"I want to see the end of the commercialisation of animal exploitation," says Chris Delforce, the man behind Dominion, an Australian documentary the protest was promoting. "At the end of the day I can’t stop anyone if they want to kill an animal and hurt that animal. I can’t stop that, I have no power to stop that," Delforce says. Vegans are opposed to the chicken farming. Credit:Jessica Shapiro "But I can empower people with knowledge so that commercially, animals aren’t mistreated and abused." Monday's sit-in at one of the CBD’s busiest intersections delayed peak-hour traffic for several hours, and paralysed parts of the city. The chaos it caused was roundly condemned by police and Prime Minister Scott Morrison, who called the protesters "green-collared criminals".

On the same day, federal Attorney-General Christian Porter told his state counterparts that animal rights protesters who invade farms should face tougher criminal penalties, and asked Australia's Privacy Commissioner to investigate Monday's demonstrations. Dominion appears to have become a clarion call for disparate groups decrying animal cruelty. Loading Replay Replay video Play video Play video Prominent Australian ethicist Peter Singer's 1975 book Animal Liberation introduced that concept to the mainstream. But it remained a fringe issue for many years. Outrage over animal testing of products such as cosmetics over the past decade has prompted many multinational companies to cease doing so. Many people have switched from buying cage eggs to only eating free range.

Loading It’s taken longer for consumers to push back against some of the other practices of the enormous animal husbandry industry but they are taking note. Major supermarket chains have launched advertising campaigns declaring they only sell pork, ham or bacon supplied by farmers who don't use sow stalls. Animal rights groups have gone from being known only for their annual protests against duck shooting to a political movement with members in two state parliaments and an ambition to break into federal politics. Animal Justice Party candidate Mark Pearson, a former executive director of Animal Liberation, became the first Australian member of Parliament to be elected on an animal rights platform when he entered the NSW upper house in 2015. In Victoria, the AJP's Andy Meddick was elected an upper house MP for Western Victoria – prime dairy farming country – in late 2018 with less than 3 per cent of the vote.

Emma Hurst, who stood for election in last month's NSW state poll, is waiting for final preferences to be distributed on Monday but is confident of a win. She says the party will have at least two upper house candidates in each state and territory except the ACT at the federal election. Ms Hurst sees veganism and animal rights as far broader issues than simple identity politics. Animal Justice Party NSW upper house candidate Emma Hurst. "I don’t see ourselves as a single issue party because it's such a big and complex problem that we’re tackling. We’re also developing lots of policies on people as well. We have position papers on domestic violence, gun violence; a lot of these things interact. "I think it’s a movement, I don’t think it’s a fashionable thing. I think it's something that will grow bigger and bigger. It's the social movement of our time."

Internationally, veganism is increasingly being adopted by people concerned not just about animals, but also the environment and their health. Up to 70 per cent of people worldwide have either reduced the amount of meat they eat or eliminated it from their diet, according to recent research by Global Data, which works with thousands of the globe's largest companies. The biggest reason for people's conversions, according to a Vegan Australia survey of 12,000 people, is seeing films that expose animal cruelty. Marieke Hardy has been vegan for a decade. Credit:Daniel Mahon For Marieke Hardy, the Melbourne Writers' Festival artistic director and a long-time panelist on ABC TV's Book Club, becoming vegan a decade ago began as a dare from a co-worker. She loved eating meat, but tried avoiding animal products for a week, and has continued to do so. "I find people’s furious reactions to it pretty amazing," Hardy says. "There does seem to be a simmering vitriol about it. I'm first to make jokes about vegans.

"I respect people's rights to take action. That’s what protest is. We’re very lucky to be able to stand on a street corner and disrupt day-to-day activity... This is no different to protesting the Iraq war, or the women's march. "Someone on Twitter the other day said the reason people are so upset is there's always a low level of guilt and shame attached to how we use animals and we don’t want to look back at that. I loved eating meat, it was delicious... I really didn’t want to watch films of slaughterhouses. But when you do, there’s no going back." Protesters outside the Melbourne Aquarium on Monday. Credit:Zach Hope Exposes of Australia’s live export industry, particularly the distressing footage shown on 60 Minutes of sheep "boiled alive" on overheated ships, or Four Corners' broadcast in 2011 of cruelty to Australian cattle sent to Indonesian abattoirs, caused widespread outrage. But there’s long been a disconnect between what happens at farms and slaughterhouses and what ends up on our dinner plate.

Apart from celebrity endorsements, climate change – not just animal welfare – has been a key driver in people taking up veganism. That message was repeated on Monday, with some protesters yelling about a "climate emergency" in the same breath as protesting animal cruelty. Some have suggested livestock are responsible for up to 50 per cent of global greenhouse gas emissions. But Oxford University's Food Climate Research Network has found that figure is closer to 11 per cent. Animal rights protesters took to the streets of Sydney, carrying placards directing people to watch Dominion. Credit:AAP Dominion, much of it shot with hidden cameras, unsparingly depicts methods of killing livestock that Delforce says are commonly used in Australia, including the gassing of pigs with carbon dioxide and the live maceration of male chicks in industrial blenders. Monday's actions were staged to mark the first anniversary of the release of the movie, which is narrated in part by Hollywood actors Joaquin Phoenix and Rooney Mara, and chart-topping Australian singer Sia.

Delforce has become the face of Australia's animal rights movement following Monday’s protests. The 28-year-old, who grew up in Canberra and now lives in Melbourne, is an intense young man. When I asked to meet him this week, he was reluctant to provide an address, instead suggesting we conduct the interview in a park in an industrial suburb in Melbourne's outer north. Dominion director Chris Delforce, an animal rights activist and vegan. Credit:Joe Armao We sat on a park bench discussing the reaction to Monday's protests. His film, which has been watched more than 500,000 times on its official YouTube link, attracted an extra 60,000 views within 48 hours of the demonstrations, he said. Delforce, who has an IT background, has also developed a map on the website of activist group Aussie Farms displaying the location of thousands of properties where animals are bred and raised (from fish to bees, horses, goats, cattle, greyhounds, egg-laying hens and broilers), or killed and processed (abattoirs and knackeries).

Loading The Aussie Farms website includes a disclaimer, saying it "does not condone or encourage the use of this resource for illegal purposes including trespass". I ask Delforce how he would feel if his home address, and those of his fellow activists, were published online? He counters that he has received many death threats from those opposed to his actions, and states that he and his fellow activists are not violent and have no interest in targeting farmers' homes. Delforce says their intention is to increase transparency surrounding farming practises.

"There have been occasions where people just don’t align with the values we espouse as animal activists," he says. "We’re all about peace, we’re all about non-violence, and anyone who acts aggressively or violently we don’t consider them part of our movement." The protesters, and their tactics including the map, have outraged farmers, especially those who live on properties where they run livestock. Farmers leader Tony Mahar. Credit:Stefan Postles National Farmers' Federation chief executive Tony Mahar has labelled activists as "extremists" whose actions have caused farmers enormous distress and left them feeling unsafe. "[Farmers] feel like the industry’s under siege, from floods and fire and droughts, and now these radical extremists seeking to run agriculture out of town."

"They are radicals," Mahar says, although he shies away from describing them as terrorists, as some farmers have. "Not all vegans are like that," he says. "We’ve been careful. People have felt that they're under attack a little bit. But terrorism is not the right term." John Gommans with one of his 7000 goats. Goat farmer John Gommans is well versed in the tactics of animal rights protesters. Last Sunday he closed his Gippy Goat Cafe at Yarragon in Victoria's south-east after what he describes as a campaign of harassment by animal rights groups. The trouble started in December when about 70 people arrived at his property south-east of Melbourne. They stole several goats, including kids, from a petting enclosure next to the cafe. A milking goat stolen at the time was later returned and then taken in a further theft, he says.

"Our staff and customers have been subjected to nearly four months' of constant harassment, vile statements and threats from the abusive vegan activists," he said in a Facebook post. "We have personally been subjected to an appalling stream of threats of extreme violence against ourselves, our family, our staff and even their families." Security footage of animal activists taking goats from a petting pen at John Gommans' property in December. Credit:Gippy Goats Cafe/Facebook Gommans, who runs about 7000 goats across several properties, mainly for milk, some of which is powdered and exported, posted footage of the livestock theft on Facebook. He reported the theft to police. Six people were later charged with theft over the incident. In March Cara Garrett, 24, was found guilty in Latrobe Valley Magistrates’ Court of removing an ear tag from a stolen goat and housing livestock without a Property Identification Code. She was fined $1 for each offence and ordered to pay Gommans $250 compensation.