Animal Rights

You may know that I am a vegetarian, but might not know why. Well, here's a summary of how I became one:

My parents at one point were vegetarian in the sense that they didn't eat any dead animal. After my mum gave birth to me, she craved fish, so I grew up in a 'pesco-vegetarian' family. I had never liked the idea of killing things, but it was only when I reached the age of about sixteen or seventeen, that I really thought about these things deeply. It was the same idea when I got interested in certain ideas, such as yoga and buddhism (I don't claim to be a Buddhist or to know anything about Yoga) and also when I joined the Green Party. After going to Climate Camp in Kingsnorth (admittedly only for one day), I saw a vision of peace and vegetarianism, which has attracted me ever since.

In the November after my seventeenth birthday, I became 'fully' (at least according to Western standards) vegetarian.

It was only very recently that I first took part in an animal rights' protest:

That was a very powerful and interesting experience and I hope to go to one again soon.

Incidentally there was one which happened very recently,
and there will be some more soon.

You might be asking me why I care about animal cruelty when so many terrible things happen to humans.

Well, in my opinion, caring about animals doesn't mean that I won't care about people too. Quite the opposite.
My ethics are based on the idea that all living things have the capacity to suffer, since we all come into being (perhaps by birth), live,and eventually die. In that sense, I am equal to a chicken. Just as I don't want to suffer myself, nor do I want any animal to suffer, and obviously not any human.

I also believe that humans have a flawed relationship with the planet, an essentially exploitative relationship and that to remedy many of the problems on earth, this relationship must be changed.

Whether or not you believe in animal rights, the fact that, for example,

"in December, Bell & Evans will open a $25 million plant to replace its current plant, which processes 800,000 chickens a week. The new plant is a third larger and will boost production to 1 million chickens a week, according to the company."

must be a cause for concern. When perhaps before, although cruel, animal exploitation was chiefly for survival, this appears to be an addiction, a disorder, an illness.

As is the utter disgrace that one million chickens, members of an exploited species, which lose their dignity and integrity for the sake of human desire, were left to die in a heat wave
Now some party politics. The U.K. has a Prime minister, who, according to this article, written before he came to power, is totally in favour of hunting,

His argument is,

"I always thought that the ban was a mistake because I think it is very difficult to enforce."

Surely it is harder to enforce, for instance, the 'war on drugs'in Afghanistan.

If you support animal rights, or simply want this craziness to end, I recommend that you at least support, if not get involved in 'Animal Rights in Kent' and at least consider the Green Party in future elections.

For more information written by much more experienced people, visit:

Animal Rights in Kent

and blogs such as:

http://stevencampkin.blogspot.com/

and

http://stuartjeffery.blogspot.com

All views expressed in this blogpost are simply my own views. If I make a mistake, whether factual, grammatical or stylistic, I am the one to blame