Emily: Hi it's Emily from Bite Size Vegan and welcome to another vegan nugget. Today
I'm honored to be joined by my friend and mentor Gary Yourofsky who has graciously agreed
to be here and answer questions that you, the Bite Size Vegan audience, have sent to
me. I'm going to be releasing this interview in a series of videos so be sure to stay tuned
to the channel. Gary I just wanted to thank you so much for taking time out of your busy
schedule to be here and answer some of these questions.
Gary: Anything for you Emily.
Emily: Thank you.
Emily: Can you tell us a little bit about your own journey to veganism? Was there an
inciting event, and what contributed to your decision to change?
Gary: I'll try to do the quick version of my story. My stepdad is a clown in the circus.
He took me backstage when I was around 23 to see the elephants. I was excited, I did
not know what was going on backstage. And immediately when I went backstage I knew something
was awry, something was wrong. Elephants were in chains, they were acting erratically, swinging
back and forth. From there, I went to a slaughterhouse in Detroit, Thorn Apple Valley pig slaughterhouse
for 6 weeks straight every day for 2 to 6 hours every day as a meat dairy and egg eater,
still a stubborn person, that's why I actually work well with people. I know what it's like
not wanting to give up certain foods that you love. And by the way, you actually don't
have to give up those foods, you're just veganizing those foods. But anyways, I knew I had to
make a decision. I witnessed a Holocaust for those 6 weeks straight. And I'm Jewish and
I don't say that term lightly, but Auschwitz is still alive Birkenau is still here. We
did not eradicate concentration camps, we just had different victims inside of these
camps. Just different victims, same actions going on. Beings being treated like nothing,
like they are worthless, like their lives don't matter. People mocking them while they
are killing them and torturing them. People ignoring their plight, we're just doing it
to the animals. And we started on the animals too by the way, that's why we've learned how
to kill and harm and enslave each other so efficiently, we practiced on the animals.
Back to my other point about getting rate of speciesism, then you wouldn't have racism
and sexism. So that's my story, I saw the pigs at the slaughterhouse, I knew I had to
make a decision. Was I going to be their friend or their enemy. I chose to be their friend
and not their enemy. I did not want to be a two legged devil to these creatures anymore.
Keep this in mind too, there's a quote from a bishop from Britain, William Ralph Inge.
In an 18th century sermon, this man actually said, "we have treated our distant cousins
in fur and feathers so horribly, that beyond a doubt, if they ever formed and organized
religion, the devil would be depicted in human form." It breaks my heart to hear that statement
because it cannot be impugned. We must be devils to them, we cut things off their bodies
while they are fully conscious, we cut them up at a slaughterhouse while they are fully
conscious, we steal their babies, we rape them, we light them on fire for burn research,
we make them do stupid idiotic tricks for entertainment, we must be the worst beings
ever in the eyes of the animals. And it is my goal in life, and I know yours too, the
Metal Chef's too, and all the vegans on this planet, to change that perception. To let
the animals know that we're not all evil. We're not all bad. Sadly, the majority of
humans are bad and evil though. But I don't think it was meant to be that way. And what
we try to do is we try to awaken people out of that soporific state. Get them back to
reality, take them back to that conscience that they had when they were young. When they
were a kid, when they were in awe of animals. When animals were everything, when all your
stories when you're growing up, think about it. All the childhood stories, all the movies,
all about animals. But we don't tell the kids what they're eating. Once in a blue moon I
get invited into a kindergarten, first or second grade class, and of course the first
thing is you can't show slaughterhouse videos, they're going to have nightmares. And you
can't tell them what meat is. And I just don't understand. So I have to lie to them? Why
do we lie to kids? Lying is part of the game too, this information. Of course I violate
all rules, so even when they tell me that I still went in the classrooms with first
and second graders over the years and I said, how many people like Babe? They say I love
Babe, the pig in the movie, oh Babe is great. I said how many people had a hotdog recently?
I love hotdogs. That's Babe. So all of a sudden the teacher goes, no. All of the sudden I'm
a bad guy because I told them the truth? But I'd be a good guy if I lied to them? So just
trying to awaken people. Just try to bring them back to reality. Because people definitely
aren't living in reality. I know fantasy land's a fun place to be, I was there for 25 years.
Emily: Gary, I just want to thank you so much for giving us your time and I've been asked
on behalf of so many of my viewers to just thank you for everything that you do. So,
thank you so much. Gary: Thank you. Keep on. Everybody pass her stuff around, it's tight
stuff. Honestly. BiteSizeVegan.com. Share it.
I hope you enjoyed hearing Gary’s conversion story and ethics discussion. I’d love to
hear your story and your thoughts on the issues addressed in this interview segment. Let me
know in the comments below. Give the video a thumbs up if you liked it and please share
it around to spread the message. Stay tuned to the Bite Size Vegan channel for more installations
of my interview with Gary and if you’re new, be sure to click that big red subscribe
button for more awesome vegan content every Monday and Wednesday and some Fridays. I’ll
also be posting bonus footage and answers that don’t make it to the channel in the
ViV Area of BiteSizeVegan.com, which you can access for free when you sign up for the Nugget
Newsletter, which you can do by clicking below. And for even more bonus and behind-the-scenes
footage and to support the spreading of the vegan message, click on the Nugget Army logo
over there or either one of the support links in the video description. Now go live vegan
and I’ll see you soon.
Subtitles by the Amara.org community