At first blush, the Right-to-Life and Animal Rights Movements look like philosophical adversaries:
IF YOU LOVE ANIMALS SO MUCH HOW CAN YOU DEFEND ABORTIONS AND THE KILLING OF THE UNBORN? (Right-to-Lifers)
IF YOU CARE SO MUCH ABOUT A HALF-INCH EMBRYO WHY DO YOU EAT VEAL AND OTHER ANIMALS? (Animal Rights Activists)
But both movements address the same thing: empathy or (lack thereof) and the human desire to not see something uncomfortable or something that threatens their world view. Certainly, photos of the (non-food) products of the dairy, egg and meat industries and photos of abortion results are not hidden from public view. But they are clearly not enough to change minds or even penetrate mainstream news.
CAMPAIGN RESULTS ARE UNDERWHELMING
Sadly, both movements have limited luck in fording the deeply rooted human empathy divide.
Animal rights activists try to personalize one animal--meet Ida the goat!--so people can see that any animal can be loved or a pet. They offer cruelty-free food--plant-based meats and dairy alternatives--and report on widespread animal decimations from disease depopulation, fires, sacrifice festivals and holidays to slaughterhouses. "Pass the Big Mac," unimpressed people say.
Right-to-Lifers show photos of baby-like embryos on posters to the public. They show expectant mothers ultrasounds of a fetus. And, like animal rights activists, they offer abortion alternatives like adoption. "Hurry up, with the abortion," says their unimpressed target audience.
Both movements suffer, as the cliche' goes, from a failure to communicate.
It has been said you cannot make someone see something when their paycheck depends on not seeing it. The corollary apparently, when looking at the Right-to-Life and animal rights movements, is you can't make someone see something when their appetite or lifestyle is dependent on it.
How To Influence the Other?
Both Right-to-Lifers and animal rights activists operate out of an ethical, spiritual or religious perspective that others don't share--or don't share all the time. "Yeah, sometimes I don't eat meat," someone might say or, "Abortion is wrong when the fetus is viable." To activists, that is watered down indignation and outrage and unforgivable middle-of-the-roadhood.
Thanks to social media and post-Covid, post-Trump partisanship, echo chambers and "preaching to the choir" have become the communication norms. Podcasts, blogs and Substacks amass millions of friends and followers imparting a warm feeling of being "right," supported by outspoken thinkers who agree and being at exactly at the right place in the bell-shaped social/political curve. But are minds of the "other" changed? Taylor Swift has 94.4 million followers on X (formerly Twitter) but could not sway the recent US presidential election, after all.
Right-to-Lifers and animal rights activists lament that they often cannot even inspire their families and friends to agree with them.
Is a conservative just a liberal who was mugged yesterday? A liberal just a conservative who was discriminated against? Is a personal, traumatic experience required for a mind change? Right-to-Lifers and animal rights activists hope for an answer.
(Article changed on Mar 22, 2025 at 2:59 PM EDT)
(Article changed on Mar 23, 2025 at 4:53 PM EDT)
