Poem - Dance of Freedom and Love

What a beautiful night.
There is such a delight.
Merry friends dancing around.
Singing, clapping, what a beautiful sound...
Silence inside, a peaceful abide.
a harmonious melody, an awesome symphony.
Spontaneity, freedom, expressing the Perfect oneness.
existence dancing with Herself.
Come dance along to this perfect song.
Leave your facades, your pressures, your stress and sorrows...
all is okay.
Just relax.

Take a step. Take another step.
Just be here in this dance, here in this freedom, here in this Now.
See how the worries fade away, when you lose your self
Moment after moment.
movement after movement.
In this spontaneous dance.
Take a chance and let's dance.
Freedom and peace. Is Here and Now
just embrace her and invite her to dance
Under the wonderous sky,with the moon and the stars dancing along.
Dance, lose yourself in the dance, uniting with the stars,the moon,
All people, and other apparent objects.
Dance until you realise that you been dancing with yourself, with existence, all along.
Dance and your problems will fade away.
Embrace this moment and dance.

Collection of my poems/writings about Love, Peace, Presence

Poems, peace, unconditional love, awareness

Peace and love in a fragmented world
Two pieces of a puzzles searching for completeness
Poem - you are Infinite, not a fragment of bad self-esteem
Unconditional love, love without conditions, a love that liberates
If I don't love you, remind me to wake myself up!
Poem - Raging waters, peaceful stillness
Poem - Dance of Freedom and Love
Poem, Love, attachments

Writings of others

Stillness, peace, unconditional love - Living as Awareness

More resources (articles, links, etcetera)
Resources

Unconditional love, love without conditions, a love that liberates

Love this quote about true LOVE ♥:
"THE FLOWERING OF LOVE

When you see a flower in the garden, and in the presence of that flower you feel good and alive, you call the flower 'beautiful', and you cut the flower out of the ground, and you place the flower in a vase on your windowsill. You say to the flower, "You are mine and mine alone, beautiful flower; you make me happy and whole; do not leave me and do not change or I will be broken…", and you have the audacity to call this 'love'.

Wrenched from its natural ground, divided from Source, the flower is 'yours' for a while, yes, you can tell yourself that, but soon it withers and dies, starved of life and possibility. Deep down, you know that the flower could never be 'yours', so anxiety and sadness rumble underneath the entire project from the start. This is not unconditional love, friends, this is possession; fear masquerading as love. This is the attempted annihilation of beauty in the name of security, and it is what we are taught and sold, and it is why your human relationships are fraught with such drama, unspoken expectations and deep sorrow.

Wake up to a deeper kind of love, friends, a love without conditions, a love that liberates, a love that never says "you are mine", a love that would never wrench a flower from its beloved ground, a love that won't possess or control but sees the beauty in another's ungraspability, and loves their freedom despite the pain. A love that doesn't come from without but is the nature of the within, the inevitable consequence of knowing how free you truly are.

Love the flower, see the beauty and the fragility of the flower, yes, be infinitely kind to the flower, but never forget, it cannot be yours and it cannot complete you. It belongs to the universe.

Love the entire universe through the flower, and let go of promises. We only make promises because we do not trust ourselves. There is only Now, and that is the ground of love, and its fertiliser.

– Jeff Foster"
From http://www.deepestacceptance.com/




--------- Another quote:

Your body is away from me
But there is a window open from my heart to yours. From this window, like the moon I keep sending news secretly. ~Rumi

Why campaigns against factory farms, zoos, etc. promote speciesism

Colin Wright wroe:The reason that people who promote SICs (Single Issue Campaigns) don't understand why they are counter-productive is because those people think that the problems that they need to address are that humans commit atrocities against nonhumans in factory farms, zoos, labs, etc. etc. ad nauseam.

That's not the problem we need to address at all. The only way to fix all the problems with factory farms, zoos, labs, etc. is to eliminate the root of the problem. The root of the problem is speciesism.

So in order to eliminate the factory farms, zoos, labs, and all the other atrocities, including domestication in general, the only thing we REALLY need to do is... eliminate speciesism. Nothing else will help.

But, since all SICs are BY THEIR NATURE speciesist... engaging in them creates and fosters a state of speciesism in the people who do so. And since people who are willingly engaging in speciesism can't understand why speciesism is the problem, they are not making the connection why SICs are counter-productive (this is like the "racist" who thinks they are not racists simply because they know that ____ are inferior to their ethnicity).

Most people who engage in SICs claim that all we need to prove that SICs are productive is hard numbers as to who did what from SICs. But that's the error - hard numbers don't show whether the speciesist paradigm has changed in any significant way. Especially since there are MANY non-Vegans who call themselves Vegan because they are speciesist and don't really understand the term Vegan in the first place.

"Hard numbers" won't have any bearing on the issue. What will have a bearing on this issue is when we see more people exclusively educating others about Veganism and less people engaging in SICs. In essence, less speciesism and more Veganism.

That's not EVER going to happen from people engaging in SICs. SICs are the problem, they can't be the solution.

Edit: If you're going to try to argue against this, I suggest you use rational arguments that address the point made in the OP, not just Appeal To Emotion and other fallacies. Thanks.

Installing sprinkler systems for chickens?

Bob Linden wrote:

THE WORLD VEGAN SUMMIT & EXPO is being organized for the purpose of creating a nucleus for VEGAN activism and advocacy, and for advancing the abolition of the use of animals for all purposes.

It is in complete opposition to recent trends in so-called "welfare reform" (where no one fares well) which are proving to be so detrimental to animals, including the contrivances of "humane meat, dairy, fish, eggs", "humane slaughter", "family farms", and all animal-derived "products" labeled "sustainable", "grass-fed", "pasture-raised", "local", "organic", "free-range", "cage-free", and "higher welfare" - and the promotion of the trivial such as flexitarianism, Meatless Mondays, baby steps, doing "something" now - and the release of undercover video unaccompanied by a vegan message.

It is to offer an alternative to a movement comprised of organizations that partner with animal-exploitation industry, including those who betrayed billions of chickens in support of amendments to the Egg Products Inspection Act.

Welcome to an event free from the deceptive propaganda of HSUS and its groupie groups that are ready to sell you "enriched" "furnished" cages, praise for pig killers, and "meat"- eating and "vegetarianism" instead of VEGAN activism at the upcoming trade show in LA in July.

It would be antithetical to the philosophical perspectives of the WORLD VEGAN SUMMIT & EXPO to feature speakers from organizations who admittedly routinely engage in "welfare reform" activism, as United Poultry Concerns openly states. It saddens me that Karen Davis thinks that I am refusing to schedule her because I "hate" her. Really, how can I hate someone who cares so deeply about chickens as I do, who so dramatically and empathetically articulates their suffering, and who rescues and provides them sanctuary. I don't consider her anything like the cold, calculating, deceptive, diabolical operatives of the Humane Society of the United States or Mercy For Animals, for example. I'm sure that her intentions are good. The problem is that when Karen deviates from the path for veganism to "welfarist" detours, it's bad for animals. UPC support for the heinous HSUS anti-vegan bigger-cages scam, Prop 2 in California, with its cynically-absurd title, "The Prevention of Farm Animal Cruelty Act", was instrumental in what is now becoming catastrophic for massive numbers of chickens. She was quoted in the NY Times back then saying that Prop 2 would provide "comfort" for chickens. A recent NY Times piece was speaking about how great chickens now have it in California (even though nothing has gone into effect). Our actions and our statements are so dangerous when they become marketing ammunition for animal-abuse profiteers. My understanding is that Karen now regrets support for Prop 2, and I wish she would be more vocal about that. Unfortunately, the "animal rights seal of approval" that the recent egg bill stamped on "enriched" or "furnished" cages, will equate to Prop 2 = "enriched" cages, a formula for disaster brought by "welfarist" activism, even without UPC support of that egg bill. And even at the time UPC was opposing the egg bill, it still invited an HSUS shill to address a conference that it was organizing. Most recently, a UPC public relations person again talked of the UPC goal to make chickens as "comfortable" as possible in chicken exploitation industry, which is a misleading unattainable exaggeration.

Some may assume that the WORLD VEGAN SUMMIT & EXPO may be endorsing the campaigns of its speakers, and I could not, in good conscience, for a variety of reasons, lead people to allocate resources of time or money toward installation of sprinkler systems in hen houses, as UPC so campaigns - perhaps not even fully considering the consequences to be suffered by birds ranging from compromised insulation to drowning, etc., should the systems actually be employed - as we activists save the burning barn for the ranchers. These days, newly-installed sprinkler systems will immediately be understood as "humane" and compassionate treatment of chickens, which turns us into chicken-"meat" salesmen again, as Prop 2 did, as the egg bill transformed animal advocates into egg salesmen. That same egg bill should and must be recognized as one of the most massive betrayals of animals ever, with supposed "protectors" reversing long-held positions against intolerably cruel and torturous concentration-camp conditions of "enriched" or "furnished" battery cage warehouses for chickens, and then campaigning FOR them in an incomprehensible new blood-brother partnership between chicken-massacring United Egg Producers and the pig farmer - led Humane Society of the United States, inexplicably joined by ("Animal Rights Conference" Organizer) FARM, Mercy for Animals, Farm Sanctuary, Compassion Over Killing, the ASPCA, and the (Hope Bohanec - influenced) In Defense of Animals (which now opposes). While the egg bill did not pass in Congress, it has permanently damned chickens to a future of deplorable conditions, of horrendous imprisonment, mutilation, and death which can now be stamped "humane", and become the Prop 2 standard in California, unfortunately thanks to misguided UPC past policy, and to those other groups that are about to gather at their fundraising trade show in LA.

I would suggest one possible strategy for UPC to win the hearts and minds of "anti-humane" vegans. There you have communications director Hope Bohanec, one of the biggest voices FOR Prop 2 (now against it), and one of the biggest voices FOR the egg bill (now against it), born again, writing a book against "humane meat", telling me it's everything I've been saying all along, and wanting to come on my radio program to talk about it. But she refuses to mention the groups by name who fed her the propaganda she vomited. It would not make a very compelling interview to hear something like... "So who told you that the 'enriched' cages previously considered too cruel for chickens are now good for hens, Ms. Bohanec?" "Animal Protection Group X, Bob" ..."and who told you that hens can engage in natural behaviors when crammed into such 'furnished' battery cages, even though they feel no sunlight or earth beneath their feet?" ..."Animal Rights Group Y, Bob"..."and who decided on the deceptive ploy to suggest advertising that the egg bill bans BARREN BATTERY CAGES, knowing that the public would believe that the CAGES would be banned, when in actuality, it was just that the cages not be BARREN, remedied by a stick or some wood shavings?" ..."Animal Welfare Group Z, Bob"... I'm sorry, but I just don't feel that UPC has its lines down right yet for what we're doing, but is welcome to register and attend and work to create vegan strategies that wont lead to so many such future regrets.

"Welfarist-reform" activism brings us empty promises today that only lead to broken promises in the future, giving the public rationalizations for not going vegan, when only vegan will do.

The animals need a vegan world now. The planet needs a vegan world now. The children need a vegan world now. In the face of the relentless massacre of innocent harmless billions, of climate change, of poverty, world hunger, and disease - how can we delay? Where is the sense of urgency? It is to be at the WORLD VEGAN SUMMIT & EXPO!

www.WorldVeganSummit.com

Suffering of backyard chickens laying eggs

"The ancestor of the modern laying hen would lay at most a dozen eggs, once per year. Over the course of many years of selective breeding, the domesticated laying hen has been turned into a creature who will lay up to 300 eggs a year during her peak laying period. This high number has only been achieved through cruel genetic and behavioral manipulations. Normally, hens are instinctively driven to lay a number of eggs (totaling about 12) called a "clutch". After this number is achieved, the hen will stop laying eggs in anticipation of the hatchlings. This behavior holds true whether the eggs are fertilized or not. Egg farmers take advantage of this fact by removing any eggs that the hens lay. This forces them to continue to try to form their clutch of eggs in vain desperation. Sadly, they will be driven to madness as they attempt to form their clutch because their eggs are constantly stolen. Needless to say, this puts a tremendous psychological and physical strain on these birds. An animal that might otherwise live the better part of a decade is all but used up within a couple of years.

A hen in a backyard setting, given proper nesting materials will also attempt to form a clutch. If you chose to steal the eggs rather than leave them be, she will desperately attempt to form her clutch until she stops laying eggs or simply drops dead. By doing so, you are perpetuating the same cruel fate that she endured on the farm. The calcium needed to form just one egg can bind up ten percent of the calcium from her bones. Extended egg laying without proper mineral replenishment will lead to soft or fractured bones. When left alone, hens will actually eat their unfertilized eggs. This replenishes them with much needed minerals lost during the egg formation process." - Andy Williams

Working for laws against rape and torture while promoting animal exploitation?

A friend wrote: “”The other thing to think about is this: if my child were in a foreign prison where torture was standard of course I would work day and night to get her out. If others did not care if she ever got out but were working on laws to prevent her from being raped and tortured while in there I would not waste one precious moment of my time fighting against those working for better conditions while she was in there. How would she feel about me if she were being raped and tortured and found out I worked in opposition to those trying to pass laws against these things? To see it from the victims's eyes is key. Spend time working for freedom. Don't waste time working against others”

Here are my thoughts:
What if you knew that the efforts of those that claimed to work for better conditions, would reduce the chances of your child to ever get out? What if they made the public feel more comfortable of the situation, because that they in fact were sending the message that it is okay for your child to be exploited and confined in the prison, but that it should be done in “another way” that also will increase the profit of the industry.


What if those persons claimed to work for justice, but in fact were teaching the public that “happy exploitation” is all fine, and it is moral to partake of products that come from persons that are exploited and imprisoned? After all, as long as they “are treated well” - everything is all fine?


What if “working against others” is actually an effort in working against the promotion of Welfarism and speciesism?
What if “working against others” is working against the big Animal organizations cooperating with industry to legitimize and reform animal exploitaiton, so that the industry can make more profit; and non-vegans can become more comfortable in exploiting nonhumans?
What if the efforts of those supporting Welfarism is in fact a major block for freedom for the nonhuman animals?


More reading: http://bloganders.blogspot.no/2014/05/abolitionist-veganism-articles.html