We continue with a brief retelling of Will Tuttle, Ph.D., The World Peace Diet. This book is a voluminous philosophical work, which is presented in an easy and accessible form for the heart and mind.
“The sad irony is that we often peer into space, wondering if there are still intelligent beings, while we are surrounded by thousands of species of intelligent beings, whose abilities we have not yet learned to discover, appreciate and respect …” – Here is the main idea of the book.
The author made an audiobook out of Diet for World Peace. And he also created a disk with the so-called , where he outlined the main ideas and theses. You can read the first part of the summary “The World Peace Diet” . Today we publish another thesis of Will Tuttle, which he described as follows:
Inheritance of the practice of violence
It is very important not to forget that eating food of animal origin is our age-old habit, our bad heredity. None of us, the author assures us, would choose such a habit of our own free will. We were shown how to live and eat. Our culture, from the most ancient, forces us to meat-eating. Anyone can go to any grocery store and see how the habit is formed. Go to the section of baby food and you will see with your own eyes: food for babies up to a year already includes meat. All kinds of mashed potatoes with rabbit meat, veal, chicken or turkey meat. Almost from the very first days of life, meat and dairy products have been included in our diet. In this simple way, we train our young generation from the very first days to eat animal meat.
This behavior is passed down to us. It is not something we have consciously chosen ourselves. Meat-eating is imposed on us from generation to generation, at the deepest level, as part of the process of our physical development. It’s all done in such a way and at such an early age that we can’t even question whether it’s the right thing to do. After all, we did not come to these beliefs on our own, but they put them into our consciousness. So when someone tries to start a conversation about this, we just don’t want to hear. We’re trying to change the subject.
Dr. Tuttle notes that he observed with his own eyes many times: as soon as someone raises a similar question, the interlocutor quickly changes the subject. Or he says that he urgently needs to run somewhere or do something … We do not give a reasonable answer and react negatively, because the decision to eat animals did not belong to us. They did it for us. And the habit has only grown stronger in us – parents, neighbors, teachers, the media …
The social pressure exerted on us throughout life makes us see animals only as a commodity that exists solely to be used as food. Once we start eating animals, we continue in the same vein: we make clothes, we test cosmetics on them, we use them for entertainment. In different ways, animals are inflicted with a huge amount of pain. A wild animal will not allow tricks to be performed on itself, it will obey only when it is inflicted with terrible pain. Animals in circuses, rodeos, zoos are subjected to starvation, beatings, electric shocks – all in order to later perform concert numbers in a brilliant arena. These animals include dolphins, elephants, lions – all those used for entertainment and so-called “education”.
Our use of animals for food and other forms of exploitation are based on the idea that they are merely a means for our use. And this idea is supported by the constant pressure of the society in which we live.
Another important factor, of course, is that we simply like the taste of meat. But the pleasure of tasting their flesh, drinking milk or eggs can in no way serve as an excuse for the pain and suffering inflicted on them, for constant killing. If a man experiences sexual pleasure only when he rapes someone, hurts someone, society will undoubtedly condemn him. It’s the same here.
Our tastes are easy to change. Numerous studies in this area have shown that in order to love the taste of something, we must constantly maintain memories of what it is like. Will Tuttle noticed this first hand: it took him several weeks for his taste buds to learn to send signals of pleasure from vegetables and grains to the brain after eating hamburgers, sausages and other foods. But that was a long time ago, and now everything has become even easier: vegetarian cuisine and vegetarian products are now common. Substitutes for meat, dairy products can replace our usual taste.
So, there are three powerful factors that make us eat animals:
– inheritance of the habit of eating animals
social pressure to eat animals
– our taste
These three factors cause us to do things that are contrary to our nature. We know that we are not allowed to hit and kill people. If we commit a crime, we will have to answer to the fullest extent of the law. Because our society has built a whole system of protection – laws that protect all members of society. human society. Of course, sometimes there are priorities – society is ready to protect the stronger. For some reason, young and active men with money are more protected than children, women, people without money. Those who cannot be called people – that is, animals, have even much less protection. For the animals we use for food, we don’t give any protection at all.
Even vice versa! Will Tuttle says: If I put a cow in cramped quarters, steal her children, drink her milk, and then kill her, I will be rewarded by society. It is impossible to imagine that it is possible to commit a greater villainy towards a mother – to take her children from her, but we do it and we are well paid for it. Due to this we live, for this we are respected and we have many voices of support in the government. It’s true: the meat and dairy industry owns the most powerful lobby in our government.
Thus, we not only do things that are contrary to nature and bring extraordinary suffering to other living beings – we receive rewards and recognition for this. And no negativity. If we barbecue the ribs of an animal, everyone around us admires the aroma and excellent taste. Because this is our culture and we were born in it. If we were born in India and tried to fry beef ribs there, we could be arrested.
It is important to realize that a huge number of our beliefs are embedded in our culture. Therefore, it is necessary, figuratively speaking, to find the strength to “leave your home.” “Leave home” means “to ask yourself a question about the correctness of the concepts accepted by your culture.” This is a very important point. Because until we question these generally accepted concepts, we will not be able to develop spiritually, we will not be able to live in harmony and absorb the highest values. Because our culture is based on domination and violence. By “leaving home,” we can become a force for positive change in our society.
To be continued.