I just listened to the latest podcast from Gary Francione wherein he interviews Gary Steiner. I shouldn’t be surprised, but Steiner didn’t expect hostile reactions from his NY Times piece. It’s clear he’s VERY new to vegan outreach and activism. Both Garys have some good ideas and some great intentions, but both seem completely out of touch with the mainstream.

Consider:

What’s funny is that the Garys hear these excuses and probably think, “I can explain the fallacy and logically persuade this person to see the error in their ways. I’m a professor afterall and that’s what I do!”

But I think anyone who has been involved in vegan education for any significant amount of time realizes that it doesn’t matter that there’s a logical fallacy if pointing out the argumentative mistake won’t effectively convince people to go vegan. The trick in vegan education is to get people to go vegan, not to create the most complete and coherent – yet unconvincing – argument for veganism. If you can do both, go for it. But if/when you must choose, pick efficacy over logical validity.

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Sections: Vegan Et Cetera
Topics: argumentation, bingo, college, debate, defensive omnivore bingo, effectiveness, efficacy, Gary Francione, Gary Steiner, logic, philosophy, professor, university, vegan education, vegan outreach