Pamphlets: are there any new ideas in vegan activism?
06 April 2017 [link youtube]
The article alluded to (repeatedly) in the video is by Nathan Harrison: https://medium.com/@harrisonnathan/the-actual-number-is-almost-surely-higher-92c908f36517
If you'd like to know more about "the wildlife management approach" (mentioned very briefly, in contrast to abolitionism), click here for a playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLZEkgohG7k7qrHC5-UQDpMKvEmQjPiTTv
Youtube Automatic Transcription
are there any new ideas in vegan
activism vegan politics yes and no in the last five years I can say the big debate ideologically on an abstract level of political theory has maybe been abolitionism versus the citizenship approach Sony's fell off my desk don't worry about it keep rolling no take to write and on the level of street activism on the level of public outreach education and you know activism in a narrow sense an applied sense the dispute is actually been invoked pamphlets whether or not pamphlets are effective or ineffective as a way of creating a vegan world it may sound like a ridiculous simplification you but please take this example into consideration direct action everywhere DXE they were founded with a mandate of challenging overcoming and moving beyond the pamphlet giving paradigm their founder Wayne's Young years of bitter experience discovered that handing out pamphlets on university campus was a completely ineffective way of getting people interested in veganism or converting to veganism on an intuitive level we can all sympathize with that his conclusion was to found a new movement in veganism that was strictly defined by and guided by the findings and Social Sciences his clear opposition would be animal charity evaluator zay siiii and to some extent mercy for animals and they for their part deeply believed that handing out pamphlets is effective and that they can prove it through social science research and that social science research will vindicate their claims that if you donate one thousand dollars to them they will take that money and print so many pamphlets and then they can measure as a real scientific metric how many new people will convert to veganism because there's a predictable relationship the number of dollars the number of pamphlets they're handed out on a university campus and the number of new people who will become vegan they will give a link to an article below this video in that article by Nathan Harrison actually the scientific concedes of pretty much all sides are destroyed but it's interesting we have these two opposite extremes that really depart on the issue of pamphlets and even though there are office extremes on this issue they both feel that the findings of social science research can and will and should define future veganism as a movement interest anything positive commitment to thing or the defeat of the abolitionists versus the the citizen who broke the approach people oh my god it's absurd I think with commitment is that all vegans have learned that it's incredibly hard to get five vegans to work together in an organization and direct action everywhere is itself a fascinating example of that direct action everywhere originally proclaim themselves to have no centralized organization they proclaim that they would be a totally horizontal organization total horizontal no vertical no no hierarchy is basically this mean that nobody was giving orders no estate he orders now I was one of many people on the appointed that was a lie that was never true there was one self-appointed dictator for life Wayne's Young and his girlfriend and they were the king and queen and everyone had to follow their orders and there were different chapters in the structure but some chapters were more equal than others and whatever they had a problem for example that a number of sex scandals they would then be challenged by the public or I remember said well what are you doing about the sex scandal and they turn and say oh don't worry we have this totally hierarchical manage your real structure this person reports to this person they take the complaint to this committee and they were poured it on and it ain't so was that a sex scandal if it's revealed that a one hundred percent bureaucratic almost communist hierarchical structure totally centralized totally an equal to their article but publicly under website they were proclaiming they were fully horizontal there were no leaders and no followers they were just a network a social network providing community and different Nexus points and days of action for people to me so quite a few things have changed now if you go to their website they instead espouse of philosophy of emergent leadership and they more transparently than ever admit that yes they are a group with leaders and followers and that Chicago has more decision-making power than Texas needles to say Chicago is more decision-making power than someone in Africa or Thailand or what have you so they've had to fess up they've had to reform their approach and there's strategy towards these things so look no doubt looking over the new ideas that have come and gone in veganism in the last five years if we go back ten years I've made videos with us before we really saw the dying away of the inner Co primitive s approach that was huge back in two thousand and one we saw you know approaches that tend to be focused on domesticated animals people's affections for their pets animal rescue animal shelters you know we found the rise of the anti speciesist approach of trying to construe the struggle of veganism as parallel to the abolition of slavery equality for black people being construed as equivalent to equality for animals we have had a number of new ideas emerge but I think when you look at the rise and fall of each of those disputes for example there was a very passionate debate between Gary francia on a and a direct action everywhere when he was challenging them on their beliefs they subscribed to temporarily direct action everywhere subscribe to the same idea that mercy for animals subscribes to that vegans should not preach llegan ism and should not even use the word vegan so bizarre chapter unless I've years because they believed that it was more effective as activists to so-called get your foot in the door to use vaguely suggests reduce it Arianism cutting down on meat instead of actually arguing for veganism to take this really self contradictory and covertly vegan approach and so anyway just make sure that was a very dramatic debate we're girlfriend Sione challenged them on that if you check the article with the link below this video you'll actually find the evidence-based argument for that is deeply flawed it was always been misleading there never has been a social science rationale for the just get your footman to approach the pro vegetarian approach in the crypto vegan approach as opposed to be honest and open direct with people that you're about veganism in ecology and animal rights and what have you in looking at the rise and fall of all of these ideas whether ideological or pragmatic you know whether they're about the style of education outreach or more in terms of political theory I think anyone can see that by far the most successful groups have been the groups that are totally outside of these tivity probably in the single greatest success now very late in his career is McDougald you know dr. MacDougall with his diet books and he's actually created a durable foundation for public education engaged in promoting his particular form of low oil a low-fat starch-based big Hyatt it's incredibly effective it's incredibly influential and souls it's also esteemed it also has public trust right and that's something that's hard to qualify parchme hard to quantify but you know how do people regard you if what you're known for if what you're appearing on the news for is screaming like a maniac in a Taco Bell because you're morally opposed to people eating meat which is what DXE does their disruption of it yes they get press coverage but this isn't building trust cooperation this isn't building esteem you know as opposed to me MacDougall does get on TV from time to time and on the radio what have you but this point he's big enough that he has his own events its own conferences and forced publishers on books for many many years how is he perceived by the public and what is the case he's make has an event now the ethical veganism is a tiny fragment of his approach to veganism he does actually espouse ethical veganism but it's in there almost as a footnote but in terms of method MacDougall success probably has more to teach us than all the so-called social science discourse that groups like direct action we're an AC e-waste so many pages discussing and another one obviously is pcrm pcrm Physicians Committee for Responsible medicine again do they even broach ethical veganism for them it's mostly science-based dietary and health based veganism but what they've engaged in isn't a lesson you can simply take from the social sciences what have you what they've engaged in his old-fashioned washington DC lobbying including lawsuits yes lawsuits for the progress of civilization putting together a lawsuit taking the US government to court engaging in lobbying really old-fashioned washington DC pork barrel politics lobbying in in the most despicable sense of the word lobbying these are the groups that I think what might as well say over the last five years where we can see tremendous success despite the fact they had no contact with any of these ideas so look at mcdougall look at pcrm where do they stand on abolitionism vs. citizenship approach or my own approach is the wildlife management paradigm I reject both the citizenship paradigm and the evolution is going on I talk about wildlife management approach who is fundamentally different um where C stand on hbo's issued the history as they stand knowing I'm so sorry where do they stand are the social science of effective agnes of anfo courage they understand they have been outside of you know the High House of these disputes of what's been going on with in veganism annual with that being said I actually do not want to belittle somebody like Wayne's Young even though frankly I think his writing is garbage i think its articles are idiotic and amazingly counterproductive i think the whole flirtation that Wayne had and also that groups like Mercy for Animals had with this idea that veganism dare not speak its own name that veganism shouldn't promote veganism medicine for reduced areas instead ludacris self-defeating you know debate gavin in the movement could go on and on about that but i just want to say even is coming back to the original idea that sparked direct actually everywhere I can recognize Megan respected sincerity of where it was coming from that Wayne had these years of experience handing out pamphlets and he said we've got to go back to the drawing board this isn't working and I can look at groups like animal charity evaluate errs again if you read the link below this video you're going to find it been totally corrupt totally incompetent and they have really misrepresented pseudoscience as the progress of science in advance eat vegan movement really outright lies tremendous contempt for animal charity valuators and what they did with a unique opportunity where they could have done something positive moment but with that being said I can still recognize that that started with this same impulse of vegans taking a look at what they've been doing for the past five years and saying this hasn't been working there has to be a better way
activism vegan politics yes and no in the last five years I can say the big debate ideologically on an abstract level of political theory has maybe been abolitionism versus the citizenship approach Sony's fell off my desk don't worry about it keep rolling no take to write and on the level of street activism on the level of public outreach education and you know activism in a narrow sense an applied sense the dispute is actually been invoked pamphlets whether or not pamphlets are effective or ineffective as a way of creating a vegan world it may sound like a ridiculous simplification you but please take this example into consideration direct action everywhere DXE they were founded with a mandate of challenging overcoming and moving beyond the pamphlet giving paradigm their founder Wayne's Young years of bitter experience discovered that handing out pamphlets on university campus was a completely ineffective way of getting people interested in veganism or converting to veganism on an intuitive level we can all sympathize with that his conclusion was to found a new movement in veganism that was strictly defined by and guided by the findings and Social Sciences his clear opposition would be animal charity evaluator zay siiii and to some extent mercy for animals and they for their part deeply believed that handing out pamphlets is effective and that they can prove it through social science research and that social science research will vindicate their claims that if you donate one thousand dollars to them they will take that money and print so many pamphlets and then they can measure as a real scientific metric how many new people will convert to veganism because there's a predictable relationship the number of dollars the number of pamphlets they're handed out on a university campus and the number of new people who will become vegan they will give a link to an article below this video in that article by Nathan Harrison actually the scientific concedes of pretty much all sides are destroyed but it's interesting we have these two opposite extremes that really depart on the issue of pamphlets and even though there are office extremes on this issue they both feel that the findings of social science research can and will and should define future veganism as a movement interest anything positive commitment to thing or the defeat of the abolitionists versus the the citizen who broke the approach people oh my god it's absurd I think with commitment is that all vegans have learned that it's incredibly hard to get five vegans to work together in an organization and direct action everywhere is itself a fascinating example of that direct action everywhere originally proclaim themselves to have no centralized organization they proclaim that they would be a totally horizontal organization total horizontal no vertical no no hierarchy is basically this mean that nobody was giving orders no estate he orders now I was one of many people on the appointed that was a lie that was never true there was one self-appointed dictator for life Wayne's Young and his girlfriend and they were the king and queen and everyone had to follow their orders and there were different chapters in the structure but some chapters were more equal than others and whatever they had a problem for example that a number of sex scandals they would then be challenged by the public or I remember said well what are you doing about the sex scandal and they turn and say oh don't worry we have this totally hierarchical manage your real structure this person reports to this person they take the complaint to this committee and they were poured it on and it ain't so was that a sex scandal if it's revealed that a one hundred percent bureaucratic almost communist hierarchical structure totally centralized totally an equal to their article but publicly under website they were proclaiming they were fully horizontal there were no leaders and no followers they were just a network a social network providing community and different Nexus points and days of action for people to me so quite a few things have changed now if you go to their website they instead espouse of philosophy of emergent leadership and they more transparently than ever admit that yes they are a group with leaders and followers and that Chicago has more decision-making power than Texas needles to say Chicago is more decision-making power than someone in Africa or Thailand or what have you so they've had to fess up they've had to reform their approach and there's strategy towards these things so look no doubt looking over the new ideas that have come and gone in veganism in the last five years if we go back ten years I've made videos with us before we really saw the dying away of the inner Co primitive s approach that was huge back in two thousand and one we saw you know approaches that tend to be focused on domesticated animals people's affections for their pets animal rescue animal shelters you know we found the rise of the anti speciesist approach of trying to construe the struggle of veganism as parallel to the abolition of slavery equality for black people being construed as equivalent to equality for animals we have had a number of new ideas emerge but I think when you look at the rise and fall of each of those disputes for example there was a very passionate debate between Gary francia on a and a direct action everywhere when he was challenging them on their beliefs they subscribed to temporarily direct action everywhere subscribe to the same idea that mercy for animals subscribes to that vegans should not preach llegan ism and should not even use the word vegan so bizarre chapter unless I've years because they believed that it was more effective as activists to so-called get your foot in the door to use vaguely suggests reduce it Arianism cutting down on meat instead of actually arguing for veganism to take this really self contradictory and covertly vegan approach and so anyway just make sure that was a very dramatic debate we're girlfriend Sione challenged them on that if you check the article with the link below this video you'll actually find the evidence-based argument for that is deeply flawed it was always been misleading there never has been a social science rationale for the just get your footman to approach the pro vegetarian approach in the crypto vegan approach as opposed to be honest and open direct with people that you're about veganism in ecology and animal rights and what have you in looking at the rise and fall of all of these ideas whether ideological or pragmatic you know whether they're about the style of education outreach or more in terms of political theory I think anyone can see that by far the most successful groups have been the groups that are totally outside of these tivity probably in the single greatest success now very late in his career is McDougald you know dr. MacDougall with his diet books and he's actually created a durable foundation for public education engaged in promoting his particular form of low oil a low-fat starch-based big Hyatt it's incredibly effective it's incredibly influential and souls it's also esteemed it also has public trust right and that's something that's hard to qualify parchme hard to quantify but you know how do people regard you if what you're known for if what you're appearing on the news for is screaming like a maniac in a Taco Bell because you're morally opposed to people eating meat which is what DXE does their disruption of it yes they get press coverage but this isn't building trust cooperation this isn't building esteem you know as opposed to me MacDougall does get on TV from time to time and on the radio what have you but this point he's big enough that he has his own events its own conferences and forced publishers on books for many many years how is he perceived by the public and what is the case he's make has an event now the ethical veganism is a tiny fragment of his approach to veganism he does actually espouse ethical veganism but it's in there almost as a footnote but in terms of method MacDougall success probably has more to teach us than all the so-called social science discourse that groups like direct action we're an AC e-waste so many pages discussing and another one obviously is pcrm pcrm Physicians Committee for Responsible medicine again do they even broach ethical veganism for them it's mostly science-based dietary and health based veganism but what they've engaged in isn't a lesson you can simply take from the social sciences what have you what they've engaged in his old-fashioned washington DC lobbying including lawsuits yes lawsuits for the progress of civilization putting together a lawsuit taking the US government to court engaging in lobbying really old-fashioned washington DC pork barrel politics lobbying in in the most despicable sense of the word lobbying these are the groups that I think what might as well say over the last five years where we can see tremendous success despite the fact they had no contact with any of these ideas so look at mcdougall look at pcrm where do they stand on abolitionism vs. citizenship approach or my own approach is the wildlife management paradigm I reject both the citizenship paradigm and the evolution is going on I talk about wildlife management approach who is fundamentally different um where C stand on hbo's issued the history as they stand knowing I'm so sorry where do they stand are the social science of effective agnes of anfo courage they understand they have been outside of you know the High House of these disputes of what's been going on with in veganism annual with that being said I actually do not want to belittle somebody like Wayne's Young even though frankly I think his writing is garbage i think its articles are idiotic and amazingly counterproductive i think the whole flirtation that Wayne had and also that groups like Mercy for Animals had with this idea that veganism dare not speak its own name that veganism shouldn't promote veganism medicine for reduced areas instead ludacris self-defeating you know debate gavin in the movement could go on and on about that but i just want to say even is coming back to the original idea that sparked direct actually everywhere I can recognize Megan respected sincerity of where it was coming from that Wayne had these years of experience handing out pamphlets and he said we've got to go back to the drawing board this isn't working and I can look at groups like animal charity evaluate errs again if you read the link below this video you're going to find it been totally corrupt totally incompetent and they have really misrepresented pseudoscience as the progress of science in advance eat vegan movement really outright lies tremendous contempt for animal charity valuators and what they did with a unique opportunity where they could have done something positive moment but with that being said I can still recognize that that started with this same impulse of vegans taking a look at what they've been doing for the past five years and saying this hasn't been working there has to be a better way