Insperational Quotes

The original incident that started to change my perception and thinking from the "norm" to how I feel now (which was weird because it never bugged me before) was my last experience of catching and killing over 150 crawdads and then having me and my family toooo lazy to put in work to peel them and eat them and than watching 90% of them getting thrown into the trash...they all lost their lives for nothing, just because we wanted something to do. I decided that I just can't take the life of living things anymore for sport, food, or just because I can. After this incident what encouraged me, helped me, and pushed me along was a series of quotes. They really got me thinking in a new perspective. Here are a few that I like:

"Isn't man an amazing animal? He kills wildlife by the millions in order to protect his domestic animals and their feed. Then he kills domestic animals by the billions and eats them. This in turn kills man by the millions, because eating all those animals leads to degenerative - and fatal - health conditions like heart disease, kidney disease, and cancer. So then man tortures and kills millions more animals to look for cures for these diseases. Elsewhere, millions of other human beings are being killed by hunger and malnutrition because food they could eat is being used to fatten domestic animals. Meanwhile, some people are dying of sad laughter at the absurdity of man, who kills so easily and so violently, and once a year sends out cards praying for "Peace on Earth". - Preface from Old MacDonald's Factory Farm, by C. David Coates.

"There can be no justification for causing suffering to animals simply to serve man's pleasure or simply to enhance man's lifestyle." -The Dean of York

"True benevolence or compassion, extends itself through the whole of existence and sympathizes with the distress of every creature capable of sensation." - Joseph Addison

 "Man is the only creature that consumes without producing. He does not give milk, he does not lay eggs, he is too weak to pull plough, he cannot run fast enough to reach rabbits. Yet he is lord of all the animals. -George Orwell, Animal Farm

"People are the only animals that drink the milk of the mother of another species. All other animals stop drinking milk altogether after weaning. It is unnatural for a dog to nurse from a mother giraffe; it is just as unnatural for a human being to drink the milk of a cow." Michael Klaper, M.D., American author and international lecturer:

Compassion Quotes:

"Life is as dear to a mute creature as it is to man. Just as one wants happiness and fears pain, just as one wants to live and not die, so do other creatures."
- His Holiness The Dalai Lama

“The assumption that animals are without rights, and the illusion that our treatment of them has no moral significance, is a positively outrageous example of Western crudity and barbarity. Universal compassion is the only guarantee of morality.” - Arthur Schopenhauer, German Philosopher

"An animal’s eyes have the power to speak a great language."-Martin Buber

The question is not, "Can they reason?" nor, "Can they talk?" but rather, "Can they suffer?" -Jeremy Bentham

Quotes about hunting:

"Whether hunting is right or wrong, a spiritual experience, or an outlet for the killer instinct, one thing is not is a sport. Sport is when individuals or teams compete against each other under equal cercimstances to determine who is better at a given game or endeavor. Hunting will be a sport when deer, elk, bears, and ducks are... given 12-gauge shotguns. Bet we'd see a lot fewer drunk yahoos (live ones anyway) in the woods if that happend. -R. Lerner, letter, Sierra

"Wild animals never kill for sport. Man is the only one to whom the torture and death of his fellow-creatures is amusing in itself. - James Anthony Froude, Oceana, 1886

After starting this process I felt so strongly I made it permanent that this was how I was going to live the rest of my life. I'm not quite there yet but I'm working on it! So I got my tattoo. It says Ahimsa, a word rooting from Buddhism and Hinduism. Its meaning is to not injur or show cruelty to any creature or any person in any way..it also means kindness and consideration for other people and things as well as deals with the sense of responsibility and duties. The word also breaks down to this:

Abstinence from animal products

Harmlessness with reverence for life

Integrity of thought, word, and deed

Mastery over oneself

Service to humanity, nature, and creation

Advancement of understanding and truth