Vegan Outreach President and Co-Founder Jack Norris

Jack Norris, RD, President and Co-Founder of Vegan Outreach discusses the history of the animal rights and vegetarian movement in the United States and the evolution of Vegan Outreach.

Vegan Outreach is an American animal advocacy group working to expose and end cruelty to animals through the widespread distribution of printed informational booklets. As of 2008, over 8.7 million hard copies of Vegan Outreach brochures have been handed out by the local members of Vegan Outreach around the world since the group's inception.

Vegan Outreach's mission is the reduction of the amount of suffering in the world. They have chosen to focus on people's food choices for three reasons:

- The number of animals raised and killed for food each year in the United States alone vastly exceeds any other form of exploitation, involving numbers far greater than the total human population of the entire world. Ninety-nine out of every 100 animals killed in the United States each year are slaughtered for human consumption.

- The intensity of farmed animal suffering: the overcrowding and confinement, the stench, the racket, the extremes of heat and cold, the attacks and even cannibalism, the hunger and starvation, the illness, etc.

- Exposing factory farms and advocating ethical eating is perhaps the most readily accessible option for reducing animal suffering. Every day, every single person makes decisions that affect the lives of farmed animals. Inspiring someone to change leads to fewer animals suffering on factory farms. By choosing to promote cruelty-free living, every person is a potential major victory.

All of Vegan Outreach's printed materials advocate for a reduction and eventual elimination of animal products from one's diet. Furthermore, suggestions for alternative foods, information on staying healthy on a plant-based diet, and tips for advocacy are included in the brochures. Vegan Outreach suggests that one's guide shouldn't be an endless list of vegan ingredients but rather doing his or her absolute best to stop cruelty to animals. In other words, the focus isn't so much personal beliefs or specific choices but rather the animals and their suffering. Vegan Outreach encourages people to become vegan advocates because if someone believes that being vegan is important, being the most effective advocate for the animals must be seen as even more important. The impact of one's individual veganism -- several hundred animals over the course of a lifetime -- pales in comparison to what he or she can accomplish by being an example to others. For every person inspired to change his or her habits, a vegan's impact on the world multiplies.

Please visit http://www.VeganOutreach.org

Category:

Education

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• animal
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[robinliveshere]

One day people will look back in history and wonder how people used to eat 'dead animal flesh' and torture and enslave animals without good reason. Especially since meat causes many health problems.

[Iamjanwar]

Vegan Outreach is a uniquely admirable group for its thoughtful and rational approach to reducing animal suffering, its emphasis on the use of objective and reliable information in its pamphlets, and its willingness to play down the "three-pronged" argument. This a great presentation introducing the group and its evolution along with the rest of the movement!

[boltdenimon]

Why does he keep saying "vegetarian"? Isn't he promoting veganism?

[EllenJaffeJones]

Great effort. Important to spread the word!

[muhcartay]

Next time keep the camera still. The zooming in and out is distracting.

[futoncat]

@TheErsatzMode Lmao! Judging by his caps lock, I would modify it to ADHD.

[TheErsatzMode]

@BrickJerryCircleShir

It's just over an hour long. ADD?

[BrickJerryCircleShir]

DAMN THIS VID IS FUCKEN LONG

[DavidInSugarLand]

Great history lecture, Jack. I was directly affected by the 7" ep record you mention. It and Conflict's "A Nation of Animal Lovers" (both had foldout record sleeves with pro-animal rights/veg*n info), becoming a vegetarian the evening I read it (forget which one I got first - both were 1983 - and vegan shortly thereafter. Vegan Outreach is a great group and I fully support their efforts, and have started helping as I can. - David

[dwdeclare]

thank you for uploading this. i am looking forward to the day when people will look at all the ethical evidence for being a vegan and realize that it is the kindest and most reasonable way to live.

[phishmarisol]

I think you need to take a look in a dictionary before further commenting. Omnivores eat both plants and animals. It has nothing to do with being mammals or not. As for "God" designing us I think your time would be better served researching who came first - us or the animals we eat.