St Francis of Assisi and Ramalinga, Ramana was an exemplary and saintly realised being, who did not discriminate between human and non-human sentient beings. Few understand the true import of his life and teachings, preferring to concentrate on the surface words, fewer still have the egolessness to live such a life, but to me he exemplifies the sentient ethic and ideal in practice. Yet while complete Enlightenment is a very difficult goal, the ideal of compassion and empathy for all sentient beings, and living a Vegetarian or Vegan lifestyle that does not require the slaughter of innocent beings for one's gross palate, is something that anyone can do.Sentientism is the philosophy that all sentient beings - all beings that feel and can suffer - have intrinsic moral value and rights. Therefore, we are obliged to treat all sentient beings with kindness and compassion, regardless of their external form or level of intelligence
I affirm that no ethical system can be valid if it does not acknowledge equally all sentient beings. I have felt this for a long time, but now I feel it much more strongly than ever, especially having known Bonnie, a domestic hen. As Mahatma Gandhi, teh great ex[onent of Ahimsa, said:
"The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated."
and
"I hold that, the more helpless a creature, the more entitled it is to protection by man from the cruelty of man."
It is almost impossible to comprehend the terrible tragedy of billions of other sentient beings who live brief unnatural lives to feed human gluttony, vanity, or sociopathic so-called scientific experiments. The current scale of human abuse of nonhuman sentients is the most appalling crime of our, or any age.
It must surely also be the case - if the universe is a moral place, as I beleive it is - that such actions cannot go without having some extreme counter-effect. It has been suggested to me (and this idsea has also been championed also by the Hare Krishnas, although not from the full perspective, because they still have an exoteric understanding) that for as long as human beings mistreat animals, they will receive the karma in return, and there will always be wars and attrocities and crimes and terrorist acts.
And even if one is not an animal lover (although anyone who doesn't have some measure of sensitivity for all beings regardless of external form is, I believe, is intrinsically lacking in empathy) it still is a real fact that speciest attitudes of abuse of animals are also tied up with misogyny, racism, and other forms of chauvinism. Just as the psychopath starts by torturing and murdering small animals and then progresses to human victims, so society begins by porojecting the Other onto animals, and then progresses to oppression of women, minorities, and even the atrocity of the holocaust
That is why the world has to change. No system of spirituality and individual and collective transformation today that does not address this issue can be considered complete.
But such is the state of present human consciousness that this is a matter given only low priority, even among progressive individuals. Unlike human and environmental rights and sensitivity, Sentient Rights are still greatly underrepresented in the current New Paradigm/Integral Movement/Global Mindshift. It is not that those involved are callous and don't recognise its relevance; but rather that the mental framework just isn't there yet. A totally new worldview is required, to create a totally new civilization and totally new world.
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