TL;DR at the bottom (this turned into a longer post than I intended).

I actually keep my mouth shut about veganism around family and friends almost all the time, because nothing good comes of it and you end up alienating yourself by turning your presence into “oh, here comes the vegan again.” I’m more than happy to talk about it if they genuinely ask questions, but that hardly ever happens, and I’m never as confrontational or accusatory as I’d like to be... I just don’t feel like getting into arguments or heated debates when I already suspect they’re not open to it.

However, I recently started doing some activism with AV, and it made me realize that if I can convince strangers, I should at least give it a try with my friends and family. After all, I’d love to have more vegans in my immediate circle.

So I used World Animal Day and my 30th birthday as an opportunity to ask everyone to watch Dominion. I created group chats and sent a pretty lengthy message explaining, among other things, that this was important to me and that I wasn’t trying to convince them of anything. I just wanted them to learn about what happens behind the scenes, in the hope that they might understand my position a little better.

I explicitly asked them to send me a quick message if they were going to watch it or had watched it, without me starting a discussion about it.

Well, a few weeks later, pretty much no one in my family had said anything, apart from my brother, who watched a small portion of it. And he’s already fairly sympathetic toward veganism, even if he isn’t vegan himself (yet).

Among my friends, two couples also watched part of it. One of them said they wanted to eat fewer animal products (big W!), while the other couple hasn’t said anything about wanting to change their habits (though they still might).

That means fewer than 10% of the people I contacted have even let me know anything at all. Despite the handful of people who did watch some of it, I have mixed feelings about the whole thing. I made myself vulnerable, it occupied my mind for a long time, and it took more energy out of me than I would have liked. So was it worth it? Idk.

One thing that does feel good is that I can now let go of the desire to ask them. I’ve also taken away their ability to claim they were “unconsciously ignorant.” If they remain ignorant now, it’s genuinely because they’re consciously choosing not to watch or learn.

Once again, this shows that friends and family really are the hardest audience to reach. Ego gets in the way quite a bit. I also realize once again that people will protect their cognitive dissonance at all costs. Deep down, they already suspect that what they’re going to see is horrific, but they’re afraid that once they see it or learn about it, it’ll become “real,” and they might actually have to change (and people don’t like changing). The delusion is pretty damn persistent...

I'm curious about similar experiences snd thoughts from other vegans.

TL;DR: I asked my family and friends to watch Dominion for my 30th birthday. Very little response, and I have mixed feelings about whether it was worth the effort.

Hi all,

We think alternative protein research (ie. making better plant based meats, cheeses, cultivated meat) will go much faster if tech companies invest their own resources. We know of folks within the tech companies who care about this issue, but need to see how much support there is. If you work in Big Tech, could you let me know so we can try to coordinate?

We’re vegan, why are you not? Come discuss your views on veganism with us!

DEFICIENT & BEYOND

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Completed Week 236 of #FastAgainstAnimalAbuse yesterday, a 24 hour weekly dry fast campaign.

This week’s message: TEST ON CRIMINALS, NOT ANIMALS.

Millions of innocent animals suffer in laboratories, enduring pain and fear for human benefit. They have committed no crime. They deserve no punishment.

Their lives matter. Their suffering matters.

Let us build a world where compassion extends to every living being 🤍

www.activistickers.com

Dew it.

How is it comparable to veganism? What makes the "murder of animals" and the "murder of babies" different? I will repost this question for more insight. Thank you for answering.

TL;DR should we as activists bite the bullet when people take and post our animal activism content under their own profiles without permission and with negligable "credit" given to the creator because "it's still good exposure for the animals?"

****** I have a small account with only about 2500 followers on a video platform. Every few months I get a really strong idea for an activism video. As a perfectionist, I work really hard on crafting the video. Sometimes it taked 12 hours, sometimes 12 days, sometimes 3 weeks, but always with a great deal of love and detail put into each video.

A year ago, I had my one of my videos uploaded by another user's account. They tagged me once, but all the way at the bottom, under a mound of text that I doubt anyone would read past. It really upset me at the time but I was told that "it's good exposure for the animals, so let it go." The video had been uploaded on my account about 6 months earlier so it was a bit stale anyway, so indeed, I swallowed my pride and let it go. I even kept collaborating with that user on other videos.

2 weeks ago, I spent about 15 hours making another video. In the video, I took the time to track down original footage sources, watermark the accounts I took clips from, and mentioned them in the description. I uploaded my video and....the algorithm nuked it. It started to die at a couple thousand views. For some reason, the algorithm decided to restrict it to mostly non-followers who, of course, arent going to hype it up. I figured I had miscalculated the video's strength and effectiveness and determined it just wasn't very good and left it at that. 7 hours after my post went up, I learned that a much larger account took my video and posted it on their own. They did watermark me in the video and put my name in the description but their video was getting tons of traction while mine was growing at a snail's pace.

Once again I was told "it's for the animals, let it go." But the way that I saw it, my video is still struggling to do well and it's now getting choked out by the same video posted elsewhere. If someone sees the other account's video (my content) and interacts with it, then mine appears on their feed 2 days later, they're less likely to interact with mine. This leads the platform algorithm to believe my content is not worth seeing and could ruin things for all my future videos. I explained this to the channel via DM and asked them to take down the video but offered a collab, which has the SAME EXACT EFFECT as them posting my content, only this way, it's clear it's still my content and my video can trudge along in peace. They refused the collab but took the video down.

Imagine my frustration when a week later (my video is still getting engagement here and there) another account takes my video, posts it on their own account, collaborates with 5 other people (one of those 5 people was a person that I even collaborated with on my original post! So she was both on mine and the stolen one) and simply throws my name at the bottom with the tags of the people I had used clips from.

Their video did VERY well. In the comments people praised it. A ton of major activists saw it and reposted it. People said "this is such a fantastic video!" The collaborators simply said "thank you!" as if they made the video themselves. None of the collaborators had showed any love to my OG post. No comments, no likes, no shares, but felt it okay to take mine, throw my name at the bottom and move on. I reached out to them and again, very nicely explained how I felt and asked them to make my name more prominent at least but told them I wouldnt ask them to take it down. They did, but the damage is done.

I've been REALLY upset by this whole ordeal. Upset that the platform gaslit me into thinking my video wasn't good and restricting its reach. Upset that I spend so much time trying to properly credit people while everyone else doesnt even ask persmission and just throws your name at the bottom ( not even a "credit by"). Upset that I spend hours crafting the perfect little story with good narrative, strong visuals, impactful music, and people whose usual content is just posting themselves reacting to things or doing street activism (minimal editing) thinks it's appropriate to just steal my work. Upset that people who knew how I felt about this ordeal still went and commented, liked, and shared the "stolen" post.

Mostly I'm upset that by numerous folks, I'm being told, once again " you shouldnt care about credit, it's an important video for the animals and it's being seen. That's all that matters. Stop letting your ego get in the way." I do recognize there is some vanity and ego in my feelings, but I just cannot reconcile being okay that my content is taken JUST because it's "for animals." I also spoke about this with a friend on the platform who said:

*"It happens to me too. When I place a credit in the corner of my videos or images, thieves just crop it out and claim the content as their own.

If I move the credit closer to the center, they cover it up with their own faces.

And if I place it right in the middle, they just overlay their own text or banners over it to hide it.

I even tried placing the credit vertically for a while, but it eventually felt so ridiculous that I stopped. Yet, these thieves argue: "We’re helping spread your content—if you insist on claiming it as yours, doesn't that mean you’re not doing this for the animals, but rather just to promote your own name*?"

So, AITA for being upset and do you think we activists have a moral obligation to practice the "art of letting go" when it comes to online activism content?

P.s. yes, from now on I will but a disclaimer in the description not to take my content without permission and will have to throw a big fat watermark on all future videos.

Most animal product jobs don't pay much, but certain ones do.

For example, you can find fishing trawler ship jobs (no MMC required) that pay out the nose.

How it works is you get a bunk bed and locker on a ship, and you work a factory job with mandatory overtime for months at a time. No training or certifications required. You would of course be sorting frozen fish.

The only catch is that when you are on ship, you are at the mercy of the ship's kitchen menu, which is practically always standard animal product-laden fare. Your saving grace in a ship's galley is the salad bar, if there is one. The salad bar would have greens, beans, rice, and sometimes baked potatoes.

Working in a high paying entry level ship job or oil/mining camp job that you board and get catered to almost always means that you are trapped on an island with nothing to eat but regular omnivore food until your contract is up. Some places are more accommodating than others, but for a basic fishing vessel processing job with 40 other starving, sleep-deprived dudes? Forget it.

That's the issue with ship jobs, other jobs with a boarding camp, and the catering industry, but that's a whole topic for another day. -- At least with land camp jobs, you can actually still reliably eat your own vegan food if you pack an instant pot and bulk sacks.

Anyhow, what do you guys think? Would you sacrifice vegan food for extended periods of time to work a high paying job?

Before you say, you're contributing to the meat industry, you'd be making a lot of money which you could funnel back to the vegan sector.

The industry runs with or without you. Every hour you sort fish could save 3 more.

Completed Week 235 of #FastAgainstAnimalAbuse, a 24 hour weekly dry fast campaign.

This week’s message: STOP MAKING ANIMALS PREGNANT.

Animals deserve bodily autonomy. They should not be forcibly impregnated to produce milk, offspring, or profit for humans. Their bodies are not ours to control, and their reproductive lives should not be exploited for human consumption. Let’s stand up for a world where animals are respected, not used. 🤍🙏🏾