Computers

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We pick up information from all over the place, but these days mainly from the Net. Let’s say you’re worried about there being something missing in the food you’re eating these days. What if you generally felt ill or heavy or queasy all the time? Let’s say you have ‘conventional eating habits’ and then … suddenly you stumble over a web site or some information that suggests a radical change. It occurs to you to try something a bit different.
Let’s say you’re used to those mild but annoying stomach aches and that it might be ‘guilt-gut’, and you know you get it from eating rubbish food and animal-based foods. So, you’re determined to try something different, keeping your meals safely plant-based. Of course, you mightn’t know at the time that a vegan diet will solve this problem for you, but once you try it, once you’re into ‘clean plant food’, you find the ‘machine’ runs smoother. What then? You aren’t stupid, you know the old conventional animal-based foods and fast foods are there waiting in the wings, ready to take over again. Their taste still attracts. You know they could seduce you back. You also know the new regime of foods will lead onto other things. You’re torn between immediate satisfaction and re-educating taste buds for the sake of long term effects.
If you’re moving towards veganism you might have been reading up on it, getting familiar with food ideas, filling your head with positive sounding information ... and yet, still, you’re quaking in your shoes. You take a plunge - eat a whole week of vegan food. You find you’ve got a stomach full of powerful food. “At last!” Now you feel optimistic. You say to yourself “If only I can keep this up”.
Avoiding tempting animal foods, eating only plant-based - the very simplicity of the idea is intriguing. As you move into optimism and veganism you see how pessimistic the old food regime makes you feel, as if you’ve given up, as if the food you’ve been eating not only clogs you up but blocks your escape. The old meat and dairy diet is like a prison, like a great constipator.
You wonder why it has taken so long for the penny to drop. Perhaps you regret all the damage it’s done to you, perhaps how complicit you’ve been in the whole conventional eating habit and animal abuse thing. You see what these weird vegans have been on about, and feel thankful that your ‘information machine’ has introduced you to a whole new world, a whole better way of viewing your life.
Computers, ah yes, they make us feel lucky to be alive today. They provide a conduit between ourselves and what is going on beyond.