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VOICES FOR ANIMALS ACROSS THE AGES: ELLA WHEELER WILCOX

Posted on | by Sandra Kyle
Ella Wheeler Wilcox (November 5, 1850 – October 30, 1919) was an American author and poet. Her works include Poems of Passion, and Solitude.   She coined some memorable phrases, including  “Laugh, and the world laughs with you; weep, and you weep alone”.
Her poems, written in rhyming verse, were filled with insight, and though not highly critically acclaimed were widely accepted and loved by the public. Her works popularized what at the time was known as ‘New Thought’ embodying the belief that all life is connected spiritually as well as physically, and that people are spiritual beings.  As ‘Voice for the Voiceless’,  her most famous Animal Rights poem shows, she believed that animals also have souls.   Some of her most popular works were ‘Poems of Passion’, (1883) A Woman of the World’ (1904)‘Poems of Peace’, (1906), and ‘Poems of Experience’ (1910). Her autobiography,  titled ‘The Worlds and I’, was published a year before her death.

‘You may choose your words like a connoisseur, And polish it up with art, But the word that sways, and stirs, and stays, Is the word that comes from the heart’.  Ella Wheeler Wilcox

 

 

THE VOICE OF THE VOICELESS

I am the voice of the voiceless; 
    Through me the dumb shall speak; 
Till the deaf world’s ear be made to hear 
    The cry of the wordless weak. 
From street, from cage, and from kennel, 
    From jungle and stall, the wail 
Of my tortured kin proclaims the sin 
    Of the mighty against the frail.

I am a ray from the centre; 
    And I will feed God’s spark, 
Till a great light glows in the night and shows 
    The dark deeds done in the dark. 
And full on the thoughtless sleeper 
    Shall flash its glaring flame, 
Till he wakens to see what crimes may be 
    Cloaked under an honoured name.

The same Force formed the sparrow 
    That fashioned man, the king; 
The God of the Whole gave a spark of soul 
    To furred and to feathered thing. 
And I am my brother’s keeper, 
    And I will fight his fight, 
And speak the word for beast and bird, 
    Till the world shall set things right.

Let no voice cavil at Science– 
    The strong torch-bearer of God; 
For brave are his deeds, though dying creeds, 
    Must fall where his feet have trod. 
But he who would trample kindness 
    And mercy into the dust– 
He has missed the trail, and his quest will fail: 
    He is not the guide to trust.

For love is the true religion, 
    And love is the law sublime; 
And all that is wrought, where love is not, 
    Will die at the touch of time. 
And Science, the great revealer, 
    Must flame his torch at the Source; 
And keep it bright with that holy light, 
    Or his feet shall fail on the course.

Oh, never a brute in the forest, 
    And never a snake in the fen, 
Or ravening bird, starvation stirred, 
    Has hunted its prey like men. 
For hunger, and fear, and passion 
    Alone drive beasts to slay, 
But wonderful man, the crown of the plan, 
    Tortures, and kills, for play.

He goes well fed from his table; 
    He kisses his child and wife; 
Then he haunts a wood, till he orphans a brood, 
    Or robs a deer of its life. 
He aims at a speck in the azure; 
    Winged love, that has flown at a call; 
It reels down to die, and he lets it lie; 
    His pleasure was seeing it fall.

And one there was, weary of laurels, 
    Of burdens and troubles of State; 
So the jungle he sought, with the beautiful thought 
    Of shooting a she lion’s mate. 
And one came down from the pulpit, 
    In the pride of a duty done, 
And his cloth sufficed, as his emblem of Christ, 
    While murder smoked out of his gun.

One strays from the haunts of fashion 
    With an indolent, unused brain; 
But his sluggish heart feels a sudden start 
    In the purpose of giving pain. 
And the fluttering flock of pigeons, 
    As they rise on eager wings, 
From prison to death, bring a catch in his breath: 
    Oh, the rapture of killing things!

Now, this is the race as we find it, 
    Where love, in the creed, spells hate; 
And where bird and beast meet a foe in the priest 
    And in rulers of fashion and State. 
But up to the Kingdom of Thinkers 
    Has risen the cry of our kin; 
And the weapons of thought are burnished and brought 
    To clash with the bludgeons of sin.

Far Christ, of a million churches, 
    Come near to the earth again; 
Be more than a Name; be a living Flame; 
    ‘Make Good’ in the hearts of men. 
Shine full on the path of Science, 
    And show it the heights above, 
Where vast truths lie for the searching eye 
    That shall follow the torch of love.

 

 

 

INDIA LEADS THE WAY IN ANIMAL RIGHTS LEGISLATION

Posted on | by Sandra Kyle

 

The Father of Modern India, Mahatma Gandhi, once said: ‘The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated’.  Decades after Gandhi pronounced these words Indian law makers in the states of Punjab and Haryana have passed groundbreaking legislation, ruling that all animals are legal ‘persons’, entitled to legal rights like human persons.

Echoing an order passed by him while sitting at the Uttarakhand High Court last year Justice Rajiv Sharma’s order stated:

“The entire animal kingdom, including avian and aquatic, are declared legal entities having a distinct persona with corresponding rights, duties and liabilities of a living person. All citizens throughout Haryana are hereby declared persons in loco parentis (responsible for a child in parents’ absence) as the human face for the welfare/protection of animals.”

Justice Sharma also stated: “We have to show compassion towards all living creatures. Animals may be mute but we as a society have to speak on their behalf. No pain or agony should be caused to the animals. Cruelty to animals also causes psychological pain to them. In Hindu Mythology, every animal is associated with god. Animals breathe like us and have emotions. The animals require food, water, shelter, normal behaviour, medical care, self-determination.”

In most of the world, if they have a legal status at all, animals are classed as ‘property’.  Animals were recognized as property in Law at a time when the general belief was that God had given humans special rights – they had ‘dominion’ over the animals.  Animals did not possess moral standing because they lacked rationality and autonomy.  They were mere machines, acting on instinct, incapable of thinking or feeling the way humans do.  As little as fifty years ago this belief (that quite obviously lacked common sense) still had currency.  For example, scientists were cautioned not to ‘anthropomorphise’ when studying animal behaviour.  However, much has changed since then.   Back in the 19th century Darwin made the irrefutable case that humans had evolved from animals, clearly asserting that emotions and not only physical forms had shown continuity through species.  Thousands of scientific studies conducted over the last forty years have now proven without doubt that animals feel physical pain and positive and negative emotions just like us. Consequently, assert philosophers such as Peter Singer, the interests of humans and animals should receive equal moral consideration.

Yet in the most places an animal has the same legal status as a ‘thing’ – a car, television set, or toaster for example.  What kind of law states that animals are more like a house or a pair of headphones than a human being?   It is clearly ludicrous.  Animals are not inanimate objects.  They have the capacity to suffer, and engage in intelligent thinking.   By categorising animals as property the law is treating them as non-sentient objects, making it more likely for us to treat them as if they were.

An animal is not a toaster!

The very welcome Punjab/Haryana ruling comes as there is a worldwide push towards recognising animals as ‘sentient’ under the law.  A number of countries and cities, including France, New Zealand, Brussels and Quebec now have formally recognized animal sentience.  This is the first step towards recognizing animals as ‘non-human persons’ – which should, by the way,  replace the word ‘animal’.  If pigs and chickens in factory farms were called ‘non-human persons’ and given rights more commensurate with people than with things, then it will be a lot harder to imprison, torture and slaughter them in their billions every single year.

In Justice Sharma’s ruling fish and birds will also benefit.  Plundering the ocean’s inhabitants, cramming fish so tight in tanks in polluted water where they can hardly move; keeping wild birds in tiny cages without ever being allowed out, or blasting them out of the sky to hunt them,  will also be difficult to justify when they have personhood status.

According animals ‘person’ status will make an enormous difference.   For example Justice Sharma included 24 individual welfare codes that would take immediate effect.    Animal activists in India, such as Karuna Society for Animals and Nature, Haryana-based Teachers Association For Animal Rights, and Government Minister Maneka Gandhi – a powerhouse who has done more for animal rights in India than any one person – will be rejoicing at this news.   Having recently returned from Haryana and witnessed for myself the reality of animal suffering in that state as it is all over India, I join them in their rejoicing.

The judgement still has to be ratified by India’s Supreme Court, but if all goes well a precedent will be set.  India has paved the way, and now it is up to the rest of the world to follow suit.     According personhood status should be a campaign priority for all those everywhere who work to relieve sentient beings from their sufferings.

Sandra Kyle

HIGH SPEED SLAUGHTERHOUSES A GIANT STEP BACKWARDS

Posted on | by Sandra Kyle

The worst incidences in animal slaughter occur in slaughterhouses where line speeds are increased.  Gail A Eisnitz in her book ‘Slaughterhouse’ talks of pigs surviving the stunning process and having their throats slit, then being dumped into scalding water fully conscious and wounded to drown.   High speed slaughterhouses will cause more of this kind of thing to happen, causing endless suffering to innocent and helpless animals, and putting  even more pressure on the fragile mental health of slaughterhouses workers.   The buying public could end up eating contaminated meat.   There is only one step forward for the slaughterhouse industry, in America and worldwide, and that is to wind down until full closure is achieved.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/mar/06/ive-seen-the-hidden-horrors-of-high-speed-slaughterhouses

 

‘I’ve Seen You In The Meat Aisle’, by Emily Murphy

Posted on | by Sandra Kyle
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I’ve seen you in the meat aisle

Seen you choosing what to eat

Eyeing up their body parts

In rows all nice and neat.

I’ve seen you grabbing bottled milk

That wasn’t made for you

And I know you never think about

The suffering they knew.

I’ve watched you fill your trolley up

With misery and pain.

Eggs and cheese, a leg, a wing

My heart just broke again.

You say I should respect your choice

That it’s your right to choose

Well legally perhaps you win

But morally you lose.

I don’t know how you do it

But you close your ears and eyes

To the slaughterhouse, the blood and screams

Their fear, despair and cries.

It doesn’t even cross your mind

You bite and drink and chew

And you keep yourself from knowing

They died because of you.

So no, I don’t respect your choice

There’s no respect from me

You are putting in your stomach

Someone you refuse to see.

The animals, they have no voice

Convenient for you

 

But have a heart and look at those

WHO LOST THEIR LIVES FOR YOU

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Foxes in the Hen House

Posted on | by Sandra Kyle | 2 Comments on Foxes in the Hen House

Jacinda Ardern and the New Zealand Government appear to have  a blind spot in Brand Kindness, writes Save Animals from Exploitation’s Campaigns Officer MONA OLIVER.

Tens of thousands of NZ animals are still enduring horrendous conditions on ships bound for countries with low animal welfare and unregulated slaughter. The government needs to extend its circle of compassion and start fronting up with answers to the question of Live Export.

https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/opinion/112195693/when-will-the-governments-brand-kindness-be-extended-to-animals?fbclid=IwAR2U-qLOiQzICdL8m3qThyDYBkztFcM64ZxRCQTGvil2RlCfMAr1YOsW4lo

We’re sorry, Dr Drip….

Posted on | by Sandra Kyle | 2 Comments on We’re sorry, Dr Drip….

The story of Dr Drip highlights what is wrong in the horseracing industry, write Lynley Tulloch and Sandra Kyle.

Dr Drip was an American multi-stakes winner, a racehorse with an impressive pedigree, bred for big things.   During his career he earned a barrel of money for his owners but when he was no longer profitable they got rid of him.    Many ex-racehorses go unceremoniously straight  to slaughter at a fraction of their natural life span, but Dr Drip changed hands between owners until he ended up with Jermaine Dewayne Doucet Jr, an 18-year-old from an impoverished Louisiana community.   The day he was discovered Dr Drip had no water and the pile of hay in his pen was molding and inedible.  He was so weak and skinny that he didn’t even have the energy to swish the flies off his tail, and his underside was covered with maggot-infested sores.   The ex-thoroughbred was too far gone to save, and was euthanised the next day.

Dr Drip had been a magnificent specimen in his prime, a perfect  example of equine athleticism.   Yet even though they are large, strong animals horses are very easily hurt, especially when they are being whipped to run at dangerously high speeds on hard ground.   

That racing hurts horses should be obvious.   Those who think a day at the races is harmless are either uninformed, or don’t care about horses.        No doubt it’s great fun for people who attend race meets in their thousands, wearing slinky dresses and stiletto heels, derby hats and bow ties,  and sipping champagne.  It’s an opportunity to see and be seen, get a little tipsy, and if you’re lucky go home richer than you arrived.   What’s wrong with that? What’s wrong with having a bit of fun? 

There’s no problem with having fun so long as your fun does not hurt other beings.  In horse racing as in so many other cases, we think nothing of exploiting animals for our benefit.  Whipping a horse on to go at ever more dangerous speeds is just one  example.   Another, widespread in the industry, is to begin training horses at the age of just two years old when their bones have not stopped growing.   Intensive training at this stage can cause tendons to break and bones to chip and fracture.    Burst arteries is another injury that is more likely to happen to a juvenile horse.   A number of  racehorse deaths are  caused by forcing a horse to perform on pre-existing injuries, which are not always obvious. Horses, like many animals, are very stoic.  They could be in constant pain and you might not even know it.  The problem of horse injuries and deaths is further complicated by the use of drugs .   A racehorse who is laid off because of injuries is not profitable for the owners, so unscrupulous veterinarians and trainers administer drugs to mask the effects, resulting in the injury being aggravated and worsened. 

 International animal rights organisation, PETA claim that studies show one in 22 horses fail to finish a race due to injuries sustained and that three thoroughbreds die every day in North America from race injuries.  In the past eighteen weeks, there have been 28 horse deaths at just one racetrack, Santa Anita Park in Los Angeles. 

Like many other racehorses, so long as he was winning Dr Drip was safe, but the moment he started finishing further back in the field he wasn’t worth the effort, and was ‘retired’.   We often talk about ‘retired race horses’, as if there is some form of animal retirement that compares to human retirement. There is not – it’s a disingenuous way of creating the illusion that the animals we selfishly use get some kind of deserved rest after their hard work.

Let’s set the record straight. A survey funded by the RSPCA in 2002-2003 in Australia found that standardbreds and thoroughbreds were exited from the industry for a range of reasons – including poor performance, ill-health or injury, or unsuitable temperament and breeding. The fate of many of these horses remains unknown due to no tracking system. Some get rehomed for other equestrian purposes while 6% of thoroughbreds and 17% of standardbreds get sent to the slaughter house.

Horse arriving at a slaughterhouse

Save Animals From Exploitation (SAFE) revealed that in New Zealand 1962 animals were slaughtered in 2011. That is a lot of individual horses for a small country with a small population.   The  problem is we don’t see them as individuals when they’re earmarked for slaughter, but as a statistic.  We don’t look into their eyes and see the sadness, the terror.  For horses  bound for slaughter their trial begins on the truck, where they are sometimes transported for more than 24 hours at a time without food, water or rest.  Such are the conditions of transport that horses are sometimes hurt or even killed in transit.  By the time they arrive at the slaughterhouse they are exhausted, stressed, bewildered and fearful.

When it comes to a quick and painless death, it is harder to achieve with horses than it is for  bovines, sheep, and other large mammals.  Horses are skittish by nature (owing to their heightened fight-or-flight response), which makes accurate pre-slaughter stunning difficult. As a result, horses can sometimes remain conscious during dismemberment. Before the last domestic plant closed in 2007, the United States Department of Agriculture  documented rampant cruelty violations and severe injuries to horses. Gail A Eisnitz, in her book ‘Slaughterhouse’ interviewed one horse slaughterhouse worker who said:  “You move so fast you don’t have time to wait till a horse bleeds out. You skin him as he bleeds. Sometimes a horse’s nose is down in the blood, blowing bubbles, and he suffocates.”

It’s time to rethink our relationship to non-human animals and stop abusing and slaughtering them.   If you are in doubt about whether we should treat an animal like a horse as a form of entertainment and profit, and then send it off to slaughter, then try putting your feet in the horse’s shoes.

Would you like this done to you?

Why are human beings cruel?

Posted on | by Sandra Kyle | 1 Comment on Why are human beings cruel?

It may be hard to understand the precise origins of human cruelty, but the harm our actions cause to non-human animals need not be difficult to change writes End Animal Slaughter’s SANDRA KYLE.

There are a number of theories about why human beings exhibit cruel behaviour.   Christian fundamentalists say that our troubles started when Eve tempted Adam with the forbidden apple leading to The Fall, while scientists assert cruelty is more likely to be the result of our evolutionary past.  

 Many psychologists maintain that in order to be cruel to others we have to ‘dehumanize’ them, as with the institution of slavery in the 18th and 19th centuries, and the Nazi’s treatment of the Jews in the Second World War.  

There is a famous social psychology experiment conducted in the 1960s, known as The Milgram experiment.  Stanley Milgrim and his team recruited 40 men to participate in an experiment on ‘memory and learning’.    The subjects were from a diverse range of occupations and varying levels of education, and were told that they would be paid for their participation, no matter what the outcome.   One by one the men were taken into a room and placed in front of a control panel that ostensibly delivered electric shocks to other participants (actors, actually), who were located elsewhere in the building.   Standing beside them was an official looking ‘scientist’ in a white coat carrying a clipboard and making notes.  As he instructed the men to steadily increase the amount of voltage to near fatal level, every one of the subjects did so.    Delivering what they believed to be real electric shocks the men showed signs of tension and stress, sometimes severe, but even though they could hear the screams from the other room they did it anyhow.

Milgrim experiment on obedience to authority

 Milgrim’s research was considered evidence that German soldiers in concentration camps were only able to carry out such atrocities against the inmates because of unquestioning obedience and deference to authority.

It is doubtful that there is a ‘silver bullet’ for understanding cruel behaviour however.  Sometimes acts of cruelty come from our sense of justice and outrage.   We may want to hurt and punish others, because they have hurt us or those we love.   Included in expressions of cruelty by humans to other humans are some motivated by extreme racial biases.  A recent example of this is the recent Christchurch massacre by a single gunman of peaceful Muslims praying in their mosques.

Some of these theories of cruelty may bear more weight than others, but it could be that pinpointing where cruelty in human nature comes from may be a difficult, and even pointless, exercise.   As human beings we are a bundle of characteristics, and thankfully, along with the potential for cruelty, there is a great capacity for empathy, compassion, kindness and caring.

When it comes to other animals who we know feel pain and fear just like us, the majority of humans would not directly hurt them.    We love our pets, who we think of as members of our family.  Yet there are many animals we continue to hurt indirectly, and this is widespread and sanctioned as normal behaviour. Eating the flesh of animals is an example, especially those that have led lives of torture in factory farms. 

In order to continue with behaviours that deep down we know hurt sentient beings,  we are forced to rationalize, and live with ‘cognitive dissonance’.    Eating meat isn’t cruel because…  Wearing wool isn’t cruel because….  Testing on animals isn’t cruel because…. Having a flutter on the racetrack isn’t cruel because….  I don’t want to think about it… so I’ll think about something else instead.   

To overcome these tendencies in ourselves we have to be ruthlessly honest and courageous enough to change the harmful behaviours we engage in.  As far as cruelty to other animals is concerned, we need to put ourselves in the place of the sentient being our actions are harming.  There may have been a time when we needed to eat and otherwise exploit other animals, but that is certainly no longer true.   If we stop indirectly hurting animals, we will not only become happier and more peaceful human beings, but also develop a sense of wonder and appreciation for all Life.  Refusing to change our behaviours on the other hand, means we continue to be a direct link to their egregious suffering and premature deaths.  Knowing how much they suffer I think the choice is clear. We have to stop hurting other animals.

https://www.peta.org/blog/10-of-the-worst-things-still-happening-to-animals-today-and-what-you-can-do-about-them/

‘Like lambs to the slaughter..’ What choices will you make this Easter?

Posted on | by Sandra Kyle | 5 Comments on ‘Like lambs to the slaughter..’ What choices will you make this Easter?

This weekend, families across the country and around the world will celebrate Easter with leg of lamb dinners and egg hunts.  The tradition of eating lamb at Easter has old testament roots, and was part of Jewish Passover observances before the birth of Christianity.  Similarly, eggs have been a symbol of rebirth and new life since ancient times, but it was Mesopotamian Christians who first adopted them as an Easter food.   

Read more about Easter traditions in these two articles:  https://www.history.com/news/easter-foods-from-lamb-to-eggs )

http://upc-online.org/alerts/180328_the_easter_chick-a_lost_soul.html

While eating  lamb and eggs at Easter reaches back to antiquity we should not in this, or in any other case, accept tradition  blindly.   While traditions are well and good – they give us a sense of comfort, pride and belonging –  they must always be revised and adapted in light of an ever-changing society.   If a particular tradition is cruel or harmful to sentient beings (as in many that involve other animals)  then it is immoral to continue with it, and it should be stopped.    As celebrated Animal Rights Activist Maneka Gandhi wrote in the article ‘Tradition is no excuse for Cruelty’, about a barbaric Indian rite of passage  ritual (Ukweshwama) where  a group of youths torment and slaughter a terrified bull with their bare hands:

 “While I respect culture, this bull-killing ritual causes extreme suffering to an innocent creature and has no place in the modern world. Tradition is not an excuse for cruelty, and many societies have ended or are working to end ‘traditional’ practices—such as slavery, cannibalism, infanticide, female circumcision, foot-binding, bullfighting, and fox hunting—that cause animals or humans to suffer”.

Is it acceptable now to eat the flesh of baby animals to commemorate the birth and death of Christ, himself called The Lamb of God because he submitted meekly to his persecutors ‘like a lamb led to the slaughter’.? Isaiah 53:7:

Is it acceptable now to eat the eggs of mother hens who are confined to tiny cages on factory farms for their entire wretched lives?  Even  free range eggs involve cruelty such as killing one day old roosters by shredding or suffocation.   I think the answer is clear.  The tradition of eating chocolate eggs can stay, but the practise of consuming eggs that involve extreme cruelty to sentient beings has no place in a progressive, compassionate society.

This Easter I hope you will remember the gentle lamb and the mother hen. If you still eat them, it will be an opportunity for you to reflect on the cruelty involved getting them to your plate, and to begin your transition to a harmless diet.

Sandra Kyle

Veganism is Not a Fad – It is a Revolution

Posted on | by Sandra Kyle

Getting on to 25 percent of the entire world is now vegetarian/vegan, and the number keeps growing. The end of animal agriculture is on the horizon. End Animal Slaughter predicts that by 2025 slaughterhouses in the Western world will be closed, exploited workers will no longer have to do their soul-destroying jobs, and billions of animals like Rosie will be liberated. Read about ‘The Year of the Vegan’ here:

https://mercyforanimals.org/2019-year-vegan-mainstream-economist-forbes

It’s Time to Challenge the Status Quo around Speciesism

Posted on | by Sandra Kyle | 1 Comment on It’s Time to Challenge the Status Quo around Speciesism

End Animal Slaughter contributor LYNLEY TULLOCH knows who the animal ‘terrorists are’ – and it’s not the activists!

“In Australia, as in New Zealand and elsewhere, the animal agriculture industry terrorises millions of animals as a matter of routine. They hold them in detention camps, brand them, breed from them, kill their offspring, and milk them.

Then they are sent off to be gassed in chambers (if you are a pig) or stunned and bled out with a knife stuck in your throat (for bovines, goats and lambs). If you are a chicken, it is even worse. You get to hang upside down with your feet shackled while being dumped in a tub of electrified water”.

Read the article here:

https://www.nzherald.co.nz/wanganui-chronicle/news/article.cfm?c_id=1503426&objectid=12222453&fbclid=IwAR0juiXV80wQfhGOaHTSFLxbtL1gU3AyRvD3tRX_9vHgajgNQo-t2vEcmpI

Finding Our New World

Posted on | by Sandra Kyle | 1 Comment on Finding Our New World

We too are animals, and we create our world within our own minds writes End Animal Slaughter Contributor PAUL STEVENSON. When we begin to extend our circle of compassion to include all beings we will transform not only ourselves, but the world we live in.

For millennia we have treated other species of animals as if they were unthinking, unfeeling automata. Descartes believed that because animals lacked a soul they could not feel pain or anxiety, and although his views were not universally accepted they did gain widespread influence.

Rene Descartes

The tragedy is that they helped to provide people with an excuse for treating animals with impunity on a vast scale, and that attitude has persisted right up to the present day. However, we have known since 1859, when Darwin’s “Origin of Species” was published, that we are all related and have all descended by the process of natural selection from one common ancestor. We too are animals, no better and no worse than any other species, just different.

Charles Darwin

The similarities between us and other animals are vastly greater than the differences, especially the similarities between all species of vertebrates. We all share the same skeletal body plan and possess similar organs. We share similar nervous, endocrine, circulatory and digestive systems, all of which operate in much the same way. It cannot be denied that other species experience pain as we do. Similarly, a great many of them experience similar feelings and emotions as us. We are also discovering by the day how complex their societies are. Given the above it is hardly surprising that we share so much in common; in fact it would be astonishing if we didn’t. In view of this we must radically revise our treatment of them.

Animals share not only a similar physiology, but similar emotions

I believe that we have an obligation to treat other animals with respect and avoid causing them unnecessary suffering. The way we treat others has profound implications for us for the following reasons.

There are two aspects to our behaviour – its effect on others and its effect on ourselves. This is similar to Newton’s Third Law in physics, “for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction”. However, although the reaction may well be opposite in behavioural terms,  its effect may be very unequal because of the influence of the mind. Our world is not so much a geographic place as a cognitive one. All we ever know is the product of our own mind, so the meanings our mind makes are our world. It is a world of our own making, our own personal, subjective and cognitive world.

It is our own thoughts that determine our happiness and peace

The way we treat others therefore has profound implications for our own state of mind. Like produces like, and when we treat others well we similarly treat ourselves well, and come to like ourselves more. However, the opposite is also true – when we ill-treat others we ill-treat ourselves and come to dislike ourselves. This has an enormous effect on our personal sense of well being, as in order to feel happy we must like ourselves.

When we ill-treat others we cannot like ourselves and thereby deprive ourselves of peace in our heart. When we speak of “others” we must necessarily include other species of animals for the reasons described above. Now that we know they experience life very much like us we cannot continue to callously exploit them. We cannot permit ourselves to respect and cherish other animals when our sole reason for keeping them is to steal their products and their lives. We cannot allow ourselves to know them and their suffering. We are forced to treat them with contempt rather than respect. As in wartime, we have to deny the enemy’s humanity in order to destroy him.

But in hardening our hearts to their suffering we harden ourselves. In refusing to see and hear them we reduce ourselves into small, hard, cold people. This then becomes our world. We live in a small, hard, and cold world.

It should therefore come as no surprise to discover that so many people live deeply unsatisfying lives. Yet when we cease abusing other creatures and begin treating them with kindness and respect, the opposite becomes true. Our hard hearts soften as we begin to extend our circle of compassion to include every living being.   We do not have to cross oceans to find the New World. Our mind becomes our own New World, our personal Paradise Garden.