Nothing beats the old-fashioned way of curling up on the chair with a good book.
Norm Phelps is my favourite writer on animal rights and protection. I know there are many, but perhaps I can relate to what he writes because he is Buddhist, hence, whatever he writes comes from the premise of compassion more than “correctness”. Compassion comes from the heart. “Correctness” comes from the brain. You can fool the brain, but not the heart.
Here’s something I would like to share with you. Norm Phelps talks about the beginning of “animal slavery”, of using and exploiting goats, cows, donkeys, mules to do our work for us. He tells us how wrong that is, and I totally agree.
“Animals graze, they do not labor” – how very, very true. And hence, we have no right to make them work for us. Just as we have no right to make dogs, cats, monkeys, etc. do silly tricks to entertain us. Let a dog be a dog and let a cat be a cat. Instead of making them (forcing them) behave in certain ways, we should let them be who they are and understand that that is their natural way of being.
This is a good book, folks. I highly recommend it.
It brings the subject of animal protection several notches up. A good reminder to all of us who profess to love animals!
1. Do not eat them.
2. Do not wear them.
3. Do not use or exploit them.
4. Just love them and protect them from all forms of harm.