Living my morals

 It has been quite a while since I wrote to this blog. If you've read my last post, "Cognitive Dissonance", you will know that I had started eating animal products. I had given some reason for this, but I have since had time to think more about it and I am understanding better why this happened. Depression was one reason. If you have never been through a severe clinical depression, you will find it difficult to understand how much of a negative effect this has on suffers' lives. I don't know if using this as an excuse is appropriate as I have discovered some other reasons for my decision, but it certainly was a large part of it and I can't help think that I might have made a different decision if I hadn't gone through such a dark period in my life. It is possible that the depression set in motion a domino effect that ultimately led to my change in diet. 

Lately I have been reading the book, "The Joyful Vegan: How to Stay Vegan in a World That Wants You to Eat Meat, Dairy, and Egg", by  Colleen Patrick-Goudreau. I highly recommend it. She mentions a few reason people go back to an animal based diet which helped my understand myself better. One of the reasons she gives is burnout. After years of guilt over feeling like I wasn't doing enough, trying to be a super-vegan, I finally just gave up, feeling as though I could never be good enough. That, topped with my mental health issues, was a recipe for failure. I've since tried to give myself permission to fail. To not be good enough and accept where I am right now. 

She also suggested reading and watching videos to help inspire me and keep me informed. These don't have to be videos of slaughter houses and pushy ultra vegans. In fact, in my case, it might not be good for me at all. So I've started reading more, including adding a few books to my audible account that will help inspire and encourage me.

It is still a difficult journey and probably will remain so for a long time. But I am well on the road to recovery, feeling stronger as far as my mental health goes, learning to forgive myself and taking one small step at a time. 

One final step that I have taken is making my journey as a vegan a one issue journey. Previously, because of religious beliefs and health related reasons, I tried to "excuse" my veganism by telling people I was vegan for ethics, religion or health, depending on my audience. With the last two I would tell people I ate a plant based diet in order to avoid discussing ethics. 

I have decided going forward that I would only be a vegan for ethical reasons, period. I don't need to give any other reason. It is almost impossible to defend the position using Christianity (except, perhaps, in the Eastern Orthodox Church, where "fasting" is plant based and monks tend to fast all year round - but not the laity), but almost all Christian sects/denominations believe the bible not only allows but also commands the eating of meat. Typically you will here the excuse from these groups, "That is what God created animals for".  

I also decided that health reasons were not a good reason for me. Veganism has been scientifically demonstrated to be healthy and meat eating harmful to humans. But, I wouldn't eat animals even if it could be shown that eating meat was healthier. Obviously I would have to eat meat if veganism was deadly to human life, but it isn't and we don't need to even focus on such hyperbole. 

So, ethics is the only reason for me to not eat animals. It is a good reason and, in my opinion the best and only real reason to stop. I am happy when anyone for any reason stop eating animals, but for me it will, from now on, be my morals that guide me.

Finally, I am doing this for myself, that is, my morals. I love the animals, I know they feel pain, happiness, sadness, loneliness and every other emotions I have. I want EVERYONE to go vegan. But, I don't care how others take it or what they do with the information I and others provide. My life will continue on just fine without their liking me or my position. I spent a lot of time thinking that my worth as a vegan and a person was tied to everyone else. If I wasn't convince people to go vegan on ethical or health grounds, then I was failing. "Why won't they listen?", "How do they see the videos and read the facts and not become vegan?" are some of the things I would think and say. Now, I don't care if they listen or not. I would love to see people change for any reason, whether it is because of my testimony, others' or because they did their own thinking and research on the subject. But if they don't, then so be it. It isn't going to change my views and I'm not going to let it bother me. 

This can sound confusing, I admit. I don't want it to appear that I don't love the animals or the people I talk to (If I loved the animals and not the people I would be just as much a hypocrite as when I loved humans but didn't care about the animals).  I just don't want to think it all sits on my shoulders. What they do with the info I give them is not my problem. I am vegan because I, me, myself, love animals and don't want to participate in causing them suffering. I was told once concerning my going vegan, "But you are only one person", to which I responded, "Yes, that is true. But I am one person" (Of course, there are tens of thousands more like me, but you get the point).  

I will be writing more about religious views on eating meat and why I think it is either a bad reason to stop or a terrible reason to keep eating animals. 

Cognitive Dissonance

I've spent the last year or so eating animal products.  I blame this on a number of things. The first and foremost being my struggle with depression (Actually, bipolar II). I got to a point where I didn't want to have to think about what I ate because I simply could not think about much of anything.  There are other reasons, but this is the most important to me and the most effective when explaining my decision to other people.  But...I've come to realize there is no truly good reason for my decision.  I just had a change of mind, of which I cannot really explain.  I've thought and thought about it, but I simply cannot come up with a good enough excuse.  And, for me, this is a problem.

How could I do it knowing what I know about animal suffering?  Cognitive dissonance.  I simply turned off that part of me that knew better. I turned off the compassion. If one is good enough at this (and I think most people are, or at least can learn to be) any guilty pangs one normally feels can be quashed. Each time that niggling in the back of my mind started to surface, I mercilessly shoved it back into the dark recesses of my mind until it could do nothing effective.

I suppose a lot of people do this. I know friends and family who admit they have seen the videos and read the articles, but continue to eat animals anyway saying something like, "I don't want to think about it".  I use to judge these people as cruel, uncaring (when it comes to animals) and ignorant. I'm reminded of the passage in the Bible, "Do not judge lest you be judged". Know I know what those people are thinking and how they are able to do what they do in the face of the data. I've become one of those people.

I've also found it difficult to decide why I should stop eating animals. I was a Christian. The church branch I was a part of believed in regular fasting. The fasting promoted was basically a vegan diet. Except for a few occasional exceptions on certain days, one was to only eat vegetables, fruit and bread.  A plant based diet was built into the church practice.  But, maybe because of the depression, I bounced back and forth between atheism and religion as I began to learn outside of my religious upbringing.  This caused me to try to fast and then to abandon the practice in an irregular cycle.  It was very frustrating. 

The difficulty with veganism by religion (at least my religion) was that eating animals wasn't looked at as being wrong.  Not harming animals was simply the byproduct of the fasting. The fact is the Bible, and Christianity in general, not only allows the consumption of animals, but it justifies it. In some places, primarily in the Old Testament, it commands it. Animals were once killed by the tens of thousands every year simply to be burned to ash for the purpose of the absolution of one's sins.  It is true that in the New Testament, supposedly instituted by Jesus and his followers, the killing of animals in place of the believer in payment for his or her sins is no longer commanded.  But that is the rub: no where does the Scripture command or even suggest the killing of animals for any other reason. Besides the sacrificial system, the Old Testament's views on animals still stands. 

All of this is to say, if you use the Christian religion (maybe even most religions) in an attempt to justify veganism or condemn the harming of animals, one is doomed to a very confusing time at best.  Even religions like Hinduism seem ineffective against the eating of animals, even the sacred cows. True, a great number of Hindus are, at the very least, vegetarians.  But a good many are not. Either because they particular brand of the religion allows it or, which is more likely, the adherents simply don't care any more about the injunction.  Something common to all religions, including Christianity.

Not eating animals is best done from an adjustment of our morals based on enlightenment values, especially that of reason. We know from both observation and science that animals suffer. They do a lot more analogous to humans, but they especially suffer. We can look at the data, look at the animals and make an informed and accurate decision concerning their suffering.  It is true that even children have a natural aversion to animal suffering and eating animal flesh appears to be, although I am not an expert in this, wholly a learned behavior.  But as adults we have every responsibility to use our capacity for reason to understand the situation and do something about it.  So why don't we?

I am going to be thinking more about this over the next few days, but I am going to go back to veganism.  This time not because of religion but because I know that the suffering of animals is a real thing and because not hurting them is the reasonable thing to do. 

Where is compassion in all of this?  That is important too, but I don't know if one can get to that point without knowing at least some of the facts. Compassion as a gut reaction can only get someone so far. At least, that is the case for me.  What about empathy?  As far as pain goes, I suppose I can feel for the animal to a certain extent. But realistically, it is impossible to truly put yourself in the place of animals because of their inability to communicate in any detail what they are truly feeling. I am not a cow or a pig or a chicken, even though I am an animal.  Any sort of empathetic reaction I have will simply be the result of anthropomorphize the animal and I am not convinced that is a good way about this.  I may be wrong here, but I think reason and compassion are the only way to steadfastly hold to one's position, the right position, when it comes down to it.

These are my thoughts, right or wrong. But they will help me better to understand the plight of the animals and do something to reduce their suffering, including gong back to a plant based diet and stick to it for the rest of my life.