Well, kids, it’s looking like I’m not going to have enough time in the near future to write up a proper blog entry on my recent decision to go vegan. What do I mean by proper, exactly? Eh, I’m not sure. You see, veganism is something I’ve been interested in for several years, now. I’ve done quite a bit of reading on the subject and slowly but surely I’ve reached this personal conclusion that since there is no good reason for me to contribute to the accumulation of pain and suffering in this world, well, I’d really rather not continue to contribute to that accumulation (hey, wow, that was a wordy mouthful — this must be why they invented the word ahimsa).
I was 13 years old when I first read about vegetarianism. I remember being solidly blown slighltly left of center by this huge thought, that I could simply choose not to eat meat — I could simply choose not to choose death. I did a lot of reading on the subject (because reading’s what I do when I’m interested) and at 16 I had my last bite of animal flesh (a chicken nugget — weird, how you remember these sorts of things). And from what I remember, it really wasn’t that big of a deal — I chose vegetarianism as a personal, ethical decision and as such I consciously accepted the subtle little mare’s nest of minor difficulties that come along with that decision, that it might not be as easy for me to nosh as it was when I was an omnivore and that I might be a bit more of an oddball even among oddballs, given my choice in lifestyle.
Thing is, I was raised in a surprisingly intellectually focused conservative Christian home and from a very young age I can remember feeling quite strongly that it’s more important to remain true to one’s ideals than to appear to be "right" or "correct". This is something I found C.S. Lewis alluding to in The Screwtape Letters (in the sense that the patient’s encouraged disapointment that modern Christians do not wear sandals in no way invalidates Christianity) and found more strongly in Jefferson’s advice to his nephew and namesake, that one does not choose atheism because it is de riguer or because one has no respect for religion, one chooses atheism because religion is so important that to merely give lip service to a perfunctorily religious social collective because one’s family does so or because one’s friends do so is a form of blasphemy on the highest level. To my mind, the moral imperative of the human experience is to continuously contribute to the larger whole of awareness by consistently making the most prescient decisions one can make in this moment, here and now, regardless of how odd or quirky those choices may immediately appear to be. Because, certainly, both Gandhi and MLK looked odd and/or quirky when they first began the work for which they are now famous — and what kind of world would we live in if those two men had been afraid of social conditioning?
That’s not to say that I’m aiming to be an MLK or a Ghandi or even a Mother Theresa, just that I’d like to believe that I’ve been informed and buoyed by the enlightened example of greater human beings like these.
And for a long time, I really felt that being vegetarian was more than enough — I get a little jiggy with the politics, I vote, I’m informed about environmental issues, I recycle. I don’t eat the dead. What’s wrong with all that?
Nothing, honestly. It’s just that, for me, there are other, better, more prescient choices.
What gives us the right to use animals? I’m not asking what gives us the right to kill them, or decide what’s in their best interst, I’m asking — what gives us the right to dominion, as human beings?
I’ve never considered myself a feminist because I believe that it’s most important to create a set of philosophical human rights in which feminist concerns go without saying — in other words, as we work to build a future world in which we truly value human rights, we should not need to foucs on the special rights of women or blacks or latinos or any other group of whatever denomination, so long as the lanuage and the lens of our ethical paradigms are workable and fitting.
And yet, how can our ethical paradigms be workable or fitting so long as we affirm a reality in which it is acceptable to seize what we desire from other creatures? What kind of morally acceptable paradigm gives us the right to forcibly inseminate other creatures so that we can consume their breast milk? What kind of morally aceeptable paradigm gives us the right to skin other living beings so that we may fabricate shoes or special fasteners that hold up our pants? If we see ourselves as superior to other non-human creatures and take what we want from them at will, how far are we from engaging in the same sort of behavior with other human beings whom we may, in this or that moment, see ourselves as being superior and therefore, morally dominant, towards? If we may seize from cows, why not women? If we may seize from pigs, hounds and boars, why not blacks and latinos? Why not Jews or caucasians?
I saw veganism, for a long time, as an unnecessarily difficult choice — not a choice that would be difficult for me, but one that would be a burden on everyone else around me. Most recently, I’ve come to see that concerm — that my ethichal choices may be difficult or burdensome — as ridiculous. After all, this line of reasoning mimics the same line Jefferson mocked. I do not make ethical choices because my ethical choices may or may not make me acceptable to a certain social group; I make ethical choices because every ethical choice I make contributes to the longevity and the sustainability of the greater group to which I belong — because the nature of humanity should be humane; because this descriptive group quality, humane, is precisely what I strive to be.
