If animals could speak humanity would truly weep. Humans have committed unspeakable atrocities and barbarous acts against each other. But we have enslaved, caged and committed genocide against the animal kingdom. We have eliminated 75 per cent of all wildlife, forced thousands of species into extinction or to the verge of. We have concreted their habitats, and savagely dominated their kingdom.
Deep ecology is the philosophy that all living beings have equal entitlement to share planet Earth. That we should interfere with natural occurring ecosystems as little as possible. I too do not subscribe to an anthropocentric environmentalism. Beyond this notion of deep ecology I believe that nature is sacred. That all living beings including the Earth itself have a spiritual content. All lining creatures are capable of pain and suffering and therefore deserve moral and legal protection.
How we treat innocent and vulnerable animals speaks volumes about the progress of our own human civilisation. Even animals which we consider loveable pets such as puppies and kittens are suffering and dying needlessly in laboratories as was recently uncovered by a BUAV investigation.
The majesty of our planets is in its amazing diversity. Which child hasn’t wondered how many different beautiful animals and trees there is in our world?
We have uprooted indigenous tribes from their fifty thousand year habitats to satisfy a lust for more profit. Never considering the accumulated wisdom these peoples have to offer our brave new world. Even today in just about every corner of our world indigenous peoples are struggling for the survival of their culture and identity. The global economic system is so unrefined that profit almost always comes before people.
In my time with indigenous tribes in Indonesia I could only lament at the fact that so many remarkable abilities, so much kindness and innocence which accompany their traditional ways of life are being extinguished. The younger tribesmen gradually being exposed to western media are turning away from the old ways. This combined with the onslaught of commercial profiteering means that this hidden face of humanity is being lost forever.
The issue is that we consider GDP as the only yardstick for economic growth. We should think more of combining this with some kind of social happiness index. We put value on things rather than people. That is essentially the logical extension of our consumer society.
The challenge is not only to protect indigenous tribes as party of a new holistic environmentalism but to take forward their ancient wisdom with us into tomorrow’s ultra technological society. Scientific thinking holds the key to progress. I truly believe that humanity through the unfoldment of scientific discovery will produce technologies which can escalate human evolution into a new ‘golden age’. Our aim must therefore be to create a tomorrow with greater meaning, where we know the value of things not just their price. A refined capitalism led more by ordinary people and less so by politicians and corporations.
By Andrew Charalambous – www.andrewcharalambous.com