Pissing into the wind

I seem to have subscribed to every human and animal rights organisation on facebook. Every day my newsfeed is a testament the the endless creative ways we humans find to fuck each other up. It leaves me with an unspecific, itchy need to do something, but I don't know what.

Contrary to popular belief, I don't think that Mcdonald's is going to close down tomorrow because I have abstained from Mcfluffy's for ten years; not since I was about twelve years old, anyway. It is very original and eye-opening for every vegan to hear that classic rebuttal to their beliefs - 'One person not eating meat wont shut down any farms'. If only the Three Sisters of Pureora or each person who attended the Montgomery Bus Boycott had had someone with such insight around.

What a genuinely shitty attitude to have.

Sometimes it takes one individual to single-handedly bring about change, sometimes it takes a thousand individuals, but either way, change works on a person-by-person basis; individuals add up. But that's irrelevant. It's an argument that suggests that no matter how inherently wrong something is, if your objections to it have no immediate or apparent effect then it's acceptable to just ignore your moral repulsion, and even actively support and indulge in the wrongdoing.

It's basically self-validation for doing fuck all. It's saying, I don't need to stand up for anything because I have realised something that those people haven't; they're idealistic, childish. It's ignoring the  fact that some forms of protest, like going vegetarian or not buying The Sun aren't intended to be revolutionary acts, but are just manifestations of the thought 'I wont be a part of this'.

And it's ignoring the most fundamental fact of all - that the majority of those people holding the signs know that they're a insignificant little blip in a world of horrible bastards, but they keep holding them anyway. They keep wearing those awful sandals and growing dreadlocks and not shaving their arm pits... they don't give up.

It sounds like I'm saying I'm awesome for being a vegan, but I'm not trying to. I'm just saying that it's a shitty argument.

Which brings me back round to my original point. I think growing up and trying to adhere to a set of values is about accepting that you're pissing into the wind, and then trying to decide which direction to piss. I need to do something about all this suffering on my newsfeed, but I don't know where to start.