We take many calls at the NJARA office on a variety of
issues, but a particular call from a member prompted me to write. He was
very despondent over the magnitude of animal cruelty, didn't think he
could handle it any more and felt like pulling back. He didn't know how
other people were able to handle it and function "normally."
I had to smile, because I knew that personally I did not
function normally, at least not in the accepted use of the term. We
talked at length about the animals' suffering and our suffering, and how
we can work to eliminate both.
Suffice to say, it ain't easy being an animal rights
activist. I'd venture to say that most of us did not even choose to be
an activist -- that choice was made for us because of the millions of
people who use animals for their own selfish purposes. I know that as
long as people are exploiting animals I will be among those committed to
working towards animal liberation. But that doesn't mean I don't have
times when I wish I were, as Jackson Brown once said, a "happy idiot"
and be free to live my life. But personally I know that will never
happen. The writing is on the wall and I have to -- every dedicated
activist has to -- figure out how to live with this.
Eleven years ago, when I first became involved in animal
rights and learned of all the horrors inflicted upon animals I
immediately knew I would work to end this. But the more I learned, the
more despondent I became. The vastness of the abuse was staggering to
me, the pain and suffering incomprehensible. There are still times when
I think I will literally go insane with the anguish I feel over the
extreme cruelty that billions of animals are forced to endure. How can I
ever be happy again? Feel joy again? How can I ever allow myself to
laugh and feel good when every minute of a chickens life in a battery
cage is filled with intense pain, suffering, confusion, and terror?
Although these feelings could have worked to immobilize me and push me
further away from animal rights, I have, over time, come to terms with
them.
Someone once told me that I should look forward to and
relish those moments when I feel good and enjoy life, not berate myself
for them, because in our vocation those moments of pure joy are few and
far between, when it seems that all we ever hear about or subject
ourselves to is one animal atrocity after another.
Animal rights is most certainly a difficult issue to
commit to. It is different from other social movements aimed as
eliminating injustice because those movements were orchestrated and
fought primarily by people who had a personal interest in it -- those
who personally felt the oppression, who personally felt the hate, the
suffering, the violence. With animal rights we are fighting for another
species. It is easy for the vast majority of people to be unconcerned
about animal rights because the pain and suffering is not theirs. So it
takes a compassionate, and yes, special, person to break through those
barriers and fight for injustice that does not actually affect you. It
takes a special, but not superior, person to fight for nebulous
victories. Most of us will never see the animals who we dedicate our
lives to saving... the animals who will never be bred for research
because a company became cruelty-free... the animals who will never be
savagely killed for vanity as a greedy fur industry dies... the animals
spared a miserable existence on a factory farm when our influence turns
yet another person vegan.
And that may make it difficult to stay with animal
rights. It might be easier for animal advocates to forsake a rightist
attitude and to commit only to working hands on with animals. Here you
may feel that your efforts are really working to save animal lives since
you actually see the fruits of your labor. By all means help those
companion animals, but do not let that diminish your dedication to the
animal rights fight. Figure out how to make both fit into your life if
you need to, yet never accept less than total abolition of animal
exploitation.
But also, do not allow hands-on animal work to consume
all of your time, as it will, if you let it. Do not let it diminish your
animal rights activism, which will work to eliminate animal suffering
long term.
Passing by that one animal for the good of the many, and
really understanding why, at times, that is necessary, is difficult to
come to terms with. A member, new to the issues, recently asked if a
puppy in a pet shop doesn't have just as much right to a good life as a
dog in a shelter? And ethically, shouldn't we help that animal by taking
her out of the pet shop? Yes, ethically we should, but realistically we
can't and logically we mustn't. It takes discipline and a heart of steel
-- a contradiction in terms for an animal rights activist -- to turn
your back on that individual dog and continue to work to educate so that
there will be a day when there are no puppies in pet shops.
With a strict animal rights philosophy as our guide,
merely the knowledge that our commitment to total abolition of animal
oppression is saving animal lives has to be enough. And it really is
enough, because we are working on a long-term solution to the problem,
working in a preventive manner by eliminating the root cause of the
problem, and not simply treating the symptoms of an animal abusive
society. We don't need band aids, we need radical change.
So, working for animal rights puts you in a dilemma. Our
morals and ethics tell us that we should help an animal in need, yet at
times we overlook that one animal in order to help the greater number.
Our strong sense of compassion and justice is the driving force behind
our dedication, but we must use logic and reason in order to be able to
function. Our hearts are open to all the injustice humanity can inflict
onto our nonhuman brethren yet at times we must close our eyes to it.
It's not easy making your life's work fighting for social justice and
animal rights is certainly no exception. In fact it may be the hardest
battle yet.
Janine Motta
New Jersey Animal Rights Alliance
PO Box 174
Englishtown NJ 07726
United States of America
Phone: 732-446-6808
Fax: 732-446-0227
www.envirolink.org/orgs/njara/
Source:
njara@superlink.net (New Jersey Animal Rights Alliance)
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