While other social movements appear to effectively change societal attitudes through peaceful protests, the same may not be true for veganism. Research studies suggest that peaceful protests may worsen attitudes toward vegans, regardless of the nature of the protest (disruptive or non-disruptive). It seems people view vegan protestors as more immoral and less similar to themselves, in comparison to other protestors. This finding may present a significant problem for vegan activists wishing to win people to their cause.
RACHEL E. MENZIES: The vegan movement promotes non-violence towards animals, and a rejection of speciesism; veganism has therefore been proposed to be an unconventional form of political participation. The majority of vegans have been shown to be politically motivated, with one aim of their diet being to bring about broader societal change.
However, veganism largely remains a fringe movement. Rates of veganism remain relatively low in Western countries (around 1–2%) and vegans frequently report feeling stigmatised and discriminated against. Rather than focusing on diet as an individual choice, a collective action approach can arguably impact existing social and cultural attitudes to meat consumption. Given this, it is important to consider what methods of collective action may be most effective in increasing support for veganism…
Most relevant research on collective action efficacy has compared violent and non-violent protests. For example, Stephan and Chenoweth (2008) examined resistance campaigns around the globe from 1900 to 2006, classifying them as either violent or non-violent. Their analyses revealed that around 53% of non-violent campaigns were successful, compared to just 26% of violent campaigns… More recently, Orazani and Leidner (2019) examined participant ratings of the perceived non-violence of 23 real movements in the United States (e.g., the women’s rights movement, the anti-whaling movement). Their findings revealed that the perceived use of non-violence of these movements was associated with significantly greater likability, support, and willingness to join the movement…
Whilst many protest movements across history have chosen violent means, this by no means represents a typical protest. In particular, highly organised and planned protests (such as those typically organised by animal rights groups) are unlikely to escalate into violence. Indeed, the decision to focus much of the research on what is termed “extreme” protest tactics, suggests that these tactics are not common. Protests that are disruptive yet non-violent (e.g., traffic blockades) have received far less empirical attention.
To the best of our knowledge, not one published study has examined the impact of extreme protest tactics in the context of the vegan movement specifically. Whilst Feinberg et al. (2020) used a depiction of a fictional animal rights organisation, this purported organisation focused on protesting animal testing, rather than animal consumption. This gap is notable given that vegan activists may be subject to more backlash than protestors for many other current social movements…
Although violent protests have been repeatedly shown to engender hostility from the public, the ability of peaceful yet disruptive protests to sway public opinion is unclear… Attitudes to vegan protests are likely to be influenced by factors unrelated to the protestors themselves. Research has indicated that certain personality and demographic characteristics are associated with negative attitudes to both vegans and activists. In particular, right-wing authoritarianism (RWA), characterised by adherence to convention and punitive attitudes towards non-conformists, is associated with hostility towards vegans. RWA has also been shown to predict more negative attitudes to protests on topics relevant to veganism, such as climate change…
The results of the current studies suggest that while disruptive protests may worsen attitudes to vegans (at least among women; Study 1), so too may non-disruptive protests (Study 2). This finding may present a significant problem for vegan activists wishing to win people to their cause. Whilst other social movements appear to effectively change societal attitudes through peaceful protests, both under experimental conditions and in real world settings , the same may not be true for veganism.
Given the current findings that perceived immorality and social identification mediate these effects, these dual mechanisms may be worth targeting. It is possible that efforts to highlight the moral nature of the protest and its focus, or efforts to increase perceived similarity, may help to reduce the negative impacts of witnessing vegan protests… That being said, given the perspective of TMT, it is possible that any form of protest which makes mortality salient will increase hostility to vegans. From this theoretical approach, protests which eschew mentions of death entirely, and instead focus on promoting shared cultural values (e.g., compassion), highlighting climate-change benefits, or emphasising the health and longevity benefits of plant-based diets, may be more effective. SOURCE…
RELATED VIDEOS: