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Welcome to the Vegan Report, my name is Ryan and today we are discussing a deep division

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plaguing the vegan movement.

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Way back then I remember how Israel was looked at very favorably by vegans.

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One media outlet called it the Global Center of Veganism.

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Online I remember the many popular videos of Gary Yorovsky being interviewed on Israeli

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TV, always with Hebrew subtitles.

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But since October of last year, since the brutal attacks and kidnappings perpetrated

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by Hamas and then the violent retaliation of Israel, something shifted in the vegan movement.

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And I witnessed internal conflict, not about how effective activism should be done, think

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about welfarism vs. abolitionism, but about the Gaza war.

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And when I witnessed Jewish vegan activists leaving the community in drove, erasing even

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their social media presence, I knew that this represented the breaking point for the cause.

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To discuss this topic, I have with me 4 brilliant Jewish vegan activists.

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Donnie Moss, who is behind the popular Animal Rights Online News magazine, Der Turn, Mira

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Jacer, founder of the Jewish Animal Rights Organization Tikva for Animals, Bobby Soot,

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a distinguished filmmaker and photographer who has collaborated with notable figures

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such as Sean Mosin, Generation Vegan and musician Moby, and Shani Cohen, successful vegan entrepreneur

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behind Shani Seasoning and Urban Leaf Catering.

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I like to always ask the question, who is your vegan hero and why?

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I feel like it always allows to reveal who you are in the space of veganism, what your

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perspective is.

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So, who would like to start?

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Yes, Mira.

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Hi, I'm Mira Geiser.

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I would say my vegan hero is not a specific person necessarily, it's more just kind of

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the mindset that certain people have and just wanting to be as effective as possible and

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then not, you know, if they don't see the results that they'd like to see, they're willing

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to kind of shift their perspective and try new things and not necessarily be stuck in

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their ego of what they're more experienced in maybe if they're not seeing the results

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they want, but I would want to give a shout out to my mom who despite being very empathetic

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and really feeling what animals go through, she's gone to some awful places with me to

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get footage and it would not have been possible without her driving me there.

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So yeah, I'm just really thankful for that.

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Thank you, Mira.

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What about you, Donnie?

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So in 2004, I stumbled upon a veg fest in my neighborhood and left with a DVD, Meet

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Your Meat, and that was the start of my, that was a documentary film that shows, takes

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viewers behind the scenes of factory farms and slaughterhouses, and that was the start

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of my vegan journey and my journey as an animal rights activist.

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And I've loved PETA ever since.

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I would say my vegan hero is Jane Vales Mitchell, the former CNN anchor who is now a full time

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animal rights sort of campaigner, vegan campaigner with who created the vegan app Unshane TV.

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Thank you, Donnie.

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Shani?

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Hi, I'm Shani Cohen.

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I live in Vancouver, Canada, and I went vegan in 2013 after watching and it's funny that

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you mentioned that Gary Yorovsky famous speech, I am a Gary Yorovsky vegan and ever since

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then I truly have been looking up to him.

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His unapologetic stance of like on veganism is something that always moves me through

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all these years in activism and in life.

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And so yeah, I truly appreciate him.

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He's the one that gave me that push to open my eyes and and join the movement.

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So.

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Thank you, Shani and the fellow Canadian.

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Hi, Bobby.

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Hi, I'm Bobby.

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I'm in Austin, Texas.

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I'm an animal rights photojournalist.

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I guess my vegan hero would be my twin brother who after attempting suicide went to rehab

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and went vegan day one and says that that's what really saved his life was adopting a

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vegan lifestyle and he's the one who convinced me to become vegan.

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So he's definitely my hero.

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Thank you, Bobby.

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Okay, so let me start with this question.

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In the introduction, I talked about Jewish vegans, Jewish vegan activists leaving the

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movement.

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Is that factual?

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Did that really happen?

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Who wants to take that?

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Yes, Donnie.

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So just today, I received an email from a woman who I've never met before who said,

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I'm going to read it.

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Hi, Donnie.

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I've been an animal advocate and vegan for years.

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I pulled back from many vegan and animal rights animal activist groups after 10, 7.

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I thank you for your posts and have requested your friendship.

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I've gotten probably 20 emails like that since 10, 7.

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But I could also tell you that as an organizer in New York City, the number of vegan Jewish

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animal rights activists who participate in events has dropped precipitously.

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We've lost organizers.

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We've lost people who just show up and participate.

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And so, yeah, the loss has been pretty profound and sad.

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Mira.

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So it's interesting.

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I might have a different perspective than a lot of other vegan Jews, not necessarily

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everybody, but I started noticing a problem in 2020 during COVID.

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More people were home in quarantine, so they were online and they were posting more about

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their thoughts.

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And that's when I started seeing things blaming Jews for COVID, which was very reminiscent

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of Jews being blamed for the Black Plague.

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And it just, I think I started speaking out around then.

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I know I was interviewed for an article when James asked me to start talking about the

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animal holocaust and that was beginning of 2021 and the person was just reaching out

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to people who had been posting, Jews who had been posting.

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So I definitely started seeing an issue then, but I think at that point it was certain pockets

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of the vegan community or the animal rights movement.

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So if you weren't in those specific spaces, you didn't necessarily see it, but just over

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time I saw it get more obvious and also kind of spread throughout the community where it

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wasn't just like sporadic random scenarios.

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And I got to a point where the space I was in, I did not feel safe being in and also,

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especially when you're doing activism that's more high risk where you're working with

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other people and you need to make sure that you trust each other, especially safety that

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you have on another's backs.

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It just wasn't possible knowing what they thought about Jews and what they were saying

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about Jews.

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And again, this is way before 2023.

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And so it got to a point where I was kind of at a crossroads where I didn't want to stop

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advocating for animals, but I didn't really know where to go.

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There are certain approaches to help animals that I find I'm more effective with and maybe

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come more naturally and I just didn't see any of those spaces being welcoming to me.

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And so it got to a point where I thought maybe I would create my own thing, but I didn't

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feel knowledgeable enough and experienced enough.

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But I did notice there was a gap in the Jewish community in Israel as a country in terms of

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maybe things that, like approaches that weren't being filled.

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And certain, there was a lot of like vegan food advocacy and stuff like that, but there

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was less so maybe systematic stuff, abolitionist stuff.

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So I thought maybe I could fill in that gap.

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And just over time I saw more and more vegan Jews basically say like, I see it now and

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I'm willing to join you because I feel like there's no other option.

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And there were people, especially after October 7th, 2023 that I thought would never leave

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the spaces they were in that are not only leaving those spaces, but some of them are

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completely done and honestly so traumatized, they're not lending their expertise or experience

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to the community at all.

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And again, these are people that have been instrumental for a variety of things in the

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activist community that I never would have seen coming.

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I think that there is a disproportionate, in a positive way, amount of Jews across the

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globe that are involved in the activist community considering how small of a percentage we are

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population wise.

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I think it's like 0.2 or 0.2% of the world population and we're involved in all facets

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of the activist community, whether that's lawyers helping out an activist or animal rights cases,

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rescuers, investigators, organizers, protesters.

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And yeah, just seeing very few Jews actively involved in the larger community compared to

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where I was in 2020.

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Bobby?

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Yeah, I guess it depends on what we mean by leaving the movement.

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I organized the vigils in LA for six years and I did a lot of street activism and I'm

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not going to be doing street activism anymore.

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I was starting to clash with approaches to activism and effective communication that

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I was seeing on the streets and then after October 7th was kind of just the push that

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I needed to be like, I'm not going to be doing this anymore.

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However, I can't say that I've left the movement.

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I'm still an animal rights photojournalist.

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My photos are going to be on exhibit at Tel Aviv University in May.

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They're in an art magazine in Japan.

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It was just published.

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So I'm still doing that.

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I'm just not out on the street so you won't see me active.

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You might say he left, but I haven't left.

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I'm just changing my approach.

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Shani?

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I can only, like I don't know about Jews in general, but I can speak for myself and my

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Jewish friends in the community here in Vancouver and I definitely can tell that we are choosing

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not to participate in events outreach because of, we just feel ostracized and just that feeling

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of being unwelcome in the movement just has caused us to kind of like do our own thing

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within ourselves, which is just weakens the movement altogether because our power is in

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numbers when we do outreach, when we do protests and to alienate that part of, and like Mary

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said, Jews are essential in any human rights fight that we had over the years.

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If it's the fight, BLM is part of it, animal rights movement, all of this stuff.

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And so we just don't feel welcome anymore.

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And so then choosing not to participate and yeah, definitely it's something that has

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been happening since October 7 and the explosion of anti-Semitism in the movement.

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Well I guess naturally my second question is what caused that departure from the movement?

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And Mira, you alluded to that.

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Now Shani, you've named it explicitly.

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So why?

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Why are Jewish activists not feeling safe, not feeling welcome?

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What's happening?

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Donnie?

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Well, I mean it really started right after October 7th when you would know, you know,

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after that massacre where 1200 people, 1200 people in Israel were literally burned in their

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homes, raped, murdered, kidnapped.

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I mean in additional 250 kidnapped.

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The typical expressions of support that were accustomed to seeing, we just, the victims

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of that, of those atrocities weren't afforded, those words of compassion and sympathy and

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it was just, and what is that?

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Why is that?

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But it became, sort of, it got dark very quickly.

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Long before Israel even responded militarily, you know, the, instead of reaching out to

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Jewish people in the community, people started to post that this was an act of resistance

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that this was justified, that they were, this was exaggerated, that Israel did this to itself.

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I mean, the mental gymnastics employed to not just say what it was, a horrific terrorist

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attack against innocent civilians, including children and families and kids dancing at a

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festival, it became, sort of, odious, hateful right away.

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And then shortly thereafter, the accusations of genocide and colonialism and apartheid and

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ethno-state, I mean, these were activists with whom I've been working in the streets

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for, in some cases, 20 years, not once in my career, well, I should go out of career

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because I'm a volunteer, but not once in my life as an animal rights activist, did any

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of these people even talk about Israel or Zionism?

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The fact that I was Jewish was irrelevant, and then all of a sudden, people's identities,

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they sort of transformed their identities into anti-Zionists.

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Where did that come from?

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And many of them sort of secretly admitted that they didn't know anything about the issue

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or the region.

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They were just jumping on this bandwagon, and it was just anti-Semitism.

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One of the things that struck me, and then I'll turn it over to somebody else, was that

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not long after Israel began to defend itself and tried to get the hostages back, three

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animal rights organizations who had never commented on geopolitical issues and were really focused

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on animal rights made inflammatory posts falsely accusing Israel of genocide.

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And thousands upon thousands of animal rights activists in the movement who've maybe never

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given the Middle East conflict any thought, who didn't know anything about the region,

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were then seeing that these groups that they supported and were members of and respected

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were accusing Israel of genocide, which is not what happened at all.

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And so I think that that really pushed things forward in terms of alienating Jews from the

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movement.

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I started to say earlier that I'm an organizer in New York City.

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I used to get, I could easily get 40 or 50 people to come out to a protest.

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Now I not only have Jewish activists who aren't coming out anymore in many cases, but I also

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have activists who don't come out because I'm Jewish.

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And so this is really hurting, this is really hurting not just Jewish activists, but the

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animals for whom we all should be fighting.

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And to make matters even more worse or complicated is that many of the people who are alienating

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us and attacking us aren't really even active in the movement.

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So they're sabotaging, they've almost co-opted the movement to and are sabotaging it at the

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expensive animals.

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Yeah, I think that there's a few factors involved with what happened.

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And I think that if we're honest with ourselves, we can admit how much intolerance is in the

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vegan animal rights community.

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I mean, vegan activists and animal rights activists are intolerant.

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I can't tell you how many times I've heard them say, well, I'm not going home to my parents.

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They're monsters.

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They're not vegan.

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They have this binary view of the world after becoming vegan that you're vegan, you're good,

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and if you're not, you're bad.

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And so if you're not, then you're not welcome.

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And you combine that with this new approach to fact checking, which is just how I feel

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about something is enough.

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And you combine that with the fact that we don't put one and one together anymore to

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get two on our own.

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And we turn and look to the crowd and the crowd is the loudest voice.

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I think that those had a lot to do with what happened.

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It was weird because it was surprising and not as surprising as I would expect at the

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same time because I have found animal rights groups to be incredibly angry and intolerant.

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And it's like, well, par for the course, I guess.

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But what was difficult was with groups that I'd worked with for 10 years, organizations,

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on October 8th, I put up a post on my Instagram page saying I stand with Israel and all of

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them called me and told me to take it down.

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And I was like, well, hang on a second because we as an organization, we stood up for George

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Floyd.

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We stood up for Ukraine.

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We stood up for the shootings at gay bars in Orlando.

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We stood up for all these things.

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But now because it's a Jewish problem, we're just going to say, well, it's too complicated.

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We're going to stay away from this one.

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Well, at the same time, using words like genocide and their posts on their websites.

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So I think that the problem is that people have, because of things like cancel culture,

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have become scared with saying what's right versus what's popular because most of people's

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lives exist on social media and that life can be taken away so easily with someone just

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saying, we need to cancel this person.

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So I think what happens in the animal rights movement in terms of views of things can often

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be microcosm of the larger world.

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And the surge of antisemitism was not just in the vegan community.

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It's been an issue worldwide.

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In some places, the statistics of antisemitic events has been as high as it has been basically

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since the Holocaust, depending on the location, or as early as it started to be tracked basically

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by certain organizations.

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And I think, you know, then you're bound to get, you know, some of those people that are

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in the vegan community to have those opinions as well.

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But I will say, I've basically never seen any accountability in the animal rights community

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for xenophobia towards Israelis and just antisemitism towards the Jews in the community.

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I will say there was one instance where someone, again, this was way before October 7th, 2023,

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when one person had made a blatantly stereotyped nonfactual comment about Jews.

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And I had called this statement now, and then their friend had talked to them and they reached

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out to me.

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But in terms of organizations, especially after October 7th, having any accountability

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for the organizers or people involved, I have seen none.

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And if anything, these people are continuing to be platformed more and more.

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And I'm talking about people that are blatantly supporting the kidnapping of people, people

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that are trying to justify why it's okay to take hostages, why Hamas was doing something

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good, why Hezbollah was doing something good.

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I mean, some of these people have, I don't know, close to 100,000 followers in the community

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and then they're sharing that stuff and they're not getting any repercussions for that.

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And then there's me and my friends, none of us who have a significant amount of followers

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trying to say anything.

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And it's really just not getting anywhere.

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And kind of like what Bobby said, that people just have the choice of either being in a

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very hostile environment where not even everyone wants to work with us, but then they end up

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just resigning from positions they're in.

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And yeah, I mean, it got to a point where I was trying to keep track of different statements

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made and I've just run out of storage on my phone from all the screenshots of things being

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said.

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And it's basically most major organizations in the community I've seen have said awful

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stuff or knew about awful stuff and we're trying to justify it and just ignore it.

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And that's where I find it to be very problematic because like what hope of recourse is there

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if everyone's either going to ignore it or tolerate it.

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This is very interesting because something I found sinister about this all is how, like

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you said, there was no media coverage, nobody is talking about it.

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There's this huge shift in the vegan movement, the vegan community, and it just goes unnoticed

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except for a few influencers here and there raising their voice against those positions

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and against anti-Semitism.

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I waited, like who is going to cover this story?

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Why is nobody talking about it?

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So I don't know if you have an answer for that, but yes, Shani.

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Sorry, I was muted.

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I just wanted to answer to your previous question.

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Why don't we feel safe?

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And I agree with what everyone were talking about, I really felt it because I've lived

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everything that you guys just said.

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And for me, it was even more personal when in the first, I think, week or two after the

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October 7 attacks, the Vancouver vegan community has really rallied up and started to make

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lists of businesses that were put in on some sort of like a black list of do not support

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these genocidal Zionist businesses.

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And I was among them and to reiterate what Mary said, like these are accounts with thousands

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and hundreds of thousands of followers sometimes.

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And the impact of that was just unimaginable.

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Like it's to be put on a list kind of like throws you back to really dark times in our

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history.

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And that's alongside with all the posts and DMs that people have been sending me.

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So I just to reiterate what everyone said.

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So yeah, just personally, my business was alienated was put on a list not to support

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in the local community.

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So that was the main event that made me feel unsafe in this community in particular and

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the vast community in general.

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And to your question why nobody's talking about it, I can't tell.

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It feels like you say there's the cancel culture that we're all been marinating in for years,

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not only in this subject, but in other subjects as well.

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And I don't know, it feels like there's like the vegan community as a whole is part of

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this like more general and larger human human rights movement and progressive movement.

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So naturally, these people took the stance of supporting Hamas and absolutely ignoring

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the suffering of the Jewish people and especially after the massacre in Israel.

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And it just became just like the people before me said they jumped on the bandwagon.

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Nobody, it doesn't feel like anyone has truly critical nuance conversation about what is

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happening in Israel using slogans like genocide, apartheid, ethno-state.

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It's just, it's fashion.

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It feels like just fashion.

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He really stops to talk about this and all the complicity around it in a, yeah, in a

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matter that will give space to everyone because there are legitimate grievances to the Palestinian

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population who lives in and outside of Israel in Gaza and Judea and Samaria.

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There is a legitimate criticism that we can put on the Israeli government.

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We're not saying we're angel.

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We also have our own grievances towards our government.

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But from this to where we are and where days after, like Bobby said, we were massacred,

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there's a big, big gap that I don't know how to bridge that gap, how to make it make

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sense.

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Donnie.

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I think we should clarify that a lot of the people who have been attacking us are disguising

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their anti-Semitism behind anti-Zionism.

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What we know, or I mean, I can only speak to them for myself, that when someone calls

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me a Zio or a Zionist, that's really a stand-in for Jew because an estimated 95% of Jewish

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people believe that Israel has a right to exist.

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I mean, Zionism is a right for Jewish self-determination in our ancestral homeland.

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If that word has somehow been transformed or bastardized, now it means racism and colonialism.

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It doesn't mean any of these things that are being attached to it now.

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My belief is that the vast majority of people who are anti-Zionism is anti-Semitism because

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you're basically stating that Jews don't have a right to live in their ancestral homeland,

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which they've inhabited for 3,000 years except for certain expulsions, and that Israel is

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actually the most successful decolonization project in the history of the world.

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To somehow suggest that Jewish people who are indigenous to the region or Jews who have

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fled persecution, pogroms, post-war Europe, and have gone there to suggesting that we

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don't have a right to be there, and those indigenous Jews who have been there for generations

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are never right to be there.

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It's just anti-Semitism.

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Masked as something else.

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Mubbi?

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Yeah, I totally agree with Donnie.

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I think that Israel is the new Jew when it comes to anti-Semitism.

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They just say that they're attacking Israel instead, but we all know what that means.

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I think what made this feel different, I grew up in the 80s in Texas as a Jew.

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I've seen anti-Semitism since I was a kid.

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What made this different is for the first time, anti-Semitism was trending.

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It became the new thing to do.

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You have people like Kanye with a Super Bowl commercial.

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It's for his website, which is just a shirt with a giant swastika on it, HH1.

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Nobody's calling that out.

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Nobody's saying anything about that while at the same time calling Jews Nazis for defending

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their homeland and defending their people.

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It's gotten to where as long as you have freedom of speech and people will listen, it's okay

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for you to say something as long as you are either a victim or championing victimhood.

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The victim is just who social media decides that the victim is.

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It's usually just the smaller group.

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This is dangerous because these are easy answers.

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These are easy.

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This correlates to something that I saw a lot in Animal Rights Movement that was making

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me want to step out in the first place was we use easy, lazy activism.

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We use shaming and ridicule as a way of saying that we're holding someone to account.

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It has nothing of you to shame and ridicule someone.

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I don't need to know anything about Donnie to start ridiculing him right now.

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Nothing.

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The difficult part is having understanding and being able to create open discourse, validating

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people's experiences because none of us were born vegan.

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We don't want to do that.

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We just want the easy answer.

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We want the easy enemy.

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I think that that moved into anti-Semitism.

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I think anti-Semitism was already there.

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Mira.

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I forgot who had said it.

387
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Just that people aren't really thinking necessarily about what they're saying.

388
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They're jumping on the bandwagon.

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I think in the case of anti-Semitism, it's definitely true in the movement.

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00:32:59,240 --> 00:33:04,040
In the larger world, people just have a fundamental misunderstanding or lack of understanding as

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to what anti-Semitism is and how it functions.

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People assume it's like every other bigotry, but instead of seeing Jews as less than it's

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often what they call punching up, where the evil puppeteers over seeing and controlling

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things.

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It's almost like a copy and paste template throughout the years, whatever is cherished

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in society, were the ones that are messing that up.

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If social justice is what's deemed very important in this time period, Jews are the ones getting

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in the way of that.

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00:33:39,200 --> 00:33:42,240
When capitalism was important, Jews were the communists.

400
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When communism was important in certain regions, Jews were the capitalists.

401
00:33:47,640 --> 00:33:53,200
I also don't understand how the Soviet Union played a role in literally the rhetoric we're

402
00:33:53,200 --> 00:33:55,200
talking about now.

403
00:33:55,200 --> 00:34:03,440
My grandmother would go undercover into the Soviet Union to help try to free Jewish political

404
00:34:03,440 --> 00:34:05,600
prisoners.

405
00:34:05,600 --> 00:34:13,080
She would take photos of what she was seeing in the area just to remember her trips.

406
00:34:13,080 --> 00:34:23,840
I was looking at one of her photo albums and there was propaganda at a bookstore.

407
00:34:23,840 --> 00:34:27,520
I read it and I was like, this is literally what we're seeing now.

408
00:34:27,520 --> 00:34:31,600
It was like, I don't, the gist of it, because I don't remember the details, was basically

409
00:34:31,600 --> 00:34:42,800
it was depicting Israel as a not as Hitler actually, like controlling and grabbing.

410
00:34:42,800 --> 00:34:45,680
I think it was the US.

411
00:34:45,680 --> 00:34:49,480
Then at the bottom it says Zionism is nobzyism.

412
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That's literally what we're seeing.

413
00:34:50,760 --> 00:34:57,480
People just don't understand what they're saying is not only not a new original concept,

414
00:34:57,480 --> 00:35:01,600
it's literally very old.

415
00:35:01,600 --> 00:35:07,360
Those that understand how anti-Semitism was looked in the past are like, yeah, this makes

416
00:35:07,360 --> 00:35:12,640
sense, but people aren't really taking the time to look at that.

417
00:35:12,640 --> 00:35:19,240
To them, it's how could it possibly be anti-Semitism?

418
00:35:19,240 --> 00:35:23,400
It doesn't look the same as other forms of discrimination, I guess.

419
00:35:23,400 --> 00:35:26,400
Shani?

420
00:35:26,400 --> 00:35:35,520
To continue what Merah was saying, I look at anti-Semitism as kind of like a virus.

421
00:35:35,520 --> 00:35:43,360
It's funny that after COVID people can now understand this analogy of a virus being mutated

422
00:35:43,360 --> 00:35:46,360
and changing.

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00:35:46,360 --> 00:35:57,400
It moved from hatred that is based on religion based with the Christianity and moved on to

424
00:35:57,400 --> 00:36:04,480
science, what we saw with the Nazism of the race differences, etc.

425
00:36:04,480 --> 00:36:12,040
In today's world, when the religion is social justice and liberation and everything that

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00:36:12,040 --> 00:36:19,280
this movement is standing for, anti-Zionism in air court, just like Bobby said, is anti-Semitism.

427
00:36:19,280 --> 00:36:24,400
It's just another trope, it's just another version of anti-Semitism and these people

428
00:36:24,400 --> 00:36:27,200
just cannot see it.

429
00:36:27,200 --> 00:36:33,160
It's just important to understand that it's just like a virus who gets mutated.

430
00:36:33,160 --> 00:36:37,440
It's just a form of Jew-hatred through the centuries, through different times in our

431
00:36:37,440 --> 00:36:40,680
history.

432
00:36:40,680 --> 00:36:47,160
This is just another version of it.

433
00:36:47,160 --> 00:36:54,240
They think they're so original and so revolutionary, but it's just another form of Jew-hatred.

434
00:36:54,240 --> 00:36:56,240
Bobby?

435
00:36:56,240 --> 00:37:02,160
I have a question that I want to pose to everybody.

436
00:37:02,160 --> 00:37:11,320
That is, I don't understand how and when it became socially acceptable to be anti-Semitic,

437
00:37:11,320 --> 00:37:12,320
but it is.

438
00:37:12,320 --> 00:37:16,840
All the proof you need is you look at college campuses in the US.

439
00:37:16,840 --> 00:37:24,720
If there were protests stopping African Americans or LGBTQ groups from getting into class and

440
00:37:24,720 --> 00:37:28,280
terrorizing them, those would have been shut down immediately.

441
00:37:28,280 --> 00:37:34,960
But because it was Jews that weren't being able to get to class, it was considered a

442
00:37:34,960 --> 00:37:44,960
freedom of speech or PC, which is just fascism disguised as political correctness.

443
00:37:44,960 --> 00:37:52,280
My question is, does anyone have an answer for why it became okay to be anti-Semitic

444
00:37:52,280 --> 00:37:56,120
when it's still not okay to be racist, it's not okay to be homophobic, it's not okay to

445
00:37:56,120 --> 00:38:00,640
be transphobic, but anti-Semitic is fine.

446
00:38:00,640 --> 00:38:02,640
Donnie?

447
00:38:02,640 --> 00:38:05,320
I mean, I could try to answer that question.

448
00:38:05,320 --> 00:38:14,280
At the beginning of this post-10, 7 world, someone framed it to me like a lot of people

449
00:38:14,280 --> 00:38:18,120
were jumping on the bandwagon with all of this anti-Semitic rhetoric under the guise

450
00:38:18,120 --> 00:38:21,040
of oppressor versus oppressed.

451
00:38:21,040 --> 00:38:25,560
And there was this perception that Jewish people are white, despite the fact that I

452
00:38:25,560 --> 00:38:30,160
believe that a white Jews are in the minority in Israel.

453
00:38:30,160 --> 00:38:34,920
I don't know what the exact numbers are, but there are plenty of Israelis who are people

454
00:38:34,920 --> 00:38:39,960
of color from Ethiopia and other parts of the Middle East and Africa.

455
00:38:39,960 --> 00:38:46,160
And so I think that they latched onto this sort of oppressor versus oppressed narrative

456
00:38:46,160 --> 00:38:53,160
and that gave people a free pass to behave and to use such anti-Semitic language.

457
00:38:53,160 --> 00:38:59,400
I mean, we think in social justice movements, people criticize microaggressions.

458
00:38:59,400 --> 00:39:06,640
Not only are microaggressions against Jews not being addressed, full-blown attacks against

459
00:39:06,640 --> 00:39:09,080
us are now perfectly acceptable.

460
00:39:09,080 --> 00:39:16,520
And I just want to read, this is just one post made by a former DXE spokesperson.

461
00:39:16,520 --> 00:39:21,080
And DXE is an organization that I loved and supported financially and made video.

462
00:39:21,080 --> 00:39:27,240
I mean, I was really on board and for them to not put a stop to stuff like this.

463
00:39:27,240 --> 00:39:28,600
So I'm going to read it.

464
00:39:28,600 --> 00:39:35,840
And this is again, a former DXE spokesperson on social media, potentially thousands of

465
00:39:35,840 --> 00:39:38,840
people or tens of thousands of people saw this.

466
00:39:38,840 --> 00:39:45,320
All Zionists are infiltrators when they operate within any other cause or movement.

467
00:39:45,320 --> 00:39:50,600
They would rather nuke the entire organization than allow it to take a stand against the

468
00:39:50,600 --> 00:39:52,560
genocidal ethno-state.

469
00:39:52,560 --> 00:39:57,600
Their ultimate solidarity is with white supremacy and fascism.

470
00:39:57,600 --> 00:40:02,240
But the Western left has allowed them to embed themselves within our ranks because we have

471
00:40:02,240 --> 00:40:08,840
been brow-beaten into submission by claims of anti-Semitism made by those same infiltrators

472
00:40:08,840 --> 00:40:13,920
to silence us when we attempt to build intersectional multinational coalitions.

473
00:40:13,920 --> 00:40:17,400
This is especially sinister in the animal rights movement.

474
00:40:17,400 --> 00:40:25,160
A movement long ago, a long co-opted by Zionists to humane wash their sinister and virulent

475
00:40:25,160 --> 00:40:27,080
ideology.

476
00:40:27,080 --> 00:40:29,720
Zionists cannot be animal rights activists.

477
00:40:29,720 --> 00:40:34,640
All Zionists are infiltrators within the animal rights movement and their influence

478
00:40:34,640 --> 00:40:36,520
is a ticking time bomb.

479
00:40:36,520 --> 00:40:41,360
Their solidarity with your cause or organization is entirely contingent to your submission

480
00:40:41,360 --> 00:40:47,520
to their theocratic genocide, ethnic cleansing of the Middle East, and black hole drain on

481
00:40:47,520 --> 00:40:49,560
the American economy.

482
00:40:49,560 --> 00:40:54,640
All Zionist influence in progressive movements must be rooted out and destroyed by any means

483
00:40:54,640 --> 00:40:55,920
necessary.

484
00:40:55,920 --> 00:41:00,160
All Zionists are inherently infiltrators because their ultimate goal is the acceptance

485
00:41:00,160 --> 00:41:03,040
of Israel within progressivism.

486
00:41:03,040 --> 00:41:07,920
And they will never accept that the best tactic for progressive causes is to abandon Israel

487
00:41:07,920 --> 00:41:11,240
before we associate too closely with genocide.

488
00:41:11,240 --> 00:41:15,960
Their contributions regardless are made to obfuscate the reality that they are in fact

489
00:41:15,960 --> 00:41:22,720
murderously Islamophobic and they use your deeply held beliefs to mask their bloodlust.

490
00:41:22,720 --> 00:41:29,400
Zionists dress up and mock progressive activists by even appearing at rallies and other events.

491
00:41:29,400 --> 00:41:31,320
This actually goes on.

492
00:41:31,320 --> 00:41:36,800
But just replace the word Zionist with Jew, which is exactly what this person meant and

493
00:41:36,800 --> 00:41:42,000
which is exactly what 95% of Jews are.

494
00:41:42,000 --> 00:41:48,240
And this was, you know, people like this and share it and comment it and thank her for

495
00:41:48,240 --> 00:41:49,920
posting this.

496
00:41:49,920 --> 00:41:53,120
Where do you go from here as Jews in a movement?

497
00:41:53,120 --> 00:42:00,400
So I've been living in Israel the last couple of years and it has been difficult in the

498
00:42:00,400 --> 00:42:08,720
sense that not all the sanctuaries there have bomb shelters and let alone for the animals,

499
00:42:08,720 --> 00:42:14,680
like it's just not possible like financially to build like a very small bomb shelter is

500
00:42:14,680 --> 00:42:18,160
like tens of thousands of dollars or dollars or shakals.

501
00:42:18,160 --> 00:42:23,440
I don't remember which currency it was, but just to create a small enough shelter to be

502
00:42:23,440 --> 00:42:28,760
able to continue to have staff and volunteers come and make sure the sanctuary is functioning

503
00:42:28,760 --> 00:42:30,640
for the residents.

504
00:42:30,640 --> 00:42:34,280
And I remember wanting to fundraise for some of them, especially when there were like way

505
00:42:34,280 --> 00:42:40,800
more rockets happening up north in Israel and there's a sanctuary up there that, you

506
00:42:40,800 --> 00:42:43,920
know, the person running it just had to lay down in a field and pray that the rocket wasn't

507
00:42:43,920 --> 00:42:44,920
going to hit her.

508
00:42:44,920 --> 00:42:48,320
And I remember thinking I need to fundraise, but who in the community can I actually share

509
00:42:48,320 --> 00:42:52,880
this fundraiser with because like no one's going to want to share it, which is in fact

510
00:42:52,880 --> 00:42:53,880
very true.

511
00:42:53,880 --> 00:42:58,720
I mean, sanctuaries themselves and sanctuary founders have said disgusting things themselves.

512
00:42:58,720 --> 00:43:01,720
So it's not like I could share it with fellows, sanctuaries necessarily.

513
00:43:01,720 --> 00:43:05,960
And it was just this moment where I know it's been brought before the animals are suffering

514
00:43:05,960 --> 00:43:06,960
because of that.

515
00:43:06,960 --> 00:43:12,040
And like I just had no idea who I could share the fundraiser with.

516
00:43:12,040 --> 00:43:17,600
And ended up being I just shared it in the Jewish community and non-vegans were donating.

517
00:43:17,600 --> 00:43:23,520
And that's kind of the situation where it's been and activists, you know, for example,

518
00:43:23,520 --> 00:43:32,160
in the U.S. where I've done animal activism, just have no idea what it's like, you know,

519
00:43:32,160 --> 00:43:39,680
trying to help animals when you're worried about rockets and like just, you know, I don't

520
00:43:39,680 --> 00:43:45,720
know, trying to document animal cruelty at a dairy farm and like driving up north where

521
00:43:45,720 --> 00:43:51,320
there's way more concentration of rockets at that point and being like, you know, praying

522
00:43:51,320 --> 00:43:55,000
on the highway that you won't need to get out, lie on the side of the highway and cover

523
00:43:55,000 --> 00:43:58,400
your head and pray a rocket doesn't hit you because like there's no wild Michelle at your

524
00:43:58,400 --> 00:44:00,800
nearby, but you got to do to help the animals.

525
00:44:00,800 --> 00:44:04,640
And then there's, you know, people in the U.S. kind of saying like, I hope the rocket

526
00:44:04,640 --> 00:44:05,640
hits you.

527
00:44:05,640 --> 00:44:10,920
Like it just, it's not, yeah, it goes back to the question.

528
00:44:10,920 --> 00:44:20,240
Like I don't really know how you could reconcile this when even the animals that need the help

529
00:44:20,240 --> 00:44:25,040
so that volunteers continue to come and, you know, make sure their spaces are clean and

530
00:44:25,040 --> 00:44:30,960
that they're getting the exercise they need are not enough for these people to put whatever

531
00:44:30,960 --> 00:44:34,160
ideas they have aside and be like, okay, let's make that happen.

532
00:44:34,160 --> 00:44:36,480
I just, it's a very good question.

533
00:44:36,480 --> 00:44:39,240
I don't know, but it was very eye opening.

534
00:44:39,240 --> 00:44:40,240
Bobby.

535
00:44:40,240 --> 00:44:41,240
Yeah.

536
00:44:41,240 --> 00:44:44,640
I'll actually just let you go ahead and move on to the next question.

537
00:44:44,640 --> 00:44:48,560
I just wanted to add not surprised at all that that comment came from DXE.

538
00:44:48,560 --> 00:44:50,360
Not surprised at all.

539
00:44:50,360 --> 00:44:53,800
Well, I'm wondering now about DXE.

540
00:44:53,800 --> 00:44:55,840
What's the story behind that?

541
00:44:55,840 --> 00:44:58,640
Yes, Mira.

542
00:44:58,640 --> 00:45:03,760
I will just say, just for the purpose of me talking about seeing anti-Semitism during

543
00:45:03,760 --> 00:45:08,360
COVID, they were the first ones that were on my radar.

544
00:45:08,360 --> 00:45:14,760
And ultimately why I decided to try to start my own thing for Jews, just because even back

545
00:45:14,760 --> 00:45:23,680
during COVID, it started to seem like things were ramping up and kind of just being acceptable.

546
00:45:23,680 --> 00:45:28,320
But yeah, I think at this point, it's clearly not just them.

547
00:45:28,320 --> 00:45:33,000
You know, like we've said, other organizations have put out statements and it's not just

548
00:45:33,000 --> 00:45:38,840
attendees, you know, it's organizers and it's kind of widespread now.

549
00:45:38,840 --> 00:45:39,840
So yeah.

550
00:45:39,840 --> 00:45:40,840
Yes, Donnie.

551
00:45:40,840 --> 00:45:48,480
I want to make an observation about, Mira was talking about being in Israel that there's

552
00:45:48,480 --> 00:45:56,440
I think a lot of misunderstanding about the history of Israel and what Israel is Israel.

553
00:45:56,440 --> 00:46:04,840
In the United Nations, there are 48 Muslim majority countries and 23 of them have Islam

554
00:46:04,840 --> 00:46:09,400
declared as the quote, state religion.

555
00:46:09,400 --> 00:46:15,320
Israel is the only country that identifies as Jewish.

556
00:46:15,320 --> 00:46:18,720
There's no official state religion, though.

557
00:46:18,720 --> 00:46:24,040
That's not Jews live in peace with Arabs in Israel.

558
00:46:24,040 --> 00:46:32,880
There are two million Israeli citizens are Arab and there are Christians and many others

559
00:46:32,880 --> 00:46:34,400
in Israel.

560
00:46:34,400 --> 00:46:41,080
Yet, there's this accusation that Israel is somehow an apartheid state.

561
00:46:41,080 --> 00:46:47,440
Despite the fact that in all of these surrounding countries, Jews have been persecuted, chased

562
00:46:47,440 --> 00:46:51,320
out and and and when they fled.

563
00:46:51,320 --> 00:46:57,040
So there's such a miss, you know, how Jew Howard, how is Israel a colonial state?

564
00:46:57,040 --> 00:46:59,440
There's one country.

565
00:46:59,440 --> 00:47:06,720
But these wouldn't these these other religions or ethnicities that have conquered countries

566
00:47:06,720 --> 00:47:08,680
around the world be colonists?

567
00:47:08,680 --> 00:47:12,680
Why is this one Jewish state being accused of colonization?

568
00:47:12,680 --> 00:47:14,120
It doesn't make any sense.

569
00:47:14,120 --> 00:47:17,280
It's the ancestral homeland of the Jewish people.

570
00:47:17,280 --> 00:47:20,240
There's just Israel's the size of New Jersey.

571
00:47:20,240 --> 00:47:26,040
It's a tiny state and it's racially diverse, ethnically diverse.

572
00:47:26,040 --> 00:47:32,920
But it's the center of the world's fury and that double standard to me is just more proof

573
00:47:32,920 --> 00:47:36,880
that all of this hate stems from antisemitism.

574
00:47:36,880 --> 00:47:42,600
As Shani referred to in the past, you know, Jews used to be persecuted because we were

575
00:47:42,600 --> 00:47:45,960
Jewish.

576
00:47:45,960 --> 00:47:49,840
Now we're being persecuted because we have a state.

577
00:47:49,840 --> 00:47:52,040
They're always just looking for a reason.

578
00:47:52,040 --> 00:47:55,360
It's a shape shifting virus looking for a reason to hate Jews.

579
00:47:55,360 --> 00:48:02,080
And now they're hiding behind the fact that Jews have a homeland, a state, but it's tiny.

580
00:48:02,080 --> 00:48:03,600
It's the size of New Jersey.

581
00:48:03,600 --> 00:48:08,520
And it seems like people won't and including many animal rights activists won't sit still

582
00:48:08,520 --> 00:48:12,920
until it's wiped off the face of the earth from the river to the sea in a global anti

583
00:48:12,920 --> 00:48:15,680
Fada, a violent uprising against Jews.

584
00:48:15,680 --> 00:48:22,560
Yeah, I just thought I find it really interesting that, you know, because much of the animal

585
00:48:22,560 --> 00:48:30,800
rights and vegan community is on the left in terms of political views and they're progressive.

586
00:48:30,800 --> 00:48:33,720
Israel stands against everything they hate.

587
00:48:33,720 --> 00:48:38,040
Israel is the only place in the Middle East where you can be openly gay, openly trans.

588
00:48:38,040 --> 00:48:42,280
It's the only place that has freedom of speech where you can you can protest against the

589
00:48:42,280 --> 00:48:43,280
government.

590
00:48:43,280 --> 00:48:49,040
All of these things that they that these groups say that they hold like that they stand up

591
00:48:49,040 --> 00:48:54,240
for Israel is the only only country in the Middle East that actually stands up for these

592
00:48:54,240 --> 00:48:55,760
things.

593
00:48:55,760 --> 00:49:02,120
And this just shows like how unwilling these people are to actually do any research to

594
00:49:02,120 --> 00:49:07,920
actually do it to be educated in any way on what they're fighting against.

595
00:49:07,920 --> 00:49:10,720
Or it shows the depth of hatred against Jews.

596
00:49:10,720 --> 00:49:14,240
They're willing to throw Israel under the bus, despite the fact that it represents all

597
00:49:14,240 --> 00:49:16,120
of these progressive principles.

598
00:49:16,120 --> 00:49:21,160
And just to add to that, Bobby, I mean, Israel is, you know, many people describe it as the

599
00:49:21,160 --> 00:49:24,320
vegan capital of the world.

600
00:49:24,320 --> 00:49:30,760
You know, my friends who live in Israel just say that the whole country has been sort of

601
00:49:30,760 --> 00:49:37,240
veganized and maybe, you know, maybe Myro or Shani can speak to that more.

602
00:49:37,240 --> 00:49:44,240
But to then sit then accuse us of of vegan washing or humane washing.

603
00:49:44,240 --> 00:49:47,720
I mean, it's all it gets spun around.

604
00:49:47,720 --> 00:49:54,360
But it's true at Israel is a is a is a center of animal rights advocacy and veganism and

605
00:49:54,360 --> 00:49:56,800
all of these other progressive principles.

606
00:49:56,800 --> 00:50:03,920
Yet people in our community are are siding with those who want to do away with all of

607
00:50:03,920 --> 00:50:07,600
these principles just doesn't make any sense.

608
00:50:07,600 --> 00:50:08,600
Santicemitism.

609
00:50:08,600 --> 00:50:12,640
Yeah, I actually produced a vegan travel show.

610
00:50:12,640 --> 00:50:16,640
And an episode we episode one was in Israel.

611
00:50:16,640 --> 00:50:22,080
And the vegan community there was, you know, this was seven years ago was incredible.

612
00:50:22,080 --> 00:50:29,640
And what I found was incredible was how accommodating even the IDF, the military is for vegans

613
00:50:29,640 --> 00:50:33,520
in terms of like giving them vegan gear and vegan food.

614
00:50:33,520 --> 00:50:41,800
And it's just where else is that do you find these values so prevalent and yet so vilified

615
00:50:41,800 --> 00:50:43,760
at the same time?

616
00:50:43,760 --> 00:50:51,920
Well, Donnie, you said that anti Zionism was anti-Semitism.

617
00:50:51,920 --> 00:51:00,320
What do you make and that 95% of Jews, something like that, the overwhelming majority agrees

618
00:51:00,320 --> 00:51:01,320
with that?

619
00:51:01,320 --> 00:51:13,280
What do you make of those vegan Jewish activists who take the side of being anti Zionists?

620
00:51:13,280 --> 00:51:24,160
And I've heard some of that coming from just I noted his name Alex Hirschhaft, Ivan Redd,

621
00:51:24,160 --> 00:51:31,760
Peter Singer, you know, writing things along those lines.

622
00:51:31,760 --> 00:51:37,520
What do you make of those Jewish vegans in the community?

623
00:51:37,520 --> 00:51:38,520
Well, I don't.

624
00:51:38,520 --> 00:51:43,200
And first of all, there's a distinction to be made between between criticizing Israel's

625
00:51:43,200 --> 00:51:44,920
policies, which is fair.

626
00:51:44,920 --> 00:51:49,840
I mean, it doesn't feel like a double standard in light of horrible things that are happening

627
00:51:49,840 --> 00:51:56,480
in Sudan and Congo and all over the world, why the whole world has chosen to focus on

628
00:51:56,480 --> 00:51:57,480
on Israel.

629
00:51:57,480 --> 00:52:01,560
Again, that just feels like a double standard and stoop steeped in anti-Semitism.

630
00:52:01,560 --> 00:52:06,720
So I don't know if the the individuals who you mentioned are truly believe that Israel

631
00:52:06,720 --> 00:52:12,320
doesn't have a right to exist, or if they were critiquing Israeli policy, disagreeing

632
00:52:12,320 --> 00:52:17,040
with Israeli's military operations, suggesting that they employ different strategy.

633
00:52:17,040 --> 00:52:21,360
I don't know, but there are, of course, in any group, there are going to be people at

634
00:52:21,360 --> 00:52:27,160
the extreme, people who vote against their own interests, people who just want to jump

635
00:52:27,160 --> 00:52:31,120
on a bandwagon, people want to be accepted by the larger community.

636
00:52:31,120 --> 00:52:37,840
It would be easier for me to say right now that Zionism is terrorism, and Zionism is

637
00:52:37,840 --> 00:52:42,800
racism, and Zionism is colonialism, and and get back to being the animal rights activist

638
00:52:42,800 --> 00:52:47,400
I was before than it is to stand up for the truth and to stand up in principle.

639
00:52:47,400 --> 00:52:52,960
So there are always there are always going to be people who on the fringe, who are going

640
00:52:52,960 --> 00:52:58,360
to speak out and maybe take this alternative view.

641
00:52:58,360 --> 00:53:00,680
Maybe others have another explanation.

642
00:53:00,680 --> 00:53:08,360
Well at the very least, they were not vocal about the anti-Semitism that everyone on this

643
00:53:08,360 --> 00:53:14,280
call has been the victim of, you know, in terms of denouncing it.

644
00:53:14,280 --> 00:53:15,280
People are afraid.

645
00:53:15,280 --> 00:53:16,440
I just want to just interrupt.

646
00:53:16,440 --> 00:53:21,920
Yesterday I watched the closing ceremony or the closing session of the Anti-Defamation

647
00:53:21,920 --> 00:53:28,600
Leaks annual summit at the Javits Center in New York, and one of the keynote speakers was

648
00:53:28,600 --> 00:53:34,120
David Schwimmer, the actor from Friends, and he said, look, it might be uncomfortable to

649
00:53:34,120 --> 00:53:35,120
speak out.

650
00:53:35,120 --> 00:53:39,320
But I think that people have been alienated and isolated and criticized and, you know,

651
00:53:39,320 --> 00:53:43,480
canceled in some circles for speaking out against anti-Semitism.

652
00:53:43,480 --> 00:53:48,000
But he encouraged people in Hollywood, people with a platform in the music industry and

653
00:53:48,000 --> 00:53:52,560
the sports industry and entertainment industry to use their platforms to speak out because

654
00:53:52,560 --> 00:53:56,560
people like us who are public figures need that solidarity.

655
00:53:56,560 --> 00:54:00,760
We need to see that and we need people with huge platforms to correct the record, to go

656
00:54:00,760 --> 00:54:03,200
on record and say what's really happening here.

657
00:54:03,200 --> 00:54:05,200
And I'll be.

658
00:54:05,200 --> 00:54:08,200
Yeah, I think it just comes down to cowardice.

659
00:54:08,200 --> 00:54:18,480
You know, it's people are afraid of real activism, which is interesting because activism

660
00:54:18,480 --> 00:54:22,080
that asks something of you that asks you to step out on a limb that asks you to put yourself

661
00:54:22,080 --> 00:54:29,000
in an unflattering light, I guess.

662
00:54:29,000 --> 00:54:39,640
And yeah, that's just, that's really where I can come to a conclusion on is that just

663
00:54:39,640 --> 00:54:43,360
people are scared of what someone might say about them online.

664
00:54:43,360 --> 00:54:44,360
Who cares?

665
00:54:44,360 --> 00:54:50,720
You know, like I get that people have social media followings that are like, you know,

666
00:54:50,720 --> 00:54:53,680
part of their income and things like that.

667
00:54:53,680 --> 00:54:57,200
But I mean, so someone says something negative about you online.

668
00:54:57,200 --> 00:55:01,040
Some skinny tattooed punk vegan says something about you.

669
00:55:01,040 --> 00:55:03,640
You care?

670
00:55:03,640 --> 00:55:05,640
Who cares?

671
00:55:05,640 --> 00:55:08,480
Shiny.

672
00:55:08,480 --> 00:55:18,520
I think not only what Bobby and Ryan said about being cowards and afraid to go against

673
00:55:18,520 --> 00:55:23,720
the stream, which the stream and the majority of the movement, the progressive movement

674
00:55:23,720 --> 00:55:27,160
and the veian movement is anti Zionist.

675
00:55:27,160 --> 00:55:31,520
And I say that because we all know it means anti Semitism.

676
00:55:31,520 --> 00:55:43,640
Not only that, I think it's mostly the lack of understanding that Judaism is a Zionist

677
00:55:43,640 --> 00:55:45,720
movement.

678
00:55:45,720 --> 00:55:52,560
What I mean is that for thousands of years, three thousands year, we are a people who speak

679
00:55:52,560 --> 00:55:59,360
the same language, believe in the same book and pray for Zion.

680
00:55:59,360 --> 00:56:01,680
It's part of Judaism.

681
00:56:01,680 --> 00:56:10,200
So all these movement groups of not in my name or Jewish, Jewish voices for peace and

682
00:56:10,200 --> 00:56:17,480
all these people who are in the costume of, oh, as a Jew, I don't stand for what Israel

683
00:56:17,480 --> 00:56:18,980
does.

684
00:56:18,980 --> 00:56:34,600
It's just they're using their Judaism to mask their self-hatred because if you are a Jewish,

685
00:56:34,600 --> 00:56:39,240
you know that for, like I say, thousands of years, we've been speaking the same language

686
00:56:39,240 --> 00:56:45,400
and all of our prayers and all of our costumes and traditions are aimed towards Israel.

687
00:56:45,400 --> 00:56:52,240
All of our holidays, it's all stems from the land and the land of Israel.

688
00:56:52,240 --> 00:56:58,720
So I think that lack of understanding that you cannot separate Judaism from Zionism

689
00:56:58,720 --> 00:57:06,080
is also a driving force of those minority fringe Jewish people who jump to say, not

690
00:57:06,080 --> 00:57:07,080
in my name.

691
00:57:07,080 --> 00:57:12,640
I think it makes them feel more virtuous, more, I am Jewish and I'm against that.

692
00:57:12,640 --> 00:57:21,400
So you can't say you're Jewish if you don't understand that basic, like the other name

693
00:57:21,400 --> 00:57:23,280
of Israel is Zion.

694
00:57:23,280 --> 00:57:26,920
So you cannot separate the two.

695
00:57:26,920 --> 00:57:35,840
If you separate the two, you misunderstand the fundamental meaning of being Jewish.

696
00:57:35,840 --> 00:57:43,880
So it's just ignorance and the need to be so virtuous above you.

697
00:57:43,880 --> 00:57:46,840
I'm so moral.

698
00:57:46,840 --> 00:57:52,800
That's the explanation that I get from that.

699
00:57:52,800 --> 00:57:59,840
And ironically, I mean, I feel like displaying that level of hostility is just one more argument

700
00:57:59,840 --> 00:58:06,640
to have a Jewish state and an army to be able to defend yourself.

701
00:58:06,640 --> 00:58:16,320
Why is that issue the one that triggers vegans now?

702
00:58:16,320 --> 00:58:25,760
Why was it not, I don't know how Turkey was taken over by basically a dictatorship and

703
00:58:25,760 --> 00:58:28,320
thousands of journalists were thrown in prison.

704
00:58:28,320 --> 00:58:36,480
Why was not maybe the persecution of the Uyghur people in China?

705
00:58:36,480 --> 00:58:48,520
I could go down the list of horrid foreign tragedies, human rights in Iran.

706
00:58:48,520 --> 00:58:54,960
The woman there, not wearing a hijab and being sent to prison for like eight years.

707
00:58:54,960 --> 00:58:59,120
Why is this not the cause that vegans have adopted?

708
00:58:59,120 --> 00:59:04,680
Why is it the Israeli conflict?

709
00:59:04,680 --> 00:59:14,240
And I guess a second follow up question around that is why the vegan movement should anyway

710
00:59:14,240 --> 00:59:16,480
talk about those social issues.

711
00:59:16,480 --> 00:59:19,480
We're here for animals.

712
00:59:19,480 --> 00:59:23,800
We're here to stop the exploitation of animals.

713
00:59:23,800 --> 00:59:30,760
Why do we feel the need to disperse ourselves and talk about other social issues?

714
00:59:30,760 --> 00:59:38,840
Why are we not just solely focused on that very important issue that other groups, social

715
00:59:38,840 --> 00:59:43,920
groups are not talking about?

716
00:59:43,920 --> 00:59:44,920
Bobby?

717
00:59:44,920 --> 00:59:51,080
Yeah, I think that that's the negative side of intersectionalism.

718
00:59:51,080 --> 00:59:54,440
This is the idea that if I'm talking about veganism at a vegan event and not anything

719
00:59:54,440 --> 00:59:58,240
else then I don't care about anything else other than veganism.

720
00:59:58,240 --> 01:00:02,560
There's a very small percentage of the human population that has dedicated their lives

721
01:00:02,560 --> 01:00:05,840
to the liberation of animals.

722
01:00:05,840 --> 01:00:11,160
And all those other topics do is turn our attention to human centric causes when we're

723
01:00:11,160 --> 01:00:17,560
taking the small time that we have to look at animals and help animals.

724
01:00:17,560 --> 01:00:23,560
And I think to your first question, yeah, when you look at like child soldiers in Africa,

725
01:00:23,560 --> 01:00:27,760
what's happening in the Congo or the Muslims in China that are being rounded up by the

726
01:00:27,760 --> 01:00:31,200
millions, all these things are, you know, what's happening in Turkey, what's happening

727
01:00:31,200 --> 01:00:33,120
in Syria, all these problems.

728
01:00:33,120 --> 01:00:35,640
It's like people say, well, they care about these problems too.

729
01:00:35,640 --> 01:00:41,360
Well, I'm sorry, I don't see the same vitriol and hatred that I see towards Israel.

730
01:00:41,360 --> 01:00:43,400
And it's not a complicated answer.

731
01:00:43,400 --> 01:00:44,400
It's anti-Semitism.

732
01:00:44,400 --> 01:00:45,400
That's all it is.

733
01:00:45,400 --> 01:00:48,640
Anti-Semitism and an easy target and an easy villain.

734
01:00:48,640 --> 01:00:52,320
It's like, oh, they're the problem, you know, because, you know, if you talk about child

735
01:00:52,320 --> 01:00:54,280
soldiers, that's a complicated issue in Africa.

736
01:00:54,280 --> 01:00:55,720
There's a lot going on.

737
01:00:55,720 --> 01:01:01,160
And like to understand that geopolitical landscape and people claiming that they understand the

738
01:01:01,160 --> 01:01:04,920
political landscape of the Middle East, which is ridiculous, you know, but they don't have

739
01:01:04,920 --> 01:01:09,200
to worry about that because they just have to say, oh, it's Jews.

740
01:01:09,200 --> 01:01:10,480
You know, so that's easy.

741
01:01:10,480 --> 01:01:12,200
I can get on this side.

742
01:01:12,200 --> 01:01:14,920
That's where I think that comes from.

743
01:01:14,920 --> 01:01:16,360
Donnie.

744
01:01:16,360 --> 01:01:25,800
You asked why the focus on Israel as opposed to the Uyghurs, Sudan, Congo, places where

745
01:01:25,800 --> 01:01:30,640
there are actual genocides taking place in no Jews, no news.

746
01:01:30,640 --> 01:01:31,720
I think that's part of it.

747
01:01:31,720 --> 01:01:39,280
I think that this conflict has given people who are anti-Semitic a platform to spew anti-Semitic

748
01:01:39,280 --> 01:01:47,400
hate, but sort of hide behind a Kaffee or the, you know, a mask of anti-Semitism.

749
01:01:47,400 --> 01:01:51,040
But it's anti-Semitism.

750
01:01:51,040 --> 01:01:59,440
Why, again, why have all of these large multinational animal rights organizations addressed only

751
01:01:59,440 --> 01:02:04,240
one geopolitical issue on their social media platforms, which have hundreds of thousands

752
01:02:04,240 --> 01:02:05,960
of followers?

753
01:02:05,960 --> 01:02:10,600
Why this and not all of these other horrible things that are happening?

754
01:02:10,600 --> 01:02:15,360
And you know, it comes down to anti-Semitism.

755
01:02:15,360 --> 01:02:22,000
Why did they choose to step out of their lane for this cause?

756
01:02:22,000 --> 01:02:25,720
And so, yeah, again, it all comes back in the end.

757
01:02:25,720 --> 01:02:28,120
It really does all come back to anti-Semitism.

758
01:02:28,120 --> 01:02:29,520
Shani.

759
01:02:29,520 --> 01:02:34,160
I just want to play a devil's advocate because that's what I do a lot.

760
01:02:34,160 --> 01:02:39,880
Like I try to think like they think, like I try to think, what would they say to that?

761
01:02:39,880 --> 01:02:42,920
Like why do you concentrate on Israel so much?

762
01:02:42,920 --> 01:02:48,440
And I want to ask the group, what would you say to the people who say, well, in Sudan

763
01:02:48,440 --> 01:02:58,480
and Congo and all of these places, U.S. don't play a major role in being ally, like they're

764
01:02:58,480 --> 01:03:09,960
ally to Israel and these people who are protesting and like are so vocal about Israel and what's

765
01:03:09,960 --> 01:03:17,120
happening in the Israel-Gaza war, what would you say to those people who say, well, the

766
01:03:17,120 --> 01:03:19,360
U.S. government don't fund Congo.

767
01:03:19,360 --> 01:03:21,640
They don't fund these places.

768
01:03:21,640 --> 01:03:28,440
This is the one conflict that they can put an impact on because this is their country.

769
01:03:28,440 --> 01:03:34,720
Like if it's protesters from the U.S., let's say, or Canada or U.K., these are places who

770
01:03:34,720 --> 01:03:40,200
actively and financially support in Israel and are allies.

771
01:03:40,200 --> 01:03:45,040
And that is their reason why they concentrate on this conflict because this is the one conflict

772
01:03:45,040 --> 01:03:50,120
that they can impact on with protesting.

773
01:03:50,120 --> 01:03:51,640
What would you say to these people?

774
01:03:51,640 --> 01:03:57,440
I'd like to hear what that group say because this is an answer that I can hear at pro-Palestinian

775
01:03:57,440 --> 01:04:03,400
activists say, well, we can't control this, but we can control that.

776
01:04:03,400 --> 01:04:05,720
What would you say to those people?

777
01:04:05,720 --> 01:04:08,720
Miran.

778
01:04:08,720 --> 01:04:16,440
I would say ironically for at least some part of the war, the U.S. was actually in some

779
01:04:16,440 --> 01:04:19,040
way funding both sides.

780
01:04:19,040 --> 01:04:26,240
So I don't see that really being addressed, whether it's the resources that Hamas was

781
01:04:26,240 --> 01:04:34,600
getting through Iran or aid that ended up in Hamas's hands that was then used, whether

782
01:04:34,600 --> 01:04:38,120
that's fuel for rockets or whatever.

783
01:04:38,120 --> 01:04:44,640
It's not as clear cut as people might assume that Israel is the only one, whether it's

784
01:04:44,640 --> 01:04:50,960
directly or indirectly being supported by the U.S., at least at some point, like in

785
01:04:50,960 --> 01:04:53,880
2023.

786
01:04:53,880 --> 01:04:58,920
And so, yeah, I mean, if you really want to talk about, like, if someone as an American

787
01:04:58,920 --> 01:05:05,360
wants to talk about their country's involvement in this, at least talk about what's happening,

788
01:05:05,360 --> 01:05:13,840
that both sides were getting some help, again, whether indirectly or directly from the U.S.

789
01:05:13,840 --> 01:05:14,960
That's a great point.

790
01:05:14,960 --> 01:05:17,360
Thank you for that.

791
01:05:17,360 --> 01:05:18,800
Bobby.

792
01:05:18,800 --> 01:05:23,640
Israel offers more aid to Gaza than any other country in the world.

793
01:05:23,640 --> 01:05:28,360
This is a country that's basically at war with another country.

794
01:05:28,360 --> 01:05:32,080
And while at the same time being expected to make sure that country is safe, make sure

795
01:05:32,080 --> 01:05:38,560
that they have food and water and fuel and defend yourself, but when you do that, don't

796
01:05:38,560 --> 01:05:40,600
hurt any of them.

797
01:05:40,600 --> 01:05:46,920
It's this weird double standard that no other country has ever been held to.

798
01:05:46,920 --> 01:05:48,360
It's ridiculous.

799
01:05:48,360 --> 01:05:56,120
And I think that just becomes, it comes from a place where facts don't matter anymore.

800
01:05:56,120 --> 01:05:58,960
You can look at objective truth right in the face and they'll just turn it the other way

801
01:05:58,960 --> 01:06:01,760
because it doesn't align with their narrative.

802
01:06:01,760 --> 01:06:05,160
It doesn't align with whatever is holding up their fragile little world that they've

803
01:06:05,160 --> 01:06:07,680
built, so it makes them comfortable.

804
01:06:07,680 --> 01:06:14,280
And I think the problem is that people aren't honest with themselves.

805
01:06:14,280 --> 01:06:16,240
People are, oh, I know what's happening over there.

806
01:06:16,240 --> 01:06:17,240
No, you don't.

807
01:06:17,240 --> 01:06:18,240
Are you kidding?

808
01:06:18,240 --> 01:06:21,960
Oh, I'm going to stop America from eating.

809
01:06:21,960 --> 01:06:27,160
No one out there on protests on the street has the influence to change what America or

810
01:06:27,160 --> 01:06:29,640
Israel is going to do in this situation.

811
01:06:29,640 --> 01:06:34,840
They just want to be a virtue signaling loudmouth, patting themselves on the back as like on

812
01:06:34,840 --> 01:06:37,520
the moral compass for everybody here.

813
01:06:37,520 --> 01:06:38,520
That's what I mean.

814
01:06:38,520 --> 01:06:41,400
We see that in all activism.

815
01:06:41,400 --> 01:06:43,240
It's really unfortunate.

816
01:06:43,240 --> 01:06:51,240
And I don't know how we can get back to people being willing to say, I don't know enough

817
01:06:51,240 --> 01:06:54,360
about this to have an opinion.

818
01:06:54,360 --> 01:06:56,760
You don't hear that anymore.

819
01:06:56,760 --> 01:06:57,760
Donnie.

820
01:06:57,760 --> 01:07:06,560
I think the objection that Shani raises that, oh, well, we're out on the streets because

821
01:07:06,560 --> 01:07:09,400
we fund, the US funds Israel.

822
01:07:09,400 --> 01:07:16,680
I think that those who do use that argument, for most of them, I believe that it's a smokescreen.

823
01:07:16,680 --> 01:07:21,760
First of all, I don't believe that most people who are taking to the streets calling for a

824
01:07:21,760 --> 01:07:26,000
global intifada and river to the sea, they don't know which river to which sea.

825
01:07:26,000 --> 01:07:30,280
I don't think they would even be aware of the fact that Israel supports Israel but doesn't

826
01:07:30,280 --> 01:07:34,440
support some of these other countries where atrocities are taking place.

827
01:07:34,440 --> 01:07:39,380
I think that would be giving a lot of these activists too much credit.

828
01:07:39,380 --> 01:07:46,320
But I will say also that I think for most people are followers and they're jumping on,

829
01:07:46,320 --> 01:07:50,200
even if their participation isn't rooted in anti-Semitism, it's rooted by a desire to

830
01:07:50,200 --> 01:07:55,400
be part of the issue du jour or to be part of a community or to get off of social media

831
01:07:55,400 --> 01:07:57,600
and get into the streets with people.

832
01:07:57,600 --> 01:08:02,600
There are many different reasons why people have joined this free Palestine, really anti-Israel

833
01:08:02,600 --> 01:08:06,440
movement.

834
01:08:06,440 --> 01:08:12,240
There are other examples that I can think of in recent history where people just jumped

835
01:08:12,240 --> 01:08:15,760
on something that they knew nothing about and it became this trend.

836
01:08:15,760 --> 01:08:22,040
I don't know if anybody here remembers, but there was a military leader in Uganda named

837
01:08:22,040 --> 01:08:26,840
Kony who was rounding up children and turning them into soldiers.

838
01:08:26,840 --> 01:08:32,880
There was all kinds of footage of these children with rifles, really disturbing.

839
01:08:32,880 --> 01:08:40,720
It became this trend that everybody, this was probably right at the dawn of social media,

840
01:08:40,720 --> 01:08:47,120
just jumped on this, we've got to track down Kony, this military leader.

841
01:08:47,120 --> 01:08:50,600
It just became a thing in that moment and then it left.

842
01:08:50,600 --> 01:08:56,320
And of course my hope is that this will eventually subside too and that sort of this anti-Semitic

843
01:08:56,320 --> 01:09:00,800
vitriol and hate will go away.

844
01:09:00,800 --> 01:09:07,400
And I guess that's my closing question for you.

845
01:09:07,400 --> 01:09:14,760
How do you think or how do you feel about the future of the vegan movement, of animal

846
01:09:14,760 --> 01:09:23,760
rights as it has displayed this level of, I would say, stupidity if we think about it

847
01:09:23,760 --> 01:09:27,040
strategically and politically?

848
01:09:27,040 --> 01:09:29,800
Why did we get into this?

849
01:09:29,800 --> 01:09:32,320
Why did we create such division?

850
01:09:32,320 --> 01:09:35,040
This has not helped the movement at all.

851
01:09:35,040 --> 01:09:38,840
This has not saved any animal lives.

852
01:09:38,840 --> 01:09:41,280
So how do you think about the future?

853
01:09:41,280 --> 01:09:50,600
And do you have the same hope as Kony, you have expressed that this anti-Semitism, this

854
01:09:50,600 --> 01:10:02,760
wave of anti-Semitism will go away and maybe with peace in the Middle East and we can at

855
01:10:02,760 --> 01:10:06,600
last be a more unified vegan movement?

856
01:10:06,600 --> 01:10:07,600
Bobby?

857
01:10:07,600 --> 01:10:15,320
Yeah, I think the problem is that once vegan activists started becoming celebrities, it

858
01:10:15,320 --> 01:10:21,960
became an egoic movement where people weren't interested in facts, people weren't interested

859
01:10:21,960 --> 01:10:27,600
in effective communication and effective activism, they were interested in loud activism.

860
01:10:27,600 --> 01:10:33,880
It was about, get your voice, be loud instead of be effective.

861
01:10:33,880 --> 01:10:37,760
And I think that it's going to be trending that way.

862
01:10:37,760 --> 01:10:41,480
I don't know what's going to happen with the animal rights movement, but at the same time

863
01:10:41,480 --> 01:10:47,920
I don't excuse them for this because they use that way too often to avoid accountability.

864
01:10:47,920 --> 01:10:51,960
A group will do something wrong and then say, well, if you attack us, then you're attacking

865
01:10:51,960 --> 01:10:54,400
this group that's doing all this good for animals.

866
01:10:54,400 --> 01:10:58,840
Well, I'm sorry, that was your mistake.

867
01:10:58,840 --> 01:11:03,040
We can't just say, well, we can't attack vegan or animal rights organizations because

868
01:11:03,040 --> 01:11:06,160
they're doing all this good work and they are doing good work for animals.

869
01:11:06,160 --> 01:11:11,920
But that's not a shield, it's a real hypocritical, disgusting shield that they hold out in front

870
01:11:11,920 --> 01:11:15,680
of them so that they can say, well, yes, we said that, so what?

871
01:11:15,680 --> 01:11:22,920
You can't do what you want to publicly shame us and hurt our funding and hurt our work.

872
01:11:22,920 --> 01:11:31,720
It became all these different groups being the veganist vegan group instead of all of

873
01:11:31,720 --> 01:11:36,960
us working together on the same cause, which is what we started out as.

874
01:11:36,960 --> 01:11:39,880
But now it's too self-interested.

875
01:11:39,880 --> 01:11:44,880
I don't know what's going to happen, but I think that the ego needs to go away.

876
01:11:44,880 --> 01:11:52,000
We've all heard that change starts with, first there's awareness, then conversation, then

877
01:11:52,000 --> 01:11:53,000
change.

878
01:11:53,000 --> 01:11:56,440
We've been doing awareness for 80 years.

879
01:11:56,440 --> 01:12:00,000
We've been doing a yelling and screaming at people's faces so that they can hear us since

880
01:12:00,000 --> 01:12:01,080
1940.

881
01:12:01,080 --> 01:12:04,880
When the word vegan first showed up, the world is what?

882
01:12:04,880 --> 01:12:06,520
1% vegan?

883
01:12:06,520 --> 01:12:10,560
I think everyone here is smart enough to realize maybe that approach isn't working anymore,

884
01:12:10,560 --> 01:12:13,480
maybe it's time to move to conversation.

885
01:12:13,480 --> 01:12:19,960
But that's the hard part that not everybody can be involved in and that doesn't get likes

886
01:12:19,960 --> 01:12:21,600
on Instagram.

887
01:12:21,600 --> 01:12:25,520
So I don't know what's going to happen.

888
01:12:25,520 --> 01:12:32,920
In the introduction, I talked about the breaking point and I can't help but feel like this

889
01:12:32,920 --> 01:12:39,720
rise of anti-semitism, this division is a symptom of something else, maybe a transformation

890
01:12:39,720 --> 01:12:44,640
in this movement more than the central thing.

891
01:12:44,640 --> 01:12:50,040
So yeah, anyone else want to jump in?

892
01:12:50,040 --> 01:12:52,540
Mira?

893
01:12:52,540 --> 01:12:59,840
It's interesting you said a symptom of a larger problem because there is that phrase that's

894
01:12:59,840 --> 01:13:04,760
often attributed to anti-semitism especially when it exponentially grows in a society or

895
01:13:04,760 --> 01:13:09,800
a specific country that it's the canary in the coal mine.

896
01:13:09,800 --> 01:13:14,280
I don't know if it's technically speciesist because canaries were used in the coal mine

897
01:13:14,280 --> 01:13:18,480
to see if they died and there's a sign that something's not safe down there, which obviously

898
01:13:18,480 --> 01:13:20,840
is horrible.

899
01:13:20,840 --> 01:13:29,000
But that kind of countries that devolved into rampant anti-semitism ended up having larger

900
01:13:29,000 --> 01:13:35,000
issues and anti-semitism and that society was rotting.

901
01:13:35,000 --> 01:13:41,320
Just to your point, it has historically shown that way that we're kind of like the first

902
01:13:41,320 --> 01:13:45,480
line of defense that something's wrong.

903
01:13:45,480 --> 01:13:54,760
I personally, because of the anti-semitism experience, it has for better or for worse

904
01:13:54,760 --> 01:13:59,920
allowed me to see that there are issues in my own community that I can address, whether

905
01:13:59,920 --> 01:14:03,600
or not that will be easy as a separate question.

906
01:14:03,600 --> 01:14:08,600
But in a way I feel like if I'm willing to do it and I have the knowledge since it is

907
01:14:08,600 --> 01:14:13,760
my community, I have more knowledge than someone that's outside the Jewish community,

908
01:14:13,760 --> 01:14:16,120
hopefully I can use that to my advantage.

909
01:14:16,120 --> 01:14:20,160
Kind of like I said, fill in gaps that I'm seeing.

910
01:14:20,160 --> 01:14:25,200
I'm in the process of trying to launch an organization that will be based in Israel,

911
01:14:25,200 --> 01:14:29,680
but then kind of spread out to Jewish communities around the world because there are decisions,

912
01:14:29,680 --> 01:14:38,240
especially like in Israel there was a decision to make certain methods when slaughtering animals

913
01:14:38,240 --> 01:14:45,400
illegal and then that spread to a big kosher certification organization that's based in

914
01:14:45,400 --> 01:14:47,680
diaspora like around the world.

915
01:14:47,680 --> 01:14:51,120
They implemented that into their organization as well.

916
01:14:51,120 --> 01:14:58,440
They won't certify animal bodies that I guess were killed with that method.

917
01:14:58,440 --> 01:15:00,920
It does have a ripple effect.

918
01:15:00,920 --> 01:15:06,440
The aim for that is to kind of take like a macro look at the movement in Israel as a

919
01:15:06,440 --> 01:15:12,760
whole and see kind of what approaches are maybe not implemented as much and assist in

920
01:15:12,760 --> 01:15:16,960
making and kind of plugging in the holes and creating like a unifying message in the

921
01:15:16,960 --> 01:15:20,400
community and allowing for more collaboration.

922
01:15:20,400 --> 01:15:29,640
So it kind of can be more cohesive and yeah, kind of just looking at where I can help.

923
01:15:29,640 --> 01:15:40,400
So that is my plan to still stick more within the spaces I'm already in as a Jew because

924
01:15:40,400 --> 01:15:48,440
yeah, I think what better way to make an impact than the communities I'm already in I guess.

925
01:15:48,440 --> 01:15:49,440
Donnie.

926
01:15:49,440 --> 01:15:57,640
I would say over the past, since 10.7, I've spent way more time than I want addressing

927
01:15:57,640 --> 01:16:04,000
anti-Semitism because I felt like I absolutely have to be irresponsible not to and I've done

928
01:16:04,000 --> 01:16:09,000
that at the expense of time that I would have normally spent advocating for animals and

929
01:16:09,000 --> 01:16:14,480
that's a shame and I really look forward to a time when that ends because my heart is

930
01:16:14,480 --> 01:16:16,520
within this movement.

931
01:16:16,520 --> 01:16:23,880
My heart is in animal rights and as Bobby said earlier on, how I am an activist will

932
01:16:23,880 --> 01:16:30,320
change or already has changed but I'll always be here for the animals because that's where

933
01:16:30,320 --> 01:16:32,880
my heart is, that's where my passion is.

934
01:16:32,880 --> 01:16:33,880
Bobby.

935
01:16:33,880 --> 01:16:41,640
Yeah, I think that I'm guessing that almost every Jewish vegan animal rights activist had

936
01:16:41,640 --> 01:16:49,560
the same experience where I spent the last 10 years working with people like Sean Monson

937
01:16:49,560 --> 01:16:55,480
and Moby going inside slaughterhouses, going undercover into factory farms, literally being

938
01:16:55,480 --> 01:16:59,960
at a slaughterhouse three times a week every week for six years to the point where I was

939
01:16:59,960 --> 01:17:04,120
in a mental health clinic for 12 weeks and I was known for that.

940
01:17:04,120 --> 01:17:05,200
That's who I was.

941
01:17:05,200 --> 01:17:10,240
I was the guy who was organizing all the vigils and the guy who was cinematographer for Sean

942
01:17:10,240 --> 01:17:16,600
Monson and doing all this frontline activism, rescuing over 100 and something animals and

943
01:17:16,600 --> 01:17:24,240
all of that went away on October 8th and I became a Jewish vegan and I became a vegan

944
01:17:24,240 --> 01:17:27,960
who couldn't work with groups that was, I was working with groups where it was my dream

945
01:17:27,960 --> 01:17:30,320
to work with them.

946
01:17:30,320 --> 01:17:34,720
Activists and artists who I was so excited to finally be working with and then they started

947
01:17:34,720 --> 01:17:39,240
posting things and I was in good conscious, couldn't continue working for the organization

948
01:17:39,240 --> 01:17:44,200
and so now here I am in Austin, I'm not in LA anymore, struggling with a real identity

949
01:17:44,200 --> 01:17:48,520
crisis on what I'm going to dedicate the rest of my life to and how is that going to

950
01:17:48,520 --> 01:17:53,240
look, what is that going to look like because even though it was detrimental to my health,

951
01:17:53,240 --> 01:17:56,720
if someone said, hey, we need you to go and film inside a slaughterhouse right now, I

952
01:17:56,720 --> 01:18:00,880
would do it in a heartbeat because that's where my passion lies, right?

953
01:18:00,880 --> 01:18:11,320
But I can't in good conscious promote groups that promote hate and so I feel completely,

954
01:18:11,320 --> 01:18:16,560
it's like in a spy movie where the main character realizes they've been double crossed and what

955
01:18:16,560 --> 01:18:21,520
they thought was friendly ground is now enemy territory and they don't know what to do or

956
01:18:21,520 --> 01:18:26,200
who to trust or where to go and that's where I am right now and I think that there's a

957
01:18:26,200 --> 01:18:29,400
lot of Jewish vegan activists that are feeling like that.

958
01:18:29,400 --> 01:18:33,880
Shani, did you want to add something or?

959
01:18:33,880 --> 01:18:43,440
I didn't because my view on it is really pessimistic so I don't know where we go from here and

960
01:18:43,440 --> 01:18:51,040
I'm so connected to what Ryan just said, I, as a Jewish animal activist, I just feel homeless

961
01:18:51,040 --> 01:18:53,320
right now.

962
01:18:53,320 --> 01:19:04,840
I feel like almost the need of reinventing ourselves in that space which is just hurting

963
01:19:04,840 --> 01:19:10,720
the movement because like I said at the beginning, our power is in numbers, the more we grow

964
01:19:10,720 --> 01:19:17,680
the movement, the more it becomes more mainstream, the more veganism, lifestyle and the liberation

965
01:19:17,680 --> 01:19:20,800
of animals is on the table.

966
01:19:20,800 --> 01:19:26,640
The more people joining, we want to get to a point of critical mess, we all know that

967
01:19:26,640 --> 01:19:33,600
term of like when it becomes like a bit more common, your last look at the point is weird

968
01:19:33,600 --> 01:19:44,040
or fringe and this divisiveness in our movement just hurting our movement and it's just, I

969
01:19:44,040 --> 01:19:54,880
don't know if we can ever recover from that because like just like Ryan just said, you

970
01:19:54,880 --> 01:20:01,200
feel like in your own movement you don't know who to trust, you don't know who's, I can't

971
01:20:01,200 --> 01:20:08,880
see myself going back to the community here almost to a point where I have like serious,

972
01:20:08,880 --> 01:20:16,000
serious thoughts of going back to Israel because I feel so alienated in Vancouver as a large

973
01:20:16,000 --> 01:20:19,600
and the vegan movement especially.

974
01:20:19,600 --> 01:20:26,000
So I didn't want to say anything because I'm pretty pessimistic about what's the future

975
01:20:26,000 --> 01:20:32,920
of that look like but I, one can only hope that we will find those spaces to keep advocating

976
01:20:32,920 --> 01:20:41,000
for animal rights and the liberation of animals from our plates, from our culture, clothing,

977
01:20:41,000 --> 01:20:45,520
whatever all the implications of that.

978
01:20:45,520 --> 01:20:53,160
But right now I don't see the way out, I don't see how this becoming, how this goes away,

979
01:20:53,160 --> 01:20:59,120
I wish I had better answers but yeah.

980
01:20:59,120 --> 01:21:03,240
Donnie?

981
01:21:03,240 --> 01:21:09,920
This is a little bit out of place but one of the things that has struck me and over the

982
01:21:09,920 --> 01:21:18,720
past year and however long it's been since 10-7 is that our colleagues in the movement

983
01:21:18,720 --> 01:21:24,960
have been sort of attacking Israel and attacking us under the guise of free Palestine but I've

984
01:21:24,960 --> 01:21:31,120
never heard anyone in the movement state the obvious that if they really genuinely cared

985
01:21:31,120 --> 01:21:38,080
about the plight of people living in Gaza, why aren't they calling to free Palestine

986
01:21:38,080 --> 01:21:44,520
from Hamas which strips people of their human rights, which uses their citizens as human

987
01:21:44,520 --> 01:21:49,200
shields, which reigns with terror.

988
01:21:49,200 --> 01:21:57,120
It's hard to even take their approach and their point of view seriously when they're

989
01:21:57,120 --> 01:22:04,920
not even stating the obvious that if they believe that the people living in Gaza are

990
01:22:04,920 --> 01:22:08,160
victims, who are they victims of?

991
01:22:08,160 --> 01:22:13,600
Israel wants nothing more than to live in peace with their neighbors but their neighbor,

992
01:22:13,600 --> 01:22:20,680
the leadership of their neighbors and many just plain old civilians state openly, proudly,

993
01:22:20,680 --> 01:22:29,200
publicly that their desire is to wipe Israel and Jews off the face of the earth.

994
01:22:29,200 --> 01:22:34,520
As Golda Meir once famously stated, how do you negotiate with people who have come to

995
01:22:34,520 --> 01:22:36,280
kill you?

996
01:22:36,280 --> 01:22:43,000
And there's just never any discussion about that in our movement and so it just reaffirms

997
01:22:43,000 --> 01:22:49,920
this feeling that I have that all of this free Palestine activism is rooted in hate

998
01:22:49,920 --> 01:22:56,640
against Israel and Jews more than a desire to actually help the people who they're claiming

999
01:22:56,640 --> 01:22:59,000
to advocate for.

1000
01:22:59,000 --> 01:23:01,000
Bobby?

1001
01:23:01,000 --> 01:23:04,360
Yeah, I completely agree.

1002
01:23:04,360 --> 01:23:07,040
I try to make this comparison when I'm talking to people.

1003
01:23:07,040 --> 01:23:15,200
It would be like the KKK starting an uprising in, I don't know, Mississippi or wherever,

1004
01:23:15,200 --> 01:23:23,080
you know, West Virginia and then asking all the African Americans and Jews, why can't

1005
01:23:23,080 --> 01:23:27,440
you guys just, you know, like, figure this out, get along?

1006
01:23:27,440 --> 01:23:33,280
You know, when it says, and when it says in Hezbollah's basically charter on their flag

1007
01:23:33,280 --> 01:23:37,880
that we are here to destroy Israel and to destroy Jews, when Hamas says we are here

1008
01:23:37,880 --> 01:23:42,600
to destroy Israel and destroy Jews and then you say, well, they're a political party.

1009
01:23:42,600 --> 01:23:44,760
Why can't you guys just get along?

1010
01:23:44,760 --> 01:23:50,800
You know, you wouldn't say that if it was someone in a clan outfit coming on the news

1011
01:23:50,800 --> 01:23:54,360
and spouting out hate and you go, oh, that's a political party.

1012
01:23:54,360 --> 01:23:57,360
This is ridiculous.

1013
01:23:57,360 --> 01:23:59,720
Yes, Tony.

1014
01:23:59,720 --> 01:24:07,400
On October 7 and October 8 when the video footage of the hostages that were recorded

1015
01:24:07,400 --> 01:24:14,520
by Hamas and civilians who participated in that attack, when we started to see that,

1016
01:24:14,520 --> 01:24:22,640
what we saw is thousands of civilians in Gaza and Hamas taking to the streets cheering

1017
01:24:22,640 --> 01:24:28,520
over the bodies of dead and bloodied people who were in Israel, whether they were Israelis

1018
01:24:28,520 --> 01:24:33,920
or visitors in Israel, just the people who were taken hostage.

1019
01:24:33,920 --> 01:24:38,800
You just would never see anything like that on the other side of the border in Israel.

1020
01:24:38,800 --> 01:24:46,120
And so, you know, for me as a Jewish person, you know, I don't know, I don't know what

1021
01:24:46,120 --> 01:24:48,240
the way forward is for Israel.

1022
01:24:48,240 --> 01:24:53,280
How do people in this country, the peace-loving Kibbutzniks who lived on the border with Gaza

1023
01:24:53,280 --> 01:24:59,120
who were transporting people from Gaza into Israel for medical treatment at Israeli hospitals,

1024
01:24:59,120 --> 01:25:04,240
you know, who were then victims of Hamas and were still being held captive by Hamas, how

1025
01:25:04,240 --> 01:25:05,960
do they go on?

1026
01:25:05,960 --> 01:25:12,040
And so, I just, I want to be here as an American, as a Jew and as an animal rights activist

1027
01:25:12,040 --> 01:25:20,920
to say that, you know, I support them and will continue to advocate for them until this

1028
01:25:20,920 --> 01:25:23,920
nightmare is over one way or another.

1029
01:25:23,920 --> 01:25:24,920
Bobby?

1030
01:25:24,920 --> 01:25:30,200
Yeah, I think that one thing that was so telling for me was on October 8th, when all these

1031
01:25:30,200 --> 01:25:35,640
videos are coming out, this goes to my point to where people just make up their own reality.

1032
01:25:35,640 --> 01:25:37,520
People were saying, oh, well, that didn't really happen.

1033
01:25:37,520 --> 01:25:39,600
I was like, it did happen.

1034
01:25:39,600 --> 01:25:43,640
And that's Hamas showing you and bragging about it, that it happened.

1035
01:25:43,640 --> 01:25:48,000
And they're like, no, that's all fake.

1036
01:25:48,000 --> 01:25:51,520
You know, what are you supposed to say when if you're having a conversation with someone

1037
01:25:51,520 --> 01:25:55,040
and all they do is bark, no at you?

1038
01:25:55,040 --> 01:26:00,400
You know, they don't have anything to back up their beliefs other than hate.

1039
01:26:00,400 --> 01:26:01,960
And so it's like, Jews are good people.

1040
01:26:01,960 --> 01:26:02,960
No, they're not.

1041
01:26:02,960 --> 01:26:03,960
Why not?

1042
01:26:03,960 --> 01:26:04,960
Because they're not.

1043
01:26:04,960 --> 01:26:08,760
Okay, I guess this conversation's over, you know, because they're just not willing to

1044
01:26:08,760 --> 01:26:10,160
believe it.

1045
01:26:10,160 --> 01:26:17,800
And so that's where my, people call it pessimism, I call it realism, comes into, I don't know

1046
01:26:17,800 --> 01:26:25,080
because this speaks to a larger problem in terms of a lot of other groups and a lot of

1047
01:26:25,080 --> 01:26:28,320
other issues where people just say, that's just not true.

1048
01:26:28,320 --> 01:26:30,320
The earth is flat.

1049
01:26:30,320 --> 01:26:32,040
You know, how do you know?

1050
01:26:32,040 --> 01:26:34,640
I just, I just know, I just feel like that's true.

1051
01:26:34,640 --> 01:26:35,640
Oh, okay.

1052
01:26:35,640 --> 01:26:37,880
I guess that's good enough then.

1053
01:26:37,880 --> 01:26:47,680
You know, it's a form of negationism, like Holocaust denial, shiny.

1054
01:26:47,680 --> 01:26:55,600
And to what just Ryan just said, on one hand, there's this like, belentled denial of what

1055
01:26:55,600 --> 01:27:00,840
happened on October 7, but then on the other hand, they praise what happened on October

1056
01:27:00,840 --> 01:27:04,400
7 and said it was a great act of resistance.

1057
01:27:04,400 --> 01:27:05,800
So which one is it?

1058
01:27:05,800 --> 01:27:12,160
Because they just keep contradicting themselves all the time, which is funny from, for someone

1059
01:27:12,160 --> 01:27:16,520
who knows exactly what is happening to see it from the side, it's like, so which one

1060
01:27:16,520 --> 01:27:17,520
is it?

1061
01:27:17,520 --> 01:27:19,760
Did it happen or did it not happen?

1062
01:27:19,760 --> 01:27:24,040
Just another point of like, you guys have no idea what you're talking about.

1063
01:27:24,040 --> 01:27:31,480
Yeah, I feel like, you know, creating this podcast and really, you know, diving deep

1064
01:27:31,480 --> 01:27:35,120
into the world of vegan activism.

1065
01:27:35,120 --> 01:27:41,520
I have found that this division exists with many other groups, not as strong, you know,

1066
01:27:41,520 --> 01:27:47,520
as with Jewish vegans, you know, the level of hostility and all of that, what we have

1067
01:27:47,520 --> 01:27:53,120
covered in the past hour.

1068
01:27:53,120 --> 01:27:59,720
But you know, you talk with vegans who label themselves as conservatives and, you know,

1069
01:27:59,720 --> 01:28:04,920
they will tell you, I don't feel welcome in this community or vegans who are Christians

1070
01:28:04,920 --> 01:28:13,920
and they will tell you, hey, my way of doing veganism is not, you know, what is represented

1071
01:28:13,920 --> 01:28:16,560
usually in the community as a general rule.

1072
01:28:16,560 --> 01:28:24,920
You know, I did the whole episode debunking the documentary Christ, piracy, you know,

1073
01:28:24,920 --> 01:28:31,520
presenting the perspective of Christians on that documentary.

1074
01:28:31,520 --> 01:28:38,440
But things like that, you know, it again, I go back to that point of this being a symptom

1075
01:28:38,440 --> 01:28:44,040
of something else that is wrong in this movement.

1076
01:28:44,040 --> 01:28:45,040
Bobby.

1077
01:28:45,040 --> 01:28:46,040
Yeah.

1078
01:28:46,040 --> 01:28:52,920
And to your point with like conservatives, that has been a problem that has been bothering

1079
01:28:52,920 --> 01:28:58,480
me ever since I became a vegan is that they don't want to leave the echo chamber.

1080
01:28:58,480 --> 01:29:00,720
Like I said, they want it to be easy activism.

1081
01:29:00,720 --> 01:29:04,720
They don't like, you know, we all want people who think differently than us.

1082
01:29:04,720 --> 01:29:05,720
What are you talking about?

1083
01:29:05,720 --> 01:29:08,200
Of course you want people who think differently than you.

1084
01:29:08,200 --> 01:29:12,040
It's not doing us any good just preaching to the choir, but they're unwilling to do

1085
01:29:12,040 --> 01:29:17,200
it because they say, oh, they're, you know, it's again, the binary view of the world.

1086
01:29:17,200 --> 01:29:21,200
Oh, conservative, bad, you know, non-vegan, bad.

1087
01:29:21,200 --> 01:29:24,200
And it's just unwilling to see the complexity in things.

1088
01:29:24,200 --> 01:29:28,960
And this idea that, you know, a conservative would never be vegan is ridiculous.

1089
01:29:28,960 --> 01:29:34,520
My father's conservative, he's vegan, you know, it's just, again, I think it just comes

1090
01:29:34,520 --> 01:29:40,320
down to lazy, easy activism where they're not really confronted that much by opposing

1091
01:29:40,320 --> 01:29:41,320
views.

1092
01:29:41,320 --> 01:29:43,800
And if they are all that they do is scream and shout as loud as they can.

1093
01:29:43,800 --> 01:29:47,200
And they think that they sort of had some sort of impact.

1094
01:29:47,200 --> 01:29:52,320
I think until we can get over that, until we can get over ourselves and not make it

1095
01:29:52,320 --> 01:29:57,120
about how angry we are and instead make it about how effective we can be, I think we're

1096
01:29:57,120 --> 01:29:59,160
going to be in a stalemate for a while.

1097
01:29:59,160 --> 01:30:05,640
I will put an end to this conversation because, you know, I want to respect your time.

1098
01:30:05,640 --> 01:30:10,120
And let me just say, you know, this has been an honor talking with you.

1099
01:30:10,120 --> 01:30:16,120
Thank you so much for having shared, you know, your insights and your experience.

1100
01:30:16,120 --> 01:30:22,120
I really hope that this podcast makes some small difference in showing a different perspective

1101
01:30:22,120 --> 01:30:31,240
to, again, those activists who are in this echo chamber and, you know, are not seeing

1102
01:30:31,240 --> 01:30:38,480
the light anymore, are bombarded with the same messaging.

1103
01:30:38,480 --> 01:30:45,720
I do think that there are plenty of vegans and I've talked with some of them who are

1104
01:30:45,720 --> 01:30:56,040
silently supportive of, you know, the Jewish cause and are really not happy about what

1105
01:30:56,040 --> 01:31:01,000
has happened in the past year with anti-Semitism.

1106
01:31:01,000 --> 01:31:08,440
But again, you know, I would have expected that a movement like veganism, which is highly

1107
01:31:08,440 --> 01:31:16,040
non-conformist, would be more likely to speak up about those issues, have the courage to

1108
01:31:16,040 --> 01:31:17,040
do so.

1109
01:31:17,040 --> 01:31:19,200
But yeah, thank you so much.

1110
01:31:19,200 --> 01:31:22,240
I'm really happy to have done this.

1111
01:31:22,240 --> 01:31:23,400
Any parting words?

1112
01:31:23,400 --> 01:31:30,560
I just wanted to say thank you for creating that space, creating this conversation because

1113
01:31:30,560 --> 01:31:36,960
I don't think there's anything that the movement is facing right now that is more important

1114
01:31:36,960 --> 01:31:41,800
than that because just like Mera said, this is just the canary in the coal mine and this

1115
01:31:41,800 --> 01:31:50,600
is just the beginning of the erosion if you look at the history.

1116
01:31:50,600 --> 01:31:53,680
So thank you for addressing it.

1117
01:31:53,680 --> 01:31:57,520
Thank you for having me, having us, having this conversation.

1118
01:31:57,520 --> 01:32:02,440
It is super important to me.

1119
01:32:02,440 --> 01:32:10,840
And I love everything that everyone said, I'm connected deeply to the arguments and the

1120
01:32:10,840 --> 01:32:14,280
examples that everyone has just shared.

1121
01:32:14,280 --> 01:32:19,320
And I just wanted to say thank you so much for creating space for this conversation.

1122
01:32:19,320 --> 01:32:20,320
Thank you, Shani.

1123
01:32:20,320 --> 01:32:21,320
Doni?

1124
01:32:21,320 --> 01:32:27,240
By virtue of giving us a platform to talk about this issue, something which we have desperately

1125
01:32:27,240 --> 01:32:31,360
needed, you're going to be subjecting yourself to criticism.

1126
01:32:31,360 --> 01:32:36,320
So I just want to thank you for going out on a limb for us, for the Jewish community,

1127
01:32:36,320 --> 01:32:41,640
and for giving us this platform to talk about what we've experienced and how we're feeling.

1128
01:32:41,640 --> 01:32:42,640
Thank you, Doni.

1129
01:32:42,640 --> 01:32:43,640
Mera?

1130
01:32:43,640 --> 01:32:47,080
I very much second what Doni said.

1131
01:32:47,080 --> 01:32:51,240
Thank you so much for reaching out and for wanting to have this conversation in the first

1132
01:32:51,240 --> 01:32:58,200
place and making it, I guess, a discussion with more than just one Jew to kind of see

1133
01:32:58,200 --> 01:33:01,960
that there are multiple Jewish voices that are on the same page.

1134
01:33:01,960 --> 01:33:09,440
And I really hope that you won't be, I guess, on the receiving end of too much hate, which

1135
01:33:09,440 --> 01:33:16,400
sometimes does come along with, you know, I guess, going against the grain regarding

1136
01:33:16,400 --> 01:33:18,680
things around the Jewish community and Israel.

1137
01:33:18,680 --> 01:33:22,080
So yeah, just thank you so much.

1138
01:33:22,080 --> 01:33:23,200
Thank you, Mera.

1139
01:33:23,200 --> 01:33:25,040
Thank you everyone for listening.

1140
01:33:25,040 --> 01:33:29,400
I kindly invite you to share this podcast with the vegans you know.

1141
01:33:29,400 --> 01:33:32,520
Let's encourage more people to take action.

1142
01:33:32,520 --> 01:33:41,480
Again, thank you so much for caring, and I will see you next Tuesday for a new episode.

1143
01:33:41,480 --> 01:33:47,840
I just want to say sorry, but the way that the Zoom was shown to me, I kept calling Bobby

1144
01:33:47,840 --> 01:33:53,760
Ryan, so I just realized that.

1145
01:33:53,760 --> 01:33:58,040
So if that confused anyone, the names just didn't show up properly.

1146
01:33:58,040 --> 01:34:24,160
So technical thing, but sorry, Bobby, for misnaming you the whole time.