3 Ways Speaking Out About Toxic Workplaces Strengthens the Cause

In response to the article I wrote last week about the Good Food Institute (GFI), several people commented on my LinkedIn post, including another former employee who noted in the context of others speaking out: “In a retaliatory culture people will not raise issues, no matter how many hotlines you set up.”

Most people tend to give two reasons for not speaking out. One if self-preservation. If you are still inside the organization, you may fear for your own job. While understandable, being afraid to speak out about wrongdoing is not sustainable over time. Eventually, you will have to leave to save your own health or risk becoming one of the oppressors. The latter is sadly all too common. More on this (as well as the subset concern of being blacklisted in the movement more broadly) another time.

I want to focus on the second reason people give: they are afraid it will hurt the mission. Again, this is understandable. You gave your heart and soul over to an organization whose mission you care deeply about. We heard this during the Me Too era in 2018 as well, even from some women: don’t speak ill of the men even if they are engaging in sexual harassment because it will only “harm the animals”. More specifically, these men were defended because they were (allegedly) so talented in their work to help animals and that was deemed more important the harm they were causing to women in the field.

Bullshit.

This is time-honored excuse that has allowed all forms of oppression to continue unabated. If simply caring about how humans are treated is not enough to persuade you to speak up, here are three reasons why the substance of the argument is also wrong.

1. Driving workers to exhaustion does not help the cause.

If you are being ground down by demanding hours, not allowed to take time off when you need it, and otherwise being treated like a machine, can you honestly say you are at your best? If you think you can “handle it” you are fooling yourself. The body is being overtaxed even if your mind is attempting to ignore (or rationalize) the stress. When an entire team is being treated this way, the mission suffers. Bringing it to light is the best way to support the cause you care about because positive changes can lead to a healthier organization able to do the work.

2. Funding will find another, healthier home.

I know many people worry about drops in funding for the organization they care about. Here’s the thing: funders make tough decisions all the time about where to put their donations. You may think your organization is “the best” but there are many others out there also doing good work that may be more deserving, need the money more, or both. Looking at GFI funding specifically, according to the most recently available information, in 2019, GFI reported over $21 million in revenue. (Up from $8 million in 2018, a massive jump that is pretty unheard of in the animal welfare arena.) So, they are going to be just fine financially.

Plus, GFI is not the only organization of its kind, nor the first.

For example, New Harvest (founded in 2004) is doing important work supporting the science behind biotech foods and is run by a wonderful leader named Isha Datar. While I cannot vouch for what goes on internally at New Harvest, I like Isha because she has a lot of integrity, and I respect the values her organization espouses. In addition, we need more organizations led by women of color, which leads me to reason number three.

3. The need to diversify funding is critical to effective activism.

For too long, a few organizations in the farmed animal arena (and the vegan movement more broadly) have enjoyed concentrated power and funding. This is due to a well-known boys’ club, perpetuated by certain funders, that has collectively shut out most women and people of color. This is the most significant factor that is hurting the movement: over-concentration of power and resources, as well as strategic thinking.

As a result, our movement is being weakened by exalting and revering a few white men, all with the same way of thinking. We are fast becoming mono-chromed, stagnant, and irrelevant to the rest of humanity, driving away the best and brightest talent. I know several highly accomplished women who are so turned off they have left the movement all together. Others don’t even bother to try to enter.

The concerns being raised now about GFI’s leadership should cause this movement to look inward and examine how resources are being distributed. That employees past and present are so afraid to speak out for fear of retaliation is a sure sign that things have gotten out of control. If GFI and its funders did not have so much power, people would not be so afraid to speak out because they would have somewhere else to go.

This conversation is long overdue, and it’s the only way to make positive change happen. Our cause is too important to just keep our heads down and hope someone else will speak up. This quote from Desmond Tutu seems appropriate:

If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor. If an elephant has its foot on the tail of a mouse and you say that you are neutral, the mouse will not appreciate your neutrality.