Hey friends! I'm going to the White House for a reception tomorrow, and I'd like to take this opportunity to maybe spread some utilitarian ideas.

In your opinion, what's the most utilitarian 30-minute speech to give to a powerful individual?

If I had a 30 minute audience at the Whitehouse, I'd talk about poverty.
Here's the Felicifia Wiki outline on the topic
Here's Peter Singer on the topic

1. My talk would begin with the shallow pond analogy.
2. Then I'd talk about the psychological obstacles to giving: we can't always put an exact face to the child we're helping. Sometimes the problem seems too big to manage. But the response to that is to focus on the small change that we are making. It may seem like a drop in the ocean, but if it was your mother or father, it would no longer seem that way to you!
3. Then, I'd talk about cost-effectiveness of charity interventions. That is, the story of donating does not end when the money escapes from our sight. The most important part of the story is where the money goes and how much help it does. This aspect of the story varies by a factor of 10,000 times among interventions.
4. I'd talk about how rich we are and how little we are giving (<0.7% of GDP in the US and Aus).
5. I'd talk about all the things that are being done by individuals who are rallying together into giving organisations in order to establish a culture of giving that can overcome the previously mentioned psychological obstacles. Giving What We Can. Giving Gladly. Bill Gates' Giving Pledge.
6. I'd say that the government needs to keep pace with the great work of its citizens and start giving more and more effectively.

Two surprisingly relevant past threads.

• elevator pitch about speciesism
• two-minute speech on a utilitarian topic.

For a general audience that's not ready to hear about wild animals or trying to kill more insects more humanely, I think the best topic is why animal suffering matters at all, in addition to human suffering. You could cite the usual anti-speciesism arguments, or even more general arguments against causing needless suffering.) To attach this to concrete actions, you could bring up things like the importance of CAK for poultry and humane slaughter for fish.

Any ideas whom you'll be speaking to? Let us know how it goes!

in general i talk to people about why nature is not intrinsically good (at all) and about anti-speciesism