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App not listed? Try this RSS linkIn this episode of The Hen Report, Jasmin and Mariann cover a wide range of topics: Jasmin shares behind-the-scenes moments from her theater rehearsal, including an organic conversation about veganism, tallow lotion, and gelatin that unfolded among cast members without any agenda-pushing on her part. She also pays tribute to the legacy of Tommy Raskin, animal rights activist and son of Congressman Jamie Raskin, drawing from Jamie’s memoir Unthinkable. The hosts then dig into the story of marine biologist Emma Smart, who liberated a lobster from a UK fishmonger and faced a shockingly heavy-handed legal response, before closing with a rich discussion on Project Slingshot — a new UK campaign challenging factory farming with the slogan “Don’t Buy It” — and what it means for animal advocacy strategy.
- Project Slingshot & the anti-factory farming movement: Mariann breaks down this new UK pressure campaign, its broad definition of factory farming, its “Don’t Buy It” slogan, and the ongoing debate about whether explicit vegan messaging helps or hinders progress toward animal liberation.
- The lobster liberation story: Marine biologist Emma Smart rescued a lobster from a UK fishmonger, was strip-searched, and faced five criminal charges — raising urgent questions about how society and law enforcement respond to peaceful animal advocacy.
- Tommy Raskin’s legacy: A reflection on Congressman Jamie Raskin’s memoir Unthinkable and his son Tommy, a passionate animal rights activist whose final words called on people to care for animals and the global poor.
- Vegan identity vs. vegan options advocacy: Mariann draws a key distinction between advocacy that encourages people to go vegan versus advocacy that simply seeks to make vegan options more accessible and normalized.
- Kickstarting for Good & other opportunities: Applications are open for the Kickstarting for Good 2026 incubator (apply by May 31) and the Anima International 2026 Fellowship in Warsaw (apply by May 17); the Grassroots Animal Rights Summit is also coming to DC, May 15–17.
RESOURCES
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INTERVIEW TRANSCRIPT
Jasmin Singer: Welcome to the Hen Report. I'm Jasmin Singer
Mariann Sullivan: I'm Mariann Sullivan.
Jasmin Singer: Thank you for joining us today. It is a, a dreary chili day here in Rochester, but spring is around the corner. I'm sure of it.
Mariann Sullivan: I think it's always important to mention the weather. Can't do it too frequently.
I just want everybody to know that before we started recording, Jasmin said, Oh, I don't feel like looking at anything. Let's just do it.
So we're winging it.
Jasmin Singer: No, we're not winging it. I did look at it before. I just usually review it again, but
who,
who needs that when there's weather to talk about?
Mariann Sullivan: Right.
Jasmin Singer: Another thing you can't talk about enough is that the Our Hen House podcasts are sprinkled throughout your week, just
like the rain
that is going to come down today in Rochester. Rising Anxieties comes out on Tuesdays, and you have been on fire lately. The Hen Report on Thursdays,
Mariann Sullivan: It's one way to put it.
Jasmin Singer: that's this, and the long form interview on Fridays. Bonus for flock members comes out on Mondays.
We are on YouTube. We're on any pod catcher where you like to listen to podcasts, so hit subscribe, hit like, and comment wherever you listen.
So. A couple things I wanted to chat about. I, I have, you know, my play is actually in less than a month now, I'm in this play called Deep Blue Sound, which is about whales. You know, it's about the disappearance of whales and obviously there's also like a human element.
Mariann Sullivan: Presumably there are not any whales appearing in the play. Is there anybody playing a whale?
Jasmin Singer: There is, but it's like kind of artistic and like he just comes on stage and says, I'm a whale. Like he's not in a costume.
Mariann Sullivan: Oh, really? That was a cho... I always thought I was making a joke, but I wasn't.
Jasmin Singer: I also sort of ruined the ending for you, just so you just forget that we had this conversation.
Mariann Sullivan: I forget almost everything these days. So that should be easy.
Jasmin Singer: Samesies. Anyway, and so I'm just... it's the most wonderful cast, like it's a fairly large cast, like nine or 10 people, and everyone is just so talented and professional and, and I'm like, I do not always have this experience in theater, uh, especially like at the level of theater that I'm doing where you get your professional actress, but you also get non-professional actors. And so we were sitting around yesterday and someone brought a bunch of cake and he said, Sorry, I don't have anything vegan. And someone was like, Well, how many vegans do we have here? And I was like, Well, me, but I kind of count for four vegans. Uh, and you know, I said, I've been vegan for more than 20 years, blah, blah, blah. And
Mariann Sullivan: So you didn't mean you eat four times as much as other people? You meant that
Jasmin Singer: No, like just the.
Mariann Sullivan: that you're really, really, really, really vegan.
Jasmin Singer: Really vegan. Yeah. It was, it was funnier in the moment, or, or it wasn't, I don't know. But in any case, so, um, we, so we, there's always this jar of jelly beans at rehearsal. I don't know why. I think that's a little weird. Uh, but the other day someone brought Reese's Oreos, so it's basically Oreos with peanut butter stuffed in and they're vegan.
Mariann Sullivan: Yeah, I've heard of them. Yeah.
Jasmin Singer: So I was like, I made a big deal of it and I was like, I'm gonna eat one 'cause it's vegan. And anyway, so yesterday we started talking about the vegan thing and, and, and somehow the topic gets onto like this, this lotion that someone brought that he made, and there's like tallow in it. And so he's like, you can't use my lotion because it has tallow in it.
And uh, someone next to me who plays a horse groomer in the play said, What's that made of? And he was like, Horses. And he was kidding. And she was like, Oh my God, you know, and it was kind of this horrifying. And then he is
Mariann Sullivan: What is it made of?
Jasmin Singer: Beef. That's what he said.
Mariann Sullivan: All right.
So much better...
Jasmin Singer: I know, and it was like this weird moment.
Then we started talking about gelatin because it's in the jelly beans, and I was like, there's
Mariann Sullivan: Oh, nice segue. Yeah.
Jasmin Singer: Jelly beans that don't have gelatin in them. Uh, and someone's like, What's gelatin? I'm like, Oh God, it's pretty awful. I mean, speaking of horses, like there could be horse hooves in it and, um, it's just, it, it's, it's really vile.
And, and people were kind of shocked and then they're like, Why are, why is everyone being poisoned with food these days? And I'm sitting there trying so hard to be like approachable and not use this moment as a moment to like browbeat people. But I, so I kind of took like more of a backseat role, so to speak, than I usually would.
And, and the conversation kind of went there on its own. Like I didn't have to do very much. People did start connecting the dots. Um, so, you know, and then someone also hearkened back to the cookie that I had the other day. They're like, well, I guess there is lots of vegan food that you wouldn't even know is vegan. You know, it's like they...
Mariann Sullivan: So did, did they all go vegan?
Jasmin Singer: Yes. That's the, that's the end...
Mariann Sullivan: Such a good story.
Jasmin Singer: They all went vegan. Uh, it is,
Mariann Sullivan: I'm only kidding. I, I think moments, moments upon moments upon moments make a difference.
I didn't mean to make it sound like it doesn't.
Jasmin Singer: Oh no, it's fine. I, you know, it's just, it's interesting 'cause it's like ex a play explicitly about animals and
Mariann Sullivan: Right, right.
Jasmin Singer: Um. Any who I, uh, I get back in my car to leave to go home, and I'm listening to this book. I'm listening, and you know this, I'm listening to Jamie Raskin's book called Unthinkable. And you know, I think probably at least some of our listeners are familiar, but you, Jamie Raskin's son Tommy had...
Mariann Sullivan: Congressman Jamie Raskin.
Jasmin Singer: Yes. Who's vegan.
Mariann Sullivan: From Maryland.
Jasmin Singer: Yeah. And, uh, his son Tommy, had died by suicide right before the January 6th, uh, insurrection, like, like a, a week before or so. Or a little, yeah, I think exactly a week before. And so the book really, I'm not done with it, but it weaves together, uh, trauma and kind of the danger of papering things over, whether it's mental illness or like the loss of democracy. Uh, it's, I just wanted to shout it out because, clearly, he partly wrote it, if not fully, to honor the legacy of Tommy, who was an animal rights activist.
Mariann Sullivan: Passionate, passionate animal rights activist.
Jasmin Singer: He was an intern at MFA and he, he really made people in his life go vegan. And, you know, this is very sad, but his suicide note, though, I, I'm not quoting it exactly, said it was very short and it said something along the lines of, Today, my illness won. Take care of the global poor and the animals.
Or something along those lines. And uh, and Jamie Raskin is really very much honoring Tommy's legacy, you know, and bringing
Mariann Sullivan: And of course Jamie Raskin is, is fairly famously vegan himself because of his son.
Jasmin Singer: Mm-hmm.
Mariann Sullivan: I it like it, make it, I have such a, I mean, I, I don't think this is an unusual reaction. I know that, um, Tommy, you know, he had a serious mental illness and, and this was the result of it. But there's just part of me that's so angry.
I mean,
I can't help it.
Jasmin Singer: It's a natural, I think reaction.
Mariann Sullivan: Yeah, I see. I admire Jamie Raskin for getting over that 'cause I'm sure he... and God, that man has been through so much. Then he got cancer that like, and he's leading the charge against Trump. Like, it's unbelievable what that man's life is like.
Jasmin Singer: I don't think he got over his anger. I'm sure. I mean, it's a soupy mix.
Mariann Sullivan: Moving through it.
Jasmin Singer: He's moving through it because I think he feels, you know, that as so many do, there's no other choice. But, uh, suicide is, I think the, one, it's like maybe the second leading cause of death among young people in this country. It's really unbelievable how, how much it's exploded in recent years alone. I think like one in every, uh, four teenagers has thought about it.
Mariann Sullivan: Yeah.
Jasmin Singer: It, it's, it's...
Mariann Sullivan: I don't think thinking about suicide and committing suicide are... they're very, very different. Almost everybody.
Jasmin Singer: Yeah.
Mariann Sullivan: I think I would be surprised if it's not more than one in four have what they call suicide ideation.
Jasmin Singer: Sure it, it, it might have been more.
Mariann Sullivan: That's a common thing. And then there are grades, and then there's actual... there's... I mean, it's a, it's complicated.
Just because you think of suicide doesn't mean that you're going to commit suicide.
Jasmin Singer: I don't like commit in this context, and I, I know I'm being the word police, but it feels like... I mean it, I guess it is a crime, but it just, to me, it, it, it's a little more finger pointy than understanding of the unbelievable mental anguish that someone needs to be under in order to go there. But anyway, I, we don't have to, we don't
Mariann Sullivan: No, I, we could talk about suicide all day, but you know, we're not a suicide podcast.
Jasmin Singer: Right, exactly. Uh, but the, why did this make me think of the lobster woman? There was some reason why I said that, this, that, that we should talk about this Ecologist article.
Mariann Sullivan: I, I don't know. You didn't say.
Jasmin Singer: Why don't you start talking about it and I'll remember the tie in?
Mariann Sullivan: I don't know why I thought we should mention it, because if it, it, it is certainly not, um, gonna encourage anybody to be an activist. But it, this took place in the UK and um...
Jasmin Singer: I remember why. Okay, continue.
Mariann Sullivan: And, uh, the name of the article, which was in The Ecologist, is I Liberated a Lobster and Got Crushed. This is by Emma Smart, who is a scientist, a marine biologist specifically, and this is about an incident where she walked into this, um, fish monger or restaurant. It's a high, high-end restaurant. Um, oh, it's a fishmonger below a high-end seafood restaurant in Weymouth.
Uh, and, and she said, I did what we've all thought of doing. There was a lobster in, uh, in, in an aquarium. She, the very bear aquarium, she picked up the lobster, she walked calmly out. And, um, and eventually released the lobster into the wild. She knew what she was doing. She's a marine biologist. It was, you know, there was a lot of, there was unbelievable discourse.
The press paid much, much closer attention to the, to the, um, restaurant owner. Um, and, and six weeks after she liberated the lobster, four police officers in three vehicles arrived at her home and she was strip searched and her home was ransacked. As the...
I dunno what they were searching for, like hidden lobsters. I don't know.
She was, uh, taken into custody, was charged with five very serious offenses, most of which were thrown out. But she did ultimately, um, I think pled guilty to a charge of criminal damage to a lobster, even though she's the one who didn't damage the lobster. And, uh, as she pointed out, this probably cost taxpayers around 13,000 pounds.
Um, and, and all she wanted to do was to save a lobster. Admittedly, what she did was pretty obviously illegal. Uh, you know, I'm not gonna deny it, but what's going on in people's...? Like, like...
Jasmin Singer: it's just it. It's...
Mariann Sullivan: Why do people... the people, they clearly hated her. They hated her. Like the press hated her. The, the police hated her.
Like they, the way they treated her was, was emotional.
Jasmin Singer: We are missing the forest for the trees here. I mean, it reminds me of Riglan and, and you know, the, the way the cops and the security came down on the activists there, rather than like looking at the bigger picture to mix metaphors. And I remember why I, uh, was drawing a connection before. It wasn't a connection with, uh, Jamie Raskin.
It was a connection with the story of my rehearsal and the, um, the woman who plays the horse groomer who didn't want to, you know, have a horse product, but, uh, was fine having a beef product. It sort of reminded me of that. Um, because this was a marine biologist saving the lobster, there was just a, like a Jasmin connection in my Jasmin-y brain.
But in any case, what a story. That's crazy.
Mariann Sullivan: And, uh, this is her closing line, which I think is quite lovely. I will not be a bystander and I don't regret for a minute my simple, unplanned, and peaceful act to prevent ongoing harm to one vulnerable animal.
Jasmin Singer: Oh my God!
Wow. I love that. is beautifully said. All right, well something else that was beautifully said. I said that you were on fire on Rising Anxieties and uh, I stand by that. I really love when our listeners get this, like, access into your brain. Which, you know, and I know you roll your eyes when I say this, but Our Hen House, which started...
Mariann Sullivan: It actually sounded a little like surgery.
Jasmin Singer: Our Hen House, which started in January of 2010 was, you know, partly created because I had a front row seat to Mariann-isms and I just was like everyone needs this.
Mariann Sullivan: I feel like I, I've been talking on this podcast forever, constantly, so.
Jasmin Singer: But, but, but there's a particular type of punditry that you don't always have because you're, you know...
Mariann Sullivan: I, I will accept the compliment. Thank you.
Jasmin Singer: Yeah. Well, and you should, so what, you know, hopefully our listeners have already heard it, but just give us a quick glimpse into what you talked about 'cause I'd love to kind of continue that conversation a little bit.
Mariann Sullivan: I mean, it, it wasn't really a rant. I just talked about, you know, the whole thing in animal advocacy right now is anti-factory farming. Like, that's, that's the take that everybody is adopting. I'm fine. I'm all for it. I think it's good. Um, everybody hates factory farming. I think inventing the term factory farming was one of the most brilliant things this movement ever did, and we wanna use it to the fullest.
And, and so, uh, but I don't fully, what I was writing about the other day, or talking about the other day was that I don't fully understand the theory of change behind an anti-factory farming campaign. Like what do they mean by factory farming? Are they, are people going to start claiming that cage-free campaigns are anti-factory farming?
Because it just seems to be cage-free campaigns are exchanging one form of factory farming for an arguably better form of factory farming.
Jasmin Singer: Mm-hmm.
Mariann Sullivan: That's one thing. And, and also just like, like how if, if you're talking about it as a theory of change, you kind of have to talk about the fact that factory farming is how we feed the world.
So what, what is gonna replace it? Like, like you can't ignore that.
Jasmin Singer: Yeah.
Mariann Sullivan: I feel like you know a lot of people talking about it. Which, and I don't, do not have a full view of the discourse, but, uh, maybe, you know, it could, we could use a little bit more filling out. But, you know, I'm the kind of person who always likes to pin everything down. All right, what's the theory of change, blah, blah, blah.
And that's not always a good idea. And I was reminded of that by this video I saw about this new campaign in the UK. It's a big campaign. It's obviously got some money behind it. It's called Project Slingshot. The person I saw, who seems to be heading it up and who I saw talking about it, um, was Matthew Glover.
And um, basically it's about trying to change public messaging about animals from go vegan to anti-factory farming because people shut down with the vegan message. I think that's, I think that I, I don't wanna put words in anybody's mouth. Um, but I think that's the theme. And you know, as I mentioned, I was saying that if we were gonna get rid of factory farming, we have to say what will replace it.
But this kind, this campaign kind of takes sort of, and we'll talk about that a little bit, um, takes the position, no, we don't have to talk about where we replace it. We can... maybe, maybe it's better to let people figure that out for themselves. Maybe they don't feel so pushed. Maybe they, they want to see what the problem is.
They, they have more understanding of what the problem is than they used to and they, they can figure it out. And there are other organizations, it doesn't have to be part of this campaign. There may be other organizations that will tell people, we'll do this, do that. Um, so I think that's the idea behind this campaign and the campaign is really good.
Um, they do seem to define factory farming very strictly. That was one of my, um, worries that all of a sudden factory farming would just mean the worst of the worst of the worst of the worst. But no, they really mean, uh, you know, all of the abuses. Uh, you can look at, you look on their website, but they define it strictly and they're calling it a pressure campaign.
They're starting in London and as, uh, Matthew Glover said in this speech, their North Star is always end factory farming. And things he points out, some of which I would push back on a little bit. There's no vegan identity push. Okay, that's the thing that really people are worried that that's not working.
This you have to go vegan. Um, so there's none of that. There's no telling people what to eat, which I'm not sure... I mean, they're not even suggesting. There's nothing about it. I'm not sure I think that's necessary, but that's their theme, so I can respect that. There's no purity shaming, and my reaction to that was, Oh, come on.
I mean, like, yeah, there are vegans online who have bad discourse, but that's not what the movement is doing, by and large, purity shaming, come on. Like this movement is so far past that and there's so many good activists doing all sorts... but whatever. Uh, another thing, no climate framing, which I thought was interesting. Apparently, like they acknowledged you can't get anybody to care about climate change.
We're not getting... we're not messing up our message with that nonsense. All right, we're all so fucking screwed. And no culture wars. I don't even know what they mean by that. What do they mean culture wars? But the thing, the, the basic theme that they wanna tell people, which I think is really good, and I think their slogan is completely brilliant, is the theme, is like, you're being lied to.
'Cause they understand that people in the UK and you know, everywhere, but really in the UK, um, uh, don't, don't understand that all their food is from factory farms and how bad they are because they're being lied to. And the slogan is, Don't buy it. Isn't that good?
Jasmin Singer: Yeah.
Mariann Sullivan: It's a double entendre of don't buy it.
Like don't buy what they're saying and don't buy what they're selling.
Jasmin Singer: Yeah. I, I, and they have a bunch of celebrities.
Mariann Sullivan: Yeah. And the videos are great.
Jasmin Singer: Yeah, no, for sure. So, I, I am familiar with this campaign and, uh, with Matthew's work and I, um.
Let me just say first that I agree that this is really brilliant campaign and having it on the tube in London is also fantastic because as he pointed out in the video, people are like looking for things to look at and read 'cause they don't wanna like awkward... this was funny to me...they don't wanna awkwardly look at the person across from them on the tube.
Yeah, I know what you're about to say. I feel the same way. Having lived in New York City for so many years.
Mariann Sullivan: I've been on subways for hours and hours and hours of my life, so I love subway ad campaigns. I think they really reach a lot of people. I
Jasmin Singer: Yeah.
Mariann Sullivan: Have phones now, so it's different. You always have something to look at, but still, you look at those subway ads.
Jasmin Singer: And in, in London, uh, apparently like everyone takes it. I mean,
Mariann Sullivan: It's like New York. It's how you get around.
Jasmin Singer: I think in New York there's a lot of politicians who take cars, for example, to go down to City Hall, but.
Mariann Sullivan: I don't know, like, like, like it, the traffic in New York City is horrifying. It's easier. It's the easiest... the subway is the best way to get around.
Jasmin Singer: Yeah. Well in any case, they were making the point that like everyone rides the tube and I, so I love also, don't buy it, is just brilliant. So I wanna just kind of say that first.
Mariann Sullivan: All right, let's hear it. Let's hear it.
Jasmin Singer: I do not give people the benefit of the doubt that they will wind up on the right side. That when, when he says in the video, he says, We're not gonna tell people what to eat because it's obvious. I don't think it is. And I would like to go back to my story of my rehearsal where, and it's funny 'cause I didn't think about this when I was telling you that story a few minutes ago, but you know, when I took a back seat, people were having the conversation. And then you jokingly said, Did they all go vegan? And I said, Yes. They all went vegan.
They're not gonna go vegan. I mean, uh, they're not. And I, I think that I raised awareness about veganism and maybe they'll like look at a vegan item differently, um, and try it, but I don't think, I think there's like a 0.001% chance that they will go vegan and, um, and so likening that story to this situation, I don't think it's obvious.
I do think that people at the end of the day will, or at the end of their tube ride will say, Yeah, factory farming is awful. But I think they will continue to think that the food that they're purchasing is not factory farmed, and I think they will put it in a compartment in their brain, this information, that is not, you can't access when you're eating lunch.
I, I just, I really think that attaching anti-factory farming messaging to some kind of what you do next is important.
I will also say that I don't know if I'm right. I, I, I think that there are, uh, this is just my gut, my knee jerk feeling here. And there are plenty of people who have done a lot of actual research into this who would disagree with me, and they're probably way more knowledgeable than I am about this.
So this is my opinion and I am a bit dour as we know, and a bit of a curmudgeon.
Mariann Sullivan: And you know how to pronounce it correctly.
Jasmin Singer: Dour, uh, thank you Mariann for correcting me. Every time I said dower. And now I go around and correct people and they don't believe me. Any case, um, yeah,
Mariann Sullivan: I have a few things to add.
Jasmin Singer: Please.
Mariann Sullivan: I, I mean, I hear you. Like people will do anything to jump... to, to avoid the conclusion that I should go vegan. I am actually not sure, and I think one of the things they're predicating on is the telling people that they should is not gonna make a difference and it might make things worse.
Uh, and I think that's true 'cause we've been trying that. I also think it's possible, this is a really, this is a really positive framing, particularly in the UK, that, um, you know, people started by exposing what's happening on factory farms. And then to doing the, you know, vegan thing, uh, 'cause exposing what was happening, didn't, didn't do it.
Then they did the vegan thing. Vegan food is great. Like this is fabulous. It's all delicious. And that made a little inroads, particularly in the UK, but not much. And, um, and so we're moving to the next step on the assumption that because we, we've taken those steps already, they kind of do know that the only answer here is to go vegan, but they have to come to it themselves.
So I, I think that's possible that this is just, you know, another step forward in, in what has already been a series of, um, activists' steps forward, so that we're at a point where people do know that the thing to do here is to stop eating them. Um, and, uh. I do think that "don't buy it" does pretty strongly imply that you're not supposed to buy it.
But, but oddly, they do have action items. I don't know. You know, I guess I, I was really surprised by this. Their action items are all political. You know, write to your MP to ban, um, uh, whatever. They have a lot of different, they will be rolling out a lot of different campaigns about a lot of different animals, but I think that's weird.
Like if you're gonna give people what the solution is, I think then you do have to say, We're not gonna end factory farming without huge diet change, so you have to consider diet change. If you're not gonna give any solutions at all, and you're just trying to raise consciousness and have people decide for themselves what to do.
But if, if you're gonna say what you should do about the fact that pigs are suffering in this way is call your MP and support this legislation. You know, they'll say, Oh, that's what I should do. Yeah, I'm gonna do that when I get home. And uh, and then, you know, they don't.
Jasmin Singer: Yeah.
Mariann Sullivan: So that was weird. I mean, I'd be interested to know why they, why they included that.
It did. I mean, I thought it was brilliant anti-factory farming framing, um, which I was really happy to see because that's something I had questions about. And, and I really liked how they defined factory farming. But I, I, you know, like I said, I like to pin things down and to not mention that we can't feed the world unless you go vegan, unless everybody goes vegan or close to it.
You don't have to go vegan. That's the other thing that I really wanna emphasize, that I knew there was something else. There is a, I think there is a big difference between vegan, vegan identity advocacy, go vegan, you should be a vegan, and vegan options advocacy, which is the kind of advocacy I think that most people, most vegans do. Like they, you know, they bring the vegan choice, they, they, uh, they that plant-based default things in cafeterias. Like, like they make the argument.
Like, like they're not telling people you have to go vegan. They're, they're making the options available and encouraging people to try them. So this, I think we really have to separate vegan options, advocacy. I can't imagine they don't think is absolutely crucial, you gotta get the food out there.
And vegan as an identity advocacy, which, you know, go vegan, they're afraid is putting people off or think that it's, it's, it's, it's either harmful or just not really effective because people have to get there on their own. I think that... i'm not sure that anybody's making that distinction and I think it's pretty important.
Vegan options advocacy can is crucial. Absolutely crucial.
Jasmin Singer: That's exactly how I feel. And, and you know, it is funny to me to really think about this conversation and this campaign in light of what I told you about my rehearsal. Because if, if my existence and the little that I said in that room is sort of equivalent to the, the billboard on the tube, then is the next step to just sort of wait for everyone in the room to go vegan on their own accord? Like, do I bring in vegan cake if I bring in vegan cake and share it, then that's where I divert from this campaign 'cause there is not that element.
Mariann Sullivan: They're, they, I mean, this campaign is making very clear that they consider themselves one element of an advocacy, um, ecosystem. And I'm... you know, and they're depending on other groups to do other things, and I'm not sure they would say that that's, that's not something people should be doing, it's just not the piece they're, they're doing.
So I'm not sure that, that they would say that, but I think that they would say probably, I don't, I'm, I'm not, shouldn't put, I think some people would say, I don't know what they would say. I'm putting words in their mouth... that, uh, if you bring, if you bring that option in with the goal of making, getting people to go vegan, you gotta change your head.
Like you just gotta change your head. It's the goal of people recognizing what we're doing to animals on factory farming and doing something to stop that and, and encouraging them to understand that probably eating vegan food is the way to do that, but get rid of this, like, go vegan, go vegan, go vegan 'cause they don't think it's working. I'm not saying that I agree. I'm just trying to sort it out.
Jasmin Singer: Our Hen House was also founded on the principle that we have no idea.
Mariann Sullivan: Many ways forward. None of which work
Jasmin Singer: And none of which we know. I mean, that's why we have such a interesting array of guests. Everyone's doing the something a little bit differently than the next person, so.
Mariann Sullivan: It did allay my fears a lot about a few things. The the main one being, uh, what they mean by factory farming. Um. And, and if we get rid of factory farming, and this is the part that I don't understand how you don't say, but I think they deliberately don't say it because they don't think it's a good idea.
Like if you get rid of factory farming, people have to eat... they can't eat meat. Like we can't do it. It doesn't work.
Jasmin Singer: But people don't go there, in my experience. They, they just think that there are more, quote unquote, responsible ways of doing it. And so I don't think it nips it in the bud.
Mariann Sullivan: But I think that gets in the, in the way of them stopping because then they believe nonsense.
Jasmin Singer: True. Yep. All right, well, interesting chat. We'll keep, I'm sure we'll keep chatting about it.
Mariann Sullivan: We didn't fix it.
Jasmin Singer: We didn't? Well, we'll have to chat harder next time.
Uh, let's go onto some announcements before we end. Applications are now open for Kick-starting for Good 2026, an 18 week incubator for social impact entrepreneurs working to transform the food system toward a more plant-based or plant forward future.
Mariann Sullivan: Plant forward. I'm sure they chose that language carefully.
Jasmin Singer: I know. I'm sorry. I said,
I said the thing.
Didn't mean to.
Mariann Sullivan: Plant-based used to be the good thing to say,
and now we have to say something softer than plant-based. It's gotta be plant forward.
Jasmin Singer: Well, this program, which is truly fantastic, connects participants with over 40 global mentors and offers a share of $350,000 in seed funding. Last year, 18 initiatives graduated and within six months, they had collectively raised $1.5 million to scale their impact.
Applicants from around the world are welcome. You can apply solo or with a team, whether you're launching a new idea or growing an existing project. So if that's you or someone you know, head to kickstarting.org to learn more and apply. And you need to apply by May 31st, which is so much quicker... so much, uh, so much sooner than, than it feels.
I know we started the podcast talking about the weather. Now let's talk about time passing.
Mariann Sullivan: All right. Do you want me to do this one?
Jasmin Singer: Yeah, I do. Go ahead.
Mariann Sullivan: Anima International is opening applications for its 2026 Fellowship, which is a three week intensive program in Warsaw. Um, and the program is in September, the first to the 20th of September, and it combines advocacy training with The Care Conference, and it includes a stipend and you have to apply by May 17th.
So really get on that one.
Jasmin Singer: May 17 is even closer than May 31st.
Mariann Sullivan: All right. We already mentioned this a few weeks ago, um, when, um, Suzie Stork was on the, the podcast, but the Grassroots Animal Rights Summit is gonna be in DC May 15th to 17th. So, uh, yeah, that, that sounds like an exci... they're doing such exciting work.
Jasmin Singer: That's GARsummit.com and we will link to all of this in the show notes, of course.
Rising Anxieties comes out on Tuesdays. I can't wait to see what you've got up your sleeve for next week, Mariann.
Mariann Sullivan: No I'm gonna go back to like finding out what the industry's anxious about. I'm not gonna do a rant every, every week.
Jasmin Singer: We love. We love whatever you do.
The Hen Report comes out on Thursdays, that's this. The long form interview comes out on Fridays, and the bonus content for Flock members comes out on Mondays. We're a podcast. We're on YouTube. Hit subscribe, hit like, comment wherever you listen or watch. And we will talk to you next time.
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