1922: Edited by CJ Tointon
Food is a sensory experience. The taste, texture and sense of being
full, all contribute to a feeling of pleasure and satisfaction. But if the food
is animal-based, there's a spiritual dimension to consider because animals have
suffered in its making. If you care for animals, you won't be able to bear the
taste of death in these foods. But if you detach the animal from the food, you
won't worry about the spiritual side. You'll be able to 'eat, drink and be
merry' - unless you have a weight issue. Animal-based foods are notoriously
fattening. You might not acknowledge the food's spiritual dimension, but it
isn't easy to completely push your mind out of the way. It's impossible to
un-know what you already know. So when it comes to a stomach full of meat, your
mind must always be full of the murder behind it.
Omnivores must desensitise themselves if they want to indulge in animal
eating. Compassion and intelligence have to be thrown out the window. It's
neither kind nor clever to connive at the killing of beautiful, innocent
beings. We all know that they have feelings and fears, just as humans do. It's
not as if we need their carcasses or by-products to survive. It's not as if
we're out hunting them or risking our safety in any way. There's no physical
danger to us at all. We know they can't fight back. We have them nicely locked
up and ready for use. We've made everything easy for ourselves.
When it comes to 'food' animals, we humans have made sure that they've
lost the ability to protect themselves. Nature has been tamed and we want it to
remain that way. Once the animals are 'behind bars', we mutilate them (without
pain killers), confine them to spaces so small they can't move, castrate the
males, rape the females (by way of artificial insemination), fatten them and
then brutally execute them! And the animals are powerless to stop us. But maybe
animals DO have the final revenge. They DO bite back in a subtle and unseen
way. The eating of their bodies and secretions presents a creeping damage to
our metabolism. We often put on weight and suffer the ill effects of diabetes
and heart disease. Animal-based cuisine makes us slow and lethargic and in a
subtler way, our affectionate nature is weakened too. We lose empathy for those
beings for which we'd otherwise feel great affection. But the bottom line is -
we just can't resist eating them! So many of the foods we eat are animal based
and we hesitate to deny ourselves the 'enjoyment' of eating them.
Because animals represent such rich pickings for humans, it must seem
like madness (for omnivores) not to take advantage of them. But by choosing to use
animals, we bring out the worst in ourselves. The guilt and shame should be
enough, but we spend such a lot of money on these products. We get addicted to
them, causing chronic health conditions which adds up to a slowing-down of
self-development. Whatever chance you may have to make any spiritual
advancement, is held back by regularly consuming such ugly
products.
The Animal Industries are only too happy to do your dirty work for you,
rearing and killing and presenting the end product - just so long as you don't
make a fuss about it. The deal is that we turn a blind eye to the horror
whilst they conceal as much of it from us as they can. Thus, we conspire
together to objectify living, sentient beings.
Over the space of one single year, humans execute fifty billion
land-based animals, none of whom are guilty of any crime. This wash of cruelty
and destruction has forced us to pretend that what happens to animals doesn't
actually happen! And then we try to convince ourselves that we are not really
cold-blooded killers - but that is exactly what we are. There couldn't be a
better example of self-deception, nor a better example of shooting oneself in
the foot!
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