923:
What happens to billions of animals each day is enough to
give the average sensitive person night mares. Vegans can at least tell
themselves that they are not to blame, whereas non-vegans can’t do that.
For those who are unwilling to
give up their complicity with all that nightmare stuff, they have to train
themselves NOT to think about it at all. And, if challenged they can claim to
know very little about the ‘animal thing’, or even hope to deflect criticism by
claiming not to WANT to know.
Some people are able to convince
themselves animals are lesser beings and we humans are simply exercising our
rights over them, as the dominant species; we have certain privileges which
animals are not entitled to, namely the right to an enjoyable life and the use
of every available resource, of which animals are one.
For those useful animals we keep
imprisoned on farms, in cages, in pens, behind barbed wire, there’s no life;
every one of them is doomed to an existence of the meanest kind, suffering
brutality and being denied any sort of natural life, and when they’re fat
enough or they are no longer economically viable they are executed. Humans have
got it down to a fine art. The way we make ‘full use’ of the animal is all very
efficient. It appeals to the practical and brilliant brain of the human.
If humans can
see any way of taking advantage of them (of any resource in fact) we will take
it. We never voluntarily forgo our advantage, especially over the matter of
animal-use. If we do have to hunt them, because they can’t be domesticated, the
hunting is done with the same ruthless efficiency with which we farm them (just
look at the kangaroo hunting practices if you want an example of
ruthlessness!).
If an animal’s
main value is in the production of useful by-products, like eggs or milk, their
day of execution is determined by their rate of production; when that drops
below a certain level, they get the chop.
With our
knowledge of biology we understand how a body will produce (suitable foodstuffs
for humans), we understand how they mate, reproduce, secrete, fatten and
generally respond in a productive way to our needs. And we have, over centuries
of experimentation, learnt that they will still deliver, despite their most
appalling living conditions. Humans know that animals will endure life-long
imprisonment and unanaesthetised procedures and still be productive. They will
submit to the manipulation of their breeding cycle and to eating inappropriate
food and blatant fattening. And then go passively to their execution at our
behest. And why would they not? They have nothing to fight back, they are
completely in our power and must know on some level that the human can do with
them as they please.
Humans are only interested in
animals for what they can get out of them, mainly food and clothing as well as
entertainment and companionship. Nothing else matters. If they receive any care
at all it is the sort of care more to do with humans looking after a piece of
their property than concerning their individual well-being.
Their right to a life or the
conditions under which they are forced to live are of no interest to most
humans, since other factors govern everything; where money is to be made from
them and where competition is fiercest for ever-cheaper products, welfare
standards are minimised in order to maximise outcome.
The consumer, hand in glove with
the producers, cheers from the sidelines, not because they are sadists but in
order to maintain a constant supply of the food or clothing product they expect
to be available.
As typical humans, we expect good
supply of the foods we are used to just as we might expect a good supply of
water from a tap. If vegans are the thin end of the wedge, by potentially
endangering supply, veganism will always be seen as a threat.
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