NARD (National Animal Rights Day) is an event held in several countries to, according to its organizers, end animal suffering (which is not veganism) and have certain legal rights recognized for animals, based on a declaration that they read at their events and claim to have had over 20,000 people sign. Nowhere in this declaration is veganism mentioned. The event is sponsored by an organization called "Our Planet, Theirs Too", founded by actor Aylam Orian, who wanted to join forces with environmentalists (veganism has nothing to do with ecology, and in fact, they often conflict, with many mass killings of animals being carried out in the name of ecology). The name of the organization is telling, as they mix animals, environment, and human health at their events. This has nothing to do with veganism.
The organization was guided by the welfarist (non-vegan) org, Igualdad Animal, which focuses on regulating animal exploitation conditions, not abolishing it. The declaration of rights they claim to want to grant animals is inconsistent with veganism and its purpose, as they speak of suffering, ecology, and utilitarian concepts of pain and pleasure, as well as rights that would be impossible to grant to all animals as they propose. They confuse virtues with moral obligations, etc. From its foundation, this is not a vegan organization; it's centered on suffering, and its postulates are an unrealistic absurdity.
Vegans should not support non-vegan organizations that only confuse people into thinking those supposed animal rights are veganism. But veganism is a very simple principle: Humans MUST live without exploiting animals. That's what we need to make clear and spread if we want the vegan cause to advance, public perception to change, and animals to be emancipated from human domination, as this principle can indeed be applied to ALL animals.
