Wednesday, November 5, 2014

Pragmatism versus Idealism

1192: 

Edited by CJ Tointon
Take the pastoralist or the factory farmer.  They’re in a big-bucks business.  They boost the country’s economy and are rewarded for their efforts. By dint of their 'good works' (feeding the masses) they are respected.  They may be profiteering pragmatists, but they provide. They fill the shops with 'goodies'.  We approve of them whenever we buy from them.       

By contrast, the Idealist is left out in the cold. I have this image of a shivering Ideal, outside the frosty window, trying to explain to the warm and comfortable people inside. “Idealism is valid”.  And no one can hear, since they take no notice. They don’t believe in Ideal’s existence, let alone see anything worth discussing.  The idealist is given no encouragement.  There’s little interest, and even if there’s no hostility, there’s lots of indifference.  And there may be insults.      

Vegan Activists - we’re not many yet (and most people know it, and how they know it!!).  With few ‘idealistic animal-advocates’ about, it’s open slather for insults.  It’s quite safe to say anything to us and get away with it. (It’s always safe to insult a ‘peacenik’ because you know they won’t try to hit back!).  

You can always tell a proud carnivore - they reckon that if you think it, then you say it!  About vegans like me, it’s standard issue to call me a 'bleeding heart' or tell me I’m being 'self-righteous'.  All obviously untrue, but that’s not the point. It’s how it hits me (or even breaks me) that wins the point.  Our adversaries are on the look-out for any weakness.  As a potential danger to their peace of mind, we are enemy, and need to be neutralised.  That’s when the insults come, thick and fast.  For me, it might seem hard to take.  But so what? It’s not exactly a mortal blow.  Thankfully, it’s not a capital crime to speak freely, which makes us merely 'insultable'.  Big deal.  So, we get used to insults because we know we've got one great advantage over almost everyone we know.  Energy.  (It comes with the territory).  So why begrudge another person their fun, if they want to rubbish us?  To be quite frank, there’s bugger-all else for them to do.  They don’t have too much energy at the best of times.  They don’t think for themselves and don’t often engage very well.  Don’t think I’m saying people are dim. They’re often very bright.  It’s not that they’re incapable of intellectually taking our arguments to pieces, it’s just that they’re too compromised to even attempt it.  The bright, educated citizen is equally incapable as the poorest brain - the compromise cripples them.  And they’re in the same Catch 22 situation as almost every other human on the planet.  They’re 'stuffed' -  in more ways than one.  

Now many poor souls are starving to death.  And one great tragedy of the World concerns the inequality of food distribution - but that’s another matter.  Only to say, that if the human is lucky enough to have any food to eat at all, then what they’re eating is 'lead'!  Call it what you like.  A lot of the food being eaten is full of dark energy and bearing the weight of a heavy conscience.  It’s like being in charge of an unruly playground, where the children are screaming for more.  The many popular foods are screamed for by our unsophisticated taste buds and stomach.  The shops are full of goodies and we love them, so to be discussing the prospect of no longer using them, arrrgh!  To enjoy being vegan over the delights of enjoying our 'little weaknesses', makes most people nervous.  It also makes them giggle with guilt.  

Vegans would say there’s no need to 'do' guilt.  But we’re the idealists.  And it’s tricky being idealistic, since we can’t go on to explain why, because it looks like we’re big-noting ourselves.  But, without sounding smug, it all points to the fact that just by being vegan, we automatically drop much of that black energy.  We shed that particular guilt which initially and then perpetually comes down to food.  Hopefully, we choose chips (of inspiration) with everything. 

But there’s a necessary payment for all this delicious energy.  We’re talking altruistic gratitude here.   Appreciating what valuable things we get from the plants we eat.  It’s a clear sort of energy, light in weight (in the sense of no conscience-weight) and not connected to the hard-nosed pragmatism of the carnivore.  

This sort of energy comes about just through eating 'vegan' food exclusively.  It is made up of various energies, like the energy used when you engage with your dog, playing with it, testing its potential.  
It’s impossible to engage these energy-sources if you’re still playing cosy with the enslavers.  Vegans are lucky to have access to these energies, especially since they coincide with our ideal, that of Animal Rights and Clean-Energy Food. 


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