fighting

But hey, it’s surely not about our own human sensitivities getting bruised. Is it? Let’s not forget just how important this subject is, not only for me and you but for the countless animals currently living in Auschwitz conditions. Surely our own sensitivities pale to insignificance when compared to the suffering inflicted on animals. If we feel strongly about this, surely passion must outweigh politeness. Isn’t a little bit of violence-in-our-talk excusable? And wouldn’t it only be seen as a show of outrageousness, a bold move away from being Mr Nice Guy? But violence is violence. We are forced to ask if passionate advocacy can coexist with non-violence. If so, can we be sure our non-violent side is stronger than our violent side?
"Dynamic non-violence" is not the same as "not getting involved". It merely avoids our violent side being used for back-up. Take a nothing subject – the weather. We don’t need to get aggressive when discussing this, because the weather is out of our control. Animal treatment is different! We humans do control this, if not directly then indirectly. We do have a say in what happens to them. We help to keep them locked up. We are all involved. So it’s important to get this one right. The question is, how do we serve them in the best possible way? How can we act as their protectors? Humans, past and present, have subjected billions of animals to a barbaric existence. Many of us feel passionately about this, enough to "fight" for their case. But is the standard idea of ‘fighting’ appropriate or effective? Do we need to radically re-define ‘fight’, and therefore can effective advocacy be non-violent? Chinese proverb: When we fight it means we have lost our argument.