A little inconvenience

If I, as one person, can somehow decrease, even just a little, the suffering that happens in this world, whether that of a human or an animal, then I am glad to do so.  If I can do that simply by not eating certain foods or purchasing certain materials then what could be easier?  It is such a simple asceticism one that, in the grand scheme of life, hardly can be accurately called asceticism.

I asked, "What?! I can change the life of another fellow creature for the better by not eating dairy and meat and not wearing their skins?  It can't be that easy, can it?"  I sought to answer my own question and discovered to my wonderment and growing excitement that it is that easy.  It has, as of this posting, been over four years and I am still discovering.

I help animals, that much is obvious.  But what about humans?  Yes, humans too.  For those who kill are also effected even if we don't want to admit that.  Killing, killing and more killing.  Millions of suffering animals are harvested for their "resources" by humans each year and they are effected by it.  Sometimes physically but most of the time mentally.  I'll hear objections for hunters or those who own a couple of chickens that the effects certainly can't be all that bad.  They themselves don't notice any and they kill.  But what they fail to see is that a little pin prick on the hand can hardly be noticed, but chop the hand off or fill it with gangrene and the situation becomes more desperate, more noticeable.

Each time I am inconvenienced by having to abstain from a meal or walk past a pair of shoes or a jacket, instead of feeling inconvenienced, I will feel peace and gladness that I could help some worker or creature by this little inconvenience.

Sufferer

I am not against those who provide sustenance
For themselves and their family.  I'm not standing in judgement of them
Nor am I affirming their actions.
Their own conscience must do that.
What is going on in the slaughterhouses is not for sustenance but
For gluttony.
Gluttony is a poison, a vice, a disease, a sin that hurts and maimes.
If we claim to be people of peace, love and compassion and
Condone or worse, ignore what is going on
In these places of suffering and death
Then we are hypocrites and liars.
We are self deluded.
Then we are participants in and enablers of their suffering.
I am against gluttony. I am against the ignorance and dispassion that allows it. I Abhor and grieve the suffering it brings, not only to the one who suffers
But to those causing the suffering.  They are both, ultimately, suffering.

What's in a name?

The World Health Organization (WHO) has released its guidelines on naming diseases that infect humans.  Basically they want the practice of using the names of people, places and animals stopped (For the record, I would be totally honored to have a disease named after me).  The reason given by WHO is that such naming conventions can have a negative impact on the economy.  We actually saw this with bird flu, mad cow disease and swine flu.   So it is understandable that people would be a bit nervous about this, especially if you have a vested interest in the economy such as with a farmer or meat processor, food retailer, etc.

One thing to keep in mind is that what the guidelines are not saying is that current naming conventions are not ever accurate.  The fact is, sometimes they are.  Swine flu actually did originate within the swine population of factory farms according to the CDC (read all about it here).

Although I appreciate the need to protect the economy and livelihood of those who are dependent on it remaining strong for their particular sector, I am concerned that this is not going to ultimately help another very important part of the economy: the consumer.  You and me.   Distancing people from the ultimate problem, factory farming in the case of the examples I mentioned, is only going to feed the typical problem most of us have when it comes to danger: see no evil, hear no evil.  We seem to lack object permanence when it comes to danger.  If I close my eyes, it isn't there.  On top of that, those in control of the market, although often aware of the danger to the public, do whatever they can to make sure the public remains unaware (Just ask Oprah Winfrey and note the continuing battle for Ag-Gag laws).  Let's face it, knowing that pig farms are producing deadly flues and eating hamburger can cause symptoms reminiscent of Alzheimer's does make some people, especially consumers, a bit reluctant to eat the stuff.

I'm going to guess, that even with these guidelines, people are going to continue naming diseases using monikers they can remember.  H1N1 just isn't that catchy.  If the scientists won't do it then the public will.  We just like our names.  Bovine spongiform encephalopathy?  Nah.  Mad cow disease?  Oh yeah.  Not only is it catchier, but it reminds me of why I've not allowed my children to eat hamburger since (just to be on the safe side).

The Real Reasons

I keep getting lots and LOTS of invitations to join this environmental group or that animal welfare group.  I'm sure they have some good things to say and do.  But the fact is, as a Bible believing following of Christ, I am already a part of a group.  It is called the Church.

I'm not coming down on joining groups or anything, but the fact is many Christians join them without realizing exactly what they stand for.  They may say, "We stand for saving the environment" or, "We want to stop the abuse of animals" and those are great things.  But that probably is not all the these groups stand for.  Chances are very good they support a number of people or ideologies Christians should not only disagree with, but have nothing to do with either. 

For example, a group believes in stopping animal abuse (good) but also believes animals and humans are equal (bad), should a Christian join?   Or if a group supports a decrease in the destruction of  natural habitat in an effort to leave a legacy to our children (good) but believes humans are a blight on the earth and the earth would be better off without them (bad), should a Christian be comfortable joining hands with such a group?   I'm going to say "No".  But unfortunately Christians are very comfortable making such compromises.   

The fact is the Bible makes a few things clear that drive my environmental and animal welfare agendas. An argument can be (and often is) made that God intended man to be a good steward of God's creation.  They typically site Genesis 2:15.  I would argue that maybe this isn't the best argument.  I don't disagree we need to be good stewards of God's creation but I don't necessarily agree that there is a biblical case that we are commanded to do so.  At least not directly.  That said, neither do I believe you can make a case that we are to destroy the planet and abuse animals.  

The reasons I hold the views I do on animal welfare and the environment are two fold.   First,  I am to love God with all my being (Luke 10:27).  This means honoring Him in all that I do.  From this I can make decisions on how I will treat the world around me by simply asking honest questions:

• Will abusing animals so that I can wear leather or eat more food than I really need bring glory to God?  
• Does abusing animals, causing them pain and misery, bring glory to God.
• Will destroying the environment in order to have more expensive cars, bigger houses, fancier clothes, more food, etc., bring glory to God? 

Most of the time what we do as Americans that effectively destroy the environment and abuse animals amounts to nothing more than gluttony and covetousness.  And those things categorically do NOT bring glory to God.

Many Christians I know (usually rabid Republicans) make animal welfare about research and the cure for cancer.  However that is only a small part.  What about the millions of animals slaughtered each year in order to fill the stomachs of predominately obese parishioners?  How about we start with diet?

Stripping the issue for the Christian down to the raw I would suggest every believer watch a video of a slaughterhouse in full operation and ask themselves, while watching the terrified animals screaming in fear and pain, "does this bring glory to God?"  I answered no to all these questions and made changes in the way I live accordingly.  In other words, I put some thought into what I was doing and saying.

The second reason I hold the views I do is because I am to love my neighbor as I love myself (ibid).  What we do today will affect those around us.  Either by example or by the ripples of our actions as they reach other people both in this generation and the next.  For example, if the fields around our houses are sprayed year after year with increasing doses of herbicides and pesticides and those chemicals blow into my neighbors' yards and they get sick from it (and more and more evidence is showing that this is the case) then out of love for my neighbors I will eat organically and do what I can to decrease the use of these chemicals.

In reading several books on animal abuse on factory farms I was surprised to learn that the animals were not the only victims. The workers who, day after day, were responsible for the slaughter of these terrified animals were suffering both physically and mentally from the experience. Out of love for these workers I decided to not eat meat or dairy.  

It is true, I am only one person. But I am one person.  And maybe in the long wrong just me won't make much of a difference.  But I think the Bible is clear on this matter also.  I do not make choices based on whether everyone will follow me or not.  If I am the only person to do something when I know it will bring glory to God and show love to my neighbor (even if my neighbor never knows of it) then so be it.

So as a Christian I stopped worrying about the bandwagon and started asking myself the only questions that truly matter: Am I loving God and my neighbor?  Am I bringing glory to my King?  And the answer to those questions have informed what I do and how far I'm willing to go in doing it.

Healthcare Deform

Time for my weekly rant.  Normally I don't write these down but instead bombard my wife, children or any coworker that is unfortunate enough to be standing close by when I go off.  But my wife is cooking, my kids are playing video games or hiding from me and so I am forced to target my blog.

Obamacare did some good.  I'll just get that out of the way.  It isn't all bad.  But to call it "healthcare reform" is over reaching to say the least.  It was in fact health insurance reform.  Our healthcare system is still in an abysmal state right now. Frankly there is absolutely no reason for healthcare to cost as much as it does. But that isn't my gripe.  I have another axe to grind.

Thanks to Obama threatening to sue me if I don't have insurance, I'm forced to get some. I make too much money for state insurance...barely too much.  Thank goodness my kids still qualified or I would be really hosed.  So now I have to pick up insurance for my wife and I.  That comes to about twelve (yes 12) percent of my income.  So now I make less than I did several years ago when I qualified for medicaid.  Great.  So I can barely pay my bills but at least I have insurance.

"You'll be glad to have it when you need it" is what I keep hearing.  And they would be right.  I will be very glad to have insurance when I get cancer or run over by a bus or shot or something.  But in the mean time I get to feel bad about having no savings (for retirement or anything else) and not being able to buy my kids new clothes or paying off my debts.  Right now one of my cars sits in the driveway because I can't pay to get it fixed. I have a really old roof that leaks because I can not afford to get it replaced.  I have a bathroom torn apart and can't afford to finish the job.  But yeah, I'm gonna be real glad when I finally need to cash in on some of that insurance.  Forgive me if I'm not quite seeing the light at the end of the tunnel right now.

I'm healthy.  No, I don't mean I'm not sick.  I mean I actually make a conscience effort to be healthy.  About five years ago I was overweight with high cholesterol.  I would get out of breath walking to my car in the morning for work.  I was on the verge of turning forty and I was going into middle age looking like every other middle aged man in America.  Fat, sick and tired.  My doctor insisted what I needed was medicine to make me better.  I decided to fix myself.  I started running.  I switched to a plant based diet (no meat, dairy or eggs) and I started taking martial arts.  I lost weight, my cholesterol went within normal levels and I got healthier.  My asthma, which I had since I was about ten, and for which I was on a couple of  very expensive medications, virtually disappeared.  My GERD  stopped giving me so much problems.  So much so that I got off my expensive and ultimately harmful stomach medications.  I even found I got sick a lot less.

Did I turn into superman or something?  No.  I still injure myself, I still get sick on occasion and eventually I will get old and die.  So I am realistic.  But frankly I have had little need for doctors.  For a year I was without insurance (the year before Obama struck) and just paid for my wife's medications and doctor visits out of pocket.   But not anymore. Here is what I get:

• 12% of my income is now gone.
• I have co-pays on visits.
• I have co-pays on meds. In fact, I pay the exact same amount of money for my wife's meds as I did without insurance!
• So far I've gotten nothing from the doctors.  Not even a lollipop!

So, this leaves me thinking, as most men do, that I'm paying all this money and not really getting anything except a good little yummy in my tummy that some day will really appreciate having this insurance.  That just won't cut it.  So I start going to the doctor just so I can feel I am getting my money's worth.  I don't need to go.  The doctor never tells me anything I don't already know.  But I feel compelled to do something so that I can feel good about all the money I'm not seeing in my paycheck each payday.

My foot hurts from running.  Plantar fasciitis.  How do I know?  I read and it is pretty common.  What did I learn?  No one really has a good idea what ultimately causes it or how to cure it.  It just comes and eventually it goes.  But hey, I have insurance.  I go and pay my $20 and the doctor says lots of words but the subtitles say "I dunno, let me send you to the foot doctor".  So off I go to the foot doctor.  

The foot doctor says lots of words but in the end the subtitles are the same, "I dunno".  But he x-rays me.  That was fun. I got irradiated.  Maybe this insurance thing isn't so bad after all.  But I didn't glow or get super powers so it was kind of a letdown.  Nothing broken (I knew that already) and that was that.  But hey, no $20 co-pay.  Woo hoo!  Oh wait, turns out they mailed the bill to me.  Darn it!

So being forced, by law, to pay for insurance I don't need, forced me to use the doctors I didn't need so that I could feel good about having insurance I didn't want.  Did it work?  No. Not really.  I was $40 poorer after that experience and none the wiser (or healthier).   What a poser. 

Why is insurance so expensive?  Well, there are a number of reasons but the one that irks me is the fact that most Americans refuse to take responsibility for their own health.  If I walked into my doctor's office and said, "I've been eating cyanide and I'm feeling really bad, could you give me something for the symptoms?"  The doctor would assume I was crazy.  He might say something like, "You are an idiot, Brian!  You need to stop eating cyanide right now.  If you don't you are going to die".   Honest and to the point.  But if I walk into my doctor and say, "Doc, I'm eating beef and chicken for pretty much every meal except for breakfast.  For breakfast I eat coffee and donuts. I feel like crap.  My blood pressure and cholesterol are both through the roof.  How can I get these symptoms to go away?"  The doctor would prescribe a couple of meds, give us the speech about needing to loose some weight and send me on my way.  Did he really help?  Nope. Well, OK, he helped the pharmaceutical company and, due to the fact I will be back...a lot, he helped himself.  So I guess if the goal was to keep people employed mission accomplished.  

What Americans need to be told is: You are a bunch of fat, sick, dying idiots!  Stop eating meat, drinking milk, eating cheese, donuts, candy bars, etc. and start eating vegetables, fruit, nuts and more. Get off your fat arses and start exercising.  You don't have to run a marathon or learn how to cage fight, just do something more than change the channel on your t.v. or waddle to the fridge for another beer and burrito.  It is really that simple.  I'm a lazy programmer.  Trust me, if I can do it ANYONE can.

Will it cost more?  Yes, a bit.  Let's face it, the government paying for meat, milk and eggs kinda makes things cheaper.  But cheap crap is still bad for you.  Ok, so I could stop being such a jerk and say something like, "You can still eat meat, dairy and eggs, just do less of it."  But since most people have no clue how to do that I recommend you just drop it all together.  Let's face it, zero of something is a heck of a lot easier to remember than less of something.   Besides, most of the animal products companies are allowed (and even encouraged) to sell is pure garbage.  A lot of it is banned for sale in other countries because it is so bad.  But hey, give an American crap and if it is cheap enough and loaded with enough salt and sugar, he'll eat just about anything.  Even crap.  

So there you go.  I ranted.  Honestly I think I feel better now.  So I guess being forced to get insurance I don't need really does do some good. Thank you Obama!  

The end.

"You're only as clean as your colon!"

Or so cried Jim Carrey's environmental guy on the hilarious SNL skit. As funny as the parody was (I forwarded a copy to friends and asked if that was how they saw me) there is some amount of truth to his words.  Study after study over the past few decades have successfully linked diet to disease lending credence to Hippocrates' statement, "Let food be thy medicine".  

But what about genetics?  Doesn't that play a role in disease and health.  Absolutely.  Science has fairly conclusively shown the positive (or negative, depending on how you look at it) role genetics plays in the game of health.  But how big of a role?  The jury is still out on that one.  But typically it isn't as big of a role as we like to give it.  At least, from what I can tell, it isn't a big enough role to justify the fatalism I hear from the media or friends and family.

This was brought home to me recently when my sister texted me and my brother telling us we had better follow her example and make an appointment for an endoscopy ASAP.  She said, "It's in the genes!".  Colon cancer runs in my family and the usual recourse is to start getting tested yearly for this the disease after the age of forty.   Now I'm not arguing against the prudence of getting tested.  I am, however, going to argue with the typical fatalism I hear from people.  You have a family history therefore you have a [blank] percentage change of getting cancer.  What would you put in that blank?  30, 60, 90 percent chance?   Do you even know?  The fact is no one really does know.  One thing we do know is that countries with a non-western diet consisting of little animal product intake have a far less chance of contracting disease, including cancer, of the colon.  So what is our response going to be to this information?   Well, for most people it is simply to do nothing but get tested and have their bodies dissected and exposed to deadly chemicals or radiation should disease rear its ugly head.   And to me that is very sad.

I have looked into this over the years and over and over again diet is indicted as a culprit in the disease process.  It won't necessarily stop it, but the numbers are rather startling.  So what do I have to lose?   For me I completely dropped all animal products over five years ago because it seemed worth it.  At least it seemed better than the alternatives.  I wasn't willing to say, "Oh well, I guess that's it.  Colon cancer is in the family so I'll just get tested and deal with it when it shows up."  I decided to deal with it now, before it had a chance to show up.

The strange, but predictable, behavior of people, regardless of the reams of evidence in support of a plant based diet, who simply refuse to modify their diet to any appreciable extent always leaves me a bit speechless.  If I told you a plant based diet will potentially decrease your chances of getting cancer by even 1% wouldn't it be worth it?   But for most people it isn't.  And the percentages are even larger.  We like our food too much.  Call it gluttony, stubbornness, ignorance or what have you, we simply will not change until it is too late and even after the point of no-return we will continue to argue that there was nothing we could do about it. It really is tragic on so many levels.

[NOTE: I could include stats here but the fact is no matter what I show someone will argue with me that they are wrong or the Doctor, agency, study is wrong. Recently I was told that diet has nothing to do with my cholesterol.  Besides this being unscientific, I told them my blood levels of cholesterol and triglycerides improved greatly when I changed my diet to one that was plant based.  Their response? They still didn't believe me and demanded I show them the test results.  They actually thought I was lying to them.  I have done the research to my personal satisfaction and I suggest you do the same.]

Is that foam coming out of your mouth?

I am periodically taken aback at how some people react to my veganism.  Most of the time they are just indifferent.  "That's nice", they say.  Or, "I could never do that. Pass the roast beef, will you?"  But on a few occasions the reaction is a bit more...adverse.  The rise in tension is almost palpable.  It is almost as instead of stating I don't eat meat, they heard me say I don't eat human babies or something.

Now let me make it clear that I haven't always approached things...diplomatically.  But fortunately that phase was very brief.  In a household where some are vegan and some are not I learned, thanks to a very patient wife, to be a bit more tolerant of others.   Not that I always accept their claims but I try to come up with better, more peaceful ways to discuss my views while letting the fact of my veganism speak for my convictions.  So I don't compare the meat industry with concentration camps or eating meat with that of eating human babies*.

However, we as humans have this really interesting reaction to threat of the polemical kind.  When we have a strong reaction to someone's position we will sometimes make up things to show how bad the other person really is.  I don't believe that this is always intentional.  In fact, I believe it is quite often the case that it is subconscious and therefore unintentional.  Nonetheless I see it happen.  I am sure I've even done it myself.

What happens is we will state our position, someone will vehemently disagree, an argument will ensue and even if the whole event was amicable on the surface, if you give it some time and go back and ask either of the people what was said you may find that either or both have some interesting takes on the conversation.  I have been accused of doing and saying things that I know I never said or did.  Or, which is most often the case, the other person only remembers what I said and nothing about the details surrounding why I said it.

Conversation about veganism can be very difficult because we aren't just talking about our health.  If I believe an apple a day keeps the doctor away and someone else believes differently I doubt much will be made of the discussion.   But veganism has ethical implications tied to the word and so the discussion is much more than simply dietary.  This is why many have gone to stating that they are on a "plant based" diet instead of using the ethically and politically charge "vegan".   I personally have decided to stick with vegan because I want people to know, even if that knowledge is only culturally instinctual, that my choice to not eat meat is ethical. I also do this knowing that very few people want to hear it.  They would rather I just eat my salad and shut-up.  But even when I do not say anything, they will assume I did and, well, that's that.

No, I don't believe in "live and let live".  I believe in respecting and loving those around me, but that doesn't mean I am going to capitulate on my morals or ethics.  If that offends some (and it will) I can live with that.  But my actions have to be more than reactions, they also have to be true and personally initiated actions for my part.  I don't see how people can think indifference is anything other than insulting.  Many today seem to think that "tolerance" means I accept everything someone else says as true (at least for them) and therefore beyond question or objection.  Doing that is simple patronizing and not tolerance at all.   Real tolerance is to disagree with someone else and yet still respect and love them.   But because of this misunderstanding, thanks to some pedants in so-called institutes of higher-learning, people think you are being "intolerant" if your words or life suggest they could be wrong.

Of course the problem runs a lot deeper than the dictionary definition of a word.  It comes down to a fundamental misunderstanding of relationships between humans, animals and the environment.  Contrary to what one may think (and I admit that it sounds counter intuitive) to patronize someone the way I described above is an ultimate expression of self-interest and preservation.  It is saving your own face and skin all in the name of "peace" or "tolerance".   In other words you really aren't doing anyone any favors.  Society needs men and women of conviction.  People who will stand up for what they believe even if the entire society stands against them.  Not for bad things or wrong things, but for what is right and just.  If, when I die, the only thing people remember is that I was a christian and vegan, then I'm good with that.  Those two words alone say a lot about who I am.

________

* A lot has changed since I wrote this piece.  I have sense seen that being "nice" doesn't ultimately work for the animal welfare movement.  I don't wish to be rude either, but being honest and up-front is essential to people taking our message more seriously.  I also believe that there are way too many similarities with Nazi concentration camps for us to ignore.  Even Jews who have survived the horrible ordeal see the comparison. This isn't to diminish or even equate the one with the other but rather to emphasize the overt tragedy of both.