People Like Me

People like me. That was the answer I was given to my question of who would care if the Black Rhinoceros went extinct. People. Like. Me.

This thought makes my blood boil to the very point I fear my skin will simply start melting.

There is so much evil in this world. Such mass amounts of cruelty. And no, I will try not to make this another depressing blog about all the suffering of animals that goes on so freely and unchecked. After all, it's only people like me that care, right?

What I want to do is address the utterly, disgusting height of apathy that rules the world today. For instance, beginning on July 1st, thousands of baby sea lions are clubbed, stabbed and beaten to death all so Kim f*cking Kardashian can wear her ten thousand dollar fur coat and be on the front cover of Heat. Yay! But no one sees the bloodshed, only the fashion diva - and that's all that matters in this day and age.

Earlier this week in work when I had eventually worn my colleagues down into agreeing to start recycling, it was met with eye-rolling and jokes about Greenpeace. Someone asked if I believed in 'all this Global Warming rubbish' and when I tried to explain how the Arctic was literally melting away and the animals that live there will be lost, they shrugged and said that that was what zoos were for.

That's what zoos are for......

That's what zoos are for.......

Frustration. That's what keeps me up at night. That's what makes me want to punch walls and scream. Frustration at the lack of care and the total, complete bubble of ignorance that surrounds people.

Frustration quickly escalates into anger and I find myself hating everything and everyone. I hate those that poach rhinos for their horns, elephants for their tusks and tigers for their coats and bones. I hate that tens of millions of sharks are being hacked up alive, their fins sliced from their bodies for soup. I hate that dolphins and whales are slaughtered and kidnapped for humans to make money. I hate the abuse that cats and dogs receive from disturbed individuals. I hate that foxes and badgers are enduring such violent, barbaric deaths at the hands of men and the teeth of bull-lurchers. I hate that cows, pigs, sheep and chicken are harvested without even being acknowledged as sentient animals.

Oh, but that's human nature. That's what I'm told. It's just in the nature of humans to be out for themselves and as long as they are comfortable, with a tummy full of food, and a throne of power then to hell with the rest of the planet.

I just refuse to believe this. We have evolved to marvel at love, appreciate beauty and empathise with species so different from ourselves. How can a species so full of good, be so corrupt? Absolute power corrupts absolutely. Yes, yes it does.

Another statement that makes me want to break things - what can one person really do? What difference can they make? One person can be like a domino. Start the change, knock the domino over and it could start a chain reaction. If EVERYONE recycled could we save the Amazon? Could we save our trees, countryside and landscapes? HELL YES!! Of course we could. If EVERYONE did one small thing to address the cruelty of the transport and process of farm animals being slaughtered, would it raise ethical standards? YES! Yes, it would. Maybe people like me are in the minority. Perhaps our voices are too small and too easy to ignore that the message isn't making that much of a difference, but you better believe I won't let that stop me. I won't stop making noise when there is a fire raging inside of me and a chance that maybe I could be that first domino. Maybe I could do something that could make a difference.

Oh, and another thing that raises my hackles. I'm vegetarian. It's not a disease. It's not an allergy. It's a choice. I don't believe in the way animals are treated, transported and killed. I don't believe it is in any way ethical or humane. I choose to not eat meat or drink cow's milk because of the processes behind them. So when my choice is met with a condescending smile or remark, when I can see the eye-roll and joke about being a hippy, I want to punch you in the face. If you can, watch the undercover videos of the abuse that goes on in slaughterhouses and if you choose to ignore it or feel indifferent about it, then that is your choice. What pisses me off the most is the people who turn a blind eye and pretend it doesn't go on. Okay, maybe I might offend people by this and after all my parents are like that to an extent, just like probably 95% of the population. This is wrong. This is where the problem lies. You might like animals and not wish any harm to come to them, so why not try and make the difference yourself? Buying organic products is a start, but at the end of the day those animals have the same fate as those poor, innocent souls that are factory farmed. On average 80% of our meat in this country comes from animals that are factory farmed. That means that there is 80% chance your steak came from a cow that had never seen daylight, never felt real grass beneath her hooves. That means that there is 80% chance your pork chops came from pigs imprisoned in crates so small they never even had the chance to move in the months that they were kept alive.

I went out for a meal with my family and on the menu there was a dish with foie gras. I tried to explain how cruel it was and that they should avoid ordering it. And I know I can probably come across obtuse sometimes when I am in full rant mode, but I was purposely only trying to explain the facts so they could make their own minds up about what to order.

Of course, my brother deliberately orders it to wind me up. I know he couldn't have fully understood the process behind foie gras, but sitting across from him eating that, it was all I could do not to break down in tears. He did it to wind me up, like it was a joke to order it, to annoy me. These geese must endure so much suffering and so much pain all for the sake of a plate of patte. I felt sick. Sick to my stomach.

As much as I hate the human race sometimes, as much as I wish I could obliterate individuals with a wave of my hand, I will never give up that someday, someone could unite the planet to raise our ethics, especially when it comes to animal welfare. I don't think human nature is to protect number one, I think human nature shines through the most when we are laughing with friends, hugging our families, crying at funerals. We feel to levels that sometimes words cannot express. We have souls. This is why I cannot even comprehend the evil that goes on and, even more, the indifference to it.

Don't let 'people like me' be in the minority. You can make the difference just by caring, by being more aware of your actions. Investigate where your food comes from. Buy products that aren't tested on animals. Don't gamble on horses and dogs and support the abuse that comes to racehorses and greyhounds. You can care and save the Black Rhino from extinction. Together we can be the voice that banishes factory farms. Don't let apathy be this generation’s downfall. Don't let whole species be lost from the by product of indifference.

Just be human. Care.