Colleen Patrick-Goudreau

Transcription

Hi everyone it's Colleen Patrick-Goudreau from joyfulvegan.com. Welcome to Vegan POV. Today, I want to address the question why care about animal issues when there is so much human suffering and the statement sometimes heard the world would be a better place if people started worrying about other people instead of animals. Thats certainly one point of view here's my point of view. First of all,l there are a lot of problems in this world and there are a lot of people who sit on their duffs doing absolutely nothing. There are fewer people who actually get up and speak out and do something to make this world a better place, a more compassionate place for everyone To criticise animal advocates for the work they are doing seems misguided to me. I think the better question would be What are you doing to make the world a better place? directed at people who aren't doing anything at all if you need to criticize someone hold people to task who were doing nothing. I think that's better placed criticism if you need to criticize someone at all. I also think this question doesn't take into account how connected all justice issues are South African writer JM Kotsay Nobel Prize winner he was on the shortlist for the Booker Prize let's just say thinking man and I like the way he thinks. He said the animal rights campaign remains a human project from beginning to end. Compassionate people all have the same goal. We all wanna see the elimination of oppression exploitation violence because abuse, violence and cruelty all spring from the same source and they all have the same effect. This dichotomy often cited between animal rights and human rights is simply unfounded especially when you look at the fact that all the early founders of the animal protection movement in the UK and in the US were active in many social justice areas they were involved in the abolition of slavery, in the suffrage movement in peace movements, and what they had in common is that they all recognized that this issue is a social justice issue and B it's connected with every other social justice issue. For instance in England, William Wilberforce he was a member of parliament he was the first to introduce a bill to abolish the slave trade. He dedicated his life to it. And he opposed slavery on ethical grounds he was active in educational reform, prison reform, the promotion of Public Health Initiative, advocating better working conditions for factory workers and as an extension of his concern for justice he was a voice for animals and in 1824 he helped found the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals which is the predecessor to the ASPCA the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals which was started in the US by Henry Bergh Henry Burke co founded in New York Society for the Prevention of Cruelty children at around the same time Caroline Earl White an activist who worked on behalf of the suffrage movement and the abolition of slavery she founded the Philadelphia SPCA which became the American Anti Vivisection Society an organization still thriving and succeeding today on the behalf of animals. Henry Salt 1851 - 1919, he dedicated his life to social reform in areas of prisons in schools and in the treatment of animals. I just don't agree that work behalf animals hinders humanitarian issues if anything it makes them stronger because injustice for one group means injustice for all in creating more compassion and non-violence and justice in this world for everyone is what it all about. I also don't think it gives humans enough credit to say that we can care about one thing at a time. My heart is large enough to care about everyone to care about human and non-human animals simultaneously and not only do we not have to choose between the two I believe that notion that we should ration our compassion is exactly what hinders us from being the best people we can be. In fact I think it's our selective compassion that is the foundation of torn hearts and are torn planet. It's because we think we're superior to every other being on this planet that we create so much harm and destruction for everyone. It's because we don't care enough that we're seeing the effects of about apathy. It's because we don't care enough about everyone that we're seeing destruction on this planet affecting both human and non-human animals. If we acted with a little more humility in and showed a little more concern about everyone on this planet. Everyone, not just those who look like us and sound like us talk like us but everyone we would recognize that we're all in this together that were all connected and its compassion for everyone that will save not just the animals but the humans as well. That's my point of view and that's all I got. If you like what you heard today please give it a thumbs up and please pass it on and make sure you subscribe to this channel so you'll be the first to hear about more videos and leave your comments below and certainly support these messages by clicking on the Support link below course you can visit www.joyfulvegan.com for lots more information on living healthily and compassionately . For the animals both human and non-human this is Colleen Patrick-Goudreau Thanks for watching.