Today is International Meatless Day. The 25th of November each year. I didn’t know about it till I read it in the paper. There was a thought provoking article by Dada JP Vaswani about this. Here are some excerpts, verbatim:
1. Reverence for nature is essential, including for the birds and bees, whom I love to call our younger brothers and sisters.
2. My vision of unity and fellowship and brotherhood is of a world in which the right to life is accorded to every creature that breathes the breath of life.
3. We cannot take away that which we cannot give and since we cannot give life to a dead creature we have no right to take away the life of a living one.
4. We cannot speak of dharma, we cannot speak of creation as one family until we stop the exploitation of animals – until we stop all killing! All killing must be stopped for the simple reason that if man kills an animal for food he will not hesitate to kill a fellow human being whom he regards as an enemy.
5. No nation can be free until it’s animals are free. We cannot call this world our own family until all forms of exploitation cease.