Tips for a Successful Conversation

Now I'd like to further address the importance of having successful conversations by offering a few key tips for putting the Dale Carnegie principles into practice.

Study and Practice

If you are in college or high school, please take classes in public speaking and effective communication. For the rest of us, books are written and classes are taught on how we can become successful communicators, and one key tip is to read a few of the books, and if you think you need help, take a class. What you learn will offer you a lifetime of improved advocacy skills that will prove to be well worth the time you've invested. As noted above, Toastmasters is one good starting point, but community colleges and others also offer courses that are worth taking. And again, you end up with a captive audience for your advocacy!

Remember That All Pro-Meat Arguments Are Rationalizations

Nothing that anyone says disproves our fundamental message: “We don't need to eat meat to be healthy, so eating meat causes animals to suffer unnecessarily.” Whether it's “The Bible says we can do it” or “What about abortion?” or “What about plants?” just keep bringing the discussion back to the simple, undeniable fact of unnecessary suffering. Always recognize that whatever is said, it can't counter your basic message. Quite simply: You're right, and nothing can change that.

Don't Get Distracted—Abortion, etc., Is Not the Issue

Animals deserve your single-minded attention to their plight, and you don't want to alienate possible vegetarians by arguing with them about their choice of political candidate or sports team. Often when you're trying to defend animals, the other person will try to get you onto some other topic, like abortion, or some hypothetical situation about a deserted island. Refine your responses to these questions to move the discussion back to unnecessary cruelty to animals. However strong your opinions on other issues might be, you owe it to animals to always focus the discussion on their suffering. People who have radically different opinions about religion, foreign policy, or the death penalty can all agree that animals are not inanimate objects, can feel pain, and do not deserve to suffer. The animal rights message of compassion and equality can appeal to everyone, and it's important to focus on that common ground in all your interactions.

Paint a Picture With Your Words

Videos and pamphlets are great, but they can't replace your ability to effectively explain the issues. So the first thing to try to do is to get good at painting a picture with your words. Although hard, it is very useful to watch videos with some regularity so that images of some of the forms of cruelty in factory farming are always fresh in your memory. This way, when people ask you, “Why are you a vegan?” or, “Why are you an activist?” you're able to describe concrete and specific examples of the horrors that are routinely inflicted on animals. For example, rather than saying, “Animals are treated badly on factory farms,” you will be able to say, “On factory farms, chickens grow so fast that they become crippled under their own weight,” or “Cows and pigs often have their limbs hacked off while they're conscious and able to feel pain,” or “Animals are denied their every need and desire, they're mutilated and cooped up in their own waste, they're violently loaded onto trucks, causing injuries, and they're slaughtered in the most painful and inhumane manner that you can imagine. If a dog or a cat were treated the way farmed animals are treated, everyone involved could be thrown in jail on felony cruelty-to-animals charges.”

Always Maintain Composure

OK, this is easier said than done, and don't beat yourself up too badly if you fail at any of these recommendations on occasion, but do try to keep your cool. If you go off on someone who asks a question that is aggravating or seems stupid to you, you will not win that person over, and you'll alienate everyone within earshot. Really, it is simply never effective to put someone down or treat another person badly. Please, in every interaction, try to remember that you were probably a meat-eater once, too, and that even the person who seems the most antagonistic may be reachable, as are the people who are with him or her. Always do your best to be kind and upbeat.

Find Common Ground

It often happens that we go into an interaction with the idea that we're going to lay out the arguments for veganism, and the other person will simply accept them or not. It will help a lot to move into the interaction with a goal of finding common ground. So, for example, if a person asks you why you are a vegetarian, and you know that he or she has a dog or cat, you can say, “I know that you care very much about Max, your dog. For me, veganism is an extension of my love for animals like Max—I don't want to cause any animals to suffer.” Or if someone has a shirt on that supports a particular political candidate, you can say, “I see that you care about politics. For me, vegetarianism is a way of taking my political beliefs to the next level, voting for a better world every time I sit down to eat,” and so on. In any discussion, you'll learn about the other person and be able to relate animal issues to something the other person cares about.

Implement the Carnegie Principles in Every Interaction

Finally, please try to use the Carnegie principles in every interaction you have: Dress nicely, be respectful, have a conversation and not a dictation, never lose your cool, and never be rude. These things hurt animals. When you fail to be as positive and constructive as possible, you fail to help animals. It is always good to listen to and affirm people, to ask questions, and then to really listen to the answers, bringing the discussion back to the things that they already believe and how the case for compassion connects with those things.

I've found that when someone responds to my “Ask me why I'm vegan” button or T-shirt, asking them, “Have you ever thought about why you eat meat?” is a very effective method of beginning the conversation. It takes people aback and focuses attention on them, which is always good. Furthermore, it's the more legitimate question. Why are people eating the corpses of tortured animals? What is it about that that they can't give up? Because on some level, everyone knows that animals are treated badly, and most people know that animal flesh is not good for them. So asking people questions and really listening to what it is that they say in response is a very effective conversational tactic. If you make them feel heard, they are more likely to listen to you in return.

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