as “Le Fou” (#L3Fu) – “the crazy” in French. Born in Greece, raised in Paris, and currently living in Los Angeles, he has spent his life so far experiencing and being influenced by different cultures and artistic works.

After discovering the living conditions of animals in factory farms, the theme of his work has become mixing famous icons with vegan messages through pop art, combining his passion for animals and justice.

Currently in Los Angeles, his now-iconic “Vegan Club” posters sport portraits of well-known figures. I met Le Fou recently, and was pleased he agreed to an interview.

Please share your vegan story. How long have you been vegan and what inspired you to go vegan?

I have been vegan for five years now and I was vegetarian ten years before that. Funny thing is that my dogs made me vegetarian. Fifteen years ago, while driving back from Vegas, I got stuck in standstill traffic with my dogs for two hours due to an accident. It was so hot that I had to keep my car running and keep the AC on to cool my dogs.

After an hour, I noticed that the huge truck next to me was filled with pigs. I felt horrible for them being all cramped in this hot weather and I thought, “how come I feed my silly dogs while this smarter animal is treated like crap?” So I decided at that moment to not feed my pets any animal products again. A week later, I followed suit since every time I was cooking meat, my dogs went nuts and did not want to torture them now that they were vegans.

Becoming vegan took me longer. I always thought, “well I am not killing them!” The truth is that these animals have it worse. Not only are their babies taken away from them so we can have their milk, but they are plugged for life to produce milk like a machine and then killed for beef.

What made me go vegan is a story my mother used to tell me about how, when I was a baby, I used to drink so much milk from her breasts that it hurt, so she had to pull me away. That’s how I made the connection: a cow forced to produce milk constantly with machines must go through hell of a lot of pain. I imagined my privates forced to produce semen for hours over and over. Eventually the body part will let go and God knows the pain and what the part lets out – blood, puss, etc. That thought simply did it for me. Wish I had put that part of the puzzle together earlier on.

I think the only thing most vegans regret is “why didn’t I do this sooner?” How did you go from vegan to activist? How did you get into activism?

From a young age I was against injustices and always had a craving to fight for what’s right. After becoming vegan I was looking for a way to spread the truth about farm animal agriculture. At the same time, I was getting back into painting after 20 years of inactivity, and I realized I could incorporate the message in my art. This led to vegan art and street art.

I tell people that everyone can be an activist no matter how rich they are or how much time they have. What works for one person does not necessarily work for another, so we have to find what makes us happy. Here are some things I have tried, some of which I still practice, some I don’t, and some occasionally: fostering dogs; watching and spreading the word on social network about vegan movies such as Earthlings, Cowspiracy, Forks Over Knives; donating things like money and art to organizations like PETA and MFA; volunteering for those organizations; demonstrating in front of slaughterhouses and stores that sell fur; and a million other ways. Some of the ways don’t even have to be vegan related as long as we help animals in any way we can.

How did you get into street art? Can you share a little about the concept of street art?

From the first time I visited the arts district in downtown L.A., I fell in love with the artwork in the streets. Once I found my vegan art style, I couldn’t wait to share the vegan message and see how people responded. I started posting a couple of stickers and people started sharing on Instagram. Then I posted a Moby poster, a week later one of Prince who had just passed away, and then things took off. Tony Kanal, Toby Morse, and Moby started spreading the love on their Instagram. Then I had fans that started posting all over downtown L.A. and NYC, and the response was crazy! I owe most of my success on the East Coast to my main guy Anthony Proetta Jr., thanks buddy.

Street art, for me, is a way to directly communicate with masses what you want to express, while bypassing galleries. It’s a gift to beautify the city, while educating and spreading something positive. A way to also bypass the BS propaganda of commercial billboard ads such as “Got Milk?” and “Where’s the Beef?” – and pass along a true message coming from what’s behind the scenes, what’s real.

What is the message behind the Vegan Club art? What is the genesis of the project?

The message behind Vegan Club is multi-faceted. I like people to make their own interpretation of what it is so I won’t go into it. All I can say is that everyone is welcome to join the Vegan Club!

I started painting after two decades of absence. I started selling some abstract paintings but was unsatisfied with my direction. I knew I could do better, something more personal. I soon realized that I could incorporate art as a way to spread a vegan message without being too preachy, a way to make it fun, positive and inspiring while getting the attention of the masses, especially now that our attention span is one second max.

Pop art was the best way to incorporate my message, because famous people tend to get our immediate attention whether on the tabloid magazines or in the news. Brad Pitt was vegan at the time and I thought of his movie Fight Club, combined the two, and came up with Vegan Club. Then I decided to add River Phoenix to the Club, and use him as my vegan James Dean, and kept on adding more famous vegan icons.

What do you want to accomplish through the Vegan Club campaign?

The goal is to awaken as many souls as possible, of all ages!

People look up to celebrities. By using them in my art, people not only get exposed to the artists’ work but also some of the lifestyle decision they’ve made. Hopefully, this will incite people to try new good habits, such as going vegan. Change is easier and faster than we think, the hard thing is presenting information to inspire change and awaken our dormant state…

Have you had any feedback from non-vegans?

Yes!! And that’s my favorite part. It gets them wondering what’s this all about and they are constantly asking me what Vegan Club means. We are social beings that love to be part of groups. Most of the time they ask me in awe about an artist they admire they had no idea was vegan: “I did not know Kat Von D was vegan, I buy her makeup all the time! Maybe I will try vegan too and see how it goes!” “Moby is vegan? I love his music! I will check this out!” “I did not know Prince was vegan!”

I try to wake up the subconscious side of non-vegans so they can consider healthier alternatives without being forced into it. People cannot be forced to change, rather they have to be awakened from their coma state of bad habits and see that there are simple ways that will save them money and make their health better, while ending the mistreatment of animals, that no one approved of, and everyone wins! Pretty much make the world a better place with minimum amount of effort and zero cost.

How do you choose your subjects? Are there any you regret using? I recall interviews with Prince’s personal chef that said he was definitely not vegan, although he tried to eat healthy.

As an artist, I choose my subjects when I feel it’s the right time. I go with the flow and what I feel is right. That does not mean I choose the right person, nor the best representation of vegans. For me, the most important thing is to put the good intention out there.

For example, Leonardo DiCaprio and Brigitte Bardot (my Marilyn Monroe) might not be vegan, however, their contributions towards the environment and animals is worth their inclusion in the club. I am trying to set the intent on them to go vegan, like the intent Tarantino’s Inglorious Basterds depicts when Hitler is killed. The intent is a powerful seed and that’s what I like to spread. I used it in another piece of mine where I use a Warhol-style Vegan Campbell Soup with a Basquiat-style crown on top. Though neither of these artists were vegan, if they were to collaborate today, I like to believe they would do an art piece like that. That’s my intention, to make things right!

Some in the vegan community feel that it perpetuates elitism because you focus on celebrities. How do you respond to that? Do you have plans to focus on other vegans as well?

Celebrities are the most effective way for the masses to spread the love. On one side, famous artists have a lot of reach, with followers that help spread the message fast. A big part of my success so far is due to Tony Kanal, Moby, Toby Morse, Kat Von D, Doyle Wolfgang, Travis Barker, and Jane Velez-Mitchell, to name a few. These celebrities share my posts on their Instagram, buy my art, and wear my tees, and their followers get inspired by the message.

On the other side, young people like to put a poster with their favorite artist on their wall or wear their idol on a t-shirt, they share selfies with street art of their favorite musician or actor. My intentions are not to exclude anyone, but to be cautious at the beginning. I’m trying to spread the message with hype. A good example is the “Impossible Burger” currently served ONLY at the high-end Crossroads restaurant where all the stars hang out. With exclusivity, you get the attention of the masses and then you are ready to target all markets.

I don’t typically buy into vegan celebrity adulation because they seem to be rather fickle and fair-weather about it. They publicly declare they’re vegan one day, and then just as publicly declare that they couldn’t live without bacon cheese cupcakes. When a celebrity with money and personal assistants and every maitre’d in Los Angeles on speed dial can’t maintain a vegan diet – to say nothing of other lifestyle factors – I fear it makes veganism look “too hard” and restrictive for an average person. How much celebrity worship in the vegan community is too much? Is there a balance here I should learn to respect?

Celebrities are human like us. Sometimes they cheat on their diet, they have a harder time to convert. I mean, most vegans I know used to eat meat and consume dairy for decades before they converted to being vegan.

At the end of the day, spreading the love is what matters. If you did not succeed, change of heart, out of necessity or whatever reason, and go back to eating meat. We have to understand that not all of them go vegan for the well-being of animals in the first place. Some of them do it for health reasons, some for environmental reasons. The truth is that it’s hard to change habits, especially when people are used to fatty, tasty pleasures and traditional celebrations where meat is the main dish. Think Thanksgiving with turkey and Fourth of July with barbecue as the norm. Some might it’s ok, the effort matters, and hopefully tomorrow you will get it. Samuel Jackson is a good example, he had some pain on his body, became vegan and felt better. Then a movie required him to gain weight so he started eating meat again and the pain came back, and now he plans on going vegan again.

What role do you see art playing in the animal rights movement and in social justice movements in general?

I see art as the main factor of social change! Banksy and Misteruncertain inspired me to spread the love in the streets, and I hope I inspire other vegan artists to spread the vegan love next. It’s a chain reaction that cannot be stopped, especially when one spreads what is the truth and what is just!

How can people follow you and your work?

www.veganclub.co
instagram.com/iamLeFou
facebook.com/artlefou

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Post ID 1687

Almost two years ago, we found out about the work of Justin and Rosemary Van Kleeck, who were building a new approach to farmed animal rescue and care. We were so impressed by their philosophy, and so determined to help them spread it to a bigger audience, we gave them a grant for animal activism through our partnership with the kind people at The Pollination Project.

With this grant, the Van Kleecks were able to develop an excellent website as a resource for people everywhere engaged in this form of advocacy and animal care. At the online home of the Microsanctuary Movement, there are guides for taking caring of different species, a listing of trustworthy veterinarians that treat farmed animals, and advice on supporting and sustaining a microsanctuary.

Now, there’s something more they’re offering individuals with personal or nonprofit microsanctuaries: cash money.

Rocky, who is extremely handsome, lives at Cherry Run Roost Microsanctuary in Hedgesville, WV. (http://cherryrunroost.weebly.com)

Rocky, who is extremely handsome, lives at Cherry Run Roost Microsanctuary in WV. (http://cherryrunroost.weebly.com)

The Microsanctuary Movement has been given a generous (and anonymous) donation to nurture and spread even more good. In collaboration with A Well-Fed World, they have created their own seed grant program to support microsanctuaries with general expenses and also a Hen Reproductive Healthcare Fund for the specific veterinary needs of hens formerly exploited for eggs. (The unnaturally high egg production of chickens used in the egg industry frequently leads to osteoporosis and broken bones, but also uterine prolapse, peritonitis, eggs stuck in their reproductive tracts, and other painful, often deadly conditions.)

Individuals can get a $500 grant, and nonprofits can get $1000. Grant recipients will also get consulting and guidance from other microsanctuary experts.

Working with The Pollination Project, one of the things I learned about donating is the importance of timing.

“For most social change ventures, a donation of $1,000 or less doesn’t go very far unless it is exceptionally well timed,” TPP executive director Alissa Hauser wrote in Philanthopy Journal. “A timely micro-grant provides momentum for a project to raise more money and gain more exposure.”

At the wrong time, a thousand dollars doesn’t help much. At the right time, it helps enormously, especially when it represents the difference between moving forward with a project – or not. TPP has multiple examples of how small grants given at the right time have helped their grantees gain even more financial support and validation for their grassroots activism.

I’m going to brag that this is true of The Microsanctuary Movement too. That initial grant helped put a web infrastructure in place, and helped create a centralized hub for people engaged in this form of animal rescue and advocacy. Now, with this new donation funding these seed grants, Microsanctuary Movement is ‘paying it forward’ to other individuals and nonprofit microsanctuaries. And with these microsanctuary micro-grants, perhaps the next wave of vegans caring for farmed animals in their own homes can also attract more support for the life-saving work they’re doing.

To apply for a seed grant for your farmed animal rescue and care efforts, go here.

Featured image: Mott, who enjoys apples, is a resident of Triangle Chance for All in NC, where the Microsanctuary Movement began (http://trianglechanceforall.org).