Supporter
Spotlight

It started when I was 12 years old. I saw a story on TV about puppies being put down at an overcrowded pound. It made me so sad, but in that moment I also realized that the food I was eating only made it to my plate because an animal had been killed. If I wasn’t OK with that happening to a dog, it was hypocritical for me to be OK with it happening to cows, pigs, chickens, and other farmed animals. That’s when I became vegetarian.

Over the next 25 years, I continued to be interested in animal welfare, though I wasn’t actively involved with any organizations until the pandemic. My partner and I decided to adopt two rescue dogs during the shutdown, which got us more plugged into the world of animal activism. Once the Instagram algorithm realized I cared about shelter animals, I also started to see more stories about the cruelty that farmed animals face. Though I was already vegetarian, I felt that I needed to do more, and my eyes were also opened to the suffering caused by the dairy and egg industries, which is why I became vegan. It’s been only three years, but it’s one of the best decisions I’ve ever made!

Veganism and animal advocacy can sometimes feel lonely, especially if the rest of your social circle isn’t involved in it. That’s why I’ve been so thankful for the Compassion Collective. It’s a constant reminder that we’re not alone and there are other like-minded individuals also doing whatever they can to make a difference. Mikael is especially amazing in cultivating such a positive culture for the CoCo—we couldn’t ask for a better collective leader!

It was very important to me that if we were going to put money into the wedding industrial complex that we do it in a way that aligned with and promoted our values. That meant making it eco-friendly and vegan—not just with food but also with our clothes, makeup, etc. Most important to me was ensuring that our food was so delicious it would change the minds of guests who were biased against vegan food.

As this was a multiday Indian wedding, there were a lot of logistics to work through! We picked Cancun as our destination because it was actually closest for most of our guests (yes, I did a rough carbon-footprint calculation for flights when determining where to host it). We made sure to pick a wedding planner who was willing to work with us on these key principles—that was always our first question in interviews—and worked only with vendors who were willing to use vegan products, whether it was our caterers or hair and makeup artists. We even made sure all our wedding outfits were made from bamboo vegan silk, and our favor bags had plant-based snacks and sustainably made products!

Though I’m sure we weren’t perfect, and we had to navigate a few hiccups (like our venue canceling on us three months from the wedding 😅), we were really glad to have established our core values before starting our planning process. It really helped us make decisions, especially when there were curveballs.

There are a few areas that I love—of course, the undercover investigators. I can’t imagine how hard it must be to do that work, so I love the support and recognition they get from Mercy For Animals.

I also love The People’s Fund grant program, and I took part in one of the program’s events a few years ago. Being able to invest in people who are really trying to make plant-based living easier for everyone is so fulfilling!

I think two things are equally important:

1. Change minds with empathy. When you feel strongly about something, it can seem easier to scold, shame, or try to guilt people into seeing your point of view. But in my experience that doesn’t always work; it makes people defensive and closed off to new perspectives. It’s hard—and I don’t always succeed—but I try to meet people where they are on their animal-welfare journey, whether that’s just educating them about easy-to-adopt options, connecting it to other things they care about (I find there’s a lot of overlap between animal welfare and sustainability), or just being cognizant that it’s progress over perfection (getting someone to eat less meat is still a step forward even if they don’t go fully vegan).
2. Animal-welfare work is hard. Be kind to yourself. It can sometimes feel frustrating that progress isn’t coming faster or that more people don’t care. So I think the first thing you need to do is self-care so you can keep fighting the good fight without burning out. I know it’s easier said than done; I’m famous for spending hours doom-scrolling and then anxiety-spiraling.