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February 2000
Advocacy Humor and Anger: Responses to Satya's Reader's Poll

 


For this month’s Satya, we tried an experiment. We asked our readers to send in responses to a questionnaire that we printed in November and December, and posted on our website (original questions listed below). The idea was to explore the issues that concern our readers the most, and how they cope with being in a world where these issues are not exactly the primary concerns of the mainstream.

The responses were numerous and varied. Some responses were answers to each question which were then shaped into essays, and others used the questionnaire as a framework for a narrative. We received a number of thoughtful, honest, passionate and sometimes funny essays. Here is a selection of the responses that we received. Most of them will be posted on our website www.stealthtechnologies.com/satya. We hope you enjoy, learn and, perhaps, join in the dialogue and share your own experiences.

1. Would you describe yourself as an environmentalist? If so, how and when did you become aware of issues concerning the environment? What are the environmental issues that are most important to you?

2. Would you describe yourself as an animal advocate or someone who believes strongly in animal advocacy? If so, how and when did you become aware of the issues concerning the treatment of animals? What are the animal issues that are most important to you?

3. Would you describe yourself as vegetarian or vegan? If so, how and when did you become a vegetarian/vegan? What are the vegetarian/vegan issues that are most important to you?

4.
Do you make connections between the three issues? If so, how are they connected for you?

5. Do you make your concerns known to the public, i.e., making your views known to friends, family, the general public; going to demonstrations; writing letters/petitions; rescuing animals; cooking food for others, etc.?

6. Do you consider your concerns or connections to be a “world view” or kind of value system that you adhere to? Do you have a spiritual connection with these convictions?

7. Do you ever find yourself at odds with the mainstream view on the environment, animals and/or vegetarianism? Are there specific situations that come to mind where your “world view” has been challenged? What did you do about it?

8. Do you have friends, family and/or a support network who share the same values?

9. Finally, what most upsets you? When something really upsets you (i.e., images of deforestation and land destruction, animal abuse and slaughter, and/or one too many people consuming meat) what do you do to maintain your balance, sanity and/or sense of humor?


Some Ways to Face an Alienating World
By Carol J. Adams

Six Time-tested, Life-changing Ways
1) Cook a great vegan meal and invite friends over. The outer world is often one of suffering, exploitation, and thoughtlessness. As an activist, I challenge it. As an individual, it alarms me. As a vegan, I know that with each meal I boycott that world, and create a sanctuary that supports my sense that the world can be otherwise—loving, thoughtful and nonviolent. When cooking your vegan meals, don’t listen to the news, but relax into cooking. Handle the eggplants and zucchini and marvel again at the abundance of the natural world. Anchor yourself here. If you don’t cook, consider learning. Or, if you know you do not want to cook, celebrate through a great vegan take-out meal. Good vegan meals are infectious! Vegan food is both the medium and the message.

2) Keep a journal. Get up 15 minutes earlier and start writing. No excuses! I know you are tired, that you were up late the night before getting the latest mailing out, or planning the next action. Get up and start writing. Write about your hopes and your fears and your dreams and your yesterdays and your tomorrows. Feel yourself a part of the flow of your own life. It is the best gift you can give yourself. And think about it this way as well—future historians will need it as they answer the question, “what sorts of people brought about the profound changes in attitudes toward the environment and animals during the 21st century?”

3) Develop a meditation practice. Sit and go within. Learn how not to identify with your feelings, your thoughts. At the conclusion of my meditation practice I send blessings, or energy, whatever you want to call it, to people on my mind, people engaged in the work, people I love. It feels good to acknowledge them with morning energy.

4) Work with your dreams. Dreams come to give us wholeness. Write them down, and let them speak to you of inner and outer fragmentation, and how to be healed.

5) Practice a body, mind, spirit discipline, like yoga or tai chi. Through yoga I sink into the ground of my being. I integrate my left brain and my right brain, and allow my cells to be oxygenated. I arise from a yoga practice ready for the next demand, energized, at peace, and able to function more quickly, more thoughtfully, more efficiently. The spiritual underpinnings of yoga, for me, make it the art and soul of nonviolence.

6) Engage with something beautiful. An anti-pornography friend relaxes by looking at beautifully illustrated children’s books. They remind her of deep, cherished values, and help to reduce the impact of the images she has encountered in her work. I read lovely books about writing, poetry, and myths. I read to my children. I rest my mind and body through the love of words.

Other Important Pointers
7) Cry and comfort. Allow yourself to feel your feelings. Let go. I also write in my journal after crying to process the feelings and move them forward. Then, and this is important, find an act that can nurture you. Do you need some comfort food? Keep some handy in the house: warm Chai (there is one vegan version that I have found...), Tofutti or Rice Dream, Silk’s soy nog during the holidays, roasted vegetables, Millennium restaurant’s baked tofu, pear congee. Do you know your comfort foods? Make sure you do and that you allow yourself the comfort of good food.

8) Love. Love yourself. You are magnificent. You care. You act. Take time to do loving things for and with yourself.

9) Relax. Don’t think you have to do it all today. Remember that there is a web of workers; we want you to be whole, not exhausted.

10) Remember, too, it is the work and not the result. We cannot control the result of our work, but we can know that we are doing important work, life-changing, life-saving work. For instance, for the tenth anniversary edition of The Sexual Politics of Meat [see Hull review] I had to revise the number of animals killed to become “meat.” In 1990, the figure was six billion. Now, I had to update the figure to nine billion! Ugh—three billion more! And that was just land animals. I also added the number of sea animals killed to be consumed based on PETA’s best estimates. The number itself can overwhelm. But I won’t despair. We continue our work. We reach people through our lives.

11) Be silly. Play. Give your right brain some attention. I had no choice but to follow this injunction for myself when my children were in preschool. And I learned something wonderful. When I was “stuck” on how to write the “Frankenstein’s Vegetarian Monster” chapter for The Sexual Politics of Meat, I had to leave my writing to play with my then three-year-old. As we built together, the chapter fell into place. I had allowed my left brain to let go and given my right brain the time to play with the ideas. When you are stuck on something, give yourself a breather.

12) Read. When something happens that really upsets me—the Senate vote to make Clarence Thomas a Supreme Court Justice for instance—I get books on the subject and I read. After the Senate vote I needed to understand “what happened and why?” I bought some new books on racism to read. A part of me feels some sense of control by understanding what happened, and by analyzing why it happened. I become better equipped to be in this alienating world.

13) Contribute money to the causes you believe in. The act of mailing the check reminds me that I am connected to these wonderful people and what they are doing. I know I cannot do it all. It is good to feel that connection.

14) Write about all of these things. Books, essays, letters, etc., help you articulate your concerns to the world and help make you feel that you are doing something positive.

We are participating in the act of creation. Creating something can be messy—bloody even. It is birthing: noisy, exhausting, demanding. We are taking something from within, our deepest beliefs and hopes, and giving them life. Creating takes time too. Goethe said that the marvel is not that an apple falls from the tree, but that a tree can grow in opposite directions at the same time. So must we activists grow in two directions: our roots—our inward process must be tended to, as well the fruits that we bear through our outward activism. n

Carol J. Adams lives in the Dallas area. She is the author of the widely acclaimed The Sexual Politics of Meat, now in a Tenth Anniversary Edition, and is author or editor of six other books. Her forthcoming book, The Inner Art of Vegetarianism: Spiritual Practices for Body and Soul (Lantern Books, June 2000), discusses in more detail the six ways of coping described above.


The Politics of Taste
By Claudette Silver

I have to tell you—you can’t imagine the number of ways I have been described because of my vegan diet. “You have such will power,” I have often been told, as I forgo the cookie dough ice cream that is passed around at a dinner party. “You have such determination,” a co-worker tells me because I am not “tempted” to even try the chocolate cake left over from the holidays. “Not even just one little bite?” Over and over I hear this from people who want to relegate me to sainthood because of my perceived dietary asceticism. Come close, ye who believe me martyred, and I will whisper my secret. For me, being vegan is easy.

Exactly one decade ago, I made the conscious choice to live the most nonviolent, compassionate life I could. My diet was the first place to start. This meant omitting not only meat, it also meant abstaining from leather, eggs, milk, and any other “product” derived from an animal. I could not have verbalized it at the time, but I was embarking on much more than a dietary path. It was the summer of 1990 and I had the good fortune of working at a health food store where I met like-minded people and was introduced to everything from arugula to tempeh. I could find soap without lard, shampoos that hadn’t been tested on animals, and natural remedies as an alternative to chemical drugs. Happily, I had no need for the slaughterhouse or any of its by-products. In July, I made the step to eliminate as much cruelty as I could from my life by going vegan. It was an easy, simple choice.

The next month, a world event took place that put my nonviolent beliefs to the test. In August 1990, Iraqi President Saddam Hussein’s army entered Kuwait, and the spiral of events leading to the Persian Gulf War began. I was 20, a senior in college, and determined to make my role in the world a compassionate and conscious one. I remember sitting with my roommate as we watched the first “live” televised war in history. This is not how it should be, I kept thinking over and over. We heard the terms SCUD and PATRIOTS for the first time as we watched them explode in a fiery cacophony. I watched, transfixed, feeling completely paralyzed by this tragedy.

Ironically, I was scheduled to begin teaching a Peace Studies class at a local high school on nearly the same day that Baghdad was being bombed. As we watched the oil fields burn and saw America’s patriotism bubble behind millions of yellow ribbons, I had no idea where to begin. How could I teach a class on nonviolence against the back-drop of war? The bus stop where I waited every morning was directly in front of the Iraqi Embassy. There were armed men with Uzis standing all over the grounds, high on the roof, at every corner of the building. At one point I tried to engage in conversation with one of the men. He would not speak to me. Washington DC during the Persian Gulf war was a sad, cold city.

In class, we read Gandhi, Caesar Chavez, Martin Luther King Jr., mixed with a smattering of other folks who had believed in peace and social justice. I tried my best to be hopeful and find examples where peaceful, nonviolent resistance was used at all cost. We learned about Rigoberta Menchu, who despite seeing many of her villagers killed during Guatemala’s long civil war, vehemently opposed violence or retaliation, or Ilse Joseph, who traveled around the world playing her violin in remembrance of her daughters who were killed by Nazis. We also read excerpts from John Robbins’ Diet for a New America, which detailed the reasons why he relinquished his heirship to the Baskin Robbins ice cream dynasty. All in all, we read a lot and discussed issues until even I was sick of them.

By early spring we had lived through the worst of the war, a war which was termed only a “conflict” since no official declaration had ever been made. Over and over it was referred to as Desert Storm, as if Mother Nature herself was responsible for the travesty. My class was coming to a close, and I was ready to graduate from college. For the final, I asked the students to write their opinion on one aspect of violence in our society. What I received back was both beautiful and shocking. One of my students, a senior, wrote:

“This country is known for being a bully to other countries and their leaders. They claim it is for peace, but I say it is for power. The recent war proves this theory...I have also come to realize that simple, everyday things that are taken for granted are in fact violent. For example, eating eggs or meat, yelling negatively, the killing and dissecting of animals—these are things I am now against. More Americans especially should practice nonviolence.”

Bravo, my younger sister, I couldn’t have said it better!

So you see, not ordering nachos at the movies, or not eating cheese pizza on a Friday night is not the hard part. I am interested in making a dent in the long litany of suffering that humans have imposed on each other and on the creatures with which we share the planet, not in the will power or determination of my taste buds.

Really, believe me when I tell you that what I eat is the easy part.

Claudette Silver
is an artist and writer who lives with her two feline loves, Pinky and Delilah, in San Francisco.


Catapulting Beyond Cruelty
By Roberta Kalechofsky

None of us is born into the world knowing about evil and cruelty. In fact, it seems to me that babies are born with the expectation of kindness. Cruelty is a rude shock when we first experience it, more so than pain. Children learn about pain early: they fall down, they bang their heads, they get earaches. But it is a different experience when pain is coupled with deliberate human cruelty—whether to a child or to an animal. Such experiences bring us to the brink of the darkest knowledge about human beings that we have to contemplate—our capacity to inflict pain. This knowledge changes our trust toward the human race and contributes to a degree of alienation from it, so we develop strategies for living. Those who don’t, I’m afraid, often go mad. The rest of us grow veils to shield us...from “knowing.”

For most of my life, I seem to have been unduly ignorant about cruelty to animals. Perhaps I should not blame myself because much of this cruelty, such as hens trapped in battery cages, fur farms and experimentation in laboratories, is hidden from the public eye. Philip Hallie pointed out in The Paradox of Cruelty that “secrecy” is often the formidable weapon of institutional cruelty.

I discovered the horrors of the research laboratory by accident. The library in my town had on exhibit the book by Dallas Pratt, Alternatives to Experiments on Animals. This continues to strike me as strange, because my library does not usually exhibit such books, and I did not at that time read books about animals. I opened the first page with that unlimitably sad picture of a monkey sitting in a stereotaxic chair receiving electric shock. The expression on the monkey’s face overwhelmed me, and I slammed the book shut, to protect myself from knowing—determined “not to see.” However, something compelled me to go back. There the book was in the same place the next day, waiting. The incident has always given me the feeling of my “being fated” to begin the effort to understand and to cope with one more form of human cruelty, this one complacently conducted in the name of science.

At the same time that I discovered Dallas Pratt’s book, Richard Schwartz had sent me his manuscript, Judaism and Vegetarianism, with its description of factory farming and crated veal calves. Vegetarianism interested me about as much as bobsledding in Alaska—not exactly something I thought of doing. Yet his manuscript appeared in my mailbox and changed my life.

One more book sealed my fate: Skin by Curzio Malaparte, which contains a chapter called “The Black Wind,” about a man who loses his dog and finds him in a research laboratory. The description opened a chasm for me. I felt that I was gasping for breath, as if someone had delivered a blow to my solar plexus. If I tried to talk about it, I broke down and cried, as when I would hear about terrible cruelty inflicted on children. Where else do we find such a hideous contrast between power and innocence as in the helplessness of abused children and other weak creatures, a perverse predation on innocence?

At first, such cruelty reduced me to tears. But I learned to control my crying because I knew that I would be ineffectual if I showed such emotion, that I would be seen as hysterical and weak. Frances Power Cobbe, who founded the British Union Against Vivisection, used to caution her members against weeping because she feared they would be taken for “weak women.” But Bishop Desmond Tutu broke down and wept at the Truth and Reconciliation talks in South Africa. Why not? Who are those who do not weep?

These days, I admit to a hardening process. My reactions and work have become codified. I have learned how to write and talk about terrible things. I do scholarship and research and give talks on evil. I used to try to spare my audiences, but I don’t anymore. I tell them, “If it weren’t terrible, I wouldn’t be here.”

I have become interested in these creatures that I am devoting my life to defend, and I read a great deal about them. They have given me a sense of unity with creation. Through them, I have come to see that cruelty to them is the foundation of much evil in the modern world: animal agriculture is a major force in environmental decay; animal “food” is a major cause of chronic diseases; and animal “food” contributes to malnutrition and poverty. Defending animals has made me politically active, widened my world, forced me to read books about science and medicine, made me get involved with health care issues, nutrition, genetic engineering, cloning, and environmental issues. All of these issues radiate out from my concern for animal life.

Anne Frank wrote in her diary, “I firmly believe that nature brings solace in all troubles.” The steady encroachment of human beings on nature and the consequent loss of the animal world will change nature and us in unfathomable ways. We cannot say what this separation will do to our humanity, for people have always found a joy and consolation in nature that has helped them cope with pain.

Nature and animals broaden our emotional lives. Experiences of grandeur, majesty and awe come to us from nature; and animals challenge us to extend our perception of the “other.” Nature has always been a source of optimism and means of expanding our vision, which contributes to the good soul.

Roberta Kalechofsky, Ph.D., founded Micah Publications, the source for Jewish vegetarian and animal rights books, and the publishing arm of Jews for Animal Rights. She is the author of Vegetarian Judaism: A Guide for Everyone, and several works of fiction. For information, visit www.micahbooks.com.


Anger, Humor and Advocacy
By Matt Ball

In my opinion, our inability—individually and as a movement—to deal with our anger in a constructive manner is the greatest hindrance to the advancement of animal liberation.

As a reaction to what goes on in factory farms and slaughterhouses, extremely strong negative feelings are understandable and entirely justified. Over time, people tend to deal with this rage in one of three ways. The first, and most common in my experience over the years, is to burn hot and furious. This anger leads to cursing, screaming, hatred, vandalism, etc. It also doesn’t last long in many cases. I wonder, for example, what a former Vegan Outreach member did with his prominent “Vegan for Life” tattoo, once he quit being active—and vegan—after two years.

The second way to deal with these strong reactions is for people to wall themselves off from society, surrounding themselves with only the like-minded. This often fosters a “bunker” mentality, mimicking the conspiracy-theorists of right-wing militia groups. They start inventing and believing their own propaganda and myths, creating a fundamentalist religion with strict adherence and loyalty requirements. If concerned with changing things, effectiveness of “advocacy” is judged by the quantity of media coverage (quality is irrelevant).

At best, these reactions do no good in creating long-term change in society. Except to the already disaffected, neither group is appealing to the rest of the public, and their warring, misanthropic, bitter, persecuted mindset serves to keep others away.

The third possible reaction is having a positive outlook and a sense of humor. This not only makes it easier to continue in activism long-term and avoid self-righteous and arrogant fundamentalism, it also makes it possible to interact positively and constructively with others.

The question, of course, remains: how can one develop and maintain a sense of humor? Unfortunately, there is no easy answer.

The first possible step is to think about your ultimate goal. In my case, it is the alleviation of suffering. If I allow myself to be miserable, I am adding to the suffering in the world. More importantly, I am saying that unless utopia is instantaneously established, it is not possible to be happy. Thus, my goal would be fundamentally unachievable to any degree.

To have any change occur in the world, we need to convince others to think beyond themselves. We must be willing to do the same. Just as we want others to look beyond the short-term satisfaction of following habits and traditions, we need to move past our anger to effective advocacy (e.g., moving from yelling and chanting to constructive educational outreach). If I claim that I can’t be happy in this world, that I am a slave to my situation, how can I expect others to be able to do anything differently?

It also helps to maintain a historical perspective. I realize that I am not the first person to be upset by the state of affairs in the world. I can learn from the mistakes and successes of those who came before me.

Few people came to an enlightened view of the world by themselves and overnight. It took me over a year after my first exposure to the issues to go veg, and even longer after that to go vegan. If I had been treated with disgust and anger because of my close-mindedness and pathetic (in retrospect) rationalizations, I would certainly never have gone veg, and Vegan Outreach would never have come into existence.

My story is not unique. Not only does it show the shortcomings of anger and the benefits of patience, it also indicates that you shouldn’t give up on your friends if they don’t react to information as you would like them to. Shunning your friends because they don’t immediately adopt your vegan religion not only cuts you off from the very people we need to reach, it also perpetuates the stereotype of the joyless fanatic with no life other than complaining.

“Fighting” suffering is not the only way to make a better world; creating happiness and joy—especially when flowing from a thoughtful, compassionate example—can be an even more powerful “weapon” for creating change.

There has always been suffering, and, as long as there remains sentient life on Earth, there will always be suffering. This is simply the price of conscious life. The question becomes what one does with that existence. We can choose to add our own fury and misery to the rest, or we can set an example by simultaneously working constructively to alleviate suffering while leading joyous, meaningful, fulfilled lives.

So have fun! Laugh at The Simpsons (Lisa is a vegetarian); enjoy loud music (I recommend Beck: “She’s got tofu the size of Texas”); party with friends (Becks beer is vegan); enjoy great vegan food (Ethiopian is awesome).; travel to new places (Washington, DC has great Ethiopian restaurants); read (or listen to) a bubble gum novel (anything by Elmore Leonard); see a popcorn movie (South Park: Bigger, Longer and Uncut will test your sense of humor). Another way to make sure you don’t take yourself too seriously is not to let anything be off limits to humor among friends. Once the question came up—what wouldn’t I joke about? I named one thing, which, of course, became the sole source of jokes for a week!

Being a vegan isn’t about deprivation, sobriety, and wallowing in misery. It’s about seeing everything, being fully aware so as to be fully alive.

Matt Ball is the Executive Director of Vegan Outreach, a non-profit organization dedicated to furthering education and understanding. They provide copies of the informative booklet, Why Vegan. Visit www.veganoutreach.org or call 412-968-0268 for information.


Caring and Coping
By Angela Starks

I would not describe myself as an environmentalist, since I am not clear about its meaning, but I do care—sometimes passionately—about the state of this world. Am I an environmentalist by default just because I care, or does it depend on a measured amount of campaigning? Paramount for me are issues that affect our immediate health and survival, such as air and water quality. The environmental problem that annoys me most in everyday life is traffic pollution. What is the point of anything else if you can’t even breath the air in your own street?

I can’t presume to be an animal advocate, but if the question is do I believe in animal advocacy, the answer has to be yes. I don’t know if my attitude of live and let live is good enough, but if we have a relationship to animals at all, I do know it should be one of care-taker, not advantage-taker.

I became a vegetarian gradually, starting as long ago as I can remember. As a young child I would pick out the chunks of brown stuff from a casserole for no reason other than the fact that I hated the feel of it in my mouth. I think kids have a natural instinct for what’s gross. By my late teens I had made the irreversible connection between meat and cruelty, thanks to hooking up with like-minded students at college. We would attend video screenings about slaughterhouses and factory farms, share knowledge and disgust, and generally solidify each others’ resolve never to eat meat again.

It was only a matter of time before veganism seemed like the next logical step. Once in a while I succumb to the hypnotic chant of “better have a bit of dairy” but that is being deprogrammed in proportion to the amount of research I do into the false health claims of the dairy industry. The most important issue to me with regard to food choices is the truly shameful manipulation of peoples’ minds by the meat and dairy industries to get them to eat these products, especially children, which results in a plethora of health problems. Also of crucial importance is the destruction of the environment caused by intensive farming; it should be illegal, but the economic power and political influence of these industries makes this seemingly impossible.

My concerns are surely part of a worldview, even if it’s not the worldview. It is part of a value system that increasingly more people are becoming conscious of. It really feels wrong to eat corpses, to poison the air with unnecessary car journeys, to run horses to exhaustion to fuel a gambling craze.

Most of my family and friends share the same values. This is partly a result of my seeking these people out, and partly a result of us becoming more and more like each other as time goes by. It does make life easier and more fun when the people you care about share your values and lifestyle, from having a good moan together to enthusing over a new vegetarian restaurant. I don’t hide my views from friends or family—not because I believe everyone must hold the same views as me, but because relationships become boring and superficial if I am not able to share my deepest concerns.

Frustration with ‘the way things are’ can easily turn into hatred towards individuals who ridicule concerns about food choices or environmental degradation, since they are hurting not only themselves but future generations when they try to brush these things under the carpet. One reason people criticize is often because they cannot allow themselves to believe the opposite of what they themselves do. Once they have been doing things a certain way for some time, or if they have a set belief system, any challenge to that status quo causes them to be defensive. I don’t enjoy the emotions that such encounters stir up, so I do my best to reason them away the moment I feel them bubbling under the surface. To indulge in anger hurts only me, physiologically, mentally, and spiritually. Those we hate are either blissfully unaware of the fact or else they don’t give a damn about our opinion anyway (which is, after all, one of the reasons we feel so frustrated in the first place).

Tolerance helps me maintain a balance and a sense of humor. What calms me is knowing (hoping) that everyone really is doing the best they can with the knowledge that they have at any given stage in their development. It’s difficult for me to get angry at others when I recall what I might have done differently 10 years ago when I was ignorant of so many things. And I’m still learning, and that’s my other great antidote for insanity: self-education. The more secure I am in the correctness of what I am doing, the less likely I am to suffer doubts or become over-sensitive to others’ criticisms, let alone a victim of their incorrect advice (“get some milk down you or your bones’ll crumble”).

But there’s one magic bullet for me: getting on with life, and all the better if I’m not only distracted by an activity but also being constructive towards what I would like to change. Also, concentrating on setting a good example keeps my mind creatively busy and leaves little room for moodiness. This doesn’t have to mean being a full-time campaigner. It means taking good care of myself and doing what I enjoy so as to develop myself as a well-rounded and contented person. After all, no one wants to emulate a miserable specimen.


Putting Two and Two Together
By Richard H. Schwartz

My environmental consciousness grew as I taught a course entitled “Mathematics and the Environment” at the College of Staten Island beginning in about 1975. The environmental issues that are of most concern to me are global warming, the destruction of tropical rain forests and other habitats, erosion and depletion of soil, water shortages, and air and water pollution.

My awareness of animal rights issues began in the mid-1970s when I read books such as Animal Liberation by Peter Singer and Animal Factories by Jim Mason and Peter Singer, and Animals’ Agenda magazine, and I started attending vegetarian conferences. The animal issue that is of most concern to me is modern intensive animal-agriculture, since the greatest amount by far of animal abuse occurs on factory farms, but I am also concerned about animal experimentation and fur.

I became a vegetarian because of discussions about global hunger that occurred in the mathematics course that I taught. After reading Diet for a Small Planet, by Frances Moore Lappé, I realized that the scandal of world hunger and the annual deaths of an estimated 20 million people worldwide because of hunger and its effects could be ended if people shifted to plant-based diets. In the last few years, I have become very aware of how horribly dairy cows and hens are treated and how harmful the consumption and production of dairy products and eggs are to human health and the environment and, hence, have become almost vegan.

The vegetarian/vegan issues that are of most concern to me are the mistreatment of animals and the health and environmental consequences of animal-based diets and agriculture. I make connections between the mistreatment of animals, environmental degradation, and the need to shift to vegetarian/vegan diets. I strongly believe that becoming a vegan (or at least a vegetarian) is the most important thing that a person can do for animals, for the environment, for his or her health, for the conservation of resources, and for the world’s hungry people. I often state that vegetarianism is not only an important individual choice today, but it is also a societal imperative because of the very negative ecological and economic consequences of animal-based diets and agriculture.

I devote a lot of time to making my views known, because I believe that vegetarianism is a societal imperative and that the world is threatened today as possibly never before. To help make others aware of the issues, I write books and articles, and teach courses and give lectures.

I consider my concerns to be part of a “world view” and value system. With regard to my religious life, I believe that a shift toward vegetarianism is a spiritual imperative for Jews. In view of powerful Jewish mandates to preserve human health, treat animals compassionately, protect the environment, conserve resources, and help feed hungry people, and the extremely negative effects animal-centered diets have in each of these areas, I believe that committed Jews should sharply reduce or eliminate their consumption of animal products.

My views are often at odds with the mainstream view on these issues. For example, the Jewish establishment often challenges me with statements such as: By putting vegetarian values ahead of Jewish teachings, vegetarians are, in effect, creating a new religion, with values contrary to Jewish teachings. I respond respectfully and by attempting to educate my challengers: Jewish vegetarians are not placing so-called vegetarian values above Torah principles. They are saying that basic Jewish teachings that mandate that we treat animals with compassion, guard our health, share with hungry people, protect the environment, conserve resources, and seek peace, point to vegetarianism as the ideal God-directed diet for Jews today. Rather than rejecting Torah values, Jewish vegetarians are challenging the Jewish community to apply Judaism’s glorious teachings.

What most upsets and frustrates me is that while the world is so threatened today, and animal-based diets play such an important role in many global threats, and Judaism and other religions have such powerful teachings that point to vegetarianism as the ideal diet today, so many people are unaware and apathetic regarding the critical importance of a shift to vegetarianism. To maintain my sanity and optimism, I just try harder to spread vegetarian and animal rights messages through letters, articles, talks, and e-mail communications, and try to keep learning as much as I can about the issues so I can be as effective a spokesperson as possible. Promoting vegetarianism and animal rights is my most important activity today and seeking better ways to do this keeps me relatively sane in an insane world.

Richard H. Schwartz is Professor Emeritus of the College of Staten Island, and author of Judaism and Vegetarianism, Judaism and Global Survival and Mathematics and Global Survival.


You’ve Gotta Have Faith
By Richard Mehmed

How to cope in an environmentally-unfriendly, meat-eating, animal-apathetic, insane world? For me there is absolutely only one way: you’ve gotta have Faith! Faith in the power of God. Faith in your own actions. Faith in your fellow humans. Easy! Well, let me come clean. There are not many days when, after learning more about how we treat our environment, other people or animals, that I don’t put my head in my hands and mutter What’s the point? But (so far) I have always managed to pick myself up, take a deep breath and carry on trying to be part of the solution rather than the problem.

My relatively new-found commitment to environmental and social change, and my present wood-recycling career, started by a fluke, sort of a “Saul on the road to Damascus” experience. To cut a long story short, I left my well-paying job selling insurance to gaze at my navel for a while, and I also happened to be looking for some cheap wood with which to build my daughter a playhouse. On my quest I came across a company that was land-filling a ton of almost new timber every week, in the form of huge cases of quality wood. This unbelievable profligacy shocked me into realizing that this “consume and waste” society will inevitably lead us to self-destruction. I’ve got kids—what sort of world was I leaving them?

Although I thought of myself as environmentally aware, I knew right away that I had to work in whatever capacity I could to help bring about change. After years of a fairly indulgent middle-class lifestyle I was confronted with the realization that I had to reduce my own impact on the planet—big time! Reducing my consumption, committing to vegetarianism and changing my whole attitude towards the natural world became paramount.

I do fret a lot. There are so many issues to be down about, but it is global warming and species depletion that scare me most because they threaten our long-term survival. At the moment I try to judge all my actions by environmental criteria, and eating meat—if it is genuinely free range or individually hunted—can be in harmony with the environment, so I suppose I put animal advocacy slightly down on my list of priorities. But I know that we should not judge our culture by the quality of our art or our technology, but by the way we treat the most vulnerable people and the other life forms with which we share this wonderful planet. In reality, there is an inextricable link between animal exploitation and the environment. I do not wear the badge of an animal liberationist, but I want to embrace veganism because I believe it is morally and environmentally right.

Like most of us, I get depressed at the lack of effort shown by too many people. But what I find hardest to bare is the attitude of many (supposedly) educated folk I meet who see rabid consumption as a freedom issue, as a matter of lifestyle choice, and as liberation from toil: a justification for exploitation, environmental destruction and further global inequity.

Yes, it is certainly an environmentally-unfriendly and animal-abusing world. If I am still sane (and I let others judge that), it is because I have faith that with the power of God even I can achieve something. I have faith in the innate goodness of the many and in the possibility that everyone can change and contribute. If I am sane it is because I never forget that I am living in the rich part of the world—in a place where I do have options, can fill my belly every day and sleep soundly. I have the option to create and nurture rather than destroy, and to me it’s worth the hassle—any day!

Richard Mehmed is the founder of the pioneering Brighton and Hove Wood Recycling Project in England. Visit www.pavilion.co.uk/woodrecycling/ for information.


The Interconnectedness of Things
By Samantha Knowlden

My choice to live a vegan lifestyle began with my concern for the well-being of animals as well as the environment. I don’t know what the initial spark was that started me on the track I’m on today. Perhaps being on the fringe in middle and high school made it easy for me to look around and observe what was actually going on. Going vegan was a gradual process that took many years and developed simultaneously with the expansion of my worldview and awareness of other social issues and injustices, including classism, racism, feminist and queer issues, etc. This process is still ongoing as I meet and work with new people, live in different places, and learn about other issues.

I think the issues of vegetarianism, animal advocacy and environmentalism are all deeply interconnected, and for me are a part of all other struggles for social justice. They are a part of the effort to make this world a better place for every being. The vegan philosophy that I live and work by is respect for all life (this encompasses not only animals and people, but also plants, ecosystems, and the planet) and the right of all beings to a decent life. I use my vegan philosophy to guide my actions as an activist, consumer, family member, friend, co-worker, and community member.

How do I cope with opposition? I take small actions in my everyday life that I know make a difference to myself, the people around me, animals, the environment and even more remote people whose jobs make my life possible. In the rare moments when I actually buy something other than food, I use my consumer power to boycott or purchase products in order to support my vegan philosophy.

I have a strong network of friends who share my values and ideals. When things get tough, it’s easy to surround myself with them and turn ourselves into a majority, making the day-to-day challenges disappear, or at least easier.


Confessions of a Natural Born Optimist
By Marc Bekoff

Basically, I am an animal rights advocate/activist with deep concerns about all animals, plants, bodies of water, the air we breathe, outer space, and inanimate landscapes. According to my parents, I have had these concerns since I was a toddler. Thus, I am not sure how I came to my compassionate views of the world in which I live. Often, I feel deep in my heart it is simply genetic—inborn—and that I have been blessed with a keen sensitivity of the plight of other animals and all other “beings.” I am a vitalist and see and feel life in everything, animate and inanimate.

I am a vegetarian. I still eat a few animal products and strive to eliminate all animal products as time goes on. My reasons are ethical and not health related. The issues centering on meat-eating of most importance to me deal with the horrific slaughtering of our animal kin for human consumption to satisfy “nutritional” needs that for almost all people can be met by eating products other than animal flesh.

To get the message out, I publish books and articles, and lecture widely on animal protection and animal rights.
I find myself at odds particularly with my scientific colleagues and with some others because I am a scientist with a heart, a scientist who feels that the business of science could do much, much better in the area of animal protection. I also disdain how science chops everything into little bits—how science fragments, slices, cuts, and disembodies. I am a holist at heart. My anthropomorphism and sentimentalism are off-putting to many other scientists, but that’s just who I am. I think my academic record shows clearly that I (and some others) can do solid science and still be driven by the heartstrings—that solid science can be done even if one goes to the beat of a different drummer.

Most of my family and close friends support my views and animal protection in general. I maintain my sanity by being an inborn optimist who simply believes that there are many reasons for hope. I worked on a set of millennial mantras [see Bekoff and Goodall] with Jane Goodall, and her optimism, hope and friendship are among the most important ingredients in my recipe for a better tomorrow—a better world for our children and for theirs.

Animal abuse is particularly upsetting but I also ache when I feel trees being felled, water ways being changed, and inanimate landscapes being decimated. My vitalistic sense is offended by all destruction. I am a dreamer and have visions of many better tomorrows. Let us all practice peace and justice, and express compassion and respect for the rest of the world. May we all, as a tight and committed community, work towards these goals.

Marc Bekoff is Professor of Organismic Biology at the University of Colorado, Boulder. He is editor of The Encyclopedia of Animal Rights and Animal Welfare (Greenwood, 1998) and author of the forthcoming, Strolling with our Kin: Speaking for and Respecting Voiceless Animals (American Antivivisection Society).


Being Vegan—One Way to Tread Lightly
By Pulin Modi

I have been involved with and aware of environmental issues since high school (about five years or more). During this time I have continually gained knowledge about the environment and humans’ impact on it. As a result I have adopted a vegan lifestyle as the single greatest step I can take to minimize my negative impact. Meanwhile, I still continue to struggle for human rights, animal rights, and environmental protection.

I believe strongly in animal rights. After gradually being exposed to the issues and facts about how animals are treated and killed for humans, I morally had no choice but to go vegetarian and then vegan. Videos, lectures, pamphlets, books, and being around people concerned with animal rights all helped to raise my awareness about animal exploitation. I am most interested in spreading veganism because it is a relatively easy way to help the most number of animals. Veganism reflects a person’s willingness to make certain sacrifices on behalf of the animals, the earth, and one’s own health. The use of animals in the “sciences” is also an important concern of mine as a college student interested in promoting animal rights, and the rights of students to choose alternative techniques for learning about biology and psychology. Every issue is important because kids are inevitably involved and animal abuse breeds a future mentality of exploitation and injustice on all levels of life.

I believe all forms of abuse and exploitation are linked mentally and physically, as seen in the problems of the world. A person who can inject kittens with poisons and then cut them open (while they are still alive) must have problems with respecting the lives of others. It is a sick process fueled by public ignorance and inconsiderate, profit-driven businesses. Even the thought of eating the breast or leg or fat of another animal is repulsive. Think about it...those are actually body parts and fluids. Knowingly consuming these products in our “civil society” is shameful and disheartening.

I make my concerns and views as public as possible by wearing shirts, going to protests, supporting activists, tabling, leafleting, talking to others, sending email and letters, distributing stickers, going to meetings, etc. No one will ever be able to know everything or convert the world alone, so it is important to gain support from peers, convert the “opposition,” and build towards a more compassionate society. In my opinion it all comes down to simple logic. It’s just the right thing to do or else the consequences will inevitably be devastating.

I always find myself to be consistent with mainstream views but at odds with their actions. I don’t really know how to explain that very well. It seems as though everyone in the world (not just activists) wants to reduce suffering and protect the environment but they do not act on it. Veganism is the simplest way to be proactive and have an enormous positive impact on the planet. When people do not embrace a vegan lifestyle I see it as a lack of understanding. This is the reason these issues should be made as commonplace and easy to learn about as other issues such as recycling. One should always be careful not to alienate or outcast people with opposing views. You can’t change people’s lifestyles through a “hostile,” unorganized, and inefficient movement—especially when it’s based on nonhuman elements such as animals and the environment.

The fact that so any people are ignorant about these issues is disturbing because we continually breed future generations of humans who exploit the earth and its inhabitants. When something upsets me I generally make a quick transition to turn this into encouragement to work even harder and in more effective ways. By wasting time on regrets and despair, all oppressed sects of the Earth suffer.

I keep realistic goals in mind and hope for the best. The task of any activist is to gain as much support as possible. By keeping the movement fun, energetic, and well-organized, the future can only get better.

Pulin Modi
is a student at Vassar College


Nothing That Can Get Away by Itself
By Jeff Lydon

But how do you get your protein?

Even after 15 years as a strict vegetarian, the question is shocking enough to nearly paralyze me. It makes me feel like a physician who has been whisked back to the dark ages and confronted with medieval colleagues baffled by my objections to blood letting. Where to begin?

Ultimately, I recognize education—sharing knowledge of nutrition, ecology, cruelty, and socio-economic justice—as the animal rights movement’s purest, strongest weapon. Ideally, then, the question gives an opportunity to educate. And, like most of us in the movement, I try to teach. But answering a question that betrays a lifetime of myths and misinformation takes a special tact; there’s so much to erase before anything I say can stick. The orators of corporate propaganda who have infiltrated our schools, bought our airwaves, and pocketed our elected officials are the state troopers of the information super highway. Sometimes I get the feeling that countering their council looks to others like speeding in a school zone.

Implicitly, people who ask a question about protein still believe vegans’ dietary choices put their health at risk. They still believe milk is good for your bones. They still believe lean meat or white meat or fish is good for your heart. And I spend so much time with other informed vegetarians that I forget that those concerned with getting enough protein still comprise the vast majority.

It’s hard to debunk pervasive propaganda with a sound byte or two, and I’m not always armed with a packet of fact sheets, reference sources, books, and research data, nor do my listeners always have an hour to hear a response that approaches comprehensiveness. Perhaps I should be the one who listens. I should respond to such a question with questions: Where did you learn about protein and nutrition? Is it healthier to be a meat-eater or a vegan? Have you ever heard of anyone being diagnosed with protein deficiency? People might be more apt to critically examine their own story than to look closely at mine. Then I could help fill in the gaps, explain the disconnects.

Ten or 15 years ago, people wondered about your soundness of mind if you mentioned meditation, bodywork, yoga, or even recycling. Now, law offices have massage chairs in the staff lounge, accountants go to meditation retreats for team-building and stress management, and nearly everywhere you’ll find a recycling bin next to the copy machine. Yet the most fundamental part of healthy living and environmental accountability—the vegetarian diet—remains on the fringe of the mainstream. True, most restaurants have vegetarian options, while tofu and meat-free wieners are ubiquitous. Slowly, the paradigm is shifting, but more slowly where it counts the most.

The reason? People are scared about not getting enough protein and depriving their children of the strength they think only hamburgers can give. When I hear that question, “But where do you get your protein,” it conjures up a mix of sadness, irritation, and hopelessness. When it comes to animals, we really do live in the dark ages. And the rich and powerful generally want to keep us there. But the question is also one of the ways out, a wick asking for flame. And if we answer such questions well enough, we might light up this age, one candle at a time.

Jeff Lydon is an animal rights activist living in the countryside outside of Ithaca, NY with his wife, Sarah, and their companion wolf, Quinn. He works as an editor and free-lance writer, and is on a mission to find the best vegan eclair in North America.


The Plate as a Springboard for Peace and Non-violence
By Linda Ostreicher

The first mention I recall of the word “pollution” was in Tom Lehrer’s song of the same name. I’m an environmentalist, and have been since at least Earth Day 1970, when caring for the earth fit right in with my other 60s values. My in-depth education about the environment came much later, starting in 1988 when I got a job with NYC’s recycling office. Objects become garbage so quickly, going from desirable to disgusting. Then there are hazardous wastes, truck exhaust, landfill leaks, water pollution, incinerator ash, toxic exports—it all connects.

My mother loves animals and I was raised by a German shepherd, so I’ve always respected and loved animals. There were books I read as a child that enlightened me: Black Beauty, Charlotte’s Web, and C. S. Lewis’ Narnia series. I’m less concerned with animal diversity than I am with suffering. If everyone stopped eating meat tomorrow, there would be no more breeding of farm animals, but there would also be a lot less pain. Experimenting on animals seems like a mistake because we have no right to hurt them, and there are an infinite number of ways to do research. We’ve managed to stop experimenting on humans without their consent.

When I was 16, I met my first vegetarian and immediately began cutting down on meat and within a year I gave it up. For me, giving up meat was anything but difficult—the stuff was repulsive to me, pathetic bits of corpses. I would not mind meat-eating so much if we treated animals well during their lives and killed them humanely. And of course there are 40,000 people starving to death each day while meat production requires so much more land and water than plant production. I’m a vegetarian who eats eggs and milk. My definition is “Nothing that can get away by itself.” I’d give up milk and eggs, but I can’t do without milk in coffee and pizza, and figuring out if food is dairy-free is just too hard. I rationalize that if everyone ate as little dairy as me it could be produced without much harm. Being unable to go vegan helps me to understand how meat-eaters may feel.

The issues of environmentalism, animal advocacy, and vegetarianism are connected to each other and to everything else I believe in: peace, equality, etc. Meat production hurts the land and water, and the treatment of farm animals is horrifying. Even the way we shut it away from sight is harmful, because it lets us get used to killing without having to face the gore. It’s like comparing aerial war to playing a video game. Animals kill each other—that’s the food chain. But we know better, and can survive quite well without it, so when we kill, it’s deliberate cruelty.

I’m not comfortable directly attacking people’s behavior. It sometimes hardens their convictions. However, I bring up the issues when I feel I can do it without making my friends defensive. I tell everybody I’m vegetarian primarily for reasons of compassion, and that being vegetarian is easier than not being one. I go to occasional demonstrations, write letters, and sign petitions. I’ve taken in a few stray animals and I offer to pay for neutering whenever someone can’t afford it. Whenever I can, I point out that one kid in middle-class America is a lot harder on the environment than 20 in Africa.

The only spiritual leader I really respect is Thich Nhat Hanh, whose concept of “interbeing” is an interpretion of Buddhism as a spiritual belief system that includes everything else. One of the few good things about our insanely technological world is that it is becoming clearer how everything that happens to each of us affects people, animals and other beings on the other side of the world.

My worldview is challenged every time I walk into a restaurant that serves meat or a store that sells leather. I tell my friends that the smell of the leather they’re shopping for makes me sick. In an effort to do useful work, I often take lower paying jobs. I try to use things as long as possible before discarding them and I shop at second-hand stores. I use public transportation (can’t drive, don’t want to) and try to travel without exploiting anyone or anything more than necessary. A harder challenge is when the choice is between human and animal suffering—like impoverished Africans killing protected animals to sell on the black market. Obviously, it’s self-defeating in the long run, but they don’t all have a long run to count on. It has to come down to the need to redistribute wealth.

I don’t worry about the Earth. We act like Nature is some frail damsel in distress, but she’ll shrug us off like a dead flea. I’m less hopeful about situations like in Nigeria, where oil companies pollute people’s drinking water. I can complain to my friends about things like that, which helps a little, and my cats comfort me. I get angry when people I know do stupid things, like buying SUVs or eating venison. I get most upset by animal suffering. I once cried for hours after attending a public hearing about “animal control.” All I can do is turn my attention elsewhere. It’s a fine line between shutting out all the pain and losing the ability to care. Sometimes I feel that caring is all that I can do. I focus now on another issue (people’s right to health care), one that I feel I can actually have some small effect on in the world; it doesn’t depress me to the extent that I’m unable to act.

Linda Ostreicher is a grantwriter who lives in Brooklyn.


The Plate as a Springboard for Peace and Non-violence
By Bruce Friedrich

Every time I sit down to eat, I make a decision about who I am in the world: Do I want to add to the amount of violence, misery and bloodshed in the world? Or, do I want to make a compassionate and merciful choice? There is so much violence in the world, from war-torn regions of Africa, the Middle East, Asia and Europe, to our own inner cities. Most of this violence is difficult to understand, let alone influence. Veganism is one area where each and every one of us can make a difference, every time we sit down to eat. I find it empowering that I can take the option for peace and compassion every time I eat, simply by not encouraging violence and misery against animals.

“Vegetarianism,” claimed Tolstoy, “is the taproot of humanitarianism.” Indeed, slaughterhouses are perhaps the most violent places on the planet. Animals are routinely sent kicking and screaming through the skinning and dismemberment process, every one bleeding and dying exactly like they would if they were human beings. Farms today are like warehouses, treating live animals like dispensable objects: chopping off beaks and tails and genitals with no painkillers at all, inflicting third degree burns (branding), and ripping out teeth and hunks of flesh. Animals transported to slaughter routinely die from the heat or the cold, or freeze to the sides of the transport trucks or to the bottom in their own excrement. Dairy cows and egg laying hens endure the same living nightmare as their brethren who are raised for their flesh, except that their time on the “farm” is longer. In the end, they are still shipped to the slaughterhouse and killed, at a fraction of their natural life span.

There is simply no excuse for anyone who considers herself or himself to be an ethical human being, let alone an “animal lover,” to be supporting these kinds of practices, all of which are routine and universal throughout the industries which turn animals into meat, dairy and egg products.

If I can’t watch it happening, I want no part of it. I enjoy watching fields tilled and love picking apples and tomatoes and carrots and other vegetarian products. If slaughterhouses had glass walls, as Paul McCartney is so fond of saying, we would all be vegetarians.

Bruce Friedrich
is Vegetarian Campaign Coordinator for People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals.


Raw Solutions
By Robert A. Miller

Am I an environmentalist? Only in the sense that everything I do, think, and eat has an effect on the environment. I definitely think about treading lightly on the Earth. As a raw food vegan, I know and feel good about the fact that what I eat—organic, sometimes homegrown (sprouts), local whenever possible, fruits and vegetables—has little destructive effect on the environment. For example, it uses little or no packaging, and requires less transportation and its associated pollution. I do not wear leather or use animal products that I am aware of, again making a small but important contribution to lessening overall environmental destruction. But, no, I would not describe myself as an environmentalist.

John Robbins’ Diet For A New America taught me so much about environmental issues. Satya is also informative about environmental issues, as is the mainstream press if it is read in both the positive and negative sense.

I would not describe myself as an animal advocate. However, I do not use any animal products if at all possible. Diet For A New America opened my mind to so many issues regarding animals that I was unaware of or had only an inkling of before.

I make my views known when it is appropriate. I don’t proselytize. I speak about my raw foodism and related issues when people ask me—which is often—and then they are open to actually hearing. My mother is a raw foodist, as are many of my friends. With a friend, I run a raw food support and discussion group. The main topic is raw food veganism, and naturally environmental and animal issues come up. We also host raw food potlucks. These events spread the word about raw foodism and all of the connections. I see and am thankful for these connections every time I sit down to a meal.

I don’t often find myself “at odds with the mainstream” because I am finally becoming comfortable enough with myself and my lifestyle to accept that it is perfectly allowable for others to have and live out their own views about the world, despite how destructive they may be. I honestly believe that our current situation is the evolution of the world today, and that it is supposed to be that way. My place is simply to do the most I can, within my sphere, to first make my life strong, sane and useful, and then help others do the same.

Raw food-ism is important to me because I have seen so many people—beginning with myself—get rid of disease, often the so-called “incurables,” and achieve states of well-being far beyond what they ever thought possible. It is so simple, so easy and so effective. It has the positive benefits of vegetarianism and so much more. When a person eats a 100% raw food vegan diet their physical, mental and spiritual selves get much closer to their natural state. This is a very normal process, which most of us have become too civilized to understand.

The closer one gets to their natural (spiritual) self, the more they can see that the world and universe is just a circular, interconnected whole. That has been my experience, and I do my best to live that understanding every day. Eating a raw food vegan diet is the easiest way to maintain balance on all levels. It is just a matter of sticking with it until the body adapts. I am happier, healthier, laugh more, and can see the world more objectively (from my small view!) than at any other time in my life.

Robert A. Miller is a professional musician living in Brooklyn.

 

 


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