Earthlings

I'll Believe in Anything by Wolf Parade

(lyrics here) This song is about wanting to save someone and see the world from their point of view


I grew up with Shadow, Sassy, and Chance from Homeward Bound

I have always been a dog person, a trait that extended far back into my childhood. It all started with a movie called Homeward Bound: Lost in San Francisco, a film about two dogs and a cat journeying through San Francisco to find their home again after they escaped in an airport. I obsessed over the movie for weeks afterward, dreaming of my future, ideally with six dogs in my company. I watched 101 Dalmatians every day, read The Call of the Wild fanatically, and pined for a dog of my own. My love for dogs became so strong that I eventually wished that I could become one. Naturally, I have grown out of this preoccupation, but my love for dogs has never waned.

When I visited China in 2004, our taxi stopped behind a truck with a cage full of dogs on the way to slaughter. To this day, the heartbreak I felt for those animals has remained. Not many people have seen that sort of defeat in an animal: these dogs had eyes that were no longer alive. They were shivering and crawling over one another, each trying to disappear, each trying to become smaller than their handlers had already made them.

Giving up BBQ, especially when one lives in Texas, has proven very difficult

Since that incident, I have been wary of eating meat. However, the pressures of my friends and family, as well as the track coach and the irresistible Rudy’s BBQ all managed to keep me from eliminating meat altogether from my diet. 

Many weeks ago, I watched Earthlings after it was brought up in the movie discussion after the dream sequences lecture, and I was finally able to give up meat.  My friend scoffed at me and pointed out that those examples shown in the film happen only rarely. But they do happen, I responded.  Seeing men throwing chickens in chutes, hitting elephants, and deriding pigs made me livid : who are we to inflict such pain on others?  This sort of treatment, condemned when carried out on humans, is overlooked in many cases involving animals.  “It all comes down to pain and suffering…Pain and suffering are in themselves bad and should be prevented or minimized, irrespective of the race, sex, or species of the being that suffers.” (X729)  My basic belief is this: no one (animal or human) should have to suffer at the hands of another.

Many people, including myself in the past, do not like thinking about what goes into the process of getting meat on their plate. Like the film says, “Who wants to look?” (X714) To reject an understanding of how humans use animals in inhumane and cruel ways is to allow oneself to be ignorant, just as it would be inconsiderate to not want to hear about the means in which some of our clothes are made.  By not eating meat, I hope that one less baby cow is in demand to be slaughtered.  By not buying sausage at the grocery store, I hope that the inventory calls for one less package of butchered pig.  

My dog Alaska: Imagine your pet as the subject of experimentation, slaughter, or skinning.

To a human, being more powerful means being “smarter”, but the definition of mental capability is not the same for all species. We cannot possibly apply the definition of the word to animals, for it is not up to us to 

decide the “smartness” of other species, especially when we have arbitrarily molded the word to fit our culture. What we define as intelligence may be completely useless to their ways of life. Not only have they been on this Earth longer than we have, but they have learned to adapt in ways we are just now beginning to understand. If anything, their “smartness” precedes us by many hundreds of years. Just as Earthlings says, “So beneath the many differences, there is sameness. Like us, these animals embody the mystery and wonder of consciousness. Like us, they are not only in the world, they are aware of it.” (X702)

I believe that because we have the ability to use technology to aid our adaption to the changing world, we should be able to refrain from using animals for achieving our means. We can survive by eliminating meat from our diets. Clothes look just as good if manufactured with fake leather or fur. Isn’t it our duty to give up a few luxuries, to become less selfish, in order to prolong all of the precious lives on this earth? “We are all animals of this planet. We are all creatures.” (X729) We cannot think of things as lesser beings just because they are different from us, and we cannot forget that we all contribute to the systems of the Earth.

Grimm’s Fairy Tales, the origin of many of today’s most famous childhood stories

In many cultures, animals are often given holy value. I remember many of Grimm’s Fairy Tales, in which animals were the mentors of the humans, and lessons are taught through them. This is very similar to the representation of animals in Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, for Alice encounters many animals that are more enlightened and wiser than she. The caterpillar teaches Alice to “keep [her] temper” (Alice 49), and the Cheshire Cat is erudite, giving her advice on her actions throughout the book. Such stories encourage a respect for animals that the human race has often ignored, but “It takes nothing away from a human to be kind to an animal.” (X731) They are born, just like us. They are mothers and fathers, lovers and brothers. They, like us, only wish to survive.