My brain has been overactive for the past one day and it's giving me insomania now - one of the rarest things I ever experienced. In this zombie-like state lots of inspiration is going through my head and I was reminded of one of the things that I thought of some time ago.
I believe most people go vegan or vegetarian for a reason not only for themselves, perhaps you went veg because can't stand the suffering of the farm animals, or maybe you became one because you wish to help our environment. For these reasons, we also try to avoid specific industries so that we will not contribute to the things we are not supporting e.g. avoiding meat industry so as to help the animals.
However, I realised that can never happen. Now, why do I say that? Because in this world we are living in, we are all interdependent. No man is an island. Say if you buy a toyata pirus, the money goes to the people in the company. Shareholders, employees etc. These people then go and buy some meat from the supermarket. Even if it goes to the hands of a vegan, when it's passed several times around, it will probably still be spent on something which we will never want to spent a dime on. However, a positive outlook to this issue is that the money can end up in vegan societies, environmental efforts etc. and promote veganism.
We cannot isolate ourselves from the meat, dairy etc. industry, no matter what we do, we will always be linked to the people in these industries. Even if we don't support them in terms of money, we support them in terms of making the planet more sustainable for example. The only thing we can do is to contribute least directly to these industries (by going veg) and promote veganism. I think this is also an important reason why we should be friends with as many people as possible and shake hands with our enemies. The more people we can convince to go vegan, the better it is for the "interdependent" situation. I believe too that if people can see this, they will also be more willing to contribute to society because that's actually one of the selfish things you can do for yourself.
Tian Yuan Vegetarian
3 years ago
6 comments:
We are all interdependent but by limiting our consumption we contribute less to unjust systems.
Hmmm... yes, you have a point too :) but we will contribute less to just systems as well.. :S
I feel no matter how interconnected we are to each other, everybody has a choice. A choice to choose compassionately. I mean how can we be responsible for other's bad deeds when we can't even claim merits over a good deed that we have no intention or did not perform?
However, i totally agree with your last point :)
Well, thats true we can't be responsible for other people's action :D
I was refering more to how the money will flow around, more on the economic aspects rather than the karmic aspects if that's what you mean :)
The last point I edited from this quote "The most selfish thing you can do is to be unselfish". I think it's in line with karmic aspects as well as the thinking of new age people who believe in the law of abundance.
Oh, it's true, in economic aspect it can be disheartening to see good money been "misused"...
But as long as there are people like you, there is still hope :)
haha.. I am only 1 person, as long as there are ppl like you and vegans and vegetarians all over the world, there's always hope :)
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