(no subject)
in regards to the recent crimes committed by Michael Vick of the Atlanta Falcons.....though I've never been a huge football fan, I've at times admired him as he is quite an amazing athlete. If you've ever watched a game, as I have, it's quite impressive. All thats washed aside now.
I recall an excerpt from a book N turned me on to some time ago. She recalled it while rereading it in Belize. It seems appropos because as Vick made his statement yesterday, he used words like "mistakes" and "immature" which I find appalling. What he did is evil and immoral. He made no ammends to the animals he caused death and harm to, only to his fans. He's a sociopath and he deserves whats coming.
On to the quote:
From The Devil: Perceptions of Evil from Antiquity to Primative Christianity by Jeffrey Burton Russell
It may also be time for humanity to consider that its responsibilities go beyond humankind and extend to other beings as well--to animals and even to plants. What is the basis of the assumption that I have the right to cut down trees that were growing before I was born? What gives me the right to deprive the animals who live in the forest of their sustanance? The Judeo-Christian traditon says God gave creatures of the world into Adams hands for his use; but other traditions have viewed God's purposes differently. At any rate, the continued exploitations of nature by those who have ceased to believe in God or in the Book of Genesis reveals the real basis for this human "right". It is might, sheer might and might alone. Because we have the power to exploit other beings to slake our greed, we do it, and until very recently we have done it without thought or consideration. It may be that there is virture in the Hindu principle of ahimsa, respect for every living being, for every creature that can feel. Richard Taylor writes:
What but a narrow and exclusive regard for themsel ves and aslavish worship for rational nature would ever have led moralists to think otherwise? That men are the only beings who are capable of reason is perhaps true, but they are surely not the only things that suffer....The heart is no less evil that takes delight in the suffering of a cat, than one that extracts similar delight from the sufferings of men.
Whether or not you are fond of cats, your sense of evil is aroused by an account such as this:
Taylor continues with a story of some boys who set a cat on fire
A new machine has been invented for killing trees, a "harvester that grabs each tree with huge steel hands and pulls it from the soil like a carrot." (John Dillin , Christian Science Monitor, Dec. 1974) The Judeo-Christian ethic cut man and God off from nature; modern materialism has now compounded the problem by eliminating God and leaving man entirely alone.
To trees to cattle it is humanity, not nature, that is red in tooth and claw. Perhaps we might consider whether the denaturing of nature is as great a violence as the dehumanizing of human beings. And indeed whether it encourages it. We have the made universe so much an ITIT as well. The essence of evil remains deliberate violence done to a being that can feel pain. that we reduce people to the status of an
I recall an excerpt from a book N turned me on to some time ago. She recalled it while rereading it in Belize. It seems appropos because as Vick made his statement yesterday, he used words like "mistakes" and "immature" which I find appalling. What he did is evil and immoral. He made no ammends to the animals he caused death and harm to, only to his fans. He's a sociopath and he deserves whats coming.
On to the quote:
From The Devil: Perceptions of Evil from Antiquity to Primative Christianity by Jeffrey Burton Russell
It may also be time for humanity to consider that its responsibilities go beyond humankind and extend to other beings as well--to animals and even to plants. What is the basis of the assumption that I have the right to cut down trees that were growing before I was born? What gives me the right to deprive the animals who live in the forest of their sustanance? The Judeo-Christian traditon says God gave creatures of the world into Adams hands for his use; but other traditions have viewed God's purposes differently. At any rate, the continued exploitations of nature by those who have ceased to believe in God or in the Book of Genesis reveals the real basis for this human "right". It is might, sheer might and might alone. Because we have the power to exploit other beings to slake our greed, we do it, and until very recently we have done it without thought or consideration. It may be that there is virture in the Hindu principle of ahimsa, respect for every living being, for every creature that can feel. Richard Taylor writes:
What but a narrow and exclusive regard for themsel ves and aslavish worship for rational nature would ever have led moralists to think otherwise? That men are the only beings who are capable of reason is perhaps true, but they are surely not the only things that suffer....The heart is no less evil that takes delight in the suffering of a cat, than one that extracts similar delight from the sufferings of men.
Whether or not you are fond of cats, your sense of evil is aroused by an account such as this:
Taylor continues with a story of some boys who set a cat on fire
A new machine has been invented for killing trees, a "harvester that grabs each tree with huge steel hands and pulls it from the soil like a carrot." (John Dillin , Christian Science Monitor, Dec. 1974) The Judeo-Christian ethic cut man and God off from nature; modern materialism has now compounded the problem by eliminating God and leaving man entirely alone.
To trees to cattle it is humanity, not nature, that is red in tooth and claw. Perhaps we might consider whether the denaturing of nature is as great a violence as the dehumanizing of human beings. And indeed whether it encourages it. We have the made universe so much an ITIT as well. The essence of evil remains deliberate violence done to a being that can feel pain. that we reduce people to the status of an