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Dear Shi’an,
I attended your talk last Thursday at BF.
You are obviously very knowledgeable on the subject of vegetarianism and I am sure also possess deep knowledge of the Sutta.Your love of all sentient beings is admirable. I only became a Buddhist this year and have much to learn.
During last Thursday talk two of the attendees, one of them the MC, did not fully agree with your presentation.
This is to be expected, as even not all of the Buddha’s disciples agreed with everything he said during his time.
The debate can go on and on but I think let’s take the Middle Path. Let’s follow the Buddha’s advice to the zither player, who was practising very hard but did not see much progress.
Your post on the subject shows that you are still holding on to the disagreement. Brother Shi’an, please let go and let be even though I know you are trying hard to convince people to be kind to animals and be vegans.
With Metta
(Who Shi’an? This is a community blog…)
By the way… What is ‘holding on to the disagreement’? There is no need to at all. The truth is what it is – no clinging is needed to maintain the truth. Even the Buddha had no need to hold on to any truth, while he simply taught various truths as they are, with unrelenting diligence.
What Middle Path? Is anyone blogging about veganism extreme, off the Middle Path? Was the Buddha’s teaching against violence not of the Middle Path? Have never heard of vegans who point guns at anyone to force others to turn vegan. But animals are forced to go under the knife repeatedly. Who is extreme? Truly extreme are those who are apathetic, who do not care, who ask others to stop caring. Extreme are those who continue to consume with greed, with disregard to animal suffering, not willing even to lessen it by consumption.
May more and more continue to be the voices for the voiceless; and never stay silent. Though the animals are screaming away in pain, they are hidden far way; their cries cannot be heard. May no one let go of speaking up for them. Please don’t ask anyone not to speak up for the animals.
Veganism has always been featured in this website. Why ask the folks here to stop posting? Here are more posts: https://moonpointer.com/new/tag/vegetarianism-veganism
Hi,
This is not posted by Shian but by me. This blog site consists of several bloggers.
We are clear that there’s no way to make people to be kind to animals or to be vegans if they refuse to. We are just the voices for the suffering animals with no weapons but just facts. And we certainly do not expect everyone to agree with us. But this will not deter us from continuing to speak for the animals.
I’m not sure what do you mean by Middle Path. Is it to stop advocating about how we can relieve animals’ suffering? To us, seeing sentient beings suffer, be they animals or insects, and yet not lending a hand to help is to be away from the Middle Path, which is to be walked with greater and greater compassion until it becomes immeasurable, encompassing all sentient beings. If speaking up for voiceless animals is not the Middle Path, the Bodhisattva vows taken by Bodhisattvas and Buddhas (as in the Brahma Net Sutra) would be extreme as well?
For those curious, the summary of the 2 unfounded disagreements is that:
‘The conditions in factory farms might not be as intense as that featured in animal activist groups’ videos. And dairy cows are “put down” later.’
Comments (as already mentioned): Factories that allow general visits are by default the less atrocious ones – which is why the activist groups had to film footages in secret. Obviously, those who are allowed to make general visits think it’s all fine and dandy – who have NEVER witnessed what happens on the killing floor, with the shrieks, struggles, blood and all.
‘Putting down’ is euphemism for slaughter. No animal dies happily. The profit-driven animal-breeding industry is not so foolish, as to not fully exploit animals all the way. ALL milk cows are systematically and regularly raped to make them lactate till they are deemed too dry. And their calves ARE always stolen away too. They will all become meat, leather and such.
It doesn’t matter at all, even if animals live ‘good lives’ on any farm. Slavery and murder are already extremes they suffer. As featured in one of the slides, a serial-killer who does serial-killing of humans CANNOT justify his killing just because the murdered humans already led good lives. No one is his right mind will think that just because a human baby grows up happy into adulthood, it will be okay to enslave throughout and kill him eventually. If so, why impose such suffering on any other sentient being? And why support it?
Remember… it was repeatedly mentioned that the talk was to encourage reduction in consumption of animal produce. It’s not all or nothing. It was not so ‘extremely’ unrealistic as to expect total conversion to veganism, though there is feedback of conversion from some too. Sadhu!
May all beings be well and happy, free from harm and danger.
This is coming from a near-extreme vegan (no pun intended).
The Buddha did not say veganism is extreme.
He did not say the middle path is eating meat.
You can find in many mahayana sutras he even encourages a vegetarian lifestyle that does the least harm to animals.
Scriptures and sutras aside. Logic aside. Just go to your heart. Ask yourself honestly. Answer yourself honestly. Why is it you feel uncomfortable and want to defend meat eating when others encourage you on a vegan diet? Why did such a reaction occur?
And we will find that the answer is not that people are pushing their ideas on us and they can’t let go.
But rather we cannot accept veganism and need to defend our habits because this is not the same as the social conditioning we have received all the way since we are young – the conditioning that eating meat is “ok”.
This was something that affected me a little too before I went vegan. The usual reaction to this is fighting back especially if the believes and social conditioning is very deeply ingrained. This is normal.
We may also feel guilty (which was something I felt a lot before I went veg), and in order to supress that, we find reasons to justify our own believes or deny these feelings to defend our believes. This guilt – comes from our natural compassion creating a tension with our own belief system which we have been conditioned to.
Whatever we choose is our choice. But I hope you will eventually choose to follow your heart.
I admire all you vegans for your love for all living beings.
May I know where do your ingredients for your vegans’ meals come from? I assume they come from plants.
BTW, do you know how farmers protect and improve productivity of their crops? Do not pretend that you do not know that they use pesticides, insecticides and fertilizers.
While I am not too sure that fertilizers kill worms and pests and many insects, you cannot deny that pesticides and insecticides kill countless beings.
Don’t tell me that you only choose to protect animals and turn a blind eyes to the killings of all worms and insects.
Brothers, this is samsara. All beings suffer. What we can do is to reduce sufferings.
Please feel free to search the entire blogsite for evidences that we ever pretend, deny or try to hide the fact that we do not know pesticides and insecticides are used on crops.
We never did tell anyone that we do not care about insects or worms. It is very unfortunate that some insects or worms have to die while our food are being cultivated and harvested. Like you said, what we can do is to reduce suffering. Veganism is exactly the way. And if you have a choice, go organic, where pesticides and insecticides are not used. Thus, further reduce the suffering. We know that veganism is not a perfect system, and we never did claim that it is. But it is the best so far, in term of reducing suffering as you mentioned it. Unless there are some ways we can avoid hurting all animals and insects while consuming our food, I think being a vegan is still the best choice so far for now.
Just so you know, people that consume meat, hurt not only the animals they eat but as well as the insects and worms that you are so passionately trying to tell us. If you have not noticed, most factory-farmed animals eat crops too! And the crops used to feed those overcrowded factory-farmed animals can actually end world-hunger.
Indeed this is samsara. That’s why veganism is not about perfectionism/extremism. If you want to defend the lives of countless small beings, the only way is for you to die because breathing also kills bacteria. And even after you die, your body starts to decompose and form lots of worm, when you do cremation, they die.
What vegans are trying to do is to cut down the amount they need to destroy in order to sustain themselves.
Compare the 2 sentences: “since I will still indirectly kill insects when I eat plants, I might as well continue to eat meat.” vs “I will still indirectly kill insects when I eat plants, but I can work to lessen killing by stop eating animals”
Like what was mentioned, you just have to ask your heart. Trust what your heart tells you.