696:
My first instinct is to leap to the defence
of animals, because they so badly need defending. Then I realize it involves a
long ‘to-do’ list on my part. There’s the rub. I realize I’m setting myself up
for a fall. Giving up items of food and clothing because of the animals. And if
I can do without, how long for?
By being perpetually
overwhelmed with such a long list I can’t decide what needs most attention,
what to give up and what to retain. Or rather, I ask myself the question, what
is achievable? How can I ration-out my reserves of ‘care’ without completely
depleting myself and then giving up the whole project?
The Animal Rights Movement is
all about maintaining high ideals. Many of us become drained by trying to
achieve them because just by facing the issues it takes a lot of energy. So,
which issues do I take up? For animal activists there’s always a danger of
spreading ourselves too thinly and pleasing nobody, least of all ourselves. But
in prioritizing there’s a danger of putting too much onto the ‘back burner’,
and then letting some issues become permanently forgotten about. So while I
want to be consistent, knowing that no animal is more important than any other,
it grieved me to think how inconsistent I could be. Most of the animal welfare
and animal rights groups specialise on one or two main issues and ignore
‘lesser’ issues.
It isn’t only a matter of
taking up animal issues, there are people involved here, at the production end
and at the customer end. To deal with animal issues we have to deal with people
issues at the same time. Perhaps it’s most important to understand other
people’s difficulties, concerning their own use of animals. For us, we need to see
how the whole ethical confusion is a worry to many people, about the use of
animals in our society.
For me, understanding others
lack of empathy starts with looking at what empathy involves. If I wonder why
others are inconsistent I have to look at my own inconsistency. For example,
when I see the homeless man on the streets at night, I tell myself that I’ve already
got plenty to care about, so I don’t want to take on more. I pretend not to
notice him; I pretend NOT to notice what I know I HAVE noticed. It’s the same
with the way most people choose NOT to see the animals behind the food they’re
eating. They know that chickens and pigs suffer badly, but they also know they
are just like their dogs and cats at home, that they have the same sorts of
feelings and suffer the same pain when it’s inflicted, yet they treat one as
unlovable and the other as loveable. The homeless man is just as deserving of
love as my closest friend and yet I’m able to ignore him completely. Is that
just one of the absurdities I’ve got to learn to live with? Charity starts at
home, but it often stays there! The fact is that our fellow humans don’t yet
regard all sensitive and sentient creatures as of equal importance to each
other or, of course, to humans. They favour some with an abundance of kindness and
care, and totally ignore others and support their exploitation.
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