Don't
Eat Anything With a Face |
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Published on: June 08, 2007 |
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In
a changing world, one of the most widespread shifts in human behaviour
is the increasing conversion to a vegetarian diet. Suppressed in the
past by the overpowering dominance of meat-eaters, the late twentieth
century has witnessed a remarkable turn around. Availability of accurate
scientific and social information has inspired many to speak out in
favour of vegetarianism. It is no longer just a religious issue, but
one that affects science, society and indeed the long term survival
of the human race.
Pythagoras, a firm vegetarian,
once said, "The time will come when men will look upon the murder
of animals as they now look upon murder of men."
George Bernard Shaw was also a strict vegetarian. He used to say, "Animals are my friends and I don't eat my friends.... my stomach is not a graveyard for dead animals". This is quite revealing because just think; a dead cow or sheep lying in a pasture is recognised as a carrion. The same sort of carcass dressed and hung up in a butcher's stall passes as food. "...Makes No Sense" Paul McCartney, the legendary Beatle, became a vegetarian one Sunday afternoon. "One day my family sat down to eat a roast lamb. We all looked out of the window and saw our young lambs playing happily, as kittens do, in the fields. Eating bits of them suddenly made no sense. In fact, it was revolting. What are we doing? I don't believe we have the right to take a life. By eating vegetables my children have grown up without all the preservatives and chemicals that rot your teeth and gums. We use soya substitute". Paul McCartney became so committed to a vegetarian diet that he made his entire touring staff of 180 switch to it. "No meat is served on the road... the whole tour is vegetarian," says Paul. His late wife Linda McCartney said, "Just the thought of what happens in slaughterhouses is enough... anyone who cares about the Earth - really cares - must stop eating animals." Paul further adds, "If animals could speak, I think they'd tell us not to eat them. We are such a pompous race of humans, so destructive, so sad. People dream of heaven and you know, we are living in heaven, but we make it hell... people will realise that meat or rather flesh is disgusting. We cover everything up. We call pig ham. How absurd. Bean or Pig Andrew Tyler, a British journalist, visited a slaughterhouse in 1989, and wrote what he saw: "Our first truckload of pigs are ready for opening. As the first dozen are driven into the stunning pen, one urinates on the spot and makes a screeching noise I haven't heard before. Blood and mucous fly from his spout, the eyes close, the front legs stiffen, and when (the stunner) opens the tongs, he falls like a dog on his side. He lies there, back legs kicking as (the stunner) turns to the next candidate. Most huddle against the entrance with their rumps towards him, heads passively bowed, snout to snout... a couple break from the huddle and sniff a fallen comrade." Pigs are among the least understood and most persecuted of all animals. Their intelligence exceeds that of our close companion, the dog. Yet most pigs spend their much-shortened lives in bleak factory buildings, suffering abuses that would create a national outcry if inflicted on dogs. Tyler relates a slaughterer's story about the pigs' 'swimming lessons'. "Sometimes if the chap sticking (cutting with a knife) is rushing, he might not stick it right and it (the pig) looks like it's bleeding a lot, it looks dead when it's all hung up but you put it in a hot water tank and it ain't. It thrashes about. It will die eventually, probably drown in the tank." If you are an average meat-eater you have wrought considerable havoc on the animal kingdom by the time you have completed your life, and more optimistically preparing to enter another world, you might realise with horror that you have eaten:
The strongest voice against meat is that of the animals. They speak not, yet they say a lot. If we have a heart, a real human heart, then it should shatter us to hear their words:
BUT BECAUSE YOU DO, WHY
SHOULD WE SUFFER?
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- l Percentage of livestock feed produced
on cropland in USA: 64%; Percentage of fruits and vegetables produced
on cropland in USA: 2%. Written by: Sadhu Jnanpurushdas |
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