The Green Pill

Almira Tanner is the Lead Organizer of Direct Action Everywhere (DxE). At first glance, she might not be who you picture when you hear “leader of radical animal liberation network.” Growing up in verdant Vancouver, Canada, she went straight from kindergarten through grad school, finished as valedictorian of her undergraduate class, never stepped out of line, and—God forbid—never had any run-ins with the law. So how did this mild-mannered, upright kid grow up to become the animal agriculture industry’s most feared enemy?In this episode, Wayne and Almira uncover what drove her to leave her career, her country, and her comfort behind, only to live a life of voluntary indigence with the prospect of imprisonment. They discuss what it’s like to be at the helm of a social movement, the need to balance community relationships and enforce professional standards, and what it takes to be a true leader and agent of change.“And so much conflict in the movement comes from people not understanding that they're playing different roles.”This is an Uprising: How Nonviolent Revolt is Shaping the 21st Century – Paul & Mark EnglerDelivering Happiness: A Path to Profits, Passion, and Purpose – Tony HsiehEvery Twelve Seconds – Timothy PachiratWhy David Sometimes Wins – Marshall GantzDonate to DxEMusic by Moby: Everything That Rises View transcript Wayne Hsiung 0:07 Hey there, this is Wayne Hsiung and you're listening to The Green Pill, a podcast about how big personal changes can lead to big social changes. And we've had a little bit of a hiatus, many of you know that I ran for mayor and lost terribly, I have an entire podcast about that. We're gonna start this up again. Because you know, as the holiday season ends, and we get out of this pandemic period, I think there's a lot for us to reflect on together. And I wanted to do a podcast now to reflect on my life for the last seven or eight years. And I can't think of a better person for me to reflect with that Almira Tanner, the lead organizer of the Animal Rights Network, Direct Action Everywhere, the successor to me as lead organizer, and really one of the most impactful activists I've met over the last 20 years of my life. But Almira is somewhat of a surprising activist and a surprising leader and an activist movement. Don't get me wrong, she's an incredibly accomplished person. She was valedictorian of her undergraduate class, she's maybe one of the most organized people I know, and perhaps the single most organized person I know. And that's saying a lot because I know a lot of organized people. But she was on an otherwise pretty conventional path until something really big in her life changed. And you're going to hear about that change today. You're also going to learn about what it's like to be the boss. And I see that somewhat tongue in cheek because Almira and I both understand that to be an effective boss, you have to build leadership and others. But if you've ever wanted to be in a leadership position, or understand what it's like to be a leader of a grassroots network that involves 1000s of people at this point, you're gonna want to listen to this podcast and get some advice as to how leadership works, why we often fail as leaders and what we can do to be more effective leaders, not just for our teams, but frankly, for our entire planet. But maybe the most important thing we talk about is that movements are getting something deeply wrong, but also something very, very right. And what they're getting wrong is so much of what you see on the internet is just activism based entirely on feeling and emotion. And don't get me wrong, feelings are important. We discussed how the urgency of emotions is what drives movements to progress and change. But the same time, if we don't create a movement that has discipline, and strategy and organization, we're not going to create change. And I think there are lessons for us as individuals, and for us as a movement. So hope you enjoyed this podcast as much as I did. But without further ado, here's Almira Tanner. Most people who are mentors mentor them towards some educational attainment or professional achievement or develop them into kind of some sort of skill that they otherwise might not have had. One of the things you're you're renowned for mentoring people into his jail. So the last couple of years, I think you've had astonishing success at getting people to go to jail. No, but seriously, it's been kind of mind blowing to me, how many people are willing to step up and sacrifice enormous amount for a cause that's often neglected. So can you just tell me a little bit more about what you've been up to over the last couple of years? And why it is, that so many people have gone to jail under your leadership? Almira Tanner 3:10 Yeah, so I think maybe people who are listening know, but I am now the lead organizer of Direct Action Everywhere, which is the network that Wayne co-founded. And about, almost a year and a half ago, Wayne stepped down and I stepped into this, these very big shoes to fill and Direct Action Everywhere believes very strongly in the power of nonviolent direct action. And so getting people to do civil disobedience, go to the frontlines rescue animals, all of that we do, because we've seen how powerful these actions are. And a lot of times the consequences of those actions involve people getting arrested people going to jail. And you know, I think it is it has been really amazing seeing how many people are willing to step up. And people have shown blown my mind over and over again, even this year during the pandemic, which has has a whole other layer of complexity for facing jail time. You know, you're going into this, these hotspots and everything and people are still willing to do it. So yeah, Wayne Hsiung 4:09 yeah, no, I was I was really blown away by the action you all organized. And I basically have no foreknowledge of this at all the action at Smithfield's massive meatpacking facility in Southern California. And we'll talk about that more in a second. But, you know, I think that before we dive too much into the details of going to jail, because going to jail is a scary thing for most normal people who are not us, even hearing this is like what the hell you're sending people to jail. I mean, what's going on here? But I think I want to step back from there and just explain why first, because, you know, in the era of climate catastrophe, of police brutality and killings, and frankly, just economic inequality, I think one of the most common questions we get is why the hell are you so focused on animals? I mean, this almost seems like some sort of childish hobby that's got gotten out of control for you. And that's not what you and I believe. And I think increasingly that's not what serious figures in philosophy and journalism, including a lot of folks who've been on this podcast believe so maybe I mean, just saying your words, why is it that you're so focused on animals in a world where there are so many big problems? Like, what is it? What is it that drew you to this? Almira Tanner 5:18 So I like to think of myself as a pretty rational, logical person. And, you know, I think you just look, you look at the scale of this industry, you look at the scale of exploitation, how many millions, billions of animals are exploited, and just from a sheer numbers game, they're kind of, you know, winning, and, you know, in the worst race possible, but just they're also so ignored. And when you talk about animal suffering, people, yeah people kind of laugh it off, they don't think that the suffering matters. And I just think about how awful it must be to face all that suffering, and then not even have people care. So I think I want other animals to be included in the conversation about justice so badly, because I think that they are victims of oppression to just like, just like, human groups are. So I think that's partly it. And then just how interrelated these struggles are a world without slaughterhouses, a world without factory farming is better for everyone. I really, really believe that. And we can address so many problems in this world, by addressing the way that we treat other animals. So I know that a lot of people have these beautiful transformational stories like you and your dog and all of that. And, you know, I heard sometimes people say like, that's really why you do this. And I just want to be honest, I don't know if I have, honestly, like, this strong, emotional connection to other animals. And I, you know, and but I think Wayne Hsiung 6:52 I don't agree with that. I've seen you interact with animals Yeah. Almira Tanner 6:56 I mean, like, say, you go for a walk with some people and every dog, they're like, I have to pet this dog. And this dog is my best friend now. And maybe that's not me, but I just, you do when you do interact with them, you can see like, wow, these are these totally are people. They're sentient. They, they have likes and dislikes. And and I think, yeah, I think they need to be included in in our conversations about justice. Wayne Hsiung 7:20 You know, I think that's just because you're not a touchy feely person. Almira Tanner 7:23 Maybe, that's true. Wayne Hsiung 7:20 There are some people like our friend Priya, who's just kind of a touchy feely, she just runs up to everybody and says, like, Oh, I love you, I love you, I love you. And human beings and animals and other folks, like you and I, you know, are a little more focused on the abstract reason, philosophy-based arguments for animal rights. But I think you and I also both, and I've seen this, I mean, even in the way you interact with my dogs and cats, it's just, I can tell you really do care. But one of the things you and I think you have had some interesting stories that I'm going to dive into, because you blogged about them. And someday we're gonna make a video about this. You have had some pretty kind of tremendous and shocking experiences with animals that I want to get into. But what you haven't had, as far as I know, which a lot of people animal rights activists have had, is like deep personal experiences of marginalization. The only thing I can think of, and maybe I should, I'm not going to get ahead of myself, I'm certainly not going to rewrite your story is your the the only experience I can imagine maybe you had is just the experience of a woman and a woman who remember one of the funniest things you talk about your childhood, when you're growing up, all the kids in the neighborhood called you the boss. Well, I think you're already planning to become lead organizer of a massive global network when you were seven years old, Almira Tanner 8:35 I called myself, I made them call me that. Wayne Hsiung 8:39 You had a T shirt that said, like the boss, right? Almira Tanner 8:41 Yep, that I made for myself. Wayne Hsiung 8:42 But I think my guess is and I could be wrong about this and tell me if I'm wrong about this is that that maybe part of the experience of just being a woman in a world where your leadership and your experiences and your skills and abilities are not being respected, may have shaped you in some ways that far faster. Do you think that's part of it? No. Almira Tanner 9:01 I don't know. When I look back at you know, my childhood. It's like, wow, you know, I was very lucky. I had a very normal childhood didn't experience any significant hardship. And of course, I do believe that there's sexism, sexism in this world, and I'm sure yeah, and I have experienced that, but I don't Yeah, I don't think I need to, or I don't think my fight for animals has come necessarily out of experiencing any sort of marginalization. That being said, Now that I am in a leadership position I do see that more and I and I pick it up pick pick it up more when it when it's happening, but I don't know if that's what led me to fight for animals. Wayne Hsiung 9:45 So when was there a point in your life at which you thought because I mean, you're you're all in at this point. For those who don't know, mira is facing felony charges in this case in Sonoma County. She works harder than possibly any human being I've met and just as you know, you message her a t 5am, she responds in Signal, you send her an email, it's like 13 minutes, she's already gotten back to you. But I don't think this is what you thought your life was going to be, say 10 years ago that you would be this all in. So tell us a little about that journey mean, was there kind of a eureka moment? Where you thought, okay, aha, this is this is gonna be my future. And I honestly, I still don't know where you see your future. I mean, 15 years from now, where do you see yourself continuing to be moving leader or going back to being an occupational therapist? I mean, so. So was there a eureka moment for you that you thought, Okay, this is going to be the mission of my life? Almira Tanner 10:34 Yeah, I definitely did not think this is what I was going to be doing. I went to school or undergrad, then to grad school, became an occupational therapist started working right away. It's a great job, great career, I really loved it. And that's kind of when I started dipping my toes into activism, and very much was just something else that I did kind of on the side still working, still working a full time job. And I am not someone who makes like, rash life decisions at all, you know, quitting? I, I'm sure we'll get into this at another later in the conversation. But I did quit a master's program. And that was like, Whoa, I can't believe I did something so outrageous as quitting school Wayne Hsiung 11:18 So risky. I quit grad school, how scary. Almira Tanner 11:22 Like, it's kind of ironic. That's like, I'm going to jail like I do not break the rules. I don't. Yeah, I never did anything that was considered that that risky. So even when I decided to move from Canada, where I grew up, where I went to school, where I was working to California here, to focus on activism, I didn't even really commit to moving like I could, I convinced my job. I like no seniority at this job. But I convinced them to give me a six month hiatus from work. So I could come back six months later, because I didn't even want to commit to doing that. So I feel like there wasn't really this moment other than I really did think I was only going to stay here for six months, and then go back to Canada and then figure out my life from there and see what I wanted to do. And then yeah, realize the immigration process doesn't really work like that, and basically had to make a decision in two days that I wasn't going back to Canada. So I don't think there was this moment where I was like, Okay, now I'm giving up everything. But the, like, the one moment that really does stick in my head is the first time I ever came to California was the first ever DxE conference, it's 2014. There was like 40 people there, which was mind blowing. I've never seen so many activists together in the room. And now 40 people is not that impressive. But hearing people which was like you and Ronnie Rose and Cristobal and Priya and Brian Burns and Kitty like talking about why we're actually going to do this, we really think we can do this. That's when I was like, What? year before then my kind of hopes and dreams were that maybe some people would go vegan around me because of me. And maybe my friends would go vegan, that's like the best I could hope for. And just hearing someone speak about this vision of we're going to work really freakin hard. And we have science on our side and social science. And we really think we can do this. That's, I think, a really important moment where activism became much more of a focus. But even then I was still, you know, working, working a full time job. But if I had to pick something, it was then and that's why, partly why I love those conferences so much, because I've seen how transformational it was. Wayne Hsiung 13:36 And you've definitely take it to the next level. So for those of you who don't have this background, I'll say two things. One is the animal rights movement, circa 2013-2014. Was was a very, I want to say domesticated movement, it was almost entirely focused on these corporate campaigns, you work hand in hand with big corporations and apps and make the cages the animals are suffering and a little bigger. And, and obviously, when direct action where we our goal was to shake that up a little bit. And we did. And this is at a time where there had been laws passed across the country criminalizing the mere act of taking your photograph inside the factory farm. There's a law in the books called the Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act (AETA) that one of my good friends learn because he was sort of responsible for that made it a federal terrorism offense to do any sort of property destruction or threat of violence against a person who was affiliated with the industry. And even if you didn't have very compelling evidence of this, that, you know, the activist was involved in this sort of work. They could face very serious not just rhetorical allegations but serious prison sentences. And so you have people like my friend Lauren, who spent five years in prison some folks it's been even longer than her for primarily nonviolent activism. So it was it was the time where I felt like the in rights event was was missing this passion, energy and spark. And I think most people are kind of okay with that, to be honest like that. That was the the founding theory DxE was that we hope there were people who weren't okay with that. And I saw that there's something more revolutionary, transformative we could do. But a lot of the conventional voices in the movement, the people who are holding power, the people who are giving talks at conferences were pretty fine with the way the movement was in 2013, and 2014. And so what we saw in 2014, with new folks like you is that there was basically a new breed of activists who had been through a different set of experiences, who hadn't been kind of trained and domesticated by these lessons that we'd supposedly all learn from 2005-2015, who came forward and said, No, we can't do something bigger and bolder. But I want to dig a little further into kind of why it is because, you know, you're very good kid. You're what valedictorian at your university, right? You're working as an occupational therapist, we have to follow the rules, or someone could die, right? I mean, you get it. It's all about following the rules, and you get trained and you're taught to do what you do, and you just go do it. You do. So I'm just curious. So this first conference, you come to hear about us talking about animal liberation, and going right into the factory farms and taking the animals out and doing all this direct action. What was it in you? I mean, did you have a history of I mean, you didn't have much of a history of activism. Right. So what was it about you that made this appealing? You know, what was it about you that made you want to be a rabble rouser rather than someone who just was very successful in the mainstream? Almira Tanner 16:21 Yeah, I mean, my parents were kind of hippies. So we went to some protests as a as a kid, but I don't really didn't really know much about that. I don't think they ever did. Civil Disobedience. Did some stuff in high school, honestly, mostly because it was good for my resume. You know, I think I want it Yeah, I want to be honest. So I really did not have that much of a history of activism. But I think like you alluded to earlier, always been a little bit of a loud mouth, bossy kid, and someone gives me the megaphone, and I'm like, Whoa, people are gonna listen to me now like this is maybe that's where like, the sexism comes in a little bit, then it's like, wow, I can like speak up and for so like, at this point, I had already been vegan for four years, just reading, like, I didn't know anyone, you know. So like reading Gary Francion. And listening to Colleen Patrick Goudreau podcast like that was my whole world was just like reading all of this stuff. But no one ever, like I never really, really went out and did anything. You know, it did a couple other things like around the time that I started doing DxE stuff, but really nothing. And so I think it was just all of this, these years of knowing this, but no one was listening to me talk to them, when I was trying to talk to my friends and family about this. And then all of a sudden, it's like, well, here's these people who are empowering me to speak up I didn't like, really didn't know anyone else before. And it's like, it's on the surface. It's when you look at activism, sometimes it is illogical, you're like, why are people going inside of a Chipotle and yelling? But then you look when you start learning about other movements, and how social change works. And it just, it kind of makes sense. And I am someone who, yeah, like science and likes logic and reason. So even though maybe people look at it, I think they you know, of course, you hear the same things. People say to us all the time, like y'all look crazy, but like there's a point to this. And so I think all of that coming together. I think also, I've always wanted to help people as my job or my career, and you totally do as as an occupational therapist, but I think there was more that I could do more than just like helping people on an individual basis, kind of changing. Changing the whole system that we that we operate in. Wayne Hsiung 18:40 So you didn't have any sort of experiences as a rabble rouser or activist already getting involved with animal rights stuff? Almira Tanner 18:48 No, I mean, like, yeah, bossy kid, likeI would like organize the neighbors to you know, the neighborhood kids to do things, but not really. Wayne Hsiung 18:57 So what would you do when you're organizing the neighborhood kids? gymnastics? I know you're a gymnast. Almira Tanner 19:00 Yeah, I would make them do dances. Like gymnastics displays and things. I have no idea If they enjoyed this at all. I was like the older sibling. So my brother was there. And like all these neighborhood kids. Wayne Hsiung 19:12 Did you make your kid do these dance or your brother do these dances? Almira Tanner 19:15 I'm sure he was involved. Yeah, yeah, we had a whole whole neighborhood like roleplay going on for years. And of course, like I was the person who was coordinating all that. And I did really make myself a shirt that said, my name is Almira Tanner, and I'm the boss. Wayne Hsiung 19:31 We got to dig up some of these old videos or anything on YouTube. Almira Tanner 19:33 No, I mean, like my parents are, you know, this is mid 90s. So not everything was filmed, but then also not my parents at all. Like we was a slow technology adoption over there. We didn't have video cameras or anything. Yeah, barely had a computer. Wayne Hsiung 19:50 Let's talk more about this. This idea that activism that's effective has to be activism that's popular--that people feel good about it. Just send the instant moment because I think this is one of the founding theories of Direct Action Everywhere. And it's honestly one of the mythologies of history that most people are afflicted with. I mean, most people don't understand that King. I think I support were to 16% when he marched from Washington, most people don't remember that these heroic actions we see from the women's suffrage movement, like Susan B. Anthony voting illegally were widely condemned, even within our movement. I mean, people thought she was a rabble rouser and a radical and extremist and, and so can you tell me a little bit more about your feelings and kind of just debate within not just animal rights, but frankly, within society, between these institutions, institutional forms of change, like voting for Biden, and hoping that over the next 150 years, something's done about climate change, could see my bias he's now and, and these more transformative models of activism, we've seen in moments in history, like the civil rights movement, like the women's suffrage movement, where, you know, we've seen bigger change, so why to you as a leader of direct action everywhere? What do you see as the thing that folks most miss, just in the mainstream about direct action? Almira Tanner 21:07 I think people miss the fact that we're not rational human beings are not rational thinkers, I think, you know, it would be nice. If we were if people were rational, then probably a lot of the the problems that we have right now wouldn't even exist. But in the same way that I don't really know why I became an activist and why I like, you know, what was like, I don't know, it doesn't make sense. Why would I quit my like, very comfortable career and move to a different country, where I like don't know, really, anyone can get arrested and have felonies as an immigrant. Like, that doesn't make sense. But here I am. And I feel good about it. And most people just don't make really rational decisions. And so I think that's what people miss. And the thing that's hard about that, though, is because it's hard to predict. And that's the, the tension I feel a lot is, where is the line, I think there is a line, you can't just go screaming and burning everything down and saying, well, it doesn't matter if you're popular, because this is what's gonna work. that there has to be, you know, there is some line, it's hard to know where it is, and we won't know where it is until we're done. And then history will look back and say, Oh, yeah, it was the vote right at the end, you know, or something like that and miss everything else in the same way, you know, we banned fur in California, would that have been possible without all of the for activism that people hated earlier? Probably not. But we won't, we don't really know. So that's that's the tension that I feel. But I really grasped onto this concept of the movement ecology lately, that Paul Engler talks about, and just understanding that there are different theories of change. There's different strategies, they're valid, and they have to, they do kind of all operate, like we all have these different pieces to play. And so much conflict in the movement comes from people not understanding that they're playing different roles. And I just think, especially at the beginning, like when you all started DxE, like there wasn't anyone really playing this role, at least in the US. And so doesn't mean that I think this is the only thing we need to be doing. I think it's just such a neglected part of the movement. And that's why I focus on and that's why I think it's so important that we get people to do direct action, not because sanctuary work is important, not because education is not important, but so few people are doing this and and I think we need more people doing this type of work. Wayne Hsiung 23:35 Yeah, I think the point you made about human beings not being rational, so crucial, because one thing Roger Hallam said that really stuck with me. Roger Hallam was the founder of extinction rebellion, a climate justice group that has made international headlines and caused the United Kingdom's government to declare a climate emergency. And the idea behind their theory of change is that human beings aren't rational, they're emotional, and you just have to create the emotional urgency, the desperation for change that reflects the desperation our society should feel on these issues. And, and so he always says, you know, our strategy is not based on some sort of rational communications. It's about emotions, it's about feelings, and and when we started Direct Action Everywhere everyone hated us. You know, they, people in the mainstream animal rights movement tried to condemn us it they tried to destroy us. I mean, it honestly was people within the movement more than people outside of the movement didn't like it. And the reason we overcame this, though, was because we reflected the emotional urgency that so many people felt that people felt they didn't have a voice, they certainly felt the animals are getting the voice they needed, but they felt they couldn't say what they actually thought, and they couldn't express their actual feelings and, and the irony is, I think, most ordinary human beings when they see an animal being torn to pieces on slaughter line, which happens to literally billions of animals across the world, billions of animals are torn to pieces on slaughter lines and factory farms ripped to shreds alive. Their immediate reaction isn't, oh, let's patiently lobby some huge corporation for the next 30 years and hope that, you know, they'll make the cage a little bit bigger where the animals can live in for six months before they're torn to pieces on the spot align their emotional reaction is fucking stop that what the fuck is this shit, this has to stop. This is utter absurdity that this exists in the world. And no one was saying that no one was saying that we weren't be true being true to the feelings people actually felt. And I think that that was the thing that I think we captured. I think that's what great social movements, do. They they capture this emotional urgency of the moment. And then they institutionalize and institutionalization is in many ways, the harder part because you can find people's voice and give them the voice. But then directing it. As he said, it's about movement ecology, how do we make all these difficult voices and all these passionate voices work together towards something bigger, but I think what you said really resonate with me and why we started DxE, but say more about what you mean by Movement Ecology because Paul Engler's another person who's talked about emotions and trigger moments, and he, they he said to us recently, that this could be a trigger moment for our entire society. And if those of us who are interested in change are serious about it, we have to take advantage of these opportunities for societies we thinking everything. So what do you mean by movement ecology? What do you mean by by? What did Paul mean by trigger moment when he talked to you about this? Almira Tanner 26:20 So now you're gonna test me if I remember all five of them. But there's essentially like, you know, I'm sure there's more that we can come up with. But there's these five sort of theories of change, and how people how we will change the world. And one piece of that is personal transformation. So it's, you know, AA, or people going vegan, or whatever, it's like, you change yourself, and you change the world. And I think that's kind of like, where a lot of maybe the movement was, at some point, and we'll just everyone will just change themselves, and then we'll have this whole thing. And it's like, that's part of it. But that's not, you know, that's not gonna get us there, on its own. So there's like that personal transformation, there's alternatives, that people who are creat, like creating the world, we want to see creating a commune or a sanctuary or an alternative bank, like, you know, as opposed to just trying to change the institutions we have, there's going out there and doing it. Another important thing, but probably can't do it on its own. And then the other three theories of change are kind of lumped together in trying to change the external system, which would be in the inside game. So people who are running for mayor or wanting to be like, I'm gonna be totally in this institution, you know, then there's like structure based organizing, like a lot of unions and working on these, like specific targeted campaigns. And then there's this idea of the mass movement, which is just like, Black Lives Matter, like, Whoa, the spontaneous eruption that came out that is not really all that spontaneous, but kind of is just a huge, like groundswell of ordinary people taking action. So those are kind of like the five theories of change. And Paul Engler explains it way better than I do. So maybe we can link to something in the description. But especially I think, for the for the theories of change that involve capturing a large amount of the public and getting them to take action. These moments like these trigger moments, like George Floyd, being murdered, are so powerful, because all of a sudden, everyone is so much more aware of the problem. A lot of people were aware of systemic racism and police brutality beforehand, but maybe not the privileged white people. And it wasn't until that incident happened, that everybody now had to look at what was going on. And they're basically forced to confront this issue. And now we've seen probably the largest mobilization, I think, in the history of the United States. So after this, and it's not like, this has happened before people have been killed by the police all the time. And for some reason, this moment, the conditions were right, that really caused a kind of, you know, global eruption, not just in the United States, in the same thing as the pandemic, I think, has really forced us to think about public health. And that's a really great opportunity, possibly for the animal rights movement to come in and say like, well, maybe we shouldn't be creating the conditions for all of these diseases in, in factory farms. But those are those are the trigger moments that that he talks about. And you look back at the civil rights movement, firehoses is being used on children who are protesting like those images getting out really changed a lot of people's perceptions. So the some misconceptions of those trigger moments is that they just kind of spontaneously happen, and some of them obviously do. But one powerful thing you learn from social movements is they can be constructed, and you can put, you know, you can kind of like create these conditions where trigger moments are more likely to happen like us going to a farm in broad daylight to point out what's happening to the animals and rescuing them right then and there. And then that kind of, you know, I don't think we've ever seen something in the animal rights movement, like You know, George Floyd being killed or something, but over and over again, you create enough of these conditions that kind of force the public spotlight, you can really set off, I'll use all the jargon and this, this thing that set off what he calls the moment of the whirlwind, which is all of a sudden, like, you don't even know, like, you cannot orchestrate this movement anymore. It is happening. There's people out on the streets, without any direct like, you know, you didn't ask them to do a protest that people are just doing them. And that's, that's when you start to see real change, I think. So that was a lot of jargon. But I really encourage people to read, This is an Uprising, which is where a lot of that comes from. But I can't even remember what your question was. Wayne Hsiung 30:39 Yeah. I think I was kind of asking about moving to college and trigger moments. And I think you did answered it very well. And I think that the idea that you can actually create these trigger moments is a really important one, because it's not just that we wait around for for some sort of awakening of our society, it said, and this is King's philosophy that you actually have to confront it. And in the confrontation, you create the conditions that you need for society to awaken. And we saw that the early environmental movement, and when the environmental movement was successful, it wasn't just going around asking people to recycle, it was doing direct action, they literally took over an island that was gonna have a nuclear bomb go off in the early stages of the environment. This is how Greenpeace got started. You know, Paul Watson, some of these older folks, I think the island was called Amchitka in Alaska, and they're doing nuclear testing, and they didn't just wait around and hope that someday we could educate enough people about nuclear warfare and environmental devastation, that we can end this this practice, they actually went and put their bodies on the line. And that's one of the reasons the environmental didn't have success in the 60s and 70s, when it had its most important successes. Since then, we've been very domesticated. And so you know, what you said about the animal rights movement, that, that we don't understand the movement, that we don't understand the importance of these trigger moments, we don't understand direct action, more broadly say that it's a failing of the American left that and the global left, because there's so much focus on that first part of movement ecology, that you describe personal transformation, whether it's, you know, pointing out someone's racist, or engaging in a microaggression, or Twitter or trying to get someone to go vegan or telling them, they're bad person, because they don't recycle, or they take hot showers, you know, so much of our emphasis is on the personal transformation, we don't recognize how these other pieces of the movement ecology are absolutley crucial, not that personal transformation doesn't matter at all. I mean, you and I are both vegan for a reason. But it's such a limited part of the broader ecology that we need to actually change the world. And so that's our task, I guess. Almira Tanner 32:35 It kind of goes back to what we were talking about at the beginning with with jail, like, why would you go to jail? Seems like a stupid thing to do. But yeah, when you think about creating those trigger moments, and creating attention and forcing the public to pay, pay attention to an issue, you're going to get that when people are doing something really dramatic, or when you're doing some sort of thing that makes you suffer on, you know, this, especially like suffering for a just cause I think is super powerful, and really can gain public sympathy. So that kind of goes to like the point of why, you know, people would would risk their risk their freedom to do civil disobedience. In some cases, like literally, I mean, in DxE, almost dying and other movements at you know, other organizations like actually dying, being killed during these actions. That's obviously never the goal. But I do think that they're just people in the public, seeing like, there are people who are willing to do this for a cause, I think, can gain a lot of public support. Wayne Hsiung 33:43 Yeah, I mean, number one reason that the founder of this this concept, The Green Pill, Ezra Klein was willing to talk to us. And the reason he came on the podcast and was the first guest was because he was impressed by our sacrifice that people willing to risk their freedom for this cause. And that was, that was inspiring to him. And I think it's inspiring to many people. But there's a downside to that to where, and we've seen this, you know, as I was lead organizer, one point, Almira Tanner is now dealing with it now, that people also just think it's, it's too much, you know, it's extreme and to the point that they accuse you of being a cult, because you're, you're causing people to sacrifice so much. And so I'm wondering, I mean, how do you respond? How do you balance those two concerns? One is, we need people to sacrifice we're going to create change. On the second, we don't want people to sacrifice, they're ready to sacrifice and we certainly don't want anyone to sacrifice when they're not ready for. Right. And and so how do you and we've seen that some debates within Direct Action Everywhere about how far we go. So I mean, how do you think about that problem? And how do you deal with the tensions there? Almira Tanner 34:46 Yeah, it's tough because I think I've heard way too much people saying I love I love DxE, but I just couldn't. I just couldn't be a part of it because I can't get arrested. And I'm like NO! like, that's so not what everyone in our community is doing. And they're people who do so many amazing things that don't involve legal risk at all. And trying to find ways to elevate that, I think is really important. Because otherwise what people see on social media is, Wow, that's really cool. But I could never do that. And it's like the opposite of what we want. We want to have people see our actions, and then say, like, I want to do that. And I want to be a part of it. Because it's not, I don't want this ever to be, oh, like, there's five people who are really awesome activists, and then we have all these followers like, No, we, we know that we need tons of leadership in the movement. So that is a balance, especially given that organizing community events is not something that the press is going to report on or that we're going to make a video about, necessarily. So it doesn't get highlighted as much, but finding ways to do that. And, yeah, this is one of the hardest things. In this role, this leadership role is making decisions that involve risk for other people. You know, I'm happy to make decisions about myself. But when someone says, like, what do you think about this action? Or what do about this investigation, and it's in a really Republican county, and, you know, you don't know like, those people could be shot at a facility and by a farmer or face a ton of felony charges, or, you know, any manner of like, you know, really scary outcomes. That's the stuff that I think keeps me up the most at night. And I think, most like when when we're making these decisions, I think the things that I consider are: Has anyone ever done this before? What were the outcomes? Have we done anything similar? How did it go? Do we have the support in place for people after if things don't go well? Have these people ever been in situations like that? So that we're, we're taking calculated risks, and we're not just doing things without thinking about them? Wayne Hsiung 36:57 Yeah, you were just mentioning that sacrifice is really important to conveying the emotional urgency of this movement, and just inspiring people to to be a part of the change because they see someone else doing something that cost them something, they say, wow, I can do something to you know, maybe I don't want to get arrested, but maybe I want to come to a protest. But the downside is the real human consequence, because he sacrifices a real cost. I mean, people go to jail. And in one case, I mean, this is not just hypothetical one case, we actually had an activist who nearly died, because he locked his neck onto the slaughter line in an extreme act, scary act for a lot of people. And in solidarity with the animals who are being, you know, basically torn to pieces on that same slot on line. And we don't know exactly what happened and but appears one of the company employees turn the slaughter line back on while his neck was attached to it. And he was pinned against like a concrete column. And the slaughter line in his neck was being wrenched. And I think there was a moment where some of the folks who were there thought Tom's gonna die. I mean, he very well could die. So I'm wondering if you can unpack some of those tensions as someone who's had to lead our, our movement or our chapter through some of the debates, including internally about what sort of risks are appropriate, what sort of risks are too far? Because I think there probably is a line that's too far, right? You know, we don't we don't want people risking everything, especially if it's not strategically important, not the right moment. So I mean, tell me more about like your reaction to what happened with Tom. And what that taught you about the broader question about how much should be should we be willing to risk for movement, like animal rights? Almira Tanner 38:33 Yeah, so I wasn't actually, I wasn't on site at the action. So I didn't have the, like, stress of this is happening right now. You know, it's very different to hear about it after and be like, well, they got the key, and it was fine in the end, and Tom is okay, like, versus: Holy shit. This is happening right now. And you can when you watch the video, you can see the intense reactions of Louis and other people who were, who were there. So, but it definitely, I think, made us think about more scenario planning, like, what do we do, you know, next time, we need not just plan A, B, and C, but also like, A, B, C, D, so many different scenarios, so many different training things that we need to do to prepare people for. But I do think that we, you know, we, we always have to think about, like all the different outcomes of actions and we've done that pretty well. You know, doing the planning, making sure that everyone knows what their role is, they're trained for it. They understand the risks. We have other safety mechanisms in place, people know what they're doing. We've rehearsed you know, the number of times people practice locking down within three seconds and handling all the chains. That's what people don't see behind the scenes. You know, they just see people climbing on top of the roof of a slaughterhouse and think, Oh, that's so risky. And they don't see all the practice that happened. They see people. Yeah, going into a gas chamber or locking themselves to a gas chamber that just happened a few months ago. And being beaten up by security, they don't see the nonviolence training that people have had where they've prepared themselves emotionally for those situations. Wayne Hsiung 40:21 So can you tell us more about what happened there? This is Raven, right? Who was the one who got pretty badly assaulted? Unknown Speaker 40:28 Yeah, I mean, it wasn't it was Raven, I think the worst of it. But everyone really, I think got a little bit roughed up. What happened is, four activists were able to enter Smithfield's Farmer John slaughterhouse which is the largest pig slaughterhouse in the West Coast, which, until, you know, until recently, no one had ever gotten footage inside. And within a week, we had been in there twice. And the second time, there was four activists who went in and lock themselves to the gas chamber. And this is the first step in event you know, killing the pigs is first they're gassed. And they, you know, they're right across from these holding pens, they can see pigs who are basically waiting in line to go into this. So they're physically stopping this process. And the slaughterhouse company, I think, had or like, had hired like, way more security because they knew we were coming. So there was, you know, funny story, like literally right, during this action, like a security guard asked us for directions, like, you know, walking on the streets, like, I've never been here before, like, it's my first day on the job. So I think they just hired whole bunch of new security, and they were in there, and they just, like, kind of beat the shit out of these four activists, and they were wearing GoPros. And the GoPros are now nowhere to be found. They weren't taken into evidence. And it's very sketchy. Like, you know, we don't i don't know for sure what happened, but I am suspecting that they were smashed or disposed of or something. So they didn't, they didn't have evidence. Luckily, everyone is okay. They are facing charges. And we'll find out more in their arraignment in the next month in late December, I think is when their arraignment is but it was really scary, because they're on the live stream there with behind these fortress walls, and you can just hear them screaming. And like, I was there on site for that one. And that's when you just have to know like, I trust these people. They they are they're strong people. They knew what they were doing. I trust our team. Like these are some of like, this is like Raven, and Tom and Rocky and Scotty like these are some solid folks. If anyone's going to be able to handle this, it's going to be them. And, and they and they did. But you know, that makes me think the next time what's going to happen the next time someone puts themselves in a situation where people know they're not totally being recorded. There's not a whole crowd, they're like everyone else is on the other side of the slaughterhouse. That, that exposes people to a lot of risk. Wayne Hsiung 42:59 It isn't just the worst part about it, that these folks are assaulted. And they're the ones who are arrested because this is a facility that has been found in violation of the humane slaughter act, basically, allowing languishing sick animals to be sent to slaughter and rip to pieces. It's a company that has been exposed for using antibiotics and being kind of afflicted with all sorts of diseases in their supply chain. And when some activists who've been trying to get the government to do anything about this for years, just go on nonviolent, peaceful and just sit down there to expose this. Their cameras get smashed, they get the crap beaten out of them, and then they get arrested while the company I'm sure didn't get a single charge, right? No one got charged, if anything. Not that. That's that's just I mean, it's infuriating. It's infuriating. But I mean, what was your when you're hearing these folks screaming, I mean, what's going through your mind, you're sitting outside, Lead Organizer of a network. And for those of you don't understand how grassroots activism works, it's not like Almira is the marshall of this. I mean, there's somebody on the inside, there's people on the outside, it's often very loosely coordinated. Oftentimes, we don't even have specific knowledge. So when we've done stuff in Sonoma County, for example, that I've been arrested for, Almira often doesn't even know what's going to happen. She just knows I'm here to provide support, I'm going to provide some infrastructure and doesn't prevent you from being charged for it. But it really is the case that a lot of times, you don't even know exactly what the plan is. And all you're hearing is the screams from inside the facility. So like, what's your mental process? Like? How are you responding? In this moment? Almira Tanner 44:29 Yeah, I was doing jail support. So I mean, no one was in jail yet, but my, I was thinking like, where, like, we don't even know like, where in the facility these people are. Can we try to get eyes on them? Where are they going to be coming out? We had, you know, 200 people outside the slaughterhouse. So like, Can we somehow document we have people like with, with mirrors, like stuck on poles trying to peer over the walls. But yeah, in that moment, I was just thinking like, they got this You know, that says trying to tell myself like, Oh, I mean, Raven and that team like they are, like, yeah, so many like that action with so many different people doing so many different things show me like, I am not even needed, you know, like, and I don't think that's necessarily true everyone has a role to play. But it is not like you said, there's not the situation where here's this action that I planned. And then everyone just did what I told them. Things like this don't happen if there are not a ton of people who are taking leadership roles. And just like, they have their mission, and they know how to do it. And I felt confident in that team. And I, I trusted that they would support each other and they did. Right, poor Tom, once again, is just getting beaten up at an action. But I also think, knowing for them, I don't you know, I'm not them, but knowing that there was a ton of people on the outside. Yeah, that's gonna be there to support them is, is is really important. And that's like the same thing, why I think a lot of people are okay with going to jail and facing these charges is because they know that they're not doing it alone, even if there's other people who aren't facing charges, like there's so many people on their team. And that feels really good. I think especially in a society where like loneliness is so epidemic, and people don't feel like they're part of communities anymore. We actually have, there's people who are like, have your back. I think that's where to find. Unknown Speaker 46:24 yeah, Tony Hsieh who actually just died today. He wrote this book Delivering Happiness. He's the co founder of Zappos. And it's a company that's renowned for having really happy employees and delivering amazing customer service because their employees are really happy. Two of the four things he says are really important for Delivering Happiness, even within a corporation are having a sense of connection, and having real strong social connections that people you're working with. And secondly, having a purpose. And that actually matters to you not just making money, not just doing things because everyone expects you to do them, but really believing in what you're doing. And I think one of the ways you and I and other folks have been inspired to do these things that seem like extreme sacrifices, maybe some of the outside is that sense of connection and that sense of purpose. Knowing there are people who will back us up if we get thrown in jail or beaten up and second, knowing that's for good cause that what's happening these animals is just unspeakable. But what were the injuries that folks had? I just saw some pictures. I didn't know I mean, didn't even have a broken bone or a fracture or anything? No, Almira Tanner 47:21 no, I don't. So Raven went to urgent care. And I don't know exactly like I think she like a nerve injury arm. And it seems to be healed now. Wayne Hsiung 47:32 So what was this because they're trying to drag them out of the slaughter line? We don't have any video footage? So we don't really don't know other than the witness accounts. Almira Tanner 47:40 I mean, you can see like accounts. Yeah. Or you can see really shitty quality, like live stream footage that's going into the main feed. I don't know, I don't know what those employees like the security guards were told. Part of me thinks that they were just really pissed that we'd gotten in again, we had just been able to get what I think is, I can't find any other evidence of this, I'm pretty confident in saying it's like the first footage that's been captured from inside Farmer John. So for like, how many years they've been operating. And no one's ever been able to get that. Yeah, we go in, we have like 80 hours of slaughter line footage. It's just horrific. You can see, you know, at one point, a pig, like falls from the, you know, like, what's the like the hangers hangers or whatever, that they Yeah, the assembly line. They're like, threat. Sorry for the graphic details, like thrashing around in blood. Like, this is the stuff that happens there every day. And we we have this on camera now. And I think they were really pissed. And they were like, amped up the security like, no, this is never gonna happen again. And then like, three days later, it happens again, because like, the people on our team are so amazing. I don't even like I have no idea how they got in, like I genuinely do not know, not involved in the planning of it at all. But there they are in again, being able to stop the killing by you know, locking themselves to this gas chamber. I think they were probably just pissed. Yeah, that they've been able to go. Wayne Hsiung 49:08 Yeah, what does it say about an industry that when people expose them for having live animals thrashing on the slaughter line? The response is not Oh, let's look at this and see if there's something we could change or let's reflect on whether we're doing the right thing, but it's literally to physically assault the folks who exposed you. Yeah, and smash their camera. So no one else can see that again. I mean, that tells you a lot about this industry and this particular company. Almira Tanner 49:30 Yeah. And the way that now, they are restricting vigils from happening at this facility. They don't want people to bear witness, which is like, you know, the Save Movement has been they're being able to stop tracks and document what's going on. Like they are I think they think they felt really threatened by this action because it's like, it's there's, there's so much that's happening at this facility like I think constantly, they're being in the spotlight. Workers have died of COVID there during the pandemic, it's like 16, or 17% of their employees were tested positive, like one in five employees. The union that represents them is actually asking them to shut the facility down. And they're, of course not. They just got like $100,000 fine. Like this is not a great PR time for Smithfield. And then the last thing they want is people going down activists like showing that people because like you said, the people don't want to see pigs being slaughtered, they don't want animals being hurt. This industry lives in lives on secrecy, and does everything to prevent people from being able to document what's happening. Like Imagine if, like you couldn't like, if like broccoli, farmers were like, don't come in and show people like how we're growing broccoli? You know, I don't think Wayne Hsiung 50:49 You're gonna have some questions like what's going on at this broccoli farm? Almira Tanner 50:51 It's not like there's not exploitation in in broccoli farming. You know, I've just heard this really powerful presentation yesterday from another group, doing direct action for farm workers. But like, the point is like what other industries that are so ubiquitous in our society have that much secrecy? It's like something that's clearly going on? Yeah, I Wayne Hsiung 51:09 I mean, you don't see broccoli farmers petitioning the government to pass ag gag laws that prevent you from taking a photograph without, you know. So it's, it's it's bizarre. It's totally bizarre. And for those of you don't know, I mean, Smithfield has a long record of employee abuses, even being beyond COVID-19. And humans, like I think, I think there's something and this isn't just a thought this is there's actually good research on this. There's something about the commodification of the animals and the violence against animals that innoculates the management and the executives at these companies from just violence, period. Right, Bob Herbert, the former New York Times columnist, my first exposure Smithfield actually was as a Human Rights and Labor activists, because in the early 2000s, they were engaged in Union busting at their big plant and on the other side of the country, in Tarheel, North Carolina, the single largest slaughterhouse, probably in the world, they kill 25-30,000 pigs there every single day. It's just an obscene number. Unbelievable. And when workers got together, and a lot of these workers are low income, there are immigrants that black workers who are already being marginalized and oppressed in so many different ways, when they came together and said, Hey, you know, like, we deserve a living wage, and people are dying on the job, because even before COVID, slaughterhouse work is one of the most dangerous professions in the world. And anytime you see a list of the Top 10 most dangerous jobs in the country, slaughterhouse, just statistically has to be there because OSHA, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, tracks which industry is the most dangerous and it turns out, being a slaughterhouse worker is a lot more dangerous than being a cop, for example, everyone says like, Oh, my God, cops have to do this dangerous jobs like no, no, no, people are doing dangerous jobs work in slaughterhouses. And so for these workers coming forward and saying, Hey, you know, I kind of concerned my friend got his arm cut off, my other friend got sick from MRSA and His children are now sick, too. And we kind of would like to be paid more than $5 an hour for this work. And is that okay? Is it okay for us to collectively organize and just petition for a little more income, so we can pay for food for our families and health care for our kids, when they're sick from the diseases, we bring home to them from the slaughterhouse. And the company's response was literally to assault people, you can go back and read the stories from the early 2000s. So I knew about Smithfield, even before I really knew them as an animal agriculture company, because in the early 2000s, all these labor activists for against them, but but it shows you what happens when your entire industry is based on violence, and the commodification of living creatures, it's very easy to dismiss other living creatures who you see as other, you know, an immigrant, a black person, someone who's poor, right, and the idea that our entire food system could be based on a system of such violence and cruelty. It's only feasible in a society that expresses such seemingly progressive values, like human dignity, when you hide it, it's only if you hide it. And this is why they come after the folks who expose it so hard, like unbelievably hard. So I actually want to ask you about a personal experience too, though, because I mean, you saw some of the secrecy in this industry very early in your career in your life, because, alright, I'm gonna, we're gonna, we're gonna give you all the big the big tell of this podcast, but you worked in an animal testing lab a long time ago. So tell me, tell me how that happened. Like how did you end up in an animal testing lab? And like how, from what I remember you telling me about this it was a very secretive place, because they knew that when folks saw what you're doing, in this case, the pigs they would be concerned. So just how do you go from being a vivisector to an animal rights activist? Almira Tanner 54:30 Yeah, I mean, it's almost like a story of how I went from being an animal rights activist to a vivisector to animal rights activist, not that I was an activist as a kid but loved animals. Like most kids, read all the books about animals like you know, with with my friend and everything, and really early on in school, you know, you do these like group class dissections in elementary school, like you know together and refuse to participate in them because like, this is just wrong and sad. So like, I feel like I had that morality early, but then really gets stamped out of you, I think as, as you are conditioned to seeing animals as as things. So and that's, I think what happens to a lot of people for, you know why they eat animals is, is because of you know, they're just conditioned to so high school started doing, you know, participating in the dissections, again, went to university. Wayne Hsiung 55:26 It's why you stopped doing dissections in junior high, and then you started doing them in high school, just because your teachers were telling you? Almira Tanner 55:30 It wasn't even Junior High it was like elementary school I like refused to participate. I think this was grade four, honestly, right around the time I went vegetarian, because I'd been I've been vegetarian for a really long time. So yeah, I refused to dissect this salmon in grade four, I remember this. But then High School and you do the, you know, cow's eyeball and the fetal pig. I don't know, if this is what U.S. people do but that's like the standard protocol that you do. And I kind of didn't, I didn't like it. But I knew that I kind of had to do it. So Unknown Speaker 56:02 So there weren't alternatives back then? Almira Tanner 56:04 Honestly, like not that I knew of, I don't I don't think I pushed. And obviously I wish I had but here you are. You're like you do this thing. And it's not grade four where you get like, you know, you can just go sit in the hallway and decide not to do it. So I yeah, so I feel like just getting desensitized to this over and over again. And then University, I'm studying physiology. And you do this whole lab, like this whole class on dissecting this rabbit. And like thinking about it now like it's, like, it's so it doesn't even make sense from a scientific perspective. Besides, you know, the ethical stuff is like, we're learning about human anatomy. We're dissecting this rabbit. And then every lesson plan. It's like, and here's why it's different from humans. Like, here's the differences. Like why are we doing this, like this is so messed up. And I have no idea honestly, like, where those like, I don't know, where those rabbits came from, like, I don't know the history. But after after my undergrad, I didn't really know what I wanted to do. And I had this prof from this class in fourth year that Wayne Hsiung 57:09 Can I just ask you about this rabbit dissection because you don't do rabbit dissection, the United States, I've never been heard of that. And this is the first I've heard about that. And rabbits are the third most common companion animal and in the west and north America. So were you the only person who is concerned about the rabbits. I mean, honestly, dissecting a rabbit would be kind of creepy. I feel like in the United States, because I never heard about that before in high school. Almira Tanner 57:30 This was in high school. Now this is University, dissecting a rabbit in universe. Yeah, yeah, I think still, like third year anatomy class. And like, another thing that's just like, you think like, Whoa, like that, you can see the speciesism that's so strong as there was a human cadaver in this lab. But we were not allowed to touch the human cadaver. Because it's disrespectful to dissect the cadaver. Like, if you don't know what you're doing, because it's kind of like, you'll just like make these stupid cuts. And like, this is for science. And so here's this human who died of natural causes, and donated their body to science, but like, Do not touch them, because you'll mess them up. Here's this rabbit, who clearly did not consent to this at all, no idea how, how they were bred or killed. And like, go at it third years, like, you know, you have this rabbit for a semester. And so just but no one like no discussion of ethics, nothing like that. But yeah, I kind of had a little crisis of what I wanted to do with my life. At the end of like, my degree, and this prof was like, Well, why don't you come to my do masters with me, like I've you can apply for research funding, you know, you're smart, you can figure it out, whatever. So it was like this biomedical engineering lab, where we were creating what, which is really what is really amazing, like a pacemaker for people's diaphragms, essentially, that would breathe for them. That's like an alternative to mechanical ventilation. Honestly, I don't even know. Like, I wonder if it's working right now. Because it would be kind of interesting for for COVID. But, so this is like this really noble purpose. And then, like, I really, I honestly transitioned into doing this before I even really graduated my undergrad. And within I would say, like, the first few weeks or month I realized, like, Oh, this is going to be vivisection like this is not even dissection, like we are going to be doing experiments on pigs. And I like this is around the time that I'm starting to go vegan. And so like all so much like rationalization in my head about, we don't need to eat animals, but, you know, we have to do this to them, because like, this is for the greater good, and we're saving lives and all of this, but there was just no, there was never any, like, discussion about like, what other alternatives could we use? Like, is there a way to do this without experimenting on animals? And then like, as, you know, this is, you know, as this is progressing, like my part of the project started was going to be the neonatal applications of this. So like, how could you use this in human babies, which involved piglets, you know, You're gonna have to do this experiment on piglets. And I never got to that phase because I quit before it happened. But you like, I literally had this like online catalog where you like order pigs like and you can like pick the breed and you pick, you know, and like, it's like your online shopping but for human or for like, you know, beings it's so it's so strange but it's so normalized that it really isn't, like, you can just see how people get like wrapped up in this because it's not like, you know, there's no discussion really of ethics, I had to take this like animal care, like online certification class, where you like, do a bunch of like quizzes, and then now all of a sudden, you're somehow certified to take care of animals properly. I don't know, like, you know, how that is supposed to help you. When it's like an online class, and then you're supposed to be, you know, ethical with it with the, with the animals that you're experimenting on. But yeah, so after, like, I think I think I quit after six months, but it was around like four months in that I was really starting to be like, I it's hard getting hard to justify this. And I do not want to do this anymore. But I am not the kind of person who quits things or does things that are wrong, like, you know, like, not good for, like, you know, proper here I was I have research funding, I'm gonna get a master's in science, like, my name is going to be on a paper. This is exciting. But as like, I just can't do this anymore. So Wayne Hsiung 1:01:24 What were you specifically doing to the pigs, both in the lab and you you individually, so you're doing some sort of respiratory testing? Were you causing respiratory ailments in the pigs are? Almira Tanner 1:01:35 No. So we, I mean, like, I didn't really do anything, because I didn't really know what I was doing at this point. Like, I was like, the lowest ranking member of the labs was like, mostly observing, and like taking data, but we there was a surgeon like a human surgeon who worked with us. And we would like cut the pigs open and try to place so that the whole device is like this nerve cuff. Hopefully, it's not, this isn't too boring, but like, it's a nerve cuff that would like wrap around the phrenic nerve, which innervates the diaphragm. And so you'd like try to like inject. I can't remember, this is a very long time ago, like inject this nerve cuff through a vein to somehow get onto the right nerve, because like, it wouldn't be like it would be like, right, like, the vein would be like right beside the nerve, and you'd like send these like electric signals out to basically like, stimulate the nerve. So and we were just trying Wayne Hsiung 1:02:22 To help the diaphragm move faster and stronger basically and help the animal breathe human or non human. Almira Tanner 1:02:27 Yeah, cuz if you think about when you're not breathing, then you're hooked up to this ventilator. And it's just like shoving air in and out of your lungs. But that's not actually your your diaphragm isn't working. And it atrophies. Like it weakens extremely fast, which makes it really hard for people to get authentically interesting. But if you're stimulating the nerves of the day, the diaphragms actually still doing it. Yeah, then, I mean, it's kind of like, it was gonna be done without, you know, exploiting the pigs. Like, it's kind of really amazing. I hope it I hope that someone makes this work, and that we find ways to do this without hurting people or hurting hurting animals. But so yeah, we were just trying to like see, could we even get the nerve to fire and I'm just like, sitting there probably like taking the temperature reading of the pig like I you know, so it wasn't the person who was like in there, but you're standing in what looks like a surgery surgical room like you would a human and there's just an adult pig on the table. Yeah. Wayne Hsiung 1:03:20 And they're anesthetized through this entire procedure, you don't see them moving around, or anything like that? Almira Tanner 1:03:26 no, like, Yeah, and I think it's very conscious that we never saw this pig not yet conscious. Like, you go in and the techs have already like anesthetize them, and you leave before they wake up. And then they're, like, kept in this other part of the lab. But like, no discussion of, like, I wonder what how much pain they were in when they woke up? And of course, like, we care, like, did they have a fever? Are they getting an infection, but not like, because people cared about them, they just because that would be bad for the experiment. And I just remember, like, at the end, when, like, our trials on like, a certain pig were done. They would like they would kill the pig. Like, they would just never, like wake them up. I think they would give them some injection that would kill them on the table. And I just was like, well, like, like, they're not like, this pig could like, go on and live their life. You know, there's nothing like we didn't take any vital organs out of them. Like why, like, there's really no reason why we need to kill this pig. And there's like, well, there's no like, What do you mean? Like, where would this pig go? Like, what's the point like this? This this pigs purpose is done? And they didn't say those exact words. But I think that's the that's the thought process. Like what do you mean, and I didn't I honestly I don't think I even knew what a sanctuary was. Yeah, at this place. At this time in my life, like Did I say like, Oh, I'm not gonna take this pig home like I live in like a tiny little dorm you know, essentially not actually but Wayne Hsiung 1:03:37 so these are like farm pigs so multi-hundred pound animals. Almira Tanner 1:04:56 Yeah, these are I mean, I don't like i think i think there's facilities around California that breed pigs for I think people don't know it pigs are very commonly used in experiments because they are very similar to humans. And real in really awful ways. Like, I think there's apparently, their skin is very common to human skin, which means they're used in burn studies, like, it's just really like, like, oh, let's like they're so like us, let's exploit them. But yeah, so then this pig was just killed, like all we need to take some like, samples from their diaphragm. But it just like, is so that people see them as so instrumental. And just as this like, like a beaker in a lab. So yeah, that was very, it was disturbing. And like, you're in this? Yeah, like you said, it's very hidden. So this is in this medical building. You know, if you're in Vancouver on like 14th and Oak, you can go see and doesn't look like it's a lab. And there, there it is, when you have to like scan to get in. And there's posters all over the walls about like, oh, like, look at all the amazing things animal experimentation has done? Don't question this, like, you know, cute babies, like pictures of them, like they're saved because of animals. And so really ingraining and people, like you're doing the right thing. And you look at UC Berkeley, and like, their labs are all underground. You cannot you can't like how do you? How do you get into that? You can't even see what's going on? I bet you a lot of students don't even know their labs there. And yeah, this wasn't even on the campus we were at, like, this is like separate from like a separate place, then then our university. So Wayne Hsiung 1:06:35 How did the experimenters themselves justify all the secrecy? Or did they? Was it just you're part of the culture and you're just indoctrinated into thinking everything has to be top secret? And no one questions it at all? Almira Tanner 1:06:45 Yeah, and I think there's like, well, this is, you know, we're coming up with a device, it could be patented, like, it's just very normal, like, this is just science and research or, or something. And also, you know, everything has to be sterile. So you can have other people in the lab and that kind of that kind of thing. But it's so like it, there's not a lot of conversation about should we be using animals? Are there other ways to do it? Now? Maybe that's changed, because this is, like 2010, 2009 and 2010. That this was happening? Maybe those conversations have changed, but I think it's really hard to change academia. It's slow. Wayne Hsiung 1:07:25 Yeah. You're right. Yeah. So I've had similar experiences, not actually in the lab, but I think I've told you, my dad was a vivisector and one of the species he experiment on was pigs. They did rats and other animals, too, I think maybe some dogs too, but they're doing research on obesity and diabetes. And so they make these incredibly morbidly obese pigs, because they don't even know exactly how the genetically modified them with a genetically modified them. So basically turned off their hunger satisfaction response, there's like a hormone called leptin that animals normally release. And so they made their cells, their neurons in their brains less receptive to leptin. So these pictures kept eating and eating because they were trying to induce overeating, obesity, diabetes, and then trying to treat it. And what you said about two things you said, that really struck me one is that the institutionalization of secrecy, they always came up with contrived explanations for why even like a little kid could not come in. And they never really made sense to me, even as a five year old, you know, so why is he can't even take a photograph out? You know, I mean, the photograph doesn't have scientific data, it doesn't have hypotheses, you can't even get a photo out of this place. Why does he have like armed security, you know, like, it's just, and hospitals need to be sterile environments, you know, like armed security guards outside of the surgery room, relative to revenue, shoot people, their armed security guards in my dad's lab, just, it was kind of scary. And it's just clear intimidation, that there's something and I think it's honestly just as intimidating to employees because it when you've got an armed person, saying, we have sacred secrets in here that are so dangerous to the world outside, for whatever reason, it doesn't really matter why, then it just starts instilling in you the psychological fear about disclosure and transparency, that there's something so dangerous in here, something so deadly to the world that if it got out, we might have to shoot somebody, we might have to actually kill someone to stop this. And but the other thing that was true, I think my dad's lab that's true of pretty much all institutions of violence that became systematic is the division of labor. And Hannah Arendt was the one who came with this concept of banality of evil that normally we think of evil as some malicious person who just wants to hurt someone. And too often, in fact, more often, it's not one bad person. It's like a system that has been institutionalized of evil. You know, and because every single person is just part of the system in some small way, they all can sort of deny responsibility. So you and the other experimenters are cutting the pig open. Don't think about this pig is a living creature. There's just almost a, a thing that just sitting on the table, and the person who is actually giving the pig the injection to make them go to sleep. They say, Well, I'm just injecting them I'm not cutting the pig out or killing them. And you know, Timothy Pachirat writes about this in his field work in a slaughterhouse too that, it's astonishing that in these places where they're killing literally 1000s, or 10s of 1000s of living creatures every single day, every person who works there says, I'm not responsible for the killing. I'm not doing the killing. And I think that's one of the ways these systems work and, and I think that's kind of how our entire society has been shaped to basically normalize violence against animals that always feel like I'm just eating this chicken, or I'm just going to McDonald's or, you know, and and i donate to my local animal rescue. So I care about animals. Now, recognizing we're all part of this broader system, just as as a movement ecology, that helps us create change. There's like an industry ecology that prevents change, and every step of the way, and your story explains this, too, because you're a little kid who liked animals, and you had progressive hippie parents, and you don't want to fucking dissect that rabbit. But you're you're forced to basically you're told, if you want to go into anatomy, you have to do this, you have to take this dead animal and cut them up into pieces, and then your, your advisor to if you want to become at that point, what will you did you know what you wanted to become? Did you want to do a PhD? Did you want to become a medical doctor? You had no idea? Almira Tanner 1:11:05 Well, I want I thought I wanted to be a physiotherapist. And then I decided, like, I do not want to be a physiotherapist. So what am I gonna do with my life? And then it's like, oh, you could come work in my lab and get a Master's. Like, sure. I don't think I ever thought that like, I was gonna go into research. But like I said, I'm the kind of person who's like, Well, I'm not going to just take a year off. Like, that would be ridiculous. Which is like, Okay, I think part also like, maybe don't go straight from kindergarten to grad school without ever stopping school need some life experience? Yeah, I think I was just like, Here you go, here's this opportunity. Sounds great. Someone's gonna pay me to read papers in a lab minutes ago. So that's not actually what it was. But yeah, I mean, even like, when we were at the slaughterhouse a couple months ago, in Los Angeles, trying to like talk to the workers and like, get some intel, because the slaughterhouse is kinda like, fucking with us, and like changing their truck schedules. And like, how do you know, like, when the trucks are coming in, do you think any trucks are coming, like talking to these workers, like, I just work in this part, or I just work in this part, or I just work in that part? Like, they're, they kind of are like, I'm not. They were almost like, I don't slaughter animals. You know, it was like, and I, I know, no negative feelings towards them at all. But you can just see that everyone is kind of trying to, like, separate themselves from like, what's actually going on? And, yeah, I mean, there's amazing people in DxE network who used to work in slaughterhouses, and they will tell you stories of, you know, what that was like, and how, how traumatizing that is, and how they, you know, kind of were chosen to work in those fields, because maybe they were very exploitable at the time. So, you know, but that you can see how people can justify it. Or at least try to rationalize what they're doing to basically be able to, like, I think, go on with their day. Because if you have to confront what you're doing that's, that would be devastating, I think. Wayne Hsiung 1:12:59 Did you ever have a heart to heart with your professor? Did you talk to him? It was a him? About why you left? And do you know if he's still doing this work? Have you ever been in touch with him? Almira Tanner 1:13:10 So I think he I think he retired cuz he was a pretty old. But I did actually look it up recently. And like, it's still a thing. People can look up Lung Pacer. I think it's a patent thing now. So if you're interested, but I did tell him why. I was like, I cannot do this experimentation on on animals. And he was like, Well, here, how about you? Like your role can be the person who talks to the patients, and like the human patients, when we're doing human clinical trials, we're trying to get them to do Wayne Hsiung 1:13:39 He's literally plugging into the system to make you feel better about it? Almira Tanner 1:13:42 Yeah, he's like, well, you just like, don't like, like, you don't do that part. Like you can just do the other parts, which is exactly the thing where it's like, everyone can kind of be like, Well, I didn't really do it. But you're part of this thing, just because you're not the person who's injecting the pig. Like, you know, your head. I was like, I'm not gonna, I'm not gonna do that. But yeah, he was definitely trying to find a way for me to still be in this project and not have to do the direct vivisection. Yeah. But yeah, that didn't work. So I quit. Wayne Hsiung 1:14:12 You're going vegan this time too? So how does that work? I mean, how does it work? So, like, what was it that made you go vegan by the way, you've told me this before? Almira Tanner 1:14:21 Yeah, so like, I've been at this point. It's 2010. I've been vegetarian for like 13 years. Wayne Hsiung 1:14:29 For ethical reasons. Almira Tanner 1:14:30 Yeah. I was just like, miserable like, I was like, hated the lab. Like, just like kind of like really sedentary or like relatively sedentary compared to like, I was like, this Wayne Hsiung 1:14:44 It was pretty high bar Almira circa 2005. Almira Tanner 1:14:46 Yeah, like I'm not anymore. And so this is like, I feel I just like felt bad. So I was like, I'm gonna like look up like healthy, eating healthy. I know it's like not this, like going vegan for health. reasons or whatever but anyway, so that's what I kind of started learning about dairy. Turns out not that great to eat dairy. And that led me to the ethical like, so, you know, maybe I stopped eating as much dairy but I didn't, didn't cut didn't quit or anything. And then that led me to ethical concerns with the dairy industry and eggs and all this and it's like, Damn, like, I am this ethical vegetarian. This doesn't really make sense. Like, why am I eating these products of violence as well. So like, but I didn't know anyone who was being at all. And so I'm like, posting on Facebook, like, Do I know any vegans and then this, this girl, I kind of knew's ex boyfriend was vegan. So I'm like, Alright, I'll talk to this guy. And I'm Wayne Hsiung 1:15:44 Cuz you went to kind of a small remote college. It wasn't in Vancouver, right? Almira Tanner 1:15:48 It's like, on top of a mountain as Vancouver. It's like, it's not really that it's like less remote now, but at the time, you're kind of like on top of this mountain, and the only way to get down it's like a car or a bus. I don't drive. And then like it snows, and you're like stuck on the mountain. It's like, not as bad. There's like grocery stores there now, but there literally wasn't a grocery store. And I'm like paint. It's really not that far from Vancouver. It's like, what's the university called Simon Fraser University. Okay. Yeah, it's not like tiny but it's not UBC which is like the big thing. Campus, or like the big Vancouver campus. Anyway, so I'm like complaining to him as people do. Like, I love cheese. I can't give it up. And I think he's gonna be like, it's fine. Just don't eat as much cheese. And he's like that. That is he basically it's like you're whining. Like, if that's bullshit. If this is really important, you should just do it, do it. Yeah, I was like, okay, so like, then I went vegan. And this is like, but then I'm in this lab. And like, the weird thing is like, everyone in the lab was like, so great about, like, they would like bring me vegan cake. And like, all these things, like, we are torturing animals, and they're like, love veganism, you know? So I don't think I mean, I, I don't know if you can really be vegan and experiment on animals. Like a couple months later, I quit the lab, but like, that's around that time, but it was very, yeah, I was like, This is not a good time in my life. I was pretty, pretty miserable. Wayne Hsiung 1:17:12 Yeah. Interesting. So this person who's telling you, you know, just do it, don't don't whine and complain about it. Have you stayed in touch with them? Almira Tanner 1:17:21 Like, literally cannot? I don't think I had any more than one conversation with them Unknown Speaker 1:17:26 This is just someone on social media? Almira Tanner 1:17:28 An acquaintance's ex boyfriend, like I don't like Wayne Hsiung 1:17:31 Do you even remember his name? Almira Tanner 1:17:32 No, No idea. Did I ever know that? Like, I don't know. Like, it's like, like, I wonder if this like, this guy's probably eat animals now. Like, just statistically speaking. Wayne Hsiung 1:17:42 Yeah, no, you know, there's, it's weird how the social influences have an impact on you. And it's hard to say how important that specific interaction was like, so maybe someone else would have said exactly the same thing had the same impact on you. For me, it was very different. I mean, I honestly like one of the reasons I went vegan originally was because there was just like a girl that I liked in the club that I was in and I was like, You I was already vegetarian. I was an ethical vegetarian. And I'd never met a vegan before when I went to the University of Chicago and there was like this vegan, and vegan, I never even really talked to her, you know, I just wanted her like me. So I went vegan, it didn't work at all. But Almira Tanner 1:18:14 All these like, altruistic reasons. Wayne Hsiung 1:18:16 it's really stupid. But then it does kind of awaken you to the possibility that you can change, you know, even if the original impulse isn't as altruistic, as you might think. Once you get there, you realize, Oh, this isn't as hard as I thought. And, and so it's, it's, it's hard. I mean, when we're thinking about social change, like one of the theories of organizing that I've been really thinking hard about and, and just balancing in my head, both strategically and ethically is this idea of functional organizing, then I think I shared with you a little bit and the idea behind functional organizing, and there's a great article in the Stanford Social Innovation review about this is that truly effective movements are not just about the issue of the cause. They have to serve the members in the movement to that a lot of times what gets people initially involved in a movement is some practical benefit they receive from participating the movement. And so for example, the example they give in this paper, maybe it's not from this paper, it might be from a book called when David beats Goliath or something by Marshall Gantz. Why? Why David beat Goliath. Almira Tanner 1:19:14 I think it's Why David Always Wins or something? Wayne Hsiung 1:19:16 something like that, by Marshall Ganz, who's a Harvard sociologist. I don't remember if it's from the Stanford Paper for Marshall Ganz's work. Almira Tanner 1:19:21 It's not Always, it's Sometimes. Wayne Hsiung 1:19:23 Like we we lionize the farmworkers movement, rightfully so city, Cesar Chavez is amazing. And the unionized, they took on Big Ag, and they won a lot of really important victories. But one of the reasons that movement really succeeded was because within the Mexican community, there's this particular insurance benefit that conventional white mainstream insurance companies would not offer, like a particular death benefit. And I don't even understand exactly what it meant. I remember reading about this and I thought, Oh, this is like an interesting cultural practice, but and so what they did as part of the United farmworkers was they said, We know all of you need this benefit. We know all of you are in financial ruin every time someone dies because you can't do this and this this cultural Practice is absolutely crucial to your, your family and just your identity is not being served by the community, we're going to provide this little benefit. So in addition to subscribing and becoming part of the union and being a part of a political activity, we also provided this this cultural service to you. And that was really important. And I know Ganz, the Stanford Social Innovation review also talk about the NRA and the NRA is it's it does such an astonishing job of transforming people who are completely apolitical into these right wing hardcore gun activists because they provide something fun for people that every week, they just come they shoot guns together. And, you know, the statistic we use in that workshop that we built on how to change the world in one generation. And most people don't know this is that there are more gun clubs in there, McDonald's, like as powerful as McDonald's is, the NRA is arguably more powerful, because they've gun clubs everywhere that people just get together and shoot. And then they get politicized by their shared experience shooting guns, and, and so I don't know, thinking it might seem silly that you started thinking about Okay, what, what can I do to be healthier? Because I'm feeling kind of physically ill. And I started out as like a loser who'd never, I'm still a loser. But I've been on dates. Now, at this point, I was like a, you know, college student, I've never been on a date never really talked to a girl. And so I just thought, oh, maybe, maybe if I go vegan, they'll talk to me, which didn't work. But But there's something there's a truth to that. And I think the gross part of that that is that you don't want that to transform your theory of activism into something that seems very instrumental and transactional, it's like, okay, let's just give people shit. And then they'll do the right thing. So you still ultimately have to infuse the actors and with purpose, but understanding that part. And this is kind of one thing that you've done an amazing job with the people, you mentor, and we should talk about, you know, your role as an organizer. And what it means to be the lead organizer across this network is understanding that part of what you're doing is like serving the people, like as a mentor, we talk about some of the people you've developed over the years, part of what you've done is just help them. You've been there for them. You've taught them, you bought them food, you've cared for them. And that's part of the motivation, I think, for these folks to ultimately find their purpose. So I mean, what do you think about that? Like dilemma, like part of what we're doing is just serving our activists, but then we have this broader mission or social change. So how do we balance those two things? Almira Tanner 1:22:13 Yeah, I think that that is hard. And I just to touch on one thing you said like, Yeah, I don't get too hung up on like, why certain people change their habits? Because I think, at that point, yeah, I went vegan, and then spent the next four years like, basically doing nothing other than being really angry at my family and reading books, which is great. Like, I'm like, I'm glad I read those books. But like, I wasn't doing any activism. I don't think I had any impact, honestly. Because, like, Wayne Hsiung 1:22:42 I can't see you angry your parents, I've met your parents. I've seen your relationship. Almira Tanner 1:22:45 I mean, mostly like my brother, and like, there was a steak throwing incident. Like, you know, like, yeah, like, it's just like, so great. Wayne Hsiung 1:22:55 But wait there was literally a steak throwing incident? He threw a steak at me. I probably honestly deserved it. I'm I was I'm very annoying, but I just think like, they're, I don't Yeah, I don't you know, like, well, I went vegan, because someone just told me to stop eating cheese. And then I did it. And it's like, great. But then the real. The real transformation is like when you when I became an activist? Yeah. And also people stopped, started taking me way more seriously. You're kind of putting my money where my mouth is. But so yeah, I think that's really important that people don't just go to draw drilling into, like, let's just get these people to change their, their individual diets or whatever. But, yeah, I think a lot about the balance between like creating movement and like serving the community, especially when it comes to thinking about, okay, how much are we going to be a structure based organization where it's very, like, we're very organized, and it's like, kind of like a union and, versus more of a mass movement, which is like, like, like, Black Lives Matter. It's like, there's not, it's not really like, like, you know, they're just, it just is like, there's 1000s and 1000s of people who identify with this movement, it's like, you have a membership card. And like, where, where's that balance? And I don't I don't know. And I think it's been tough, especially as our community has grown. Like, no, no one person can serve everyone like in the in the way that's really meaningful. Like, now there's, like 200 chapter members, how do you have a really authentic, true relationship with 200 people, and like, 200 is like, we need to get so much bigger. And that's just the chapter members in our community that doesn't include one any person who is very involved in our community who's just not a chapter member, like there's just so many people who just come when they can and all that stuff. And I don't want to get too much into like the jargon of like what a chapter member is, but it's way more than 200 people. And then there's the whole DxE network with all these chapters, and all around the world. And then you also want to not just have relationships with people in DxE, you know, family, and you want to not live in this insular bubble, so And then I'm also an introvert. kinda, you know, I would say I'm like kind of mixed, but, but I am very happy to spend a lot of time alone. And it's like, Whoa, okay, like, I could not have this many relationships. Yeah. So but but yeah, it is an IT is tough. And I don't I think the the, you know, the easy answer, or like, which is the right answer, but hard to do is there just can't be one leader there has, you know, like, there's just so if, if everybody or a good number of people are seen as leaders, and there are a lot of leaders in DC, then it's like, people don't need to be, you know, your best friend or my best friend, or Tania's best friend or Cassie's best friend, like, there's so many people in this community who provide that support and people who provide support for each other and like, maybe we know each other. But there's a lot of opportunities for for relationships and for community building. So that's the answer. It's hard to do that. Sometimes. Especially people have jobs and lives and can't do this full time. But yeah, yeah, I'm sure that's one of the things that like, I have, like, Oh, now I know a little bit about how Wayne feels when of course, everyone's like Almira! help me. Yeah. Like, I really don't know what to do. Yeah, no, even if you want to, you just don't have enough time in the day. But I do think it's just one of these misnomers about activism organizing, not just with direct action ever, but other powerful movements that we see kind of the final product of, of a movement, like a big rally or protest or civil disobedience or even a political victory, you know, passing this a Rights Act, and you don't realize all the stuff that happens behind the scenes, like you were King in the civil rights when he was a minister. I mean, so he ministered to his, his parish. I mean, he was talking to folks and dealing with their funerals and their weddings, and just the normal things ministers do. He was very much a community person and a community organizer first before he's a political activist. And you look at kind of the environmental movement with some success and where it's been successful. It's it's usually because people have connections and bonds and friendships and, and the organizing that fails usually fails because those those relationships fail. And for all the exciting stuff that you've done in the last year, which you've done a lot of exciting stuff, not just the slaughterhouse investigation, but in a ventilation shutdown in Iowa. One of the coolest things you all did last year. I mean, we did I mean, I was part of this very peripherally. This particular thing was just handwriting notes to everyone who was a chapter member and giving them personally baked cupcakes. From what I could tell. I think you you actually baked all them or you didn't buy them? Is that right? No, we didn't. I didn't personally buy them. Almira Tanner 1:27:34 Erica, and I made them. Erica, twice as many as I did. She is much better Baker. Wayne Hsiung 1:27:39 Those are tasty cupcakes. And I think people just don't realize that this is a huge part of what makes for a good movement. It's, it's not just the exciting stuff. It's like, you know, the the nitty gritty stuff and the care that's shown behind the scenes, and I will say like, I think you've done an amazing job with this. And this is an area where I think you've grown immensely. Because three years, I mean, maybe because it was thrust upon you. And you realize, Oh, I have to do this. But, you know, three years ago, I would have thought this is one of your weaknesses. And now I think it's one of your strengths, which is pretty cool. It's good work. Almira Tanner 1:28:10 And yeah, I mean, I'm just thinking back, like, two days ago, two awesome people like brought me lasagna. And like, I was like, that. I'm like, that makes me so happy. I had lasagna, you know, and like, it's like, not like a small thing. Like they made this lasagna, but like grand scheme of things. It's like a relatively small thing. But little things like that just have such an impact on people. Someone thought about you and and I know. But yeah, I mean, like, with with it. There's always a challenge because like, yeah, some people didn't get a cupcake. The delivery didn't work out, you know, or, like, you know, there was a wrong address and like, that hurt people. Wayne Hsiung 1:28:53 Sure. Yeah. Almira Tanner 1:28:54 You know, and then I'm like, that makes you feel so bad. You know, like, and it's like, like, she'll have it and then you're like, I don't know if I should do that. Because someone's like, you know, worried about getting someone like doubt. And so it's like every everything has has a challenge. Wayne Hsiung 1:29:07 Yeah, I mean, we've we've gone through these discussions internally, both strategically and just on a personal level, about how much we want this to be a community and how much should should be a movement of just kind of almost colleagues and I, I don't know what your thinking is right now. But I know over the years, I've kind of pulled back a little bit from, from thinking that this should be friendship based and community based thinking there has to be some professionalization in the movement, including, you know, paying people like I when we started Direct Action Everywhere eight years ago, I mean, Ronnie's sitting next to me, we used to have on our website, please don't don't, do not donate. Because it's not a professional movement. This is entirely about the grassroots about real communities and real people, the friends coming together, forming these little, you know, small social networks, that ultimately combined into bigger movement and and that can be overwhelming to right that that's not the right strategy because When you when you rely entirely on your social connections, the moment someone loses that social connection, they feel like their status in the movement has been destroyed. And that they, you know, in that it wasn't real, right? It wasn't real that this, this entire thing was just kind of a sham. And and I don't know how to balance those those concerns because on the one hand, right, we know that community based movements are successful, we know that we all do genuinely benefit from community connection. On the other hand, we also know we have a purpose. And it can't be the case that just because someone's your friend, or your partner, they get a leadership position, or they get more resources, which is the way a family might operate. When you're in a family you don't worry about, there's no broader objective you're trying to take over, you're hanging off your friends, right? I mean, maybe you're trying to win a board game or something like that. But there's no strategic objective in a movement, it's very different. So I don't know, I mean, how do you balance those things? And how do you think about, like the fact that we do need these social relationships, we need to show people we care about them, in order to build the solidarity we need to achieve change. On the other hand, this is a movement about change, not just about community. Almira Tanner 1:31:09 Yeah, I'm, like, holding, like, the people that I organized with a lot. They're like, my really good friends. And, but then also, you're now in a position where you have to hold someone accountable. Like, you didn't do what you said you were gonna do, or you're late, or, you know, this is this is kind of crappy, or whatever. And that's really hard. And I think that is maybe also where, like, sex, like, I have maybe some internalized sexism, or maybe the perception of me, is clouded by sexism, where it's like, I don't want like, I'm always like, was too hard. Like, it's really funny. Like, we do these reviews of each other, like, you know, where people like on your team give you feedback. And it's like, 50%, like, split always be more of an asshole be less of an asshole. Like, it's like, like, I don't know, like, how do you know, like, some people like, you have to hold people harder, like, do this. And then other people are like, You are too harsh? Yeah. And I'm like, that is hard. Where do you like, how do you how do you deal with that? Wayne Hsiung 1:32:13 Easier If it was just one way? Almira Tanner 1:32:15 Yeah. Like, it'd be a lot nicer, or, you know, but it's like, that is such because, and I think that gets to that people need different things. And you don't know what people need, if you don't know them. And you don't know them if there's too many people to know. So it's like, it's very complicated to be able to know, the personalities of all the all of the people that you work with, and like, how is this person going to respond to feedback and, and all of that, but yeah, I think I do, like, I, I receive a grant, I don't have another job. I don't think I could do this without not having another job. And there's other key things that, you know, the people manage our legal cases, they can't just be like, well, I'm, I'm really busy at work this week, it's like well Wayne Hsiung 1:32:57 So I'm not gonna handle this for a week or two. Almira Tanner 1:32:58 Yeah, it's like, well, I mean, people have felony charges. So you need to be on top of it. So I think we've we've evolved to the point where like, we need we need this. But the reality is, we will never be able to pay everyone. What like to get the numbers that we need to really achieve change. And so there has to be like there has to be some element of community in it. And there has to be some element of like, the grassroots and volunteers. So I don't think we can ever just be this like very professional organization that does this nine to five thing and then goes home. And so there. I guess I would, yeah, I don't know which I'm like, do I lean more to the professional side of the community side? I don't know. But I don't think we can just say the community is it's hard. And it's messy. So let's just not like it is hard. And it is messy. But it's worth it. Because I don't see how we can do it without this. But then it comes comes with so many challenges. For sure. Wayne Hsiung 1:33:57 It's hard to beat these big corporations their own game. Yeah, it was in the money that they have and hiring the number of workers they have I mean, even smithville alone. I mean, I just read an Amazon, for example, one of the targets of our campaigning, I think they've now hired something like a million people just in last eight months Almira Tanner 1:34:14 yeah, I think they have the the largest hiring. Yeah. Wayne Hsiung 1:34:17 It's like one out of the 300 people in this country was hired by Amazon In last, it's in the last six months or so. It's just so scary. I mean, how do you beat that? If that's your game, Almira Tanner 1:34:26 and like, you're not gonna pay, like, like, the grants that people get that I get is, this is like, minimum wage. I think it might be lower than minimum wage. If you do the math. No, I think you're like, so it's like, this has to be a labor of love. Yeah, you know, like, it's not like no one is gonna be like, yeah, sign me up. This is like a great financial decision. . Wayne Hsiung 1:34:47 Yeah Yeah So those who don't know Almira gets a $35,000 grant. It's a grant. So it's not conditioned on anything. But for the amount of work that you do, the number of hours you spent, I'm quite confident you're getting less than minimum wage in Berkeley. Almira Tanner 1:34:58 We're just like outing ourselves as like exploiting workers, no I. Wayne Hsiung 1:35:03 It's voluntary. Almira Tanner 1:35:04 Yeah. No. And and, like, I am beyond thrilled to do it. And but I think if I didn't care about this, like no one would do this just because they don't really care about it. So there has to be some sort of like, community like purpose there that motivates people to want to do this. Wayne Hsiung 1:35:22 Yeah. Yeah, I think the Well, actually, let me let me just ask you about this. I mean, so one, one hard part of the work about the work we do is just balancing some of these strategic objectives and the fact that you have to be pushing on our mission, while also caring for not only these 200 chapter members, but all these organizers internationally and all our supporters who are not chapter members. And as Almira said, that chapter member bar is actually fairly high, you have to go through a three hour workshop, you have to, you know, meet certain criteria in terms of activism engagement in order to become a chapter member. But what are some of the other obstacles? you felt like you had a deal since you stepped up? I mean, you've always been, not always, but for a long time now, you've been our leadership team since 2014, 2013? I don't remember when it was. Almira Tanner 1:36:04 probably 2015. 2013? I had done one protest. Wayne Hsiung 1:36:09 But we met you at the forum in 2013, right? Almira Tanner 1:36:11 There was no forum in 2013. Yeah you're one year behind. Wayne Hsiung 1:36:14 Okay. So forum first year was 2014. Really? Hmm. Almira Tanner 1:36:18 I'm like, 99% Wayne Hsiung 1:36:19 Oh yeah, you're right. Because we just, I mean, yeah, there's no forum 2013. Almira Tanner 1:36:23 My first DxE protest ever was December 2013. And I think that was like, maybe a couple months after y'all have done the first. Wayne Hsiung 1:36:29 You're right. You're right, right. Cuz, yeah, in 20. In 2013, the big thing we did was called the Earthlings March, where we organize all these cities around the nation. But that was before we had any sort of global network. So there would have been no reason to have a forum. Yeah, we didn't even have the relationships beyond the Bay Area. Almira Tanner 1:36:43 Vancouver didn't participate in Earthilings March, I don't think you knew anyone there. Wayne Hsiung 1:36:46 Yeah, no. But what are some of the other challenges you faced? Since stepping up is like a movement leader? Almira Tanner 1:36:53 Well, the pandemic was one. Sure, I don't think we knew that was coming. And all of a sudden, you know, we had like, a pretty good strategic plan for 2020. Like, we're doing a lot of things, Wayne Hsiung 1:37:06 And everything goes to hell. Almira Tanner 1:37:06 And then it's like, you know, and of course, naively, I'm like, okay, we can do this. It's just like two weeks, you know, like, in March where we're just gonna move everything online, we're gonna host we're gonna host an online training every day to keep the community engaged. Like that. It's like, now it's November, almost December, still, thank God, we're not doing daily trainings anymore. Yeah, I realized that wasn't very sustainable. But being able to adapt to that was was very difficult. And, you know, one of the things that we kind of rally around, and it's like, the high point of every year is Animal Liberation Conference. And it's like, we're gonna do the amazing actions and develop all these new leaders. And maybe we just couldn't do it. And, I mean, we did it online. And I think it was amazing for an online event, but it's just never, like, it's never gonna be the same as what it is in person. So that was really hard. Another thing is just knowing all the different things that are going on, and trying to like, keep up with all the various things I think before. It's like, Well, someone else will kind of, you know, like, someone else is figuring that out. And now it's like, all you got to think about fundraising and our legislative stuff and the community like now, like, I switched roles so many times, because it's just like, it was kind of like jumping to like, whatever hole needs to be plugged, which I think is kind of your experience, because you were on every working group at some point. Yeah. But before, I'd really only done, like direct action stuff. So it wasn't like the Direct Action Committee and the protest team. That's what I was doing. And now it was like, Alright, you know what you need to, I'm gonna do fundraising. Like, oh, I have no experience with fundraising. Like, at all I've never, like, I think I did a walk a THON as a child, but like, it wasn't like, and like, all right now I lead our fundraising team, we of course, Priya is, like doing a ton of the work, but I've never had to think about that. And then it's like, Okay, and now all of a sudden, I'm like, really involved in community stuff, which is, as you said, like, not what you would have thought at all. And now I'm like, Okay, this is what I'm doing. And, you know, the development working group and supporting community and outreach teams. And I thought honestly, just kind of not done all that much direct action stuff. But anymore, because like, we have other people who can lead it. But I've just, I think that's one thing that you realize when you are a leader is like, you just need to just do what needs to get done and jump into it. And the buck kind of stops with you. That's probably is that I don't know where that why some sort of speciesist expression might be. So yeah, that has been a challenge. doing the things that I don't have that much experience doing. And then of course, yeah, like we've, as always, we've had a lot of haters, trying to say all sorts of horrible things about about us, and I probably little little conflict averse. I'm kind of like, Oh, that's happening. I'll just ignore that. And someone else will address it. And that's not really a situ, like, I can't really do that anymore. So yeah, that's one thing I've had to be able to really step up and do is I'll have the hard conversations, or I'll try to address this, or I'm aiming to do that. I don't always do it. I don't always do it well, but I think in the past, it's kind of been like Wayne's job. The thing that no one else wants to do, Wayne will do it. And yeah, it's like, Alright, well, Almira will do it. Damn it. This sucks. Yeah. But overall, I've just my, like, my confidence. The first like three or four months of it was like, really shit. Really? I mean, like, yeah, people were like, you need to be more confident, like everything was like, I don't know, this is probably a terrible idea of all blind. And now I stopped, like, still very, like, sometimes I'm like, what are we doing? I don't know. But I do feel like, wow, this is I feel way more confident. Good. And I think it's awesome. Honestly, just because it's like, someone kind of didn't get like thrown into it. But you kind of get thrown into it. And I think that has made me remember that the best way for people to learn is just doing things. So just like, you know, let's just throw these people in these roles. And unless it's something where it's a life or death situation, like, let's see what happens. And that was a good reminder, because I think I hadn't, maybe had to take on a whole different role for a while I was very comfortable organizing my protests. And telling other people how to organize protests. Wayne Hsiung 1:41:31 And you've done a damn good job at it so, I understand why you're comfortable. Almira Tanner 1:41:33 Now you need to raise a million dollars and try to build our community. Yeah. And you've done it. I mean, you've done a really good job. We have, I think, the highest number of chapter members ever, and I think your fundraising has done extraordinarily well, even better than last year. And I think it's because you've been willing to take on those challenges. And I'm told many people this, I mean, if we didn't have you, I wouldn't have felt comfortable stepping down. I don't know what would have happened to do it. Because I was definitely not at a point where I could have continued leaning. I mean, I was the the the hard conversations are talking about in the criticism. I mean, like I, I'm pretty good at taking criticism, You are, much better than I am. Wayne Hsiung 1:42:06 Yeah. And honestly, like, when you look at the feedback I got, we do 360 reviews. And we even had, like external consultants come in and interview some of our team members, I've always been pretty. The, the numbers for me are usually pretty good. I have other weaknesses that are not good. You know, I'm impatient with people. I'm rude sometimes. But taking feedback is usually one of my strengths. But oh my god, the absurdity of the hate, as a grassroots organizer, especially as a grassroots organizer for a movement that's already pretty marginalized, has been just absolutely over the top. And I think I think that is, as much as I'd like to think I'm a tough guy, I can handle criticism, that was part of it, I was just kind of, you know what, I'm just kind of tired of this. I'm tired of dealing with so many people, saying all sorts of things that are clearly false and inflammatory and hateful. And my latest thing is, I'm just convinced that social media is a huge part of problem and maybe the source of the problem entirely, because all the recent stuff that's come out about how all these social media algorithms are basically elevating conflict and hate because it creates more attention and engagement, which means more advertising dollars for Facebook, all of us have probably had the experience of some dumb Facebook posts that's actually making us anxious, and angry and hurt, you know, like conflict between two of our close friends that keeps popping up on our newsfeed. And it's because Facebook knows that we will read it, we will read it, we will pay attention, we'll come back to Facebook, even more not on Facebook, when we think about it. And that became like, my entire life, my entire life was just dealing with hatred and conflict. And, and that was, you know, no small part probably because of some minor mistakes. And we could talk about some of those. But that didn't feel it wasn't just that didn't feel good to me as a person. It didn't feel good to me as a human being, but also just didn't feel like it was the right thing for me to doing for the moment that that I my time was better spent doing something else. And I think honestly, it's it's to a certain extent, it's worked like after I stepped down, because I'm here just shook her head a little bit like, I don't know about that. I feel like after I stepped down, because I was such a lightning rod and so much of the hate and animosity was directed at me. And because we have different leadership styles, you know, I, I am much more about public facing I did a lot of communication stuff. I was doing live streams all the time, while you're more introverted, you're not out there slapping people's backs and doing all the crazy shit I was doing on Facebook, that it's led to decreased animosity and decreased internal conflict in the movement. But I don't I don't know. I mean, you don't you don't think that's true? You don't think it's gone down? Since I stepped back? Almira Tanner 1:44:05 I mean, maybe maybe it has gone down but I think it's certainly hasn't disappeared. I'm sure. I think there's people who I think probably like you said less people know me, which means that less people don't like me. So that is that is helpful, but I'm there I'm sure there's people who have various grudges against me or things or decisions and I don't even think it's necessarily like you or me. It's like things that happen in DxE that then get projected on to like you, or me, or whoever and that's like the thing that drives me the most crazy is when it's just like, I, you know, I will get blamed or credited for everything we do, which is like probably not accurate, but like you would get the worst of all of that I think or you have, but it's like, so many amazing things that people do. I have like nothing to do with and I'm like, Wow, great job. I was like, thanks. Like, Wayne Hsiung 1:45:18 I think I've done both of those things to you. Wow Almira, you're amazing! Almira Tanner 1:45:22 Yeah. Like I was just like, I'm like, good job in the VSD stuff. It's like, Well, thanks I think I had like, literally nothing to do with this. If anything. I was like, Matt, you're crazy. Like, you know, like, that probably says I like, hindered that process. But then also, like, all the things that people do that are negative, all of a sudden, it's like your fault. Yeah. Or, or like just like, why do you Why do you allow this or not allow this or whatever. And I think you you probably got the brunt of that too, for things that I did. Like, for example, like, the local butcher shop protests. Yeah. I didn't even organize that many of them. But I was leading the protest working group. And I was like, yeah, this is a thing we're doing and like people are doing this every week. Wayne Hsiung 1:46:00 Yeah, you didn't ask for permission. You didn't talk to me. Almira Tanner 1:46:01 I don't think you went to a single one of them. I think I was there every week. That it's like, like, wait, you know, shape. And he's like, I don't think either of us even knew Matt was like, I just did it. And I think that's good. I don't know, I never want to be this like bottleneck. That's totally not how you're gonna grow movement. But I just wish people wouldn't blame everything on and it's like, yeah, so it's it's Wayne Hsiung 1:46:28 Yeah, I mean, one of the weird things, too, is just one of the criticisms that came out in this campaign that I ran recently that you've heard online by people like Carol Adams is that, Oh, my God, DxE is a cult they're controlling every move, and there's, you know, they're tracking every, every behavior you're engaging in, you know, they're like, it's a combination of the Mormon Church in big data, they're intruding on everything. It's like, the reality is, from the inside, it just looks and feels like a box, everything is spinning in a 1000 different directions. And you have no idea what's going on even as a lead organizer, oftentimes. And, you know, I think it's, it's fair for you to blame leadership to some degree, for the actions of the folks who are part of a movement or an organization. But I almost think that the fallacy that the American public has faced and lionizing Heroes is just inversely the same fallacy people say when they when they blame the leader for everything that's gone wrong, especially a movement, like direct action ever, or the animal rights movement, where the specific intention is not to control people. It's empower people to go do their own thing, Almira Tanner 1:47:32 like, I mean, are, of course, a lot of people like to fight about the election, we just had an election, it was really, you know, a traumatic one. And like, yeah, there's some people in our community who very strongly support Biden, and there's people in our community who really strongly don't and I think that's okay. But it's like, I'm like, how are we a cult if we can't even agree on who to vote for? The two is like, in the presidential election, there's like, four options or whatever. And, yeah, so it's like, I think it's funny when people like, DxE controls everything your call and like, inside were like, fighting over, like, you know, all of these things like that normal people fight about. Yeah. And I yeah, I think a lot of the a lot of the cult accusations come from seeing a community where people aren't used to seeing a community. Yeah, it's like, oh, this animal rights thing, like, but they're like, they're like friends with each other. And they like, eat together. And they like sing songs. Like, that's weird. It's like, it's not really that weird. It's like a what a lot of other communities do, but I don't know if there, there had beent his community. And then there's like, this weird asian guy who's leading it and like, he's, you know, like, I don't know, I don't think those are necessarily conscious thoughts that people have in their head. But then it's just like, yeah, cuz hate our tactics, hate the disruptions. Like I do get that. But then like, the cult thing is one thing. I'm like, Well, I really don't. I don't see how the things that people say are not just markers of a community. Wayne Hsiung 1:48:57 Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And I think I mean, we've talked about this, too. There's some deeply ingrained misogyny, called allegations because it just people do not believe that there could be a set of women leaders, driving people to do some of the, you know, macho masculine things. I'm putting air quotes up, because I don't I mean, especially if you look at our actions, but even if our actions were macho, I mean, women should be entitled to do quote unquote, macho things, but oftentimes, they're not. But the idea that there's a set of women who just voluntarily decide, yes, we're going to take direct action. Yes, we're getting arrested. I think there's some folks like Carol Adams who just don't believe it. They think there has to be some male figure who's behind at all. And I know you've been frustrated. It's like, people even like, people give me credit for things a year and a half after I stepped back from leadership that I don't even know happen. They come up to me and say, like, Wayne, congratulations on the incredible action that happened. Yes. I'm like, oh, what action? I don't know what's going on. Almira Tanner 1:49:54 See, if you look at the, you know, kind of like buckets of work that we do. All of them are led by Women and I know there are incredible men and non binary people in DxE who do like awesome stuff. But like, Yeah, come on, let's have a little bit of credit that it's not just like this one male cult figure telling us all what to do like Kitty leading the community efforts. And she's been doing that for so long. So successfully, like supporting people in our community and Priya doing fundraising and Cassie leading communications and Tania is leading Direct Action Committee. But yeah, it's Yeah, and I don't know, like, I don't know if people like don't believe it, or they're just like trying to find a way to like, not like us. And that's an easy out or something. I'm not sure. But yeah. Wayne Hsiung 1:50:42 Yeah, I think it's that people don't believe it. Partly, they just don't believe that. They're women, this movement, who are the strong and that tough, because of all the stereotypes people have about woman. And if you look at the history of the animal rights movement too all the ALF style stuff, it's almost always male figures who are renowned, you know, and I'm not faulting these individuals, because they're part of a sexist system themselves. But people like Peter Young, you know, even Ronnie Lee, all these historic figures in the Animal Liberation Front who do direct action, it's almost always men. And so the idea that there could be women who are actually leading and driving this, and, and the funny thing is, the Direct Action Committee historically has been almost entirely women, the protest team, that's doing some of the most militant aggressive stuff, I think, has been probably at least 80% women and its entire history. And yet people still say, Oh, it's a man holding the strings, it must be a man is controlling this. And it's like, no, the men are wimps. Actually, were the ones saying no, this is too aggressive, please, let's be nicer. You know. So it's a strange thing. I mean, one of the hardest things I mean, that I think it'd be interesting for us to talk about too, is just the sexual harassment allegations. I mean, how how have you handled that as, as a as a woman leader, and someone who's a survivor yourself, that's got to be super hard. Like, specifically, when you feel like all these women working so hard. We care immensely about obviously, our own well being and the well being of other women in our society, in our community. And yet, we're not only being hit with these cult allegations, we're being told we're making women unsafe. How do you how do you respond to that? And tell us more about your experiences in that regard? As a leader? Almira Tanner 1:52:13 Yeah, it's hard. I think it's hard to talk about without sounding defensive. Because Yeah, every time you know, people are like, what about this? And you're like, Well, let me explain everything. And the The reality is, like, there have been incidents of sexual harassment and in DxE and that always like, yeah, I'm just like, Are you kidding me? Like, can you? Like, like, why? Like, yeah, it frustrates me so much that that people wouldn't do this. Wayne Hsiung 1:52:35 Yeah. Men are stupid. Mostly. Yeah. Not just stupid, sometimes actually violent and awful. Almira Tanner 1:52:40 Yeah. And it's in there. I wish we could say there's never been any, any terrible incidents, or any creepy people. And but there have been, I think there are in every community. And I think if you don't, if they're not in the community, it's like, well, I think they're being somehow like, swept under the rug or something. Absolutely. That's absolutely. So. But but I do think like, we, in all these incidents, we have done everything that we've we can that we know to do to protect, protect women do what the survivor wants. And I think we haven't always done that well. And we've learned some lessons, like, you know, we now have to, like, we have external people that we could go to if this ever happens again. And we have consent trainings for all of our organizers. And, I mean, like, you can't like you ask someone, you can ask someone out once a DxE, but after that, they say no, or like, kind of, you know, I don't know, like any sort of not very enthusiastic, yes. Like, can't even ask them out again, like, I feel like we have such a not, like, party, kind of like hookup culture at all. And it frustrates me when people painted that, that like, we don't have alcohol at our events. And like all of these things, it's like, we got to go to bed at like, 10pm like, all these things. And I don't mean that to say that, like, well, therefore you can't have sexual assault. Like, that isn't how that works. But people are like, I think someone called us a sex cult. Wayne Hsiung 1:54:08 Yeah, it was a journalist too. Are you kidding me? Almira Tanner 1:54:09 Yeah. I mean, and then they, they realized I was like slander or libel or whichever one it is, but it's like, yeah, like, are you really kidding me? Like this is this is this is so far from like, the culture that we that we've tried to create. So it's, it's really difficult. And like, because I think it's like, yeah, we need like, I it's balancing the the reality that like it has happened, and it could very well happen again, in the future, with the fact that we are doing everything we can to try to make this be like a safe place for everyone or, or a welcoming space. And so, yeah, I think a lot of what we can do is educate people in our community, like educate men specifically about consent. So like, this is like, I mean, like, it's kinda like we're offering the service that It should just be a thing that all people are taught. I don't you don't need to be part of an animal rights group to learn about consent. But yet, I don't think many people do say like, this is something that we're trying to try to change. But that is one of probably the hardest criticisms that that will receive. Wayne Hsiung 1:55:16 Yeah, I think I mean to two things that just are, I look at it from an external perspective. And as someone who was and to certain extent, still is involved in some of these internal, you know, crises, if you look at kind of organizations that cover stuff up, or even individuals that cover stuff up, there's this really interesting research of doctors, she I don't know, if you've read about this, it probably applies to occupational therapist too. But apparently doctors that mess up, and then admit they messed up. The people around them lose confidence in them. Right. So if you if you make a mistake, and you admit, like in one, I got this diagnosis wrong, your patients say like, Oh, my gosh, you're not a good doctor, I don't want to be around you. And your reputation is damaged by that. Even though there's evidence that when doctors admit their mistakes, they become better doctors, and you're better off trusting a doctor who's willing to say, I messed up than a doctor who just always says I'm right. And the doctors who continuously just pretend they've never done anything wrong in their lives, they have more trust in the community. So there's this incentive, by not just institutions, but individuals to cover up your mistakes. And because when you admit your mistakes, you can sometimes get punished. In the long term, we're all better off if we can admit our mistakes, because it creates safer relationships, more trust. But in the short term, the incentives are just totally skewed. And I think social media is just made this worse, because the moment you admit a mistake, which we've been transparent from day one about every incident sexual harassment, and this is way before me, too, you know, like in, I think we first posted about sexual harassment incident in DxE I think it was in 2015. Is that right? 2014? Maybe was 2015? I think it was, Almira Tanner 1:56:46 yeah, it was around then. Wayne Hsiung 1:56:48 Yeah, we post on our Facebook page. And this is someone who's very important within deoxy like, and someone who's a good friend of mine, actually not, I shouldn't say very close friend, but someone I, I was considered a friend, someone I knew pretty well, who was an organizer in Chicago, he was an underrepresented, you know, minority. And so it's really important for us to from day one, to elevate voices of color. And so this is a very strong voice of color, who absolutely had credible allegations of sexual harassment, and we removed him within one day, like, I called him within hours, and he was gone. But then we post about that instead of it leading to a dialogue and the movement and, you know, and thoughts about Okay, what could we have done to prevent this? It was just people attacking us for for admitting that one of our organizers had engaged in sexual harassment when, as you said, sexual harassment is everywhere. And the only places that are they're not admitting their sexual harassment are places where they're covering it up. They're absolutely just covering it up. So I don't I don't know how to balance those two objectives. But it's tough. I don't know if your thoughts on this have changed at all. Do you think we should be more transparent, less transparent? Somewhere between I guess? Almira Tanner 1:57:48 yeah, I don't know. Being anything like even on like a personal level, I think it's like the same dilemma that you face in a leadership position is like, how vulnerable Do you want to be? Do you want to be because I think if you never show vulnerability as a person, or you never show weakness as organization, like, like, people are like, this is like not like this is like, like, you know, and the same thing with like, DxE for like, No, we've never, we are 100% perfect. We've never made a mistake. None of our organizers have you ever done anything wrong And it's great. It's like, clearly, like, this is not an accurate picture. And so you're just lying. And if you are vulnerable yourself, I think I think people find it really hard to relate to you. But then like, I think you can kind of be and this is like the feedback that I personally got when I was first in the position of lead organizer where I was like, I like, like, I have no confidence. And you're like, I don't know what I'm doing. Like, I'm a hot mess. Like, everything people are like, You're like a little too vulnerable. Like, because now people have no confidence in you. Wayne Hsiung 1:58:48 Yeah, no, no, the doctor who is showing your mistakes. Almira Tanner 1:58:50 Yeah, like, it's like, even though you're making you need to be like people need to look to you and be like, we got this. And so there you can't be too much. And in the same way that it's like every like every little thing like this one person said this wrong word or like this fight happened. And then you like, blow it up on social media? I don't think is is the right is the right answer. But yeah, it's I don't know. Because then people feel I think people don't like to be felt like they've been left out of the loop. So, you know, people who are in the community, and then they hear some allegation, and then they're like, why didn't like why didn't I know about this? Or like, Why didn't you tell me this thing? It's like, Yeah, I don't know. There's always so many things happening. I feel like I could have like a running dialogue of like, stream of consciousness to everyone in our community like this is happening now. Like, not with conflict, but just in general with all of the things that we're doing. And that's clearly not the answer. So yeah, I think having been maybe having open spaces where people can have, you know, can can answer questions and just like adding opportunities for people to, like, bring what's on their mind is important. And now that we're in COVID times I've been doing this online, like every month or two just like having a space where I'm on zoom when people come with their random questions or concerns or feedback, having people be able to sit in our core meetings, at least as opportunities for for transparency. But yeah, I don't think we ever want to feel like we're hiding things from people definitely. Yeah, those are like all these dilemmas always that you're faced with when trying to kind of be one of the leaders of a community. Wayne Hsiung 2:00:28 Yeah. If you could say one thing, your critics, what would it be? What's the most important thing that you think folks don't realize about Direct Action Everywhere, and maybe even you personally, that they should try to realize? Almira Tanner 2:00:43 It would probably be about like, assuming good faith. And, like, I, I look at the people that we work with, and I'm like, oh, like, we all mess up so much, like people's intentions are so good. And, you know, and like, we're not like, yeah, like, people make mistakes. I make mistakes all the time. But really, genuinely feel like people are trying to do the best they can. And they're trying to make the best decisions they can for the movement for people in our community. And like, sometimes that's the wrong decisions. But I just think if people assumed good faith, and really trusted that people's intentions were good, and most people's intentions are good most of the time. Maybe not all the time. Some evil corporate people, like I don't know what Jeff Bezos his intentions are. But that would be what I would say. Just assume good faith. Wayne Hsiung 2:01:32 Yeah, that's so hard in an era of conspiracy theories, where I mean, we're basically taught on YouTube to assume bad faith about everything, everything is a lie, everything is about some cabal of people are trying to hurt you and hurt everyone else. And, and because that gets clicks, it's it's just not as interesting. Like, if the story is so many inadvertent mistake, and this disclosure wasn't made, but it's because I forgot to hit the send button that's not nearly as sexy as they're trying to hold a secret. And they're hiding it from people because they know they're evil doers, and they're gonna keep doing it. So it's just, that's not what gets people watching on YouTube. So I don't I don't know what the solution to that is. But Almira Tanner 2:02:08 Maybe that's why our YouTube channels not that good. Wayne Hsiung 2:02:12 I will say, I think that you've done an admirable job of transparency, I think you've probably done a better job than we did when when I was lead organizer, partly because you're just more organized than me, to be blunt. And, and I, I feel very much in the loop. And I think that more folks feel in the loop than they did when I was lead organizer. So I think whatever balance you've cut, I think it's been reasonably reasonably good. Not saying there aren't going to be some folks. I mean, whatever you decide to cut, cut that balance, they're going to be some people upset because some people will feel like you're oversharing Some people feel like under sharing. So you're trying to just hit that sweet spot where you're basically satisfying the basic needs of your stakeholders, while not oversharing and over elevating conflicts, or tensions or mistakes. And I think you've, you've managed that balance pretty well. Another question I want to ask you is how do you think you've changed in the last two years? As a result of your experience as a movement leader? Do you feel like a movement leader at this point? Almira Tanner 2:03:08 Um, no, I don't know if I feel like a movement leader. I do feel like I have. Like, I do feel like a leader in DxE And I think. I think there are some people who see me as that and I feel comfortable in that role, like knowing that also, I'm not the only leader and I never want to be in that position. But I feel like I've grown into that a little bit and become more confident in that. And so yeah, but I don't think I feel like a movement leader yet. Wayne Hsiung 2:03:38 I've got news for you, cuz you're literally the leader of the biggest grassroots animal rights network in Almira Tanner 2:03:43 I don't know. And I think it's like, partly still like, I think the kind of establishment AR shifty eyes. Wayne Hsiung 2:03:49 yeah, the establishment is not as excited about us. Almira Tanner 2:03:50 But I mean, I've actually had really great conversations with people who lead other organizations. And I think that that's hopefully changing. But I think it's still like those weirdos over there like doing doing their thing. And like, Yeah, but yeah, so I think that I think the confidence has changed, I think I have become more extroverted and more comfortable talking to new people, less overwhelmed, talking to new people, which just goes to show that you really can develop those skills. I think I was like, put into that position of like, Alright, you're doing a lot of community stuff now. So like, make it happen. And I've, you know, that that that actually worked out and it wasn't as scary as I thought. So I think Wayne Hsiung 2:04:36 what tips would you give someone else who's trying to build that confidence and ability to relate to other people and connect with them? Almira Tanner 2:04:44 I wonder what do you believe I'm talking to her like, This girl is so weird. I like I don't know if I can, I don't know, like, tips on like relating relating to people, but I think it's just experience just so much of life is just like doing it doing it, just Wayne Hsiung 2:05:02 go do it. Almira Tanner 2:05:03 Yeah. So that's like my, my advice to people is just Just do it. And I'm such an overthinker. So I relate to people who are maybe overthinking things. Yeah. But so much of it is just like, go to that first protest. And I always, like, tell myself this, I don't know if this is a very good strategy. But like, when I do things I don't want to do, like, have a set point, like, I don't want to clean the bathroom. But I know that I'm gonna clean the bathroom for like, 30 minutes, and, or whatever. And if it's not done, whatever, it's 30 minutes. So I just like and I always did when I was a gymnast, and I was like, really scared to try this new skill, which probably involves some sort of risk of like breaking your neck. Like, it'll be over in two seconds. So like, maybe it'll be horrible, but it will be over in two seconds. So I think so much of it is just like, do it and then tell yourself, like, go to the protest, and maybe it'll be horrible. It probably won't be, but it will be horrible. Maybe there's like this risk that no one knows you. And it's awkward and whatever. But it'll be over. Yeah, like that will end. So just like have this like, Listen, I'm telling myself when I'm signing up to be in this ice bath. Yeah, at for protests, like, whatever, it's a five minutes, you can do anything for five minutes. Maybe not hold your bathroom five minutes, but like, you know, you can do anything. So I would tell people to just push yourself to do it. Whatever it is, that's kind of like holding you back and just Just do it. I don't know. Yeah, I tell myself that for everything. Every time I go on a run. I'm like, whatever it'll be over soon, even though it's really miserable and painful. And you don't want to run this long. But Hmm, I'll just do it. Like this weird psychological? Yeah, do that for everything. Wayne Hsiung 2:06:36 Wow. That's crazy. You know, there's something about the commitment mechanism scheduling something, once you've scheduled it, you do it, you know, or you should get to the point where it's, it's much more likely you're going to do it if you scheduled especially if you have someone else's depending on you'd be there too. Almira Tanner 2:06:49 Right? Yeah. And like, that's good. That's like the worst part of jail is not knowing how long things are gonna be if someone's like your jail for this many hours. I don't care what that number is. I just know. But that's my brain. I like to time things out. So Wayne Hsiung 2:07:01 well. Last question for me then is how is activism changed you, if not leadership? I mean, how do you think activism So, what, eight years ago, you were an occupational therapist in Canada, probably thinking you're gonna go down that career path and stay in healthcare your entire life, and now you're kind of trying to heal the planet, especially in the context of a pandemic, but it's a pretty big change in your life. So how has How has it changed you? Almira Tanner 2:07:24 Well, I think it's made me more comfortable with risk and like doing kind of, you know, things that most people would think are really absurd and risky. Yeah. You know, like, I wouldn't, I was like, I don't even want to quit this, this job that I hate before. And now unlike. Okay, yep. We can have people try to go inside a Smithfield slaughterhouse like, like, or like, yeah, we don't know what those charges are gonna be. But 40 people are gonna lock themselves to a gate like, you know, you have to get really okay with that. And I think that that's just a good, I mean, not to be irresponsible, but it's a good life skill. I like to just be okay, with change. And anyone who knows me is like, I'm not that okay, with change generally, but it's way better than, than it used to be. So I think that is something that's good. And thank God because this world is so messed up right now. Like, you, we like, we're, we're in a pandemic, we don't know, if there's gonna be another one, like, you are gonna, we are gonna have to adapt. And so I think it has helped me a lot in that. And yeah, I guess also just seeing, like, the goodness of people, like I said before, like, like, holy cow, like, there are some really amazing people. And, like, people do, like, even like, this morning, like we were had this online meetup and like, this one person's like, sharing their story. And like, I've known this person for years, but like, how, like, this person has done so many amazing things. And there's such a, like, like, an incredible person. And I feel like that, like activism has made me see that most people are like, very good and altruistic. They just need to kind of like, that just needs to be like, tapped into a little bit. Not that like, I didn't know that before. I have great friends and family, but maybe you don't spend your whole day thinking about like, how can you tap into the altruism of the average person so but yeah, and just like opportunities. I, it is kind of amazing that like, I emailed Ingrid Newkirk and she said she could talk to me on the phone, like this woman like, Oh, my boy, you are so amazing, legendary. And now like, I can just like email her and be like, let's have a phone call. And she'll say, yes, that's more credit to her than to me. But I think that the amount of opportunities that the movement, like being involved in something provides is really amazing. Wayne Hsiung 2:09:45 Yeah. And I think that's a great way to end because if we believe in the goodness of the people around us and seize the opportunities we have before us, we can create change. And honestly, the things holding us back one of the analysis is that cynicism is distrust of the people around us. In this belief that the things we can do are so insignificant. If we believe those things, then we're guaranteed to lose, you know, the planets doomed, the animals are doomed human beings are doomed. Well, if we believe in each other, and we believe in our own power, that that's when the world changes. And there are these moments in history where that happens. And I think we're in one of those moments now. Because, well, definitely needs it. So cool. So tell us how people can support the work. You're doing the work we're doing. I'm still involved in this at Direct Action Everywhere, share a little bit about that. Almira Tanner 2:10:30 Yeah. So of course, like, the first thing, the most important thing for people to do is to become active. Like I said, just like, just do it and rip the band aid off and go to the sanctuary or go to the protest or whatever, but it's the end of year. So of course, we're gonna make a fundraising pitch where you can support our work financially. And yeah, like Wayne said, in the in the early days, we said, Do not donate and realize that, you know, you do actually need funds to support a social movement, and, you know, buy the drones and support vet bills and operate a community center. And all of that stuff does require funding. So if you people do feel inspired to give, you can go to directaction everywhere.com and donate there, it's pretty straightforward. Wayne Hsiung 2:11:13 And the end of the year is the best time to give. There's all sorts of perfect matching programs you can take advantage of. And I can say from my personal experience, working with Almira I cannot think of a better organization to donate to, frankly, than one led by Almira and I'm proving that with my donations this year too. So I highly encouraged you to check it out as much as possible. Almira Tanner 2:11:31 Thanks Wayne. Wayne Hsiung 2:11:35 Thanks to Almira for joining hope you had as much fun as I did in this conversation. The episode was produced and edited by my friend Ronnie Rose, thanks to Julie Waldroup and Crystal Heath for their help as well. The music in the episode is by Moby and if you found some value in this episode, please share it with someone you think might benefit from listening to it. And stay tuned because we'll have more episodes coming out in the new year. Thanks so much