A reflection on cognitive dissonance, loving animals and my vegan journey (thus far).
I was confused.
Taught to treat animals with care and compassion, to be inquisitive and respectful of creatures both in the wild and in the home, I developed an adoration of all the creatures I encountered. Yet, at mealtimes I was taught that to eat an animal was normal. I was taught to consume what I was simultaneously taught to care for, to show compassion toward.
I was confused.
Cruelty is bad. Causing pain to others is bad. Destroying life is the worst type of bad. This was all made clear to me throughout my childhood.
The conflict of what we eat and why we eat it played out in my head. Why is it okay to end an animal’s life so it ends up on my plate, when cruelty toward a living creature is considered so wrong? Does something as transient as one meal - consumed and forgotten in minutes - really justify needlessly ending a life? Even if it ‘tastes good’ or is ‘easy’?
Murder is wrong. It is rare that you will find a person who disagrees. Yet we are taught to ignore that we take a life with every meal that contains meat. We are conditioned to be wilfully ignorant.
How, as a society, did we reach this state of detachedness and complacency? How did we come to selectively apply our morals; shouldn’t they be universal? How did we become convinced that the mass producing, and mass culling of other living beings is acceptable let alone ‘humane’? Is any slaughter ‘humane’? People love their dogs and cats, why do they not care at all about the cows or chickens? What is the difference?
I was searching for answers. These conflicts played out in my head.
At 13 I decided I could no longer go on justifying my consumption of animals. Personally, I didn’t feel like I could call myself a morally sound person whilst eating meat.
It was during a Year Eight history class when something clicked inside of my head. A flick had been irreversibly switched.
We were watching a documentary about life during the industrial revolution and the role of a butcher. Seeing a pig hanging from the roof, a hook through its mouth, a knife slicing through its stomach, its insides being pulled out, blood and guts strewn everywhere, I had to look away. I was horrified. If I couldn’t bear to watch an animal be killed, let alone kill an animal myself, then I shouldn’t pay others to do so on my behalf.
My visceral response to the video said enough; it said that deep down I know this is not right. I know that the reason I can’t bear to watch this is because it is the truth. The brutal, unrefined, harrowing truth. If these practises were humane then it would be the farmers sharing videos in slaughterhouses, not the activists.
Sure, we don’t necessarily hang pigs up from the ceiling and slice them open anymore – they are predominately killed in gas chambers now. For those that say this is more humane, humane slaughter simply does not exist. Nothing about taking a life is compassionate or benevolent. Especially when it is unnecessary. I think this point is one that needs to be stressed.
Eating meat and animal products is not necessary for survival in this day and age. Nutrients can be easily obtained through other, simple means. I am a standing testament to that fact. Consuming animal products is now a choice. Your choice.
Throughout history there are many traditions and normalcies that we admonish in hindsight because they are barbaric and inhumane. The slave trade, genital mutilation, institutionalising homosexuals, widespread sexism and gender roles, I could go on. Just because the ‘many’ consider something to be ‘normal’ does not make it right. Don't be a sheep.
My choice to cut out meat at 13 was because I knew that it was not ethical to consume animals. I then made the choice to stop consuming all animal products after school because cruelty towards animals, the destruction of the planet and exploitation does not stop at the meat industry. Veganism is a philosophy and a way of living, not just a diet. It is a living embodiment of compassion in every choice you make. It aims to exclude all forms of exploitation and cruelty toward other animals, giving them back their status as fellow sentient beings of equal consideration, rather than commodities for human consumption under a capitalist system.
Cruelty is bad. Causing pain to others is bad. Destroying life is the worst type of bad. I am no longer confused about what is right and what is wrong like I was in my childhood. What confuses me now is when people do not think about their actions and cannot morally justify why they make the choices they do.
If you believe murder is wrong. If you believe inflicting pain and cruelty is wrong. If you believe exploitation is wrong, then live by these beliefs. Without excuses.
It’s that simple.
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