This Friday is the annual International Holocaust Memorial Day.
It's a day to remember the 6 million people that lost their lives, and the millions more who suffered during the Holocaust, Nazi persecution, and the more recent genocides in Bosnia, Cambodia, Rwanda and Darfur.
The Holocaust and all subsequent genocides are dark parts of our history that we hope and pray will never be repeated.
You might be wondering why I'm bringing this up on a blog dedicated to vegetarianism and animal rights?
Isn't it obvious?
In the Holocaust, the Nazi's killed millions of Jews who were too weak to fight back or speak up for themselves.
In the Holocaust, violence and destruction took over the lives of peaceful men, women and children, who were people just the same as the ones who caused so much death. They were people with real feelings, families, thoughts, happiness and sadness.
Yet all that was disregarded because of the Nazi ideals that they were not worthy of life, that they were mere instruments that should be disposed of or treated cruelly at the very most.
The Jews lived in tiny cramped surroundings, with poor sanitation. Diseases were rampant. The old, sick and any that were seen as weak were simply killed.
Sound familiar?
Every year, over 50 billion animals are killed for food alone. The Holocaust lasted 12 years. 600billion animals would be killed in 12 years. That is 1 million times more people than were killed in the Holocaust.
Animals cant stand up for themselves against us.
The life in an factory farm and slaughterhouse is one of cramped surroundings, barely enough space to move or even stand up. Animals are routinely beaten, branded, drugged, force-fed and then, when they are fat enough, or if they are weak, they face their final fate.
Animals may not be humans, but they have feelings too. They too have families, thoughts, happiness and sadness.
But we disregard all that, because to most humans, animals are mere instruments that can be disposed of or treated cruelly at least. But we refuse to see that, we refuse to think of the murder that goes into the food that we eat.
Everybody agrees that the Holocaust was the work of evil. It was a hateful genocide that we all hope will never be repeated.
I hope that one day humans look back at the murder of animals as we do on the Holocaust, because to animals, all humans are Nazi's.
