Why I am not a vegan

[Diana]

(Once again, I'm not saying the effort to be of service to others isn't worthy, just that I think anyone who thinks that by trying to be of service to others that they are "different" from those who serve themselves is delusional)

I think I understand your point, but it is more intellectual than practical. And what about setting an example? If one is living a compassionate life, and setting an example for others, how is that playing god?

Example: I don't kill insects. I have a nephew who is now an adult. I recently learned from his grandmother that he takes insects outside as a matter of course, rather than killing them (as his girlfriend would prefer). I never told him to do this, or why I did. I just do it, and now he does. I consider this service to others (human and insect). Is this playing god?

Another example: On a trip to Costa Rica we were on a boat in the jungle. We came upon another boat where a man had caught a large fish (at least 2 feet long). He was holding it up by the hook. Our guide stopped our boat for all of us to admire it. I hid inside my boyfriend's arms because I was crying silently. Cabo Kurt (the guide) saw me and told the boat driver to move on. He later told my boyfriend that seeing me sincerely—yet privately—moved by the hooked fish's plight, made him question his own actions. He was the great white hunter and had taken shooting safaris to Africa many times. Yet he was changed by this. Was that me playing god?

In my opinion, the idea of compassion derives not from the desire to do good, or because doing to the other is same as doing to the self. I don't care at all about that. I don't need to think of the other as me in order to feel pity or compassion. I think that sort of thinking is only a gimmick to get humans to feel SOMEthing.

If one has reached the stage of compassion, then one is faced with the question of what to do about the suffering here. In this, you are right I think: That we are in a way playing god because we are activating higher aspects of ourselves and trying to act with god-like understanding and balance of all things. But if your heart isn't breaking from the suffering here while claiming that STO individuals are playing god too, then you must be a hugely advanced being whose gotten past all this or you are mistaken. (I don't mean YOU necessarily, just generally anyone; and of course I could be mistaken as well—this is only my opinion.)

Perhaps because my heart breaks so much and so often, I can't fathom others who can be so cavalier about suffering. I say cavalier, because that's how it sounds to me. I may be utterly wrong about that and I take responsibility here for my own paradigm. And yet....the suffering.