Thanks, M.
Thanks, M.
"The trouble with quotes on the internet is that you can never tell if they're genuine" - Abraham Lincoln
To a certain extent, veganism is like a religion. We can produce all kinds of facts and figures demonstrating why veganism is good for a person's health and wellbeing, good for the planet etc, but veganism is more than that.
Supposing that there is a lake teeming with fish near where I live. My neighbour, who is otherwise a kindly man, goes fishing there every day;after catching the fish, he gently releases it, allowing it to swim away. I question him on this and he says he releases the fish because he doesn't want to kill it/eat it because he is a vegetarian (!). He knows that the fish survives because if it didn't, he'd soon see it's dead body. I ask him why he fishes and he says he enjoys it and has been doing it since he was a boy. I ask him about the pain the fish experiences and he looks puzzled and says 'So what? It's only a fish.' I say to him 'How would you feel if you were that fish?' to which he replies 'But the point is I'm not, and never will be that fish, so what's the problem?'
How do I answer him? (I should mention that he is an atheist and has no belief in an afterlife.)
leedsveg
answer him that the holocaust happened because the people that carried out the mass murders were not jews and were never going to be jews so they did not care that the jews died or suffered pain...
but we can all see it is wrong...
it does not actually matter... he'll probably tell you "but this is different... they are only animals" (Sigh...)
I would tell him, the fact that he cannot empathize with another living being's pain says quite a lot about him as a person..............and it's not all good!
I like Sandra, she keeps making me giggle. Daft little lady - Frosty
(He won't kill it, but he doesn't care if he hurts it )
Ask him why he's a veggie. Ask him why he's opposed to killing the fish, but not hurting it. It's "just a fish" after all.
^ what she said ^
that's awful. the fish will probably die soon. when a fishing hook goes into their mouths it doesn't just come back out like inserting a earring in our ear lobes....there's a thing on the end of the hook to stop it coming back out so the only way the hook comes out is by ripping it out and therefore ripping out the fish's cheek, or throat or tongue or whichever other part of the fish the hook got caught in! if it doesn't acutally die it will be in excruciating agony and will find difficulty eating! maybe someone should do this to him!!
I have friends who have been veggie for over 30 years and I can talk until I'm blue in the face but they'll go no further, even though their ideas seem morally inconsistent to me. But the point I was trying (not very successfully) to make was, what do you say to a person who says 'I can see the health benefit, the environmental benefit of going vegan but in instances where there are no benefits to people, does it really matter how we treat animals? I don't like to think of extreme cruelty to animals but at the end of the day, an animal is only an animal and their suffering doesn't count the same as a person's suffering. Maybe you're going to tell me that I should have empathy and compassion for an animal, as I would for a person, but because we're talking about an animal, I just don't. Call it speciesism but it's the way things always have been and always will be and I'm not bothered.'
To me, you can only go so far with 'arguing' (it's probably the same as trying to persuade someone to 'adopt' a religion). Sooner or later, you run out of arguments and it's up to the person to feel it in their heart the fundamental change in how they view animals.
leedsveg
Agreed. Some people (most people?) can't/won't see past the dividing barrier between animals and humans. Them and us. Animals are "other" and therefore the usual logic, care and compassion that one would give to people is either absent or diluted in their dealings with them. The more "alien" the animal, the less care given, eg it is easier to empathise with cute fluffy things than with fish and insects for example.
My viewpoint (feel free to disagree) is that there is no divide. We are all animals. We all have an interest in living and not being subjected to pain, whether we are human or not.
~ Don't think twice, it's all right ~
Why do people think like this? Is it simply social and cultural? I wonder if there is a relationship between specieism and other forms of othering e.g. racism, sexism, transphobia etc. Well I do think there is a link but I wonder how it operates.
I'm talking people who would not see themselves as prejudiced but do divide people into categories based on 'us' and 'them'. So arguing we are all animals, just as us humans are all people first regardless of race etc., would not really persuade them. And if this is true, how do we make the case. If we should.
Personally, I think the divide that people create between humans and non humans has a lot of RELIGIOUS influence...
Many Christians believe that humans have souls but animals don't... and they would also argue that God created us to HIS (why not her!?) image...
I hope this view doesn't offend any christians out there. I was born into a catholic family and this is the conclusion I have reached. I am sure muslims and jews probably have similar ideas in their religions... Budhist and Hindus probably don't which is why vegetarianism is more widely spread in those countries with those religions?
Yes, but that IS the point, you 'just don't have empathy and compassion' for another living being. Why? Because they aren't as 'intelligent' as us..........well there are lots of human beings who aren't very intelligent so do you have no empathy/compassion for them?
It is very dangerous to have the view that because a living being isn't 'the same as me' it is somehow inferior. Human history is riddled with the horrors associated with this kind of thinking.
It is only when humans start respecting ALL life forms on this earth that they will truly respect human life.
I like Sandra, she keeps making me giggle. Daft little lady - Frosty
If humankind is still around in 100 years time, I would be truly amazed, I'll be long dead by then anyway. My guess is that a horrible man-made (person-made?) virus will set the extinction ball rolling in the next 5 to 15 years. My second guess would be terrorists exploding nuclear bombs, so that 'civilization' falls apart.
Never mind. As long as I can cheer myself up until then, listening to Leonard Cohen!
leedsveg
Never mind. As long as I can cheer myself up until then, listening to Leonard Cohen!
leedsveg [/QUOTE]
Mmmmhhhh yeah, Len and cheery not two words I would put in the same sentence either Still great tho'!
"The trouble with quotes on the internet is that you can never tell if they're genuine" - Abraham Lincoln
LOL - no, probably not. But I understand the feeling. To me, it is logical that to piece an animal's mouth with a hook and yank it up in the air with an impressive G force seems to fly (no pun intended) in the face of "loving animals." Like on Halloween, where some idiot was putting razor blades in apples. Sort of "Yeah, I tortured the fish, but I didn't kill it."
I wonder if humans would be as keen to hunt if the tables were turned? That is, if you have an animal stalking you or your children with a gun. I wish that more humans would actually put into practice the philosophy "do under others..."
(sorry didn't mean to go all serious on ya!)
I like Sandra, she keeps making me giggle. Daft little lady - Frosty
Life is short or long or just right or it just is, depending on how you look at it. To me, it's about perspective.
Disobedience is the true foundation of liberty!
Hi gogs
The founder of veganism knew that what he was advocating was more than a diet with twiddly bits added on, because the underlying basis of his beliefs was compassion. If you had talked to him about 'militant or violent, vegan actions', I think he would have said that this was a contradiction in terms and that you were confused about what 'veganism' was actually about. And yes he was a pacifist at a time when such a belief would have met with great hostility. Did he write down a set of vegan rules or commandments? I don't think so, but then again how could he possibly have written down rules to cover every eventuallity that followed on from the premis of 'have compassion for animals and human animals'. I suppose that the way he lived his life is the guidebook on what he meant by 'veganism'. I'm not saying that we have to live our lives exactly as he did but if we stray far enough away from his ideals, then we should no longer call ourselves vegans, in the same way that fish eating 'vegetarians' shouldn't be calling themselves vegetarians.
leedsveg
I wasn't talking about 'militant or violent, vegan actions' though, whatever they may be.
I go out of my way, as do we all i'm sure, to help other people every day and make sure animals are not harmed due to my lifestyle, but i'd be an absolute hypocrit if i said i wasn't prepared to use violence in certain situations, say if my loved ones were threatened or my life was at stake. Now that may contradict your view of veganism but it doesn't mine, that's all i was trying to say earlier!
Disobedience is the true foundation of liberty!
If you can do that, fair play to you; most of the time, veganism and all it entails can be a solo journey.
I do like to think, though, that myself and my OH set the right example for her sister and brother-in-law to go vegan, when her sister discovered she'd got MS. Certainly we didn't suggest it as part of any 'treatment'.
I wonder, what do other posters know about veganism and MS? I'll search to see if it's been discussed before.
"The trouble with quotes on the internet is that you can never tell if they're genuine" - Abraham Lincoln
Hi gogs
If I'm confused, it's only after reading your postings!:smile:
Whether Daffodil was being 'tongue in cheek' or not (and only she knows) is a bit immaterial. I chose to answer her seriously along the lines that the retaliatory action she was describing, in this instance deliberately putting a fish hook in a human mouth, would be a barbaric act for a vegan to take. I don't know why my view in this scenario, makes you assume that I must be a 'pacifist' in all situations. You seem to be understanding, or should I say, misunderstanding my views on the complex subject of 'veganism and violence', based on a minimal amount of information ie one sentence.
If my loved ones were threatened or my life was at stake, I too would probably resort to violence. But the answers to life's problems, even for vegans, or should that be especially for vegans, are not always black and white.
Anyway, why should I argue further since we seem to have similar, perhaps the same views!!
leedsveg
Interesting but academic. People are selfish and cruel because their parents and school made them that way.Therefore until both are removed, the ignorance and cruelty will continue. I know children bullied at school who in turn send their children to school to be bullied, hence cruel. Animals share the same fate. If i had my way there would be hardly anybody left.
Hi Daffodil
Glad that's sorted. I can now tell the local constabulary that the 'red alert situation' is over.
I live by the Leeds to Liverpool canal and many a time when I'm jogging along the tow path, there are people fishing. As I'm passing them, it's not unknown for me to think 'Just one little (accidental) push........."Sorreeee!!" '
But I never do it.
leedsveg
Crap quality as it seems to just be filmed from the telly but.............
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n333YESORsw
Disobedience is the true foundation of liberty!
I had a friend who once suggested to me that all of a certain condition of mentally retarded people are happy all the time (and no, not the even the ones with that gregarious deficit in social barriers, who also experience their fair share of frustrations)........ because she saw some of them always smiling. When I told her this was not the case, she accepted it, but there it is... assumptions about what we don't understand.
In fact, I'm trying to be a more humble vegan because I do realize that I can't just anthropomorphize all species and think that they need the kind of things humans do. For example, there are some fish who naturally live in very cramped spaces on the sea floor. One might think, "Hey, why are we forcing them to live in cramped quarters???" when that's not really the issue. However, I also want to avoid carrying the kind of message my "vegan" friend has in saying that cows have been bred for slaughter for so long that they "just know" it's right.
"To become vegetarian is to step into the stream which leads to nirvana." - Buddha
I have no doubt that my dog and I can experience the same level of pain - if I believed anything else, you can call me insane. We all know that babies have emotion and feel pain, even though they're unable to speak and think the way an older individual do... why can't we all have the same understanding when it comes to animals?
Sarabi, I have also heard the same about mentally challenged people, that they're happy all the time, smiling not knowing about the world around them. Not a very intelligent analysis if you ask me. Of course they feel pain and emotions just like anyone else.
"Animals are my friends... and I don't eat my friends". ~ George Bernhard Shaw.
^ Oh what a terrible shame
~ Don't think twice, it's all right ~
^ditto^ !
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