Are We Fiddling While the Planet Burns?

Oh very young
What will you leave us this time
There’ll never be a better chance to change your mind
And if you want this world to see a better day
Will you carry the words of love with you
Will you ride the great white bird into heaven
And though you want to last forever
You know you never will
(You know you never will)
And the goodbye makes the journey harder still.__Cat Stevens

We vegans all do our part. At the very least, we are setting an example of what could be if all humans on this earth became vegan. I call it being a pebble in the collective shoe of non vegans.

Outside a chicken Slaughterhouse in Montreal

Karen Messier's Letter to the Editor — Karen Messier’s Letter to the Editor

But some of us also research and write about veganism and some of us protest on the streets with placards filled with messages entreating people to end speciesism.

There are fantastic websites and Facebook pages extolling the virtues and health benefits of plant based eating and veganic gardening.

Anti-fur Logo

Good-hearted and dedicated folk are running sanctuaries for farmed animals who have managed to escape, usually with help, the horrors of the enslavement within the various industries which exploit other species for profit.

We sign petitions for the release of animals held captive in zoos and other establishments of its ilk. Some groups have even managed to launch impressive and in your face billboard campaigns promoting the end to the exploitation of other species.

We deplore and decry the use of fur, wool, silk, leather, all products which humans wear on their bodies as a fashion statement, and in many cases as an offensive and vacuous declaration of status and wealth.

We also talk about the environment and the ongoing and devastating human created assault on the planet, which ironically, threatens our very continued existence. We tell people most emphatically that:

we are killing (murdering,really) the planet by way of farmed animal agriculture and over fishing of the oceans.

But is it enough? Are we getting through to people? Or are our individual and collective efforts falling on deaf ears and are we, like all non vegans who refuse to reconsider their choices,

Fiddling While the Planet Burns?

While one day more of exploiting other species is one day too many and one enslaved life lost is one life too many, we often think that we have time, that it will take time to appeal to people’s sensibilities, to change hearts and minds. Maybe it will take generations, but this is important work and patience may be the key to getting the job done in the long run.

The scientific facts say otherwise. The scientific facts say that we are heading pell-mell toward a soon to be realized catastrophic, cataclysmic planetary meltdown, the likes of which will see the extinction of the human race. We will be taking with us other species, both plant and animal, the oxygen in the air and the water, the sanctity of the dirt beneath our feet, the white of the clouds in the sky. This is the price we will pay for the violence humans take into their bodies each and every day when they feed on the bodies and secretions of other species.

Gloom and Doom you say? These are merely soothsayers and fortune tellers making outlandish predictions that come and go and never really negatively impact anyone. To the contrary, it is the earth who is speaking up, mother nature who is sending us continual messages and warnings of the folly of our human centric ways.

Big business, governments, environmental agencies and most mainstream media are covering up or diluting these messages, sweeping them under the vegetation that covers the earth, literally dumping them into the human created oceanic dead zones, along with all the toxic waste of farmed animal agriculture.

This angers me because I am vegan for the animals, but I am also vegan for my family and my grandchildren and from a wider perspective, the very life of this planet. If we do not take immediate and decisive action, environmentally there will be nothing for our children’s children and their children to leave their families. My family is, after all, my heart and I feel always and eternally responsible for their well being and survival.

The Facts:

In excess of 65 billion land animals are killed every year as food to feed a human population of 7.5 billion, while billions more are sitting in the wings awaiting their fate. Trillions of aquatic animals die every year due to over fishing, by catch, poaching (shark fins) and pollution.

Animal agriculture is the leading cause of species extinction, ocean dead zones, water pollution, and habitat destruction

A farm with 2,500 dairy cows produces the same amount of waste as a city of 411,000.

Animal agriculture is responsible for 18 percent of greenhouse gas emissions, more than the combined exhaust from all transportation.

3/4 of the world’s fisheries are exploited or depleted.

We could see fish-less oceans by 2048

Animal agriculture is responsible for up to 91% of Amazon destruction,

Animal Agriculture is responsible for 20%-33% of all fresh water consumption in the world today.

Ten thousand years ago, 99% of biomass (i.e. zoomass) was wild animals. Today, humans and the animals that we raise as food make up 98% of the zoomass.

Mother Nature’s Response In the Last 12 to 18 Months:

“Piles of dead whales, salmon, sardines and clams blamed on the El Nino freak weather phenomenon have been clogging Chile’s pacific beaches in recent months.”

“Hundreds of dead fish washed ashore in Lake DeSoto in Lake City this weekend, and the stench could be smelled blocks away….the dead fish are bass and bluegills, and that the fish kill is a natural phenomenon caused by too little oxygen in the water.”

“Both wild fish living in the sea and farmed fish using sea water have been found dead in some coastal communes in the town, causing losses of billions of dong.”

Nearly 1,700 geese were slaughtered at a farm in Chiayi County’s after an outbreak of the highly pathogenic avian influenza sub-type H5N2, in an effort to stop the disease from spreading.

“Eight dead California sea lions have just been reported, Making 10 this week alone on the beaches of Vancouver Island.”

“Massive die-off of common murres that began one year ago.The confirmed carcass count is now up to 36,000.”

“Around 40 howler monkeys have been found dead or dying in the tropical rainforests of Nicaragua.”

“Stormy weather washed up hundreds of starfish on to a beach” in England.

And this is just the tip of the iceberg. We are facing the largest mass extinction in 65 million years. A more complete list of mass die offs in 2016 and earlier can be found, with links at End Times Prophecy. I encourage you to take look. Do not let the religious references dissuade you from looking at the facts presented therein.

And for another article on another day – the strange weather patterns of extreme heat, floods, tornadoes, drought and the list goes on.

My good friend and fellow vegan and anti-speciesist AR activist, who is also a veganic farmer, has this to say about the current state of affairs:

Unfortunately no matter what we do, unless the world becomes 100% vegan today, we are screwed and that is not being pessimistic, it is just factual. ___Jimmy Videle

Annie’s Vegan View

So, what is it going to take? Do we need a peaceful People’s Revolution with everyone taking to the streets, marching on governments, shutting down big business?