Hey there modern vegans and vegan curious, it's Margaret.
And welcome back to ModVegan.
Today I want to talk with you about Nancy Holten.
A woman from Switzerland who was recently denied citizenship, for her vegan activism.
I was able to speak with Nancy,
and today I want to share with you a little bit of her story.
Please join me.
[intro]
When I first read this story I was a little bit surprised.
Because I honestly didn't understand how a small town could deny citizenship to one of
their residents.
And then I found out that because of the form of democracy that Switzerland has,
people in this tiny town can actually vote on whether you receive citizenship or not.
So you can receive permission at the governmental level,
which is what happened with Nancy,
but then at the town level,
they can still vote against your citizenship
based on how they feel about you.
Now this is problematic in any case,
because I think that it opens the door for all sorts of discrimination.
Obviously you can be denied citizenship
(we all know technically you shouldn't be denied citizenship because of any of these
things,
but if your neighbours are voting on you,
then you can be denied citizenship for almost anything.
So you could be denied based on your race,
based on your class, based on your looks, based on anything.
And if your neighbours just don't like you,
they can vote against you.
And that's kind of the principle of this:
people get to decide if someone becomes a citizen or not.
Nancy's is not the only case where rather small things
have caused people to be denied citizenship.
There was a man who was denied Swiss citizenship
because he wore sweatpants,
and the people in his community didn't like his sweatpants.
Some kind of weird stuff that really should not be the reason that you get citizenship
or not.
And it's also caused...this kind of form of direct democracy has been surprisingly conservative
in some of the things it's led to.
There was a case where a lot of women in Switzerland didnt' receive the right to vote until 1971,
and there was even one canton where women couldn't fully vote until 1991!
So we're talking years and years,
just to get women the vote.
And it's because you just have this tiny community
voting on things directly,
and obviously, in that kind of a situation,
peer pressure, all that stuff,
has a much bigger role to play,
and it can be problematic.
When I first heard the story,
I thought, well, maybe Ms. Holten did something really bad.
And we're just not hearing about that in the story.
You know, maybe she held a violent protest, or she did something illegal.
And none of those things are the case.
There was nothing like that going on.
Of course, she would have been denied a passport on other grounds if that were the case.
The local legislative body would have denied her a passport for breaking the law and things
like that.
So she didn't do any of those things.
She's not a particularly outspoken activist or anything.
Nancy had lived in Switzerland for over 30 years when she applied.
She first applied a couple of years ago, and she'd been living in Switzerland for over
30 years,
she's got two daughters, she's a single mom,
and she applied for citizenship and was denied.
So what exactly did Ms. Holten do that prevented her from getting citizenship?
She spoke on a local tv station about cowbells.
Now, one thing I didn't know about cowbells when I started researching this,
was that cowbells in Switzerland actually weigh about 5 kilograms.
And they make as much noise as a pneumatic drill,
or a motorcycle.
So, if you're standing right next to one,
They produce between 100 and 113 decibels.
Which is quite loud.
And it really only becomes tolerable when you're further away.
And so they are quite noisy.
And in Zurich, they were actually banned because of the noise.
So people were being kept up at night because the sound of the cowbells was driving them
crazy.
The judge, who wrote the opinion in Zurich,
was saying that actually the sound of the cowbells was still annoying, even from 87
metres away!
So we're talking quite a distance you can still hear those cowbells.
And they're very romantic and charming,
people love them, people like to bring them home, they'll buy little tourist cowbells
and things like that,
but that's because they're not wearing them around their necks.
And it's also because they're not living next to them.
So it's not just an animal issue,
it's also a people issue.
People are annoyed by the cowbells, not just the cows.
And for the people who've been complaining that this is just a Single Issue Campaign,
and that this woman was being annoying and pushing a single issue too far,
I don't really think that's the case.
This is something that's been an issue all over Switzerland,
not just among vegans, among normal people,
regular, everyday people who just don't like the sound of cowbells.
And I do think that Ms. Holten is correct
when she says that it's extremely painful to the ears of the cow.
Imagine every time when you eat or drink, that sound is being made.
So if you put your head down and then lift it up again,
you have this loud clanging.
And she said that she believes that it's stressful for the cows.
And that it's noisy.
So that's what she said in the television interview, which you can watch hear on YouTube.
I'll put a link below, if you speak German,
you can watch the video and judge for yourself if she sounds like a "wacky activist."
If there's anything that this case showed me,
it's that people can become upset for the smallest of reasons.
It really demonstrated to me how much of a challenge we still face as vegans.
Particularly if you live in a place that is an agricultural community.
Now, Gipf Obenfrick, which is the city that she lives in,
is a very agricultural community, I've heard from some other people that it's really kind
of the heart of agriculture in that part of Switzerland.
So it is a very traditional agricultural community.
And this probably did offend some members of the community,
who felt like they were being threatened.
I believe she mentioned in that video as well that there are people that construct these
cowbells, and they were concerned about their jobs and things like that.
So obviously, that would be an issue.
But, as far as I can tell, certainly from speaking with her, from listening to her speak
-
when you watch her speaking, even if you don't speak German, you're going to notice immediately
she is an extremely soft-spoken, quiet person, who is just trying to do something nice for
the animals, and for other people.
She's not a radical by any means.
And that becomes very clear, right away.
So even if you don't like radical veganism, once you see this woman talking, I think you
will be satisfied that's not what this is about.
In my interview with Nancy, I asked her how she felt, if there was one thing that she
could tell other activists.
And she responded that, even if a situation moves you to tears, and it really upsets you,
you still need to give people the time and space that they need to develop and welcome
empathy back into their lives.
And I thought that was very sweet.
It's very true.
People need to be told about these cases in the kindest way that we possibly can.
If you're going to be spreading the vegan message, you need to do so in a kind and friendly
manner.
I can't really imagine this woman doing anything but that.
Especially after you see her, get to know her - you're going to realize that she's just
not the kind of activist that usually ends up in the news.
That's what's kind of surprising about this.
She's not that kind of person.
So before you start judging her for being "that vegan", really do watch something with
an interview with her,
read the interview that I have with her which is going to be on my blog, ModVegan.com, I'll
put a link to it in the description box below.
But she's not "that vegan."
And I think that's important.
When we start to say that people deserve what they get because of the way that they behave,
I think that it's important to realize that sometimes,
even being very polite and kind - you're still going to get in trouble.
And you can get in trouble for the smallest thing.
And it's funny, this was a very interesting exchange for me.
It was interesting to learn about this woman, to read more about the case.
Because I think many people will have that initial reaction.
I was surprised to read in Ecorazzi, which is ostensibly a vegan publication, but they're
very connected with Gary Francione,
Ecorazzi wrote an article saying that this woman had been "difficult."
And so these are vegans telling her that she'd probably been annoying,
that she shouldn't have gone after a single issue campaign,
she should have just told people to go vegan, and it would have been easier for her.
And I have to say that is kind of an ignorance of tradition, to take that kind of position.
To believe that no-one is going to be upset by something just because you - that if you
ask someone to go vegan, that you're going to get a positive reaction,
and that if you ask someone to get rid of cowbells you're going to get a negative reaction.
And this is what other vegans were saying about this.
And I'm sorry, but they're wrong.
I made a video recently about tradition in veganism, why going against tradition upsets
people so much.
And I think that's really relevant in this case.
You have people who want cowbells.
Why do they want cowbells?
Well, traditionally cowbells are designed for tracking cows.
But of course, as Ms. Holten says in her interview, there are a lot better ways of doing that
nowadays.
We can use GPS chips, and honestly if you're going to do something with the cows, that
makes a lot more sense.
It's easier for the farmers to know where they are.
Honestly, a farmer could be at dinner, and look at his phone and know where his cows
are.
Whereas, with the bells, you have to be out there, you have to be looking for them,
it's far more difficult, makes no sense.
Besides, most of these pastures are enclosed anyway, so your cows are not going to be wandering
off that far anyway.
So it's simply a matter of tradition.
We're talking about tradition, just in the way something looks, this has nothing to do
with being anti-dairy or anything like that.
That's another interesting thing about this.
She wasn't pushing veganism.
But imagine if she had.
If she'd been saying that we needed to ban dairy or something like that.
Or that we needed to all go vegan.
I can't really imagine what the consequence of that would have been, given the kind of
town that she lives in.
So the idea that she could have just put up a vegan hot dog stand and that wouldn't have
upset people in her town...is a bit naive, in my opinion.
Another thing that this interaction, that this story really opened my mind too - and
I wrote to Nancy and I asked her: did she think that there was some justification for
protecting veganism as a creed.
Certainly because she lives in Europe, that maybe the European Union could protect her
right to be vegan and allow her to get this passport in the face of discrimination, basically.
And I think that's fair, that they would want to do that.
And I didn't before - I wasn't so sure that we needed special protection for veganism,
but I think that this case has really changed my mind.
I think that it's very important.
That at least when it comes to things like being able to get a passport and stuff.
I didn't think that vegans would need protection under the law in order to be able to get those
things, but this has changed my mind.
There is serious, serious persecution of vegans going on in some parts of the world that we
don't really understand.
Because, like, I'm lucky enough to live in a place - I just became a citizen of a country
where no-one could make me not become a Canadian because I'm vegan.
And so this story had much more of an impact on me,
because I just became a citizen.
I just became a Canadian citizen a year ago, about the same time that I became vegan.
And it was a wonderful experience for me, and I can't tell you what it looked like to
be reading this article and be thinking, this woman, this is the second time that she's
been turned down for citizenship by her town, by just a few people that didn't like her.
I can't imagine if an angry neighbour was the person in charge of whether I became a
citizen or not!
We all try to please people, I think, most of our lives.
I spent my whole life being nice and trying not to rock the boat.
And you see, with a story like this, that even if you do that, you can still end up
being in trouble.
And that was a big message for me out of this story, too.
That we can spend our whole lives trying to be the person that doesn't upset anyone,
and still manage to do something that manages to upset everyone.
And it really shows that oftentimes, society is not very friendly to people who speak up,
who speak out.
And that it can actually even sometimes put you at risk of things like not getting a passport.
And to me that says that we need to take advantage of our free speech.
If I'm lucky enough to live in a country where the fact that my angry neighbour doesn't like
the fact that I'm vegan - that that's not going to lead to me being denied a passport?
I think that I need to make it more easy for other people to use their freedom of speech.
And I think we all do.
I think that we need to respect the freedom of speech of other people.
It was very interesting to me to read - I remembered when I was reading this story,
I was thinking, Switzerland, they're not that respectful of other traditions, but they want
their traditions respected.
And there was a member of the local - I guess the leader of the local Swiss People's Party,
which is kind of a right-wing conservative party in Switzerland that was saying that
Ms. Holten "didn't respect our traditions".
"And that's why, this woman came in here and she doesn't respect our traditions."
Never mind that she's lived there 30 years,
And I thought that was so interesting, because recently, in Switzerland, they actually banned
the construction of Minarets.
And Minarets are kind of like church steeples, but for Muslims.
And the country actually banned the construction of these religious buildings because they
didn't like them.
So it's not that they respect other people's cultures, they just respect their own culture
and traditions.
And it seems extremely hypocritical to me, and a very good reason that we should all
protect our freedoms.
And the freedoms of others.
Whether we like them our not.
Maybe you don't like the issue of a cowbell campaign, Ecorazzi.
And you think that this is speciesist that she wanted cowbells to be changed for something
else.
Even if you disagree with that, she has the right to say that, and you should be defending
her right to say that.
We should all be defending her right to say that.
It is, I think, a very regressive and dangerous position to take, to argue that someone should
just be silent because then they'll never have problems.
Because, for one thing, that's not true.
There's always going to be a time when you're going to offend someone just for existing.
And that is just the reality of living in this world.
You cannot always avoid upsetting everyone just by being polite.
And we also need to defend the right of other people to express themselves.
That's why we live in a democracy, and we need to defend other people's rights to express
their opinions in that democracy.
And I was very pleased to talk with her.
I really - I would encourage you all to go ahead and read the little interview that I
did with her on my blog, on ModVegan.com, I'm going to have a link to that in the description
box below.
But you can see from the little interview that I did with her, from the interview that
she had on television, that this is just a kind woman who didn't like the sound of cowbells,
and also thought that famers could do better than cowbells, and thought that it was uncomfortable
for the cows.
I mean, she had three very good reasons for wanting to get rid of these cow bells.
And if the people in Gipf Oberfrick disagreed with her, they could have just said "we disagree."
But do deny her citizenship?
To create a facebook page expressly for the purpose of denying her citizenship?
That's kind of low, and they should be ashamed of themselves in my opinion.
You just don't do that.
You don't decide that because you disagree with someone's opinion, you're going to deny
them basic rights, like citizenship.
It's just - I think that it's extremely low.
I think that it's low of Ecorzzi to use this as an opportunity to say that Single Issue
Campaigns are terrible.
Because I'm sorry, whether or not this is a single issue campaign, nobody deserves to
have their citizenship taken away from them, or not given to them, simply because they
express their opinion.
It's wrong, and it's not democracy, and it's just kind of disgusting to me.
So, I'm curious what you guys think about this issue.
I would love to hear your comments, and I want to thank Nancy Holten again for doing
the interview with me.
If you'd like to read it, again, just check the description box below.
Thank you so much for listening, and I hope that all of you have a great weekend.
Please take care, like this video, subscribe, share it, and I will see you next time.
Take care,
bye!
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