What's wrong with single issue campaigns?

Not now perhaps (although there are goveg adds on sbs...) but if there had previously been 30 years of vegan education rather than nitpicking of certain problems within the industry and ignoring others we would be in a different situation.
We have to start now, indeed, many are.

aye, agreed. & I will happily promote veganism. Retrospectively, I don't think there was much activists could have done though.

the way I see it is, the general public are stupid.


They can only take a few issues at a time before they start feeling overwhelmed and block the whole thing out and do nothing.
By giving people a sense of "hope" that they are actually doing something to eleviate animal suffering we are encouraging them along the right path.

Single issue campaigns should be viewed as a doorway that people can take to lead them more issues and eventually the very foundation issue of animal rights.

I mean, even in retail, people only see a couple of the sale signs right at eye level.

i will add that in the past ALV has done battery hen campaigns
in fact they still have batttery hens stickers

But i think that single campaigns are AWESOME!
yes some are a waste of space but alot are doing great things 4 animals

Mmmmm, people from ALV of years gone by  have spoken to me about thier dream of seeing everyone buying free-range eggs and how ALV spent so much time and energy on that. And now, it makes them  ill to think about.

Single issue campaigns that say the solution is 'more humane treatment'- bad
Single issue campaigns part of vegan educastion/focus point to draw in public's attention whilst  maintaining no animal use is humane - good.

not true
what about the adopt a college campaign (VEGAN OUTREACH)
some single issue campaigns arent anything 2 do with food
u arent going 2 stop vivisection by going vegan we need those campagins
people going vegan in australia wont stlop live export 2 the middle east

Matt, are you talking about Proposition 2 that was passed in 2008?

That is the supposed abolition of veal crates, battery cages and sow stalls in 2015? Note, that is 5 years away.

As for campaigning for these things it just makes it more acceptable for people to keep eating calves, pigs and eggs. They will munch right now even five years before anything happens. Heck in five years time, they'll probably be eating even more, thinking it's OK. If you're for the rights of animals, you want animals to stop being used and abused, you don't care about the size of their cage. You will think they should be in this type of system at all. Why not advocate for that instead of wasting your time (and the lives of billions of animals).

Yes battery cages are disgusting but egg barns are also disgusting, why promote these things? You don't replace one evil with another evil, that does absolutely nothing for animals, it just gives people the excuse to keep eating and driving up demand.

Great podcast between an abolitionist and a welfarist here. ...
http://www.abolitionistapproach.com/audio/#erik-marcus-20070225

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THE WORLD IS VEGAN if you want it!

Yes vivisection and live export will stop when people turn to veganism. Vegan is not just what you eat. It is to reject the use of animals.

PS ...
THE WORLD IS VEGAN if you want it!

But with this you totally remove yourself from any chances of achieving industry welfare reform -- which counts, and is the only chance of a better life, for billions of animals currently at the hands of the multinationals. Can we really disregard the needs of, and turn our backs on these countless animals?

It doesn't need to be so black and white. We can engage and exploit that sole motive of a private company -- profit -- with single issue campaigns targetted at industry welfare reform. By not doing this, we completely isolate and alienate ourselves from an institution which can be used (though very, very rarely) as a cause for good.

I suppose my bottomline is: no good tactic, for anything, is as black and white as you put it.

On the topic that all activism of the past 30 years should have been solely, as Francione puts it, "creative, non-violent vegan education"... well, none of us can be sure where that would have got us. Would people such as Ingrid Newkirk (a self confessed once meataholic) have been attracted to the vegan message? Or has she only been pulled into the greater movement of animals rights -- like so many other activists -- by well managed, single issue campaigns? I fear that if all activism was positioned only around vegan education many activists wouldn't gave given the issue the time of day. I know I wouldn't; as a stupid, young, ignorant, naive 14 year old, being a hippy vegan was something I certainly wanted no part of. Ending the use of the sow stall, though? That was another story.

Agreed! Whether we agree exactly on methodology or not, I think our efforts are much better spent on getting on with outreach