“Although one can sympathize with lay persons trying to break their attachment to a diet featuring meat, it is something else again to extend those sympathies to monks, priests, and teachers. What business have these latter to propound the Dharma when they possess neither the perception nor compassion to see the connection between meat eating and the killing of harmless animals, and when they lack the self-discipline to put Buddhist compassion before the pleasures of their palates? What right have they to wear the Buddha's robes when they won't or can't honor the bodhisattvic vows they recite daily to liberate all beings?”

Source: To Cherish All Life (1981), p. 74

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Philip Kapleau6

American Zen Buddhist monk 1912–2004

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“From now on, I do not permit my sravaka disciples to eat meat. … One who eats meat kills the seed of great compassion. … I, from now on, tell my disciples to refrain from eating any kind of meat. O Kasyapa! When one eats meat, this gives out the smell of meat while one is walking, standing, sitting or reclining. People smell this and become fearful. This is as when one comes near a lion. One sees and smells the lion, and fear arises. O good man! When one eats garlic, the dirty smell is unbearable. … It is the same with one who eats meat. It is a similar situation with all people who, on smelling the meat, become afraid and entertain the thought of death. All living things in the water, on land and in the sky desert such a person and run away. They say that this person is their enemy.”

Gautama Buddha (-563–-483 BC) philosopher, reformer and the founder of Buddhism

Source: Mahayana, Mahāparinirvāṇa Sūtra (or Nirvana Sutra), Chapter Seven: On the Four Aspects

“The sight of slabs of flesh should horrify and disgust any sensitive person if they exercised their inborn compassion. Habit has dimmed their native kindliness. Their palates have become abnormally corrupted and conditioned by a taste for dead food, its flavoring and odors. People who eat slaughtered creatures every day find it hard to imagine what to substitute for meat, not realizing that meat is the substitute for vegetables.”

Helen Nearing (1904–1995) American writer

Source: Simple Food for the Good Life (1980), Ch. 4

“Someone said that Capitalism will eat itself, and I think that’s like the meat industry, the meat industry itself will become dead meat and compassion will reign supreme.”

Benjamin Zephaniah (1958) English poet and author

"Zephaniah Speaks: Poetic Thoughts", interview with Arkangel Magazine (2002) reported in BenjaminZephaniah.com https://benjaminzephaniah.com/poetic-thoughts/?doing_wp_cron=1519050664.5827260017395019531250.

“If people want to eat meat, they should kill the animals for themselves… Nor should they say that if they did not do it the slaughter would still go on… Every person who eats meat takes a share in that degradation of his fellow-men; on him and on her personally lies the share, and personally lies the responsibility.”

Annie Besant (1847–1933) British socialist, theosophist, women's rights activist, writer and orator

Vegetarianism in the Light of Theosophy(1913), p. 18-20

“What I've found is that, because most people are deeply disturbed by and feel guilty about eating meat, and yet at the same time fear not eating it, they defend themselves from having to acknowledge such conflicting feelings. These psychological defenses include denial (“Animals don't really suffer when they're raised and killed for meat.”); justification (“Animals are meant to be eaten by humans.”); dichotomization (“I'd never eat a dog, but I love bacon.”); avoidance (“Don't tell me that; you'll ruin my meal.”); and, most importantly, dissociation (“If I think about the animal when I'm eating meat I feel disgusted.”). … When people break through their dissociation, the feelings that typically emerge are empathy—and therefore disgust. That's why people tend to be disgusted by the idea of eating “unusual” animals, such as dogs and gorillas; they haven't learned to dissociate from these kinds of meat. It's also why vegetarians usually find all meats disgusting.”

Melanie Joy (1966) American psychologist

Source: Strategic Action for Animals (2008), p. 117

“I read something one day: “If someone can’t actually kill animals themselves to eat meat …,” which really put me over the top. I can’t remember where I read that, but I wouldn’t. I think a lot of people live life through convenience. … I don’t think that I fully realized until I stopped eating [meat] how much it was a part of society and how much it was affecting me. … Like anything else, you’ve been indoctrinated from day one. … when you stop eating meat, you stop supporting slaughtering animals. … people need to be more responsible for everything around them, you know—animal rights.”

K-os (1972) Canadian rapper, singer, songwriter and record producer

"K-OS", interview with peta2 (20 July 2011) https://www.peta2.com/news/k-os/.

“Some yoga teachers say that a vegetarian diet is not necessary.
[Pattabhi Jois]: [laughing] Oh … a new method!
Many Indians and Westerners eat meat.
[Pattabhi Jois]: They are not practicing yoga. Meat eating makes you stiff.
What is the most important yogic practice in this time?
[Pattabhi Jois]: Vegetarian diet is the most important practice for yoga.”

K. Pattabhi Jois (1915–2009) Indian yoga teacher

Interview in Sharon Gannon and David Life, Jivamukti Yoga, Ballantine Books, 2002, p. 83 http://books.google.it/books?id=D_9oFtc1ZLMC&pg=PA83.

“Ultimately the case for shunning animal flesh does not rest on what the Buddha allegedly said or didn't say. What it does rest on is our innate moral goodness, compassion, and pity which, when liberated, lead us to value all forms of life. It is obvious, then, that wilfully to take life, or through the eating of meat indirectly to cause others to kill, runs counter to the deepest instincts of human beings.”

Philip Kapleau (1912–2004) American Zen Buddhist monk

Source: To Cherish All Life (1981), p. 71

“Monks, a lay follower should not engage in five types of business. Which five? Business in weapons, business in human beings, business in meat, business in intoxicants, and business in poison.”

Gautama Buddha (-563–-483 BC) philosopher, reformer and the founder of Buddhism

5.177: Vanijja Sutta https://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/an/an05/an05.177.than.html, as translated by Thanissaro Bhikkhu (2001) <br class="br">Source: Pali Canon, Sutta Pitaka, Anguttara Nikaya (Numerical Discourses)

“I am amazed when I see young people eating meat. It seems to me so much thing from other times! The carnivore youth is not with the times, it has a stomach of the nineteenth century, who carnivorized Europe… Eating pieces of slaughtered animals is an anomaly, out of a vegetarian diet there is no real youth. Meat is mostly an anguished habit of old people. Requiring meat dishes, talking about it, remembering it, it's a thing of old people, old and unable to rejuvenate with a decidedly alternative diet.”

Guido Ceronetti Insetti senza frontiere

Mi stupisco, quando vedo gente giovane mangiare carne. Mi sembra talmente cosa d'altre epoche! La gioventù carnivora non è coi tempi, ha uno stomaco da secolo XIX, che carnivorizzò l'Europa... Cibarsi di pezzi di animali macellati è un'anomalia, fuori della dieta vegetariana non c'è giovinezza vera. La carne è per lo più un'angosciata abitudine dei vecchi. Richiedere piatti di carne, parlarne, ricordarli è cosa da vecchi, e da vecchi incapaci di svecchiarsi con una dieta decisamente alternativa.
Insects without Borders: Thoughts of the Unknown Philosopher (Insetti senza frontiere: Pensieri del filosofo ignoto), Milan: Adelphi, 2009, § 34.

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