Animal cruelty, climate change, monoculture...the list goes on.

[ChrissyStar]

I feel hopeless and have decided not to have children because of the state of the world (why would I wish to bring a child into this when I myself, do not like to live here?). Does anyone else feel the same?

[Peppermintbach]

Hi Chrissystar and all,

Beautiful birdy: The compost kit you described sounds wonderful. I haven’t heard of it previously but it’s something that I’ll definitely keep in mind.

Thank you so much 🙂 Your garden will thank you for it too

I love how you try to share your knowledge with us, and perhaps even more importantly, you demonstrate and lead by your (own) example.

I know you might be sick of me saying this but I truly believe you are the kind of person who encourages people around you to do better and be better. To care more and think more, and ultimately, to do more and/or make changes.

Your committment and passion is infectious and inspiring 🙂 Just keep being you, dear friend...you lift others higher simply by being you xoxox

Monkey_Magic: what an honour! I’m absolutely delighted to see you here. Thank you so much for writing, what an uplifting and encouraging post 🙂

Your words brought a huge smile to my face. I’m betting that dear birdy, and others here, had a similar response.

I love your open mindedness, receptiveness and compassion. I feel you have a willingness to challenge some common practices as well as reflect upon your own choices, and that is truly inspiring to me...

I admire how you were (are) willing to remove your own shoes, and walk a mile in animals’ hooves instead. I find this really touching and it reflects your growing compassion for both humans and non-humans alike, and a willingness to reflect and evolve...

6 year old MM sounds wonderful 🙂 I think she sounds like she was very sensitive, caring and perceptive.

In this instance, sadly she (you) instantly made the connection between her friend, Lamba, and how he became dinner. No wonder you were as distraught as you were...I wish that I could give 6 year old you a hug...

About your comment on not understanding how suffering can be dismissed, I feel birdy’s earlier comments about disconnect explains a large part of it.

Hopefully as you said, attitudes/mentality and common practices will shift towards becoming more compassionate to animals. Sigh, though this might take time...

Feel free to write in any time. It’s great having you on board 🙂

Pepper xoxo

[Birdy77]

Hi everyone 😊

Dear Monkey_Magic

I cannot tell you how awesome it was to read your message yesterday. I got a huuuuuge smile on my face & I actually jumped up and down a few times. Thank you so much for opening your heart & being so receptive and open-minded.

The story of your friend Lamba brought tears to my eyes. 6 year old Monkey understands veganism: animals are friends, not food.

How awful for you to experience that heartache, & to have lost your friend. I am so sorry. That 6 year old Monkey is still in your heart, I just know it. That is part of why you are so open-minded and open-hearted. She and her compassion live on.

That connection that Little Monkey made, is the connection that is missing in the general population. People just don't connect what is on their plate with "who" it was. Animal products are seen as just that: products. Not once-living, feeling beings who love their babies & want to live, & experience fear & terror at the end of their short lives.

If more people made that connection, or if people had to do their own slaughtering (instead of paying someone else to do it) there would be at least a lot less of it for sure.

I can totally picture you going out fully clothed to collect that plastic bag in the water (you do that while your brother runs down the beach in his undies!). You saved at least one, if not many, lives in the water that day Monkey.

Thank you again, for your incredibly uplifting message. To know that you now are more consciously aware of what goes on & may influence some of your future food choices is absolutely wonderful news.

Dear Pepper, of course I never get tired of your beautifully supportive & uplifting words. You always lift me & your words go straight to my heart. Thank you for what you said. Honestly, if any little thing I've said has inspired even a small change in anyone's mind, is wonderful for me.

There is so much to be done, so much violence being inflicted every single minute of every single day. The more people who awaken and expand their compassion to non-human animals who are at our mercy, the better this world will be.

I am crying as I write this. Having you be so open hearted & listening & hearing & engaging has meant so much to me. You & M_M are so inspiring! Thank you.

2 quotes by Alice Walker, to finish up:

Animals can communicate quite well. And they do. And generally speaking, they are ignored.

and

Activism is the rent I pay for living on this planet.

Love & light,

🌻birdy

[monkey_magic]

.....just a quick visit

A lot of different feelings are being stirred inside.

Just wanted to say I watched the worst video I've seen in my life- inside the slaughterhouse....lambs specifically.

The truth about the meat industry and so on...

Need some time to get my thoughts together and wrap my mind around it.

I get it more and more...

😞

[Birdy77]

Sitting with you inside these feelings Monkey ... I get it ... we get it .... the hurt in your heart ...

Just sitting with you in it.

Hand of peace and gentleness extended.

🌻birdy

[Peppermintbach]

Hi Chrissystar and all,

Beautiful birdy: I’m relieved to hear you’re not sick of my words, my friend 🙂 Thank you so much for sharing the quotes...they’re both very fitting and meaningful...

Sigh, to a large extent, I think (some of) us humans can be somewhat species-centric. I think I’ve said this before but I feel, for (some) people, their compassion extends only to those who are “like us”, that is, other humans...and even then, some of us still aren’t particularly compassionate towards one another, let alone non-humans...

Sadly, I feel she was right (first quote) about how we aren’t always willing to listen to animals. For various reasons, I think it can be easier for some (not all) people to ignore or disconnect, or even trivialise, non-human animals’ plight...

I like how the second quote was, in some ways, a call to action/ accountability. While I think caring and compassion is moving and powerful, I still maintain it needs to be backed by action. Or as much as we can at least, given our current personal circumstances and knowledge 🙂

birdy, your words touch so many, mine included. I think you raise the bar for what constitutes kindness and compassion towards non-human animals, which makes some of us reflect. This reflection then encourage some of us to make positive changes...you make people think and care and do and act.

Thank you, dear birdy. I keep saying this and I stand by it...just keep being you. Keep speaking up for the voiceless. Keep sharing. Keep telling us about compost kits (lol). Keep opening up. Just be you. Love and friendship xoxox

Monkey_Magic: I’m sitting with you too...

Sigh, it’s confronting, yes? Some things just stay with you, and I feel you start looking at things with fresh eyes...a different mentality. An awakening, if you will...

I would gently suggest taking your time to absorb and digest what you’ve seen...perhaps your emotions will be erratic for a while, and that’s okay... I feel it’s all part of the process...

I remember, some years ago, when I saw my very first video about something similar (cattle in my case), I felt physically ill...so I’m hearing you and understanding...it’s a lot to take in...

Hugs and comfort...

Pepper xoxo

[Birdy77]

Hi everyone,

Dear Pepper, I agree with you very much. Compassion and caring are not idle words. Compassion is a verb, a doing-word, something we choose to practice or not.

I think we have been taught to limit our compassion. I think in our pure hearts, we are all like that 6 year old Monkey, of course we wouldn't willingly and knowingly harm an innocent, defenceless creature. But society teaches us to have compassion for some but not others.

Look at the outrage that occurs when, say, pictures are published of dogs in cages ready to be cooked in Bali, the petitions that are publicised etc. But the incongruence of the fact that every single minute of the day and night, gentle, intelligent pigs are kept in precisely the same condition in our country, and nobody cares. Because ... you know: bacon.

We've been taught in our particular society to love dogs, but treat pigs as nothing. Pigs are actually more intelligent than dogs, apparently as smart as a three year old human child, and yet they are subjected for their entire lives to worse conditions than the worst criminals.

It's a cognitive dissonance that we are taught ... depending on which culture we are raised. I think most of us pretty much start out like that loving Little Monkey_Magic.
But it's those who do their own thinking, outside the cultural guidelines, and question this incongruence, those who expand their practice of compassion who are seen as extremists. Save one animal, praised as a hero; save many (by not using them as commodities), scorned as radical extremists. On the flipside, harm one animal, get charged for cruelty; harm a whole bunch of animals, get paid for it. It's messed up.

But it's society that mess us up. That messes with our ideas of what's right and what's wrong. It's done by keeping the truth behind closed doors. And when the truth is seen, like Monkey watching that video yesterday, it really shakes you up. Makes you question everything.

Because really, it's all arbitrary. Eat monkey (sorry MM, not you) whale, dolphin, dog, cat in one culture, seen as perfectly reasonable. Try that in our culture, seen as wrong wrong wrong. In some cultures cows are considered sacred ... our culture treats them as money making machines.

I know this has been a rant.

My wish is for all sentient, feeling, thinking animals be treated with loving kindness, gentleness and respect 😢😢😢

I'm off to have a massive cry now.

Love,

🌻birdy

[monkey_magic]

Birdy,

I should be eaten. If it's good enough for me to eat them than it's good enough for them to do the same to me. I was impacted big time by what I saw.

I respect what u r doing- totally!

And I agree with Pepper that u lift ppl higher.

I also want to give u credit.

It's heavy to carry that burden ( mistreatment of animals etc) but u r doing everything u can and more.

I feel that u don't have to carry that- u have wiped your slate clean. I don't feel you have anything to feel guilty for. You are doing more than your bit.

You are a shinning light. Sending you some strength hun. Please don't get too upset by the actions of others. I feel you've been exposed to a lot which grows you but I just want to say all your tears and sleepless nights have nothing to do what you have done. You are carrying more than your share....way way more....

You are an example by what u do and I really respect and admire that. Please give yourself the credit you deserve and more x

🙂

[Peppermintbach]

Beautiful birdy (a wave to all the kind people here),

I’m sitting with you in your sadness, dear friend. Offering my company, a listening ear, and a shoulder to cry on...but above all, offering you a space to talk and freedom to feel...

I know you feel deeply for the cruelty suffered, and how much it breaks your heart...

For now, perhaps just give yourself space for your tears...it sounds like you need a good cry, mine and other shoulders are open to you...

Sigh, I agree with you that the child versions of most people start out with the potential for expansive compassion. But somewhere along the way, as you said, certain norms teach selective “compassion”...

I read something recently that has stayed with me. This person said s/he believed that (some) people who claim to love animals don’t (necessarily) love animals for their overall protection and welfare, but love how animals make them feel. So this person was suggesting that some of us have a highly conditional, and almost self serving, love for non-human animals.

S/he was suggesting that (some) people love non-human animals for their own purposes (e.g. as “cute objects” that give us warm fuzzy feelings), rather than seeing them as sentient beings with feelings like grief, fear and pain.

While I personally don’t think there’s anything inherently problematic with finding non-humans adorable, I do think it becomes an issue if that is the basis for why a person cares. In other words, I think it becomes an issue if we only see their value strictly in terms in what they can “do” for us or superficially (e.g. their “cuteness”), rather than recognising their intrinsic value as feeling beings.

I agree that cognitive dissonance definitely underpins much of our treatment of non-humans. When that dissonance exists, we can either change our thinking or our actions/behaviour to cope with the inconsistency (or both?)

But I think what often happens is (most) people opt to change their thinking (rather than changing their behaviour). Thus, they try to “resolve” the inconsistency between their thoughts & actions by using personal justifications (thinking) e.g. it tastes good, discrediting vegans, I don’t care, etc.

Sigh, in my own way, I get what hurts you, and what I don’t yet understand, I’m willing to learn, be challenged and make changes.

Perhaps one day, your wish will come true. But till then, we have a long way to go...sitting with you in understanding.

Much love and friendship,

Pepper xoxox

[Birdy77]

Dear MM,

Your post brought me tears. In those tears was gratitude for your open mind & heart, & respect for your willingness to be brave & recognise injustice. To be open to the possibility of change.

It takes courage to do what you do (watch videos, research the truth behind the lies) & it takes people like you to change the world & right the wrongs.

The world will stay the same unless good people like yourself are willing to open to the horrors & to stand in solidarity with the vulnerable & voiceless victims of those horrors.

Your words of support mean so much to me.

Thank you MM.

Dear Pepper,

Thank you always for your gentle presence and for always encouraging me to be free to be me.

It means a lot.

More than I can say.

When you said what you don't yet get, you are willing to strive to understand just said so much about you & your heart.

You have encouraged me to speak up in this space, and be brave. You nurtured me into the discomfort & apparently that's the price of legendary.
I can't thank you enough.

Pepper, your really salient point about so many people only relating to non human animals on the level of what feelings they give them, how cute they are, is so very true.

There seems to be these switches in cognisance that many people use, to protect their own feelings.

Like, these videos that are free to be seen on you tube etc, the videos that you & Monkey have had the courage to watch and endure ... these have been taken down off some social media sites because of their "distressing content".

Which in a way is understandable, as it's exceedingly distressing content!! Dreadful content! ... but the fact that the distressing content is just another minute in another day of "producing our food" should create an outcry to stop the practice that is being filmed! But no, it creates an outcry to stop the publication of the practice that is being filmed!! How messed up is that?!

Just because one refuses to watch it does not make it go away, does not make it stop happening.

They say the best way for evil to triumph is for good people to do nothing. And refusing to open our eyes & see how our food screams is one really efficient way of allowing evil to be perpetuated.

If the production of "food" is so distressing to watch, maybe we shouldn't be paying for it, creating a demand for it, accepting it, tolerating it!

If we are upset about innocent creatures being harmed, we need to stop paying for it to be done on our behalf.

🌻birdy xo

[monkey_magic]

Exactly Birdy,

Really well said. It's triggering when you learn the truth about what these lives go through before you buy them. As consumers I feel people should know. It's only right.

Thanks for shinning a light on the subject, I've been your student.

🙂