CAA welcomes Mitch Thompson to our Board of Directors. Mitch joined the CAA board in December 2018 after working intensively on the Twin Cities Veg Fest 2018 planning committee earlier last year. When he’s not working with CAA, Mitch works in the Twin Cities video production industry managing equipment rentals and is the drummer/manager for internationally known local ska-band Umbrella Bed.
A lifelong Minnesotan and longtime Minneapolis resident, Mitch went veg for a combination of health and ethical reasons. “I surprised myself and everyone else when I became a vegetarian in my mid-twenties. What was even more surprising to everyone was that I never wavered from it,” Mitch said. “I grew up in a meatpacking town and it was almost like I turned away from a religion.”
Stories about family and friends parents being “rotated off the kill-line” because they became desensitized to killing resonated with Mitch as a teenager as a horrifying situation––and that was only addressing the human part of the equation.
“It always felt wrong to me,” Mitch continued, “I would see those big semi-trucks loaded with livestock. I could see their eyes, hear them, and it broke my heart. Looking back, I knew it was something I didn’t want to support. I was lucky to end up in environments later on that allowed me to take the first steps on a personal level to stand for a different way to view the world.”
He maintains the core values of an organization like CAA will be critical positions for humanity to adopt more broadly to continue on.
“We really don’t have an excuse anymore for how we treat the so-called ‘beasts,’” he said. “So much about what is wrong in the world can be either directly link to the overeating and production of animal products or indirectly in the mindset that needs to exist to let it happen. We will never evolve into a better species if we don’t move away from this and we really do need to evolve a bit more if we are going to make this whole thing work out.”
We’re excited to welcome Mitch onto the board and are grateful for the time and passion he’s put into our events so far. If you see him at an upcoming outreach or community event, be sure to say hello!