A call for solidarity with all living beings

[Guest guest]

Becoming a vegetarian is quite possibly the most important and far reaching

decision any of us is ever likely to make. Regardless how strong our initial

motivation, however, an unjustified fear of being out of step with others or

being left socially and emotionally out in the cold requires of the kind of

moral support and motivation that IVU [Planet-Vegan, PeTA, TVA...], by its very

existence, can provide to individuals and organisations worldwide.

 

In a world increasingly dominated by irrational and superstitious beliefs and

ideas based on a distorted concept of humanity and a combination of tradition

and fundamentalist political, religious, or personal intransigence, it may be

easy to question the chances of success of a bold and still pioneering

vegetarian movement committed to a revolutionary redefinition of human

priorities and of the way in which our physical, spiritual and social needs are

satisfied.

 

To discover our true selves and come to terms with the non-predatory role that

nature intended us to play at the low end of the food chain, it is necessary to

play an active part in the vital struggle to vindicate the rights of our fellow

sentient beings and guarantee their deliverance from the dread and horror of the

filthy prisons - a mockery of the levels of hygiene and cleanliness ostensibly

required in the food industry - where they languish in fear, piled high on top

of each other, until they pay the ultimate price of human insensitivity and

choke to death or feel the sharp or more often blunt blade of the anonymous

mercenary execusioners charged with the unsavoury task of rendering life into

meat to satisfy an insane human craving which defiles both our minds and our

bodies while we bicker and kill one another in endless conflicts over

meaningless issues, unable to solve the problems that we face without a valid

set of ethical rules to guide us and protect us from ourselves.

 

The historical failure to comprehend the true significance and worth of other

living organisms - inextricably linked with our own bio-rhythms and survival -

has inevitably led humans to regard all life as a limitless source of meat,

marketable items or genetic material to tinker with or clone at leisure and for

profit.

 

The buying, selling and butchering of animals is perceived as an affirmation of

human dominance and control rather than as a failure to communicate with other

highly evolved life forms. Whatever humans cannot relate to or understand, they

try to consume and digest to make it more like them, thus making it a formidable

challenge for others to view the treasured ‘tasty morsels’ as the butchered

remains of suffering individuals whose lives and death depend on the frivolous

extravagance of human gourmets.

 

Consumerism binds us as captive consumers to a society increasingly dissatisfied

with the definition of pleasure in terms of owning and using an object or

product which everyone has. Nevertheless, such behaviour may be psychologically

reassuring as a symbolic celebration of victory over poverty, letting us partake

in the coveted good things of life.

 

The seemingly Utopian vision of a planet where slaughterhouses and dreadful

nutritional diseases are banished forever to the dustbin of our darkest history

- ending the incestuous human culinary fascination with death and freeing life

to evolve and manifest its exuberant diversity unhindered by artificial

manipulation or regulatory control - may seem an unlikely promise to fulfil, but

the only clear choices for the third millennium are these: ecological disaster

brought about by social upheaval as a result of famine, or a sustainable and

harmonious future in which human desires and needs can be met without reckless

destruction of life.

 

Our active role as social campaigners - working for a radical transformation of

the way in which society is currently conceived and organised - must be to

emphasise and condemn the myriad inconsistencies, failings and excesses of

consumerism and to provide answers and solutions based on an unswerving ethic of

respect for all living beings.

 

The guarantee of a viable future for everyone lies in letting an unwavering

commitment to universal justice for all beings be our main guiding motivation

and common agenda. Let us all rise to the very serious challenges ahead and join

with IVU [Planet-Vegan, PeTA, TVA...] as active members and volunteers in

calling for the urgent adoption of ethical solutions to the grave social and

environmental problems existing worldwide.

 

Francisco Martín

Hon. General Secretary

International Vegetarian Union

http://www.ivu.org/members/council/francisco-martin.html

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