If you do something for animals in industrial farming, you will not always have direct contact with the animals. If you stop eating meat or do not keep pets, you are working towards a world in which there will be fewer (farm) animals. But this will also be a world in which fewer animals are kept in cages. There are a number of motivations to change your behavior, which may not all be very grand, but that are better for everyone, man and animals. Your benefits to help animals can be:
  • A healthier life and a healthy society (vegetarians keeping a varied diet and people consuming less industrially farmed meat, lead healthier lives and specifically have a smaller chance of developing cancer).
  • A more sober lifestyle (less meat and no tax-money to the meat industry saves money, and is better for our climate and for animal well-being).
  • Freer living (keeping no pets means more freedom in spending your time, space and money).
  • A clearer conscience (you no longer have to feel guilty and you can be proud of yourself: you are helping others to help animals).
Depending on how realistically you set your goals in helping animals, and how much time, money and effort you put into it, the benefits can be greater than the drawbacks. You may have to invest or change something before it can become fun. Compare it with quitting smoking: it's hard at first, but then you don't want to go back. Very often, it is more a matter of letting go than of actively doing something. Some things you may need to invest are:
  • having to walk further to a butcher who doesn't sell industrially farmed meat
  • learning to cook different ingredients than sole potatoes-meat-vegetables. More variety offers more possibilities, and is not more of an effort
  • receiving cynical, indifferent and ignorant remarks from your environment
In answer to the question of "what makes campaigning for animals satisfying?", Geert Laugs from Compassion In World Farming (CIWF) said: "Campaigning for animals is basically not more or less satisfying than campaigning for other causes. For some it is even a lot more awful, for instance if you can't bear to see animal suffering. It all depends on how the campaign is organized: it is possible to expose serious subjects in a playful way. In my experience, people like campaigns that:
  • do not needlessly annoy people;
  • present a positive signal (offer alternatives);
  • are motivating, get attention in a nice way
  • are covered in the newspapers;
  • are successful (with a clear goal and results connected to that goal).
We think it's obvious that CIWF actions fulfill this image to a great degree." Doing something for animals, or changing the way you eat is a form of behavior change. We want to help you to make this as easy as possible. We do not want parents to feel pressed to buy their kids a pet. What we don't like either is the way in which animals are exploited in commercials. What we did like is this anti-hunt video from Woodpecker on AdEater (MPEG 2Mb).