I feel that being straight up would be better. While it still is important to ease your opinion I feel you must make sure people understand why what they’re doing is important. If the ultimate goal is to change the way people think, then we must let them in on this. Plant the seed and let it grow… Have faith in humanity.

@JainaRae I don’t really see how preying on people’s insecurities by making them feel like they smell bad or saying that their favorite celebrities do something gets any sort of information across and ethically isn’t that far off from yelling at someone. And if you are going to yell you obviously wouldn’t yell “murderer”, you would yell “JIHAD!” or just the lyrics to this Vegan Reich song. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jbXyD17V4fg

Not pressuring people into decisions is the best way to get messages across, I think Giving information, doing sneaky activism.. you know, versus yelling MURDERER to someone who pulls out a turkey sandwich in the cafeteria

I tend to think of ‘sneaky activism’ as doing things like leaving AR bookmarks in library books that I return or putting veggie magazines in waiting rooms amongst the other magazines.

Personally, I prefer being honest and upfront with people about issues like that, just because if they have a good experience with a cruelty-free choice, they’re more likely to convince others of it as well. If you want to make a little impact on a bunch of people, then make it about the animals AND the person, ie, ” hey, did you know that not only is pleather cruelty-free, but it’s also less expensive, better for the environment, etc etc.” but personally, I’d say to just pick one of your friends to work on, talk to them about living compassionately, really, really try to make a personal impact on them, and hopefully they’ll do the same for others. Kinda like the domino effect. I mean, think about it, who really gets you to try/do something? The people in the mall kiosks, on the tv commercials, and standing around yelling about it? Or an actual friend that knows about it firsthand and takes the time to talk to you about it personally? The same thing applies here, just treat others how you would want to be treated

@endymlonvse I didnt mean literally what he was doing. What i meant was the sneaky activism such as talking to them about something important without shoving your veiws in their face. Like his example of telling them there was more options adopting. Also its cheaper that way and you save a life! Some of those dogs are already trained! Those are all comments that I would consider helpful “sneaky” activism. your not tricking anyone you just not shoving everything in your friends face. Thers a place an a time for each type of activism.

@onebadasschick I’m pretty sure when you tell people they smell bad they feel judged

The sneaky activism your describing is usually the most productive because people don’t want to feel pressured or judged. This way both you and everyone your spreading information to can be comfortable. Personally I like to mix in some blunt activism aswell but I like to keep it mixed.

I don’t see how that is being dishonest, leather really does smell bad. And there are plenty of adoptable cats in shelters. Most people don’t like being lectured anyway, so I feel this way is more effective and people will be more willing to listen.

huh idk but People should not mind you being an animal activist anyway.., if you are talking about your friends maybe they aren’t your true friends, find people that support your actions of activism.. like on peta!!

“Doesn’t PETA do stuff like this all the time?”

Yes, and I figure most vegans disapproved of that way of “advocating”. It’s not really advocating. It’s twisting the truth, body shaming, and lying – and once someone stops caring about what society thinks of their body, or what some girl thinks of their leather, then they will just continue to do what they did before. You’d have to be ridiculous to think that people are going to change for the better just to please you/someone else and not for some actually important reason.

With what @endymlonvse said, I think they are 100% right: telling someone you think their coat is ugly and smelly might get them to stop wearing that piece of leather, but in the future they are just going to find more ways to harm animals.

Again, like I said, lying to someone or tricking them into “doing the right thing” isn’t really respecting them. I would rather respect a person than trick them into what I want them to do and have them still like me.

“Convincing someone not to wear real leather because it smells bad and looks bad is just playing into someone’s physical insecurities for an ulterior motive.” Doesn’t PETA do stuff like this all the time?

It could be that sometimes by educating the person further, like in the leather jacket example this could happen. “I don’t think girls find leather attractive.”, “Oh well then I will stop wearing it.”, “Did you also know that ______ animals die because of it every day?”, “Wait a minute you just don’t find leather attractive because it kills animals, and many others girls might find it attractive.” Like when you reveal you bias towards something, sometimes your opinion on the matter may just be invalidated. So in some cases, her just telling a man leather isn’t attractive could possibly be a good comment, because she is then also not lying. Hope I explained that well enough.

I feel like approaches like this are a good starting point. On the one hand, it gets immediate results here and now which is an awesome thing, but I feel like it should be followed up with some sort of education. I’m not a christian but it’s like in the bible how jesus says that if you give a man a fish he’ll eat for a day but if your teach him to fish he’ll be good for life. Bloodmouth metaphors aside things like this give animals the fish and help them out short term but after we should lead these people away from objectifying nonhumans so that in the future they make choices that don’t harm others BEACAUSE they don’t harm others.

i like what you are say sneaky . . .

I don’t really feel like that’s activism, just sort of dishonesty. I mean, along with what you’ve said, you could at least throw in some ACTUAL animal rights activism. Convincing someone not to wear real leather because it smells bad and looks bad is just playing into someone’s physical insecurities for an ulterior motive.