If Reincarnation is Real
by What will you do now?
Photo by Author, will this be you?
We keep cattle penned, standing in their own feces for months, waiting for them to get fat enough to eat. And chickens are the cruelest kept of all food animals, with most of the males ground up at age day one, the females are kept in tiny, boring, cages to produce eggs, or to grow fat enough to eat so they could be killed at 1/10 their normal lifespan.
What will you do now to make sure that your life will be better if you come back as a hen? Why do you think it cannot happen? Are you so vain to think that you, as a human, are more valued as a life form, than a hen?
What if you are born as an animal destined to be killed only for your hide? Or worse, as a Karakul sheep who will be kicked so hard in her pregnancy that she aborts just so we can have the soft black fleece of her lamb? Or as a seal, killed only because you might want to eat fish too?
What will you do now to ensure that people will treat their food animals with more kindness and humanity? Will you become a vegetarian, or will you lobby against some of the more crueler livestock practices?
Will you spay and neuter your cats and dogs so they stop adding to the problem of unwanted kittens and pups lest you become one who is euthanized at only a few weeks of age? Or stuffed in a sack and thrown on the road to die…
Will you teach your kids that it is not okay to step on bugs for entertainment so they teach their children the same, possibly making your life as a bug somewhat less risky?
The truth is we do not know what happens to us after death, we can assume things. We can say things we WANT to happen after death, but we REALLY don’t know. Since there is a chance we could come back as a person born into poverty in another country, or as a cow in a factory farm feed lot… why shouldn’t we act now to change things so that things are not going to be so bleak in the future?
And when we think of it that way, our seemingly selfless acts of caring are actually selfish, because we are looking out for ourselves in the future.
But…
What if reincarnation is real?
What will you do NOW?
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Post Commentken bultman
On June 20, 2009 at 11:31 am
Wonderful post written with the zeal and enthusiasm of a true lover of all creatures. It’s a pleasure to await these articles.
Daisy Peasblossom
On June 20, 2009 at 12:21 pm
What I am doing. Trying to make things a little better everyday. I don’t know always if what I did it right…but I just keep trying.
Pinaki Ghosh
On June 20, 2009 at 12:43 pm
Nice article. Thanks for sharing.
Deep Blue
On June 20, 2009 at 1:21 pm
Great thinking to level with philosophers who made their philosophy to justify their weird personalities.Yours is somewhat different, you indirectly promote environmental and animal concerns which is socially impractical but globally sound.I think your idea is cheap yet will reverberate through centuries if given attention, unlike a costly defense funding to build a billion dollar nuclear bomber that would exterminate thousands to show the might of one nation. My two thumbs up.
Will
Juhls
On June 20, 2009 at 2:11 pm
Great mind-provoking piece. I totally agree that it is important to value all life, whether it be a bug, a plant, an animal, or a person. With that said, I definitely need to work on not being so scared of cockroaches – they do freak me out. I don’t personally smoosh them, but I’ve always felt badly that I don’t mind someone else spraying or smooshing them. I know they are just living there life, but it will take a lot for me to overcome my bias towards them.
Annie Hintsala
On June 20, 2009 at 4:49 pm
What a great write. Does make you stop and think.
PR Mace
On June 20, 2009 at 5:04 pm
You always have the most interesting point of view. Another thought provoking article.
Brenda Nelson
On June 20, 2009 at 9:59 pm
I like Deep Blues comment ( #5)… that I promote ideas that are social impractical, but globally sound.! thanks all
Ultimately I dont care about the economy, because the economy is an entirely mad made figment of reality, we cannot survive if we kill the planet. We should not continue to behave like the world is a video game that can restore itself.
Mark Gordon Brown
On June 20, 2009 at 10:11 pm
What if we come back as rocks?
I try to make the life of every rock a pleasure.
Ruby Hawk
On June 20, 2009 at 10:45 pm
B, we should consider all you have said and do our best for every creature on earth.But I am also concerned about the economy when I see people without jobs and means to shelter and feed their children. We must be concerned about humans and animals. We could all be vegetarian and save the planet and animals. We know raising cattle depletes the soil and destroys our waterways. Stop breeding animals for food is the first step to take.
Inna Tysoe
On June 20, 2009 at 11:01 pm
OK. But if reincarnation is real and we are (say) reincarnated as a cow, will we remember our time as humans and try to live a better life?
Regards,
Inna
Stacey T Pollock
On June 21, 2009 at 5:37 am
A very interesting way to look at things and the idea of reincarnation. I suppose in the end that all is just ‘experience’ no matter if it is seen good or bad. Even a cow still, while chewing away in his paddock might consider his life grand, atleast until it no longer exists anymore? Who knows what might be running through its mind? But one things is for certain that even in the most dire of situations, there can always be something that can be seen as also beautiful and there is something to experience at every level, no matter the circumstances.
Great article! One that certainly gets a person to think about their position in life.
Lostash
On June 21, 2009 at 6:39 am
I’d like to think that reincarnation is real, but would need some firm evidence to believe it. I’d like to come back as a human, with all my past-life experiences intact. I would certainly enjoy myself even more the second time around….and make sure that others did too!