In the Honolulu Advertiser today (June 19, 2009) there is an article about a ceremony held yesterday in Kauai to remember two slain monk seals who were recently killed (murdered) over the past two months. Jeff Walters of the state Department of Land and Natural Resources said "We're here to show respect for the seals that were lost, and for all seals and all wildlife." Approx. 100 people attended the ceremony. The two monk seals, members of an endangered and protected species, had been shot.
Monk seals are wonderful creatures, and were and are an important part of Hawaii and are well deserving of all the protection and assistance they are receiving from volunteers and the government.
However, once again the question arises "why does the government show respect for seals and wildlife but not for other animals?" On the one hand the state seeks to fine and imprison anyone who shoots a monk seal (which of course we fully agree with) while on the other hand giving permission to and supervising the operation of ghastly slaughterhouses where cows and other innocent animals are cruelly murdered and butchered to the tune of at least 33 billion innocent creatures per year (90 million per day) in the United States alone.
The cow is considered as one of our mothers along with our real mother and the earth. The cow freely gives of her milk, thus helping with nurturing and raising our children. The cows only reward for lovingly giving us her milk is that her children are taken from her shortly after birth and turned into veal (veal, or white meat comes from keeping young calves in the dark in narrow tiny stalls where they can't even turn around and who are then slaughtered at a young and tender age), and when she is no longer able to produce milk, and thus considered economically useless, she is cold heartedly sold to the slaughterhouse. She is brutally murdered, her body chopped up with a chainsaw, and then packaged up, "dressed" they call it, put on grocery store shelves and then eaten at barbecues, restaurants and in homes; the same homes where people bemoan the cruel shooting of the monk seals.
We all bemoan the hard hearted society we live in with people not showing much care for each other, and where some people feel that it is fine to shot monk seals or brutally beat peacocks to death, and often wonder "why is it like this?" Actually, the answer is right under our noses and in front of us on our dinner plate. If you look down at your plate and see a dead cow's body part, please consider whether you really needed to take that cow's life in order for you to eat dinner, or whether you could just have easily eaten tofu or some other plant based food instead.
If we want to make a kindler gentler society it all starts in our homes and what we eat for dinner. In a society where dead cows are the dinner staple then we should not be surprised by the hardheartedness we see. As we sow, so shall we reap.
Love Life! Be kind to animals; don't eat them.
Thanks for reading.
Mark Fergusson