I woke up in shock this morning; after a rather disturbing dream:
A dear friend took me out for the day; an exhibition, lunch, a bit of shopping maybe... We were joined by like-minded people and somehow were offered free meals for all in my group as together we made up the hundredth customer to walk through the door. What a stroke of luck, we were very grateful to the landlady.
Then I quietly asked if she had a vegan option on the menu and she said sure I've got something for you...
When my turn comes to be served, I receive a large plate on which sits a live broiler whose underside has been cooked for consumption and the landlady threatens to charge everyone for the expensive meal if I don't eat what's on my plate.
The cook turns up and coos to the hen that she's so sorry she had to do those horrible things to her but it was my fault, the vegan who dared to come out...
I make the decision to take my hen and leave, aware that I'm being chased. I try to hide in a boat yard (escape over the sea), then a library (knowledge is freedom), but they find me and take the hen, who by then is eating grain and salad that I gave her...
I am taken back to the inn and made to sit back in my place where I am served the top part of a leg and the deal has changed: You eat this and all the hens will be freed - I eat two mouthfuls and manage not to retch [victory fist]; my group cheer.
I go to retrieve my hen but she seems dead, I pet her neck but she flinches then I realize they would not even have had the mercy to end the animal's suffering as they served me her own leg to eat...
I ask why and they whisk her away and say they die quick enough in the sanitizing bath of boiling water! The tank has a glass wall so I can witness the beautiful bird's last moments in this cruel world -with blue lights shining through the water it almost looks as though a fluffy white cloud had drifted through blue sky... But I know. These are her beautifully soft white feathers floating in the water that is boiling her alive.
How shall I ever get over this mental torture? How is such physical torture still allowed in our 21st century civilized society?
It was just a nightmare. Just a bad dream, it's made up... Just made up? You think this is too extreme to be real? Japanese restaurants do serve live octopus for their guests to dig in, cutting into the live animal to devour its flesh without any thought for its sentience. Vivisection at the dining table.
Many birds only die at the boiling water tank due to increased attention to productivity rather than decency while taking those animals' lives. Same for the cows who have their pelt ripped off their bodies when they are still breathing and crying from the agonising pain inflicted upon them; not every stunning station is fully functioning, you see... Same for the pigs who are crammed into a gas chamber, screaming and desperately struggling for dear life while slowly inhaling poison. Same for countless animals who asked for nothing but to be left alone, allowed to live in peace, free from harm...
We know all this because some brave activists have infiltrated the decadent food system we depend on, right now, in 2023, when there are plenty of alternative plant-based foods to choose from. Those heroes have stood and watched, recording the mundane as well as the atrocious, all sanctioned by the so-called Red Tractor and RSPCA-Assured labels... Some footage has made it at last to the mainstream channels, thank God.
They are heroes because they suffer, too. How can you not be affected deep in your heart and soul when you witness atrocities and can do nothing to stop them, because it's all legal. Because there is such a demand for the end products.
Many go on to suffer from depression and PTSD after those excruciating experiences of empathy.
But it takes at least that much to redeem humankind for the amount of apathy which surrounds the 'killing for food' system.
You want Change for Good? Change what you demand to eat, what you demand your garden to look like, what you expect your travelling time to be...
Going vegan is no more extreme than installing solar panels up on your roof.
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