In regards to eating meat

[Monica]

I do apologize for contributing to your hoarseness, though 740 posts is a little much for my mind to hold in its awareness all at once.

Apology accepted! Actually, the thread is quite interesting and deep, with various viewpoints represented, so you might actually enjoy the read, if you feel so inclined sometime.

Well I think you and I may both agree that the argument is tiresome,

I don't find continued discussion tiresome if it raises new points, but I do find redundancy tiresome. It's difficult to avoid, though, when members come and go, and the thread grows ever longer.

So I will briefly summarize my viewpoints, then kindly remove myself from this thread.

As you wish! Thank you for the discussion! Please know that any further responses I may offer aren't necessarily directed at you, then, but for anyone who might wish to continue the discussion.

Philosophically speaking, eating anything is an STS act.

Let's look at the context of the term STS.

When speaking of polarity, STS refers to the negative path. But taken literally, service to self isn't negative. It's only negative if it's at the exclusion of others. We must serve ourselves to some degree, because we are part of the whole. In fact, Ra stated that love of self is actually required for STO harvest!

Thus, I don't think it's STS, in the context of negatively polarizing, when we do the normal things that we must do to take care of our physical vehicles. It's not STS to brush one's teeth, but it is serving self. Do you see the distinction?

An action becomes STS in the sense of negatively polarizing, when we have the awareness that we are harming another, or controlling or imposing on another, and we make that choice anyway.

It's not STS polarizing if someone accidentally hits a pedestrian and kills them. But it is obviously STS polarizing to intentionally kill them.

It's not STS polarizing for the vast majority of people who eat hamburgers. They've been brought up eating hamburgers and have never really questioned it. It's just a burger. They aren't thinking about the cow's suffering when they wolf down that burger.

The question then becomes: Is it depolarizing for an entity pursuing the STO path, who has become aware of the suffering of their 2D brethren, and yet they continue to contribute to that suffering?

We must take the life of another physical being in order to sustain our own physical body.

The question was raised on this thread as to whether plants are beings. How is being or entity defined? Is a sip of water a being? Is a sunflake an entity? Are we consuming entities when breathe air? (Not counting microorganisms...but the air itself?) Are we taking their lives? Or are we merging their lifeforce with our own? How is this determined? What is life? What is lifeforce?

There is no way around this, given the rules of the 3D physical experience. The most we can do is try to draw a line somewhere in the natural food chain, according to our own inner wisdom, experience, and preferences, and let the chips fall where they may.

Very true. But we already do that with other humans, do we not? Back in the caveman days, did humans understand that it was wrong to kill another human? No. Many humans still haven't figured that out. But for the most part, most average people understand that killing another human isn't cool. And we know, from a Law of One perspective, that it's depolarizing for an STO person to do that.

So we've already drawn the line in the sand. Why not draw another line as we evolve? It seems logical, knowing what we know. We can't 'unknow' what we know.

Ethically speaking, the abhorrent and abusive conditions to which humans subject animals raised for food is a reflection of the abhorrent and abusive conditions to which we subject ourselves. In a world rampant with such atrocious acts as ritual abuse, infant sex trafficking, genocide, hate crimes, terrorism, and financial enslavement, it is somewhat curious to me that one would choose to take up animal rights as their raison d'être. But it is simply a curiosity, and nothing more. To each their own.

You just listed a handful of worthy causes. There are thousands more. We can't all work on every cause. So people tend to select a few causes that are close to their hearts, for whatever reason. Maybe they lost a loved one to cancer so they become active in cancer awareness. Their dad died of a heart attack so they are active in that. Whatever. It takes all of us to clean up the mess this planet's in. I'm glad there are people out there willing to get on Greenpeace ships and challenge the whaling ships, because I lack the courage to take on that particular cause. It doesn't mean the Greenpeace activist doesn't care about sex trafficking or child abuse! It just means that they've chosen to work on a cause that they feel they make a difference in. There is room for all. It's all good.

I've already expressed my reasons for championing the animals whenever I have an opportunity. And I'm not even one of the 'radical' ones. I don't go around rescuing cows or anything like that. (Although I do have a disproportionately large menagerie of stray dogs and cats!)

For me, the reasons are myriad, already outlined in previous posts. But other than ending wars, I can think of no other cause that has such far-reaching benefits, to so many beings, including not just the animals, but humans, and the planet itself.

Add to that, if we don't go poof next year, we're gonna have one helluva mess to clean up, and if humans don't switch to a predominately vegetarian diet, this planet cannot sustain the human population much longer. That's not theory; it's fact.

I'd say that's a very good reason to be involved in this cause. It affects us all, not just the animals.

Spiritually speaking, I do not at all believe the choice of foodstuffs has any significant impact on spiritual growth.

If I have a choice between shopping at a store that I know oppresses people by utilizing sweatshops, and a store that treats their workers well, does my choice have any significant impact on my spiritual growth?

Rather, I believe this idea to be a red herring, and a control mechanism designed to keep people distracted from attending to the myriad of dysfunctional thought patterns, inner demons, and self-destructive behaviors which are the true hindrance to spiritual growth.

Eating a greasy cheeseburger is surely a self-destructive habit. And though patterns are affected by what we eat and drink. It's already been established that when one eats a piece of dead cow, they are consuming the fear hormones the cow had at time of death. (Not to mention all the antibiotics, growth hormones, concentrated pesticides, and myriad other chemicals.) How could this not contribute to those "dysfunctional thought patterns" and "inner demons"?

While this may be debatable, and I may in fact be wrong, I can certainly point to several examples of vegetarians to whom application of the word bellicose would be an understatement. Vile is the word which comes to mind. And I can just as easily point to many meat-eaters who don't have a bellicose bone in their bodies.

That too is well established. Hitler was supposedly a vegetarian, and someone as spiritual as Carla eats meat. And we all know of our friend's Uncle Charlie who smoked 2 packs of cigs a day and had tequila every night, and was never sick a day in his life, and lived to be 95.

That doesn't change the fact that animal slaughter is violent.

For what it is worth, I have observed a general trend toward desiring less meat as I have grown in spiritual awareness. But that is the result of spiritual growth, not the cause of it.

This I agree with, generally. Feeling compassion for the animals, and raising one's awareness about the plight of the planet, is part of that spiritual awareness. Being a vegetarian is obviously not a ticket to 4D. If it were that simple, gosh, this planet could have been harvested eons ago! But, it can work both ways. One's choice of foodstuffs can affect one's spiritual growth, just as all other catalyst affects one's spiritual growth. It's a vibrational thing. Many people who have quit eating animals for strictly health reasons (STS!) with no regard for the animals, can attest to this. My husband is a prime example. He became a vegetarian for primarily health reasons, but then his vibration seemed to lighten and it became a spiritual thing. I've seen it work both ways.

OK. Peace, love, light, and all that jazz.