Great minds reflect on vegetarianism (continued)
SINCE time immemorial the wise and sensible minded people advocated vegetarianism for all humanity hence their message is remains important.
“A man can live and be healthy without killing animals for food; therefore, if he eats meat, he participates in taking animal life merely for the sake of his appetite. And to act so is immoral.” Leo Tolstoy (1828 – 1910).
“Of all the creatures, man is the most detestable. Of the entire brood, he is the one that possesses malice. He is the only creature that inflicts pain for sport, knowing it to be pain.
The fact that man knows right from wrong proves his intellectual superiority to the other creatures; but the fact that he can do wrong proves his moral inferiority to any creature that cannot.” Mark Twain (1835 – 1910).
“Non-violence leads to the highest ethics, which is the goal of all evolution. Until we stop harming all other living beings, we are still savages.” Thomas Edison (1847 – 1931).
“Think of the fierce energy concentrated in an acorn! You bury it in the ground, and it explodes into an oak! Bury a sheep, and nothing happens but decay.
“Animals are my friends and I don’t eat my friends.” George Bernard Shaw (1856 – 1950).
“At the moment our human world is based on the destruction of millions of non-humans. To perceive this and to do something to change it in personal and public ways is to undergo a change of perception akin to religious conversion.
“Nothing can ever be seen in quite the same way again because once you have admitted the terror and pain of other species you will, unless you resist conversion, be always aware of the endless permutations of suffering that support our society.” Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (1859 – 1930).
“Truly man is the King of Beasts, for his brutality exceeds theirs. We live by the death of others: we are burial places!
“I have from an early age abjured the use of meat, and the time will come when men such as I will look on the murder of animals as they now look on the murder of men.” From “The Romance of Leonard da Vinci.” Dmitry Sergeyevich Merezhkovsky (Russian, 1865 – 1941).
“It ill becomes us to invoke in our daily prayers the blessings of God, the Compassionate, if we in turn will not practice elementary compassion towards our fellow creatures.
“The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated.” Mahatma Gandhi (1869 – 1955).
“Until he extends the circle of his compassion to all living things, man will not himself find peace.” Albert Schweitzer (1875 – 1965).
“It is my view that the vegetarian manner of living, by its purely physical effect on the human temperament, would most beneficially influence the lot of mankind.” Albert Einstein (1879 -1955).
“In all the round world of Utopia there is no meat. There used to be, but now we cannot stand the thought of slaugh- terhouses.
“And it is impossible to find anyone who will hew a dead ox or pig. I can still remember as a boy the rejoicings over the closing of the last slaughterhouse.” Herbert George Wells (1886 – 1946).
“In fact, if one person is unkind to an animal it is considered to be cruelty, but where a lot of people are unkind to animals, especially in the name of commerce, the cruelty is condoned and, once large sums of money are at stake, will be defended to the last by otherwise intelligent people.” Ruth Harrison (1920 – 2000).
“When we kill the animals to eat them, they end up killing us because their flesh, which contains cholesterol and saturated fat, was never intended for human beings.” William Roberts, MD (1932 – present).
“Humans -who enslave, castrate, experiment on, and fillet other animalshave had an understandable penchant for pretending animals do not feel pain. A sharp distinction between human and “animals” is essential if we are to bend them to our will, make them work for us, wear them, eat them – without any disquieting tinges of guilt or regret.
“It is unseemly of us, who often behave so unfeelingly toward other animals, to contend that only humans can suffer. The behaviour of other animals renders such pretensions specious.
“They are just too much like us.” Carl Sagan (1934 – 1996 AD).
“What we have come to consider as “normal” illnesses of aging are really not normal. In fact, these findings indicate that the vast majority, perhaps 80 – 90% of all cancers, cardiovascular diseases, and other forms of degenerative illnesses can be prevented, at least until very old age, simply by adopting a plant-based diet.” Colin Campbell, MD (1934 – present).
“I do not see any reasons why animals should be slaughtered to serve as human diet when there are so many substitutes. After all, man can live without meat. It is only some carnivorous animals that have to subsist on flesh.
“Killing animals for sport, for pleasure, for adventures, and for hides and furs is a phenomenon which is at once disgusting and distressing. There is no justification in indulging in such acts of brutality…
“Life is as dear to a mute creature as it is to a man. Just as one wants happiness and fears pain, just as one wants to live and not die, so do other creatures.” The Dalai Lama (1935 – present).
“If slaughterhouses had glass walls, everyone would be a vegetarian.” Paul McCartney (1942 – present).
“The beef industry has contributed to more American deaths than all the wars of this century, all natural disasters, and all automobile accidents combined. If beef is your ideal of “real food for real people,” you’d better live real close to a real good hospital.” Neal D. Barnard, MD (1953 – present).
“We all love animals. Why do we call some ‘pets’ and others ‘dinner?’” Kathryn Dawn Lang a.k.a. k.d.lang (1961 – present).
In short, for the betterment of life on earth, the magical/wonderful words are; green r/evolution, eco-friendly and in harmony with nature. Together we make a change. ◆ (www.rastafarianperspectives.com or www.rastafari.co.zw)