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"But when (Jesus) saw the multitudes, (Jesus) was moved with compassion on them, because they fainted, and were scattered abroad, as sheep having no shepherd." (Matthew 9:36.) "...As sheep having no shepherd..."
The issue of animal protection and animal rights is as important as any other issue, its meaning is as deep as any other issue, and it cuts across and touches so many other issues, because it, also, is at the heart of things. People who are totally opposed to each other on all other issues, can agree here, and by thinking totally different premises for their arguments. There are people whose support of animal protection laws is based on their love of pets during their lives, and is all experience, for whom "Be Kind to Animals" is a rule of living. They may actually have given no real thought to animal rights as an issue, but always lived it as a practice, and always vicerally reacted against anyome who abuses animals. On the other end, may be those for whom it is an abstract, a stated principle of equality of all species, a philosophy that is argued on the inner truth of the nature of reality.
People can be concerned about animal cruelty and law, the environment and habitat preservation, or the outrages of commercial industries and their exploitation of animals. You can be against animal abusers because you are anti-violence, a lover of nature and rural areas, or because you hate the capitalist criminal oppressor. You can be for the protection of animals because you love them specifically, because you want a safer world for all, because you know that the most civilized societies recognize the rights of victims over the right of "property," because you seek a world of respect and equality, because you recognize the Divinity and Divine place in all, or for any number of other reasons. No matter what the principle, the higher perception of animals and their free place, is there.
Getting the violence against animals out of the human being is a huge, major step forward for all civilization, and is recognized as an overwhelming problem among those who have to deal with violent criminals. Getting violent criminals to take on the responsibility of training and caring for dogs in prison, for example, is sometimes the only way they ever begin to develop a conscience, or learn to love. Only those who have themselves been screened, so they will not just abuse the animals but will participate in the program, can be accepted, but then the dog begins to teach. Many people will tell you that they became good human beings by learning from their dogs how to live.
There is also no such excuse as that "there are other things more important, let this wait": What is more urgent than war itself, a coming battle; yet recall the wonderful story of General Ulysses S. Grant, who punished a soldier who had been abusing a horse--famous animal lover that Grant was--by tying the soldier to a tree all day. The horse had rights too, and the punishment was not delayed because there were "more important things first." It hurt nothing of the Army's cause, because Grant recognized that this horrible animal abuse, if left to get away with it, would destroy the Army's morale, and the morals of each individual. Recall the beautiful words of the late anthropologist Margaret Mead, and her comment that the worst thing that can happen to a child, is to abuse an animal--and get away with it. Then, a horrific lesson was learned.
Whether you study psychology or social justice, ecology and the environment, or religion and philosophy, no matter where you turn, the principle of animal rights and care for them, is there. It is one of the basic foundations of a true understanding of reality, and of good and fair treatment of all. No matter which modern social issue you study, sooner or later, the abuse or protection of animals will be there, because it is as much at the core of reality as anything else. God gave them souls, and a place in this world and the next, too.
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