Kindness

When I gaze up at the stars and think of the vastness of the universe, or it crosses my mind how many billions of people inhabit the earth it makes me feel reassuringly small. Why reassuringly small? Well, I know my car hitting a nail isn't really worth having a meltdown over. "21st Century earth - we landed on Mars, the ice caps melted, and Dan got a flat."

When I flip things around I'm overwhelmingly big. I'm the most massive thing I'll ever have control of, my actions are the most important things I'll ever do, my words are the most important things I'll ever say.

However as a species we tend to think we are a BIG DEAL, we're humans, and in case you didn't hear, we're sorta something special. So special that because we like the taste of animals we slaughter between 50 and 100 million animals each day, but no major headlines, because it's not humans that are being killed. On the other hand about 70 years ago 6 million Jews were killed.

So yeah, obviously the murder of 6 million Jew is something beyond contempt, beyond disgusting, beyond brutal. What does that make the slaughter of BILLIONS of our fellow animals each year at our own hand no less, purely because we enjoy their taste and texture at dinner time.

It's really messed up. However, my rant about numbers is over, the figures speak for themselves.

I would like to say a little about kindness. More to the point, why kindness is important. Ancient text would somehow have us believe that we all have free will. I can see how years ago this would have been a convincing argument. There's a coin toss, do I pick head or tails, the choice is mine...right?

Consider this, we are a very complex biological system. We are made up of sub atomic particles which form atoms, which form molecules, which form the components of our cells, which in turn form our cells, these make up our tissues, organs, bones, blood and every other constant part of our person which  combined together forms us.

Now if you were to have that exact same arrangement of energy and matter, right from a sub atomic level and put it in the exact same situation, you would get the same outcome over and over again.

Heavy stuff.

Now studies would suggest, as I'm sure you are are all aware, that people who are exposed to violence are more likely to be violent themselves. People who are exposed to kindness are more likely to be kind. Don't get me wrong there are some AMAZING stories of survivors of violence going on to become remarkable, kind people. Although the evidence speaks for itself, if you need more evidence, consider this, those raised Muslim and most likely to continue to be muslims, Christians, Christian, Jewish, Jews, and so on.

So if you're looking for a more scientific reason to be kind, there it is! Kindness propagates kindness, so if you want the those around you to be kind to you, be kind to them.

This trail of thought would lead me to think, "how can we promote kindness,  how can we build a better tomorrow, a more compassionate and sustainable future, when we kill billions of animals just because come dinner time we prefer their taste to lentils?" Saying non-human animals matter any the less because the are not human is like me saying non-white humans matter less because they aren't white.

Does the animal feel? Yes. Does the animal want to die? No. 

Be kind, don't kill people, don't kill animals, be a vegan. It does make a difference. It does matter.