Do you support the idea behind the Vegan/Omnivore Alliance Against Animal Factories (#VOAAF)?

Conversations about food trigger defensiveness from many of us. I think it’s an indication of the sorry state of our country’s agriculture that we can’t talk about food – meat, in particular – without hitting friction with most other people, but I bet someone would disagree with me even about that. I’m a vegetarian in support of ethical animal husbandry, so I’m in the position of disagreeing with vegans – people I have some values in common with – who would rather no one ever raise animals for their meat and other products, under any conditions. 

Last Wednesday Grist's senior food and agriculture writer Tom Philpott published an article titled Introducing... the Vegan/Omnivore Alliance against Animal Factories. He suggests that "conscientious omnivores," "who think that animals have a place in our farming and our diets, but in a much different way than the prevailing manner" and "vegans, who wish to remove animals from our farms and tables altogether" have a common enemy: "industrial animal agriculture." So the two groups should team up. Enter the "Vegan/Omnivore Alliance against Animal Factory Farming (twitter hashtag: #VOAAF)."

Philpott states that he’s a writer, not an organizer, and that he doesn’t mean for the organization to be anything but an idea, unless someone else wants to take up the mantle. On Friday, someone started the @VOAAF Twitter account. That feed shows the creation of a domain, a Facebook, and a call for volunteers. Will this alliance take off and become a well-known animal rights group (and perhaps lessen tension between vegans and omnivores in the process)? Do you think it’s a good concept to rally behind?

Eleanor Brown