Videos and pamphlets are great, but they can’t replace your ability to effectively explain the issues. So the first thing to try to do is to get good at painting a picture with your words. Although hard, it is very useful to watch videos with some regularity so that images of some of the forms of cruelty in factory farming are always fresh in your memory. This way, when people ask you, “Why are you a vegan?” or, “Why are you an activist?” you’re able to describe concrete and specific examples of the horrors that are routinely inflicted on animals. For example, rather than saying, “Animals are treated badly on factory farms,” you will be able to say, “On factory farms, chickens grow so fast that they become crippled under their own weight,” or “Cows and pigs often have their limbs hacked off while they’re conscious and able to feel pain,” or “Animals are denied their every need and desire, they’re mutilated and cooped up in their own waste, they’re violently loaded onto trucks, causing injuries, and they’re slaughtered in the most painful and inhumane manner that you can imagine. If a dog or a cat were treated the way farmed animals are treated, everyone involved could be thrown in jail on felony cruelty-to-animals charges.”