Many animal rights activists are living with compassion fatigue, moral injury, online harassment, financial precarity, and internal movement conflict that gradually erode a sense of safety and hope, not because they are weak or overly sensitive, but because human nervous systems are not built to hold this much unprocessed harm indefinitely. If you are struggling, reach out to people you trust and use the resources created specifically for activists and animal care workers.
REVOLUTION PHILADELPHIA: Last week, we lost Adam Altman. Adam was an animal rights activist who showed up with care and consistency in work that is emotionally demanding and often met with indifference or hostility, and he carried the suffering of animals in a world that largely looks away. There is no clean way to make sense of his passing, but it feels important to name that the way activism is structured often requires people to absorb a steady stream of cruelty, conflict, and despair with very little room to recover.
Adam’s passing did not happen in isolation. Many animal rights activists are living with compassion fatigue, moral injury, online harassment, financial precarity, and internal movement conflict that gradually erode a sense of safety and hope, not because they are weak or overly sensitive, but because human nervous systems are not built to hold this much unprocessed harm indefinitely…
Taking activist wellbeing seriously means checking in on one another, resisting cultures that glorify exhaustion, setting and respecting boundaries, and actively pushing back against harassment and cruelty, including when it comes from within our own spaces. If you are struggling, reach out to people you trust and use the resources created specifically for activists and animal care workers. SOURCE
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