This Changes Everything

Something happened in the last 24 hours that should give every animal trapped in a cage hope for the future.

I don’t mean the breaking news that came out yesterday, though it brought tears to my eyes. (I’ll have more to say about that in the weeks to come.)

I don’t mean the beginning of my trial for the rescue of dogs from Ridglan, though that could establish a ground-breaking precedent.

We’re holding a Zoom meeting tonight to discuss the events of the last 24 hours—and our plans to seize this movement to end all experiments on dogs. RSVP here!

What I mean is that a true grassroots political movement is bursting to life. Vox’s journalist Marina Bolotnikova put it best when she described recent events as “a bold and bruising experiment in broadening the movement’s tent beyond the already converted, and carrying animal rights forward into the realm of mass politics.”

What are the signs that this “bold and bruising” experiment is working? The renowned social movement scholar Charles Tilly coined the acronym WUNC to describe the characteristics of social movements that are able to create change. Worthy. Unified. Numerous. Committed.

And what we have seen, in the last 24 hours, is a movement that is showing that it is WUNC.

In the face of shocking police violence, we have maintained the moral high ground. At my hearing yesterday, Karen, a senior citizen who uses a walker, described her pride at participating nonviolently in the April 18 action. “We’re here for the dogs,” she told me. Karen, with the quiet dignity of an elder in our community, showed that we are worthy.

Even as the industry tries to divide us—supported by unfortunate factions within the animal movement itself—the Ridglan response has been a powerful coalition effort. Animal advocates from across the nation, from radical organizations like PETA to relatively conservative groups like Big Dog Ranch Rescue to wonk-ish effective altruists at Coefficient Giving, came together to support saving the dogs. I’ve never seen unity like this in the movement.

And then there were the numbers. At a typical protest, grassroots organizers struggle to get a 10 people to attend. The Ridglan campaign recruited over 1,000. Numbers like this give us real power.

Finally, there is what happened in court today. But I don’t mean with the lawyers and the judge, but with the people who showed up to support. The overflowing courtroom was filled with supporters. Most of them joined the defense of the pups on April 18. The government accused us of violence. It attempted to scare us with tear gas and rubber bullets. But not only did everyone still show up in court; they wanted to do it all again.

“I’ll be there next time,” Karen, the elderly woman with the walker, told me outside of court. “We will do it all again.”

Commitment like this is how the world changes.

Over the last few months, I have been traveling around the world revisiting a thesis I first offered to the movement 10 years ago. Animal liberation—the end to all commercial exploitation of non-human beings—will happen in one generation, I argued back in 2016.

The last few days have strengthened that argument. We are worthy. We are unified. We are numerous. And, above all, we are committed.

As my friend and fellow organizer Aidan Kankyoku put it, we got our asses kicked. And it worked.

This changes everything. A movement with this scale and commitment cannot be stopped. And even as our battles continue—in court and in the next open rescue—we should have not just hope but confidence. Soon, every animal will be free.

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Some other things

• The Dane County court found probable cause in my preliminary hearing yesterday—but removed the court order banning me from Dane County. The hearing had far more fireworks and objections than a typical hearing of this sort. Prosecutor Matthew Moeser aggressively objected to every question about animal cruelty; the court commissioner sustained the objections. Unluckily, we drew the same court commissioner in this hearing, Brian Asmus, as we saw at the bail hearing. He was no more sympathetic this time, though my attorneys (Chris Carraway and Kristen Schrank) made a strong case for the defense. Ultimately, while the court found probable cause for a felony and refused to lift my no contact order, it did lift my ban on being present in Dane County. This was the most constitutionally indefensible portion of the prior order, but we will continue the fight against the other restrictions in the weeks to come.

• We’re publishing a report on the lessons from April 18. This past Sunday, we had a long debrief session with all rescuers who participated on March 15 or April 18. We are now releasing a report based on an analysis of that feedback. Check it out here—and leave a comment.

• Some tremendous things have been written about the Ridglan campaign. Marina Bolotnikova wrote the most vivid description of the events on April 18, as a personal witness to the police brutality. Aidan Kankyoku has written what I hope will be the first of many blogs analyzing the impact of the campaign.

• There’s so much more to do, so I hope you’ll join us tonight. Even as the fight against Ridglan may be nearing its end, the fight for dogs and other animals facing torture in labs is moving on to the next step. We’ll be discussing the last day’s news, and how we can sustain and grow this momentum, at the call tonight. RSVP here to get the Zoom link!