Sep 28, 2011

Animals That Count & Animals That Don't

There's no mistaking it that other animals have been instrumental in teaching us language and counting skills:  The Ark was filled two by two, Three Blind Mice, This Little Piggy and so on...
But it seems that animals in the hands of those who grow/use/kill them hardly count at all unless it's to further profits.


And so animal ag is very interested in establishing National Animal Identification System (NAIS), so that these beings (inventory) can be traced from the AI moment  till they are stamped as the dead meat they've become.
Nope... It's no longer good enough to have the ear-tags traced along with the tonsils, skull, spinal cord, etc.  According to animal ag the global market will demand better tracking... And by their accounts it will "save" taxpayers money in the long run. :/
Yet,  with all the concern for micro-managed accountability, let's take a look at how these lives just disappear when they aren't of economic benefit: 


The Deadstock
Read about the massive deaths in the tens of thousands that are seen as trash - undocumented and unrecorded.  Worthless.


And the very inconvenient issues surrounding the volume of flesh waste that must be disposed of.
And the lives that are counted as "junk" when they outlive their economic "purpose". 


Yes indeed... Other animals did teach us to calculate very well.  And so we multiply their numbers -  And add their worth.  We subtract their meaning and divide ourselves from the essence that is them.  Such good mathematicians in our callousness and greed.


But there's another kind of equation to be done...  And it's in recognizing that they are counting on us to speak in their behalf.  Counting on us to know that each single-one of their lives have meaning.  Counting on us to never, ever sell them out...
We Are All Friends by Madeleine Tuttle
The first, best way is to go vegan.  They are counting on YOU!

10 comments:

veganelder said...

The only way to live as a nurturer instead of a destroyer is to go the ethical vegan route. Maybe it seems too hard to so many because it is so strightforward and simple.

CQ said...

Never was the axiom "a picture is worth a thousand words" truer than in this blog, Bea. The image of the still-live cow in that metal device (I don't even want to ASK what it is and what it does) and of the cow carcasses piled up in the open bed of the truck are positively revolting, and unutterably sad.

V.E., your comments are always short and sweet, straightforward and simple. Truth is just that, no more, no less, as you say.

That's why children can grasp unerring, absolute Truth -- and all the truths that stem from it -- so easily. I never tire of quoting Leo Tolstoy's trenchant observation about children and truth -- and truth's counterfeit: "Hypocrisy in anything whatever may deceive the cleverest and most penetrating man, but the least wide-awake of children recognizes it, and is revolted by it, however ingeniously it may be disguised."

Bea, your thoughts about which animals count and which don't, about the different ways and places and books in which we count and record numbers of animals, and about how animals are counting ON us to care are yet another example of how your blogs pull back the curtains to expose what's been there all along: the well-obscured obvious.

Harry said...

The matter of factness in the tone of this quote from the Heat Deaths article is indicative of how are fellow beings are held in such low regard: “Overall it really doesn’t stand out to me,” Anderson said. “Anytime when your power goes out and your backup generator fails, and you can’t ventilate, and you can’t get water to animals, you are going to have extreme death loss. ....”

"Junk cattle" is a term that I had not heard before; it appalls me as much as that horse-racing term "wastage". Look at a cow. Look at a horse. They both have such large, saucer-shaped eyes granting us huge, clear windows through which to admire their gentle, herbivorous natures - and their heart-wrenching fear when threatened. Meek, gentle, peaceable fellow beings. Sad, cowardly, murdering humans.

I want to cry. I want to rage. Please, please, PLEASE Fellow Humans, wipe the blood from your lips for the very last time. Go vegan.

Nicola said...

I have to say, the talk of waste infuriates me above all else. That humans see animals as a disposable commodity with leftovers and junk part and parcel, is repulsive and literally sickens me.

As if it wasn't bad enough that humans insist on raising animals for their flesh, now we see them raising animal slaves for NOTHING. No use whatsoever. Cannot be bothered to use them, to keep them alive, to set them free, to record it. It's as if they never existed. As if they didn't suffer unimaginable pain from start to finish. Look what greed has done to people. I'm truly ashamed.

Bea Elliott said...

Right VE - The solution is so basic... A no-brainer... It's idiot proof. It's only the pseudo-intellectuals that want to make it complex. A sure way to make the masses doubt themselves. Best advice is to encourage people to listen to their inner wisdom --- We all know what it's telling us.
I agree - It's very simple.
Thanks for the truth - yet again...

Bea Elliott said...

Hi CQ - I like that Tolstoy quote too! For me in child-like fashion I always see the Emporer's New Clothes... The crowds and mobs all in agreement about how lovely the fabric is! What a beautiful color it is! How nice a fit it is... Then out of the mouth of a babe, "The guy's naked!"

It was always a favorite of mine, but even more so after the other-animal's reality was revealed to me... Any pretty lie can be undressed by those who have the courage to do so.

Thanks for appreciating my way of expressing what I think and feel - And for all you do to expose the obvious as well... Sooner or later - They've just got to see!

Bea Elliott said...

Harry what a beautiful way of expressing the true nature of these innocent ones.

The disregard and malice done towards them only shows our species as depraved...

With such gentle beings treated so viciously I wonder sometimes do we hate them? Hate them for being so flawless and pure? Meanwhile our own species seems to be evermore in a process of decay.

My latest realization of this came today when I heard of a festival in Arkansas where planes fly 1,000 feet and throw living turkeys out so the crowd can watch and mock their inevitable end. I wailed with sorrow... Lately I can't even get mad and I don't know what that's about...

Anyway, I'm sorry for junk cows. Sorry for "accidents" that happen to billions repeatedly. Sorry for the whole damn mess we've created. :(

I can only echo your urgent plea: Please, please, PLEASE Fellow Humans, wipe the blood from your lips for the very last time. Go vegan! Please!

Bea Elliott said...

Hi Nicola - I know what you mean about the sickening way the profiteers and flesh peddlers treat life like trash.

In just the thriftiness of resources - Anyone should be appalled. These commodity industries are indeed the most wasteful in the way they utilize and dispose of "inventory". A photo and story such as this says it all: http://blogs.pe.com/politics/2011/10/supreme-court-upcoming-case-st.html
I can only conclude we are ravenous, ogres.

How long we can continue to devour - How long can we deny that in our gluttony we cast away the most important things that make us even slightly worthy of a scrap of time on this planet? If kindness isn't our unpaid debt here... I don't know what is. :/

I share your anger and shame at our species... But I'm also ever grateful for your decisions that seek a cure.
Thank you.

Have Gone Vegan said...

Literal piggy banks? Good grief.

Bea, you asked in a comment above whether we hate the sentient beings we treat so badly. What I'm starting to think is that maybe we as a species hate ourselves. Perhaps it's an expression of self-loathing that we project onto innocent others?

Bea Elliott said...

I know... The piggy bank carcasses are pretty disgusting. :(

That's interesting what you say about our self-loathing. I read somewhere that as our civilization becomes further removed from nature - On a sub-conscious level we see ourselves as not above it all, but instead false and deceptively shallow.

And to an extent I guess that's true... The best thing I know about nonhumans is that you always get exactly what's real... I don't know that there's anything we could envy more?

When we envy those "lowly" animals... It certainly must make us despise our own (inferior/fake) species.

It sure is something to think on - Thanks for the food for thought. ;)