When I first heard about “ag-gag” laws a few years ago, I could scarcely believe they were real. These laws are so obviously an infringement on First Amendment rights in support of a politically powerful industry that it was hard to believe anyone could support them as being in the public interest.

But of course money talks and it was only last week that Kansas’s thirty-one year old law, the oldest such law in the US, was struck down by a Federal appeals court. Kudos to the Animal Legal Defense Fund and its collaborators for fighting this very good fight.

Incidentally, learning about ag-gag only strengthened my decision in 2014 to radically curtail my consumption of meat in support of animal welfare and the environment. To me, it was clear that if the animal agriculture industry was willing to circumvent the First Amendment to silence whistleblowers, then you know what they are doing must be horrific. And it is.

Want to make a difference? Just eat fewer animal products. You don’t have to go full vegan right away (I certainly didn’t) to reduce your contribution to this wretched system that harms animals, the environment, and not least the humans who have earn a living perpetrating cruelty on an unfathomable scale in these facilities.