Jabari Brisport, a Brooklyn native, Democratic Socialist, and vegan, is running for New York State (NYS) Senate. The 32-year-old aims to make New York City a better place for both humans and animals.

Brisports progressive platform champions animal rights. It includes a ban on the sale of new fur apparel, an end to dairy subsidies, restricting the sale of cats, dogs, and rabbits in pet stores, and a ban on wildlife killing contests and traveling rodeos.

Schools would be required to teach humane education and end egg-hatching projects. Restaurants would have to disclose the source and treatment of animals served as food.

The vegan politician also aims to ban cruel farming practices, such as the castration of pigs without anesthesia, debeaking poultry without painkillers, battery cages for hens, veal crates for calves, and gestation crates for pigs.

In an interview with Their Turn, Brisport explained that he went vegan while he was in college: I did this on animals in performance and there was one day where they just showed us slaughterhouse videos.

At first, he cut out meat and fish. He went vegan five years later. I realized that the dairy industry is just the beef industry and the egg industry is just the chicken industry. Its so intertwined, he said.

In 2016 Brisport began attending animal rights protests. He started with Canada Gooses newly-opened flagship store in Soho. It was so invigorating fighting against a store that was participating in so much cruelty. It really awoke me to the further steps I could take to protect animals, he said.

Brisport, a third-generation Caribbean American drew comparisons to an experience he had as a freshman at New York University. I was walking arm-in-arm with my Black boyfriend in the West Village and these frat bros were following us just shouting the f-bombf-ggot, f-ggot, f-ggot. We werent letting them get a rise out of us, so we heard a pause. And then they just started going n-gger,' he said.

He continued, I think anyone who has felt some sort of victimization or felt like they have been othered or they had been made to feel less than can then empathize when someone else is being victimized, whether that someone is a human-animal or a non-human animal.

As well as standing up for animals, Brisport is an advocate for human rights. The middle school math teacher promises to fight for the New York City Housing Authority (NYCHA) to redirect public subsidies from for-profit to non-profit housing authorities.

He has spent years fighting for tenants rights. In October 2017, while running for NYC Council for District 35, Brisport and others were arrested for protesting a public meeting for luxury condominiums in Crown Heights, Brooklyn.

I want to be able to make some change, especially protecting people on housing, and education and transportation. We desperately need a government that works for all the people, Brisport told The New York Post last October.

The vegan politicians platform calls for an end to solitary confinement in prison. It also includes the legalization of recreational marijuana, the decriminalization of sex work, and restrictions on facial recognition software. He aims to pass the New York Health Act to abolish private health insurance. It would ensure that all New Yorkers have quality care.

The Democratic Socialists platform has been compared to New York Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Democratic presidential hopeful Bernie Sanders. He spent much of 2016 canvassing for Sanders.

I was thinking about the Bernie Sanders campaign and Democratic Socialism and it dawned on me that slavery was an example of capitalism, Brisport said. Youre putting a price tag on things which shouldnt have a price and thats people in the case of slavery or health care which people need to live. Its monetizing things which should not be monetized.

Democrat Velmanette Montgomery has held the State Senate for the 25th district seat since 1984. It includes the Brooklyn neighborhoods of Prospect Heights, Clinton Hill, Fort Greene, Bedford-Stuyvesant as well as bits of Red Hook, Gowanus, and Sunset Park.

The NYC primary elections take place on June 23, 2020.

Summary

Article Name

This Gay Black Vegan Hopes to Be New York State's Next Senator

Description

Brooklyn native, Democratic Socialist, and vegan Jabari Brisport is running for New York State Senate. He intends to improve the lives of animals and humans.

Author

Kat Smith

Publisher Name

LIVEKINDLY

Publisher Logo

See the rest here:

This Gay Black Vegan Hopes to Be New York States Next Senator - LIVEKINDLY