Morality

It is All About Morality

By John Taylor; 2007 Mar 05

"What we think, or what we know, or what we believe is, in the end, of little consequence. The only consequence is what we do."

This tidbit by John Ruskin was sent out by a quote-a-day feed on my Google home page. In one sense, Ruskin is right; we do set too much store by what we think and not by what we do. On the other hand, what we think, know and believe are profoundly important, not only because they condition what we do, but also because in many contexts they constitute actions in themselves, actions of more consequence than anything we ever consciously plan or do. When I think back on my best teachers in my school years I can never put my finger on why they were so distinguished from the many other teachers I suffered through. The brilliance of these few has nothing to do with anything they specifically did. Nothing tangible made them stand out. Now I think that it was mostly who they were, or to speak more exactly, how their thoughts, knowledge and beliefs fit in with not only what they did but with who they were. This combination somehow connected and flashed forth a quality of inspiration that moves me even today whenever I think about them.

The same is true for the causes of the climate crisis. It is not so much what we are doing or not doing that is the problem. At root it is what we think, know and believe that explain the bungling of the upkeep of our planetary garden. I include in evidence of this (at the end of today's essay) a report of a recent study sponsored by the UN's Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) that found that livestock production is a worse contributor to greenhouse gasses than automobiles. By some estimates the purchase of a hybrid automobile will save a ton of emissions yearly, but switching to a vegetarian diet saves a ton and a half annually.

If so, why is there so little talk in the media of vegetarianism? If it is a social good, should we not make it an ideal to strive for? If it is so good for the planet, not to speak of being better for our health, why cannot social planners set it up as a major goal to, say, double the number of vegetarians in a year’s time? Why not unleash educational campaigns to raise the number of vegetarians to more sustainable levels? The answer to that is to be found in the statistics cited by the FOA in this article: forty percent of agricultural production, some one point three billion people, work in livestock production. Every last man-jack of them regards vegetarianism as directly against his interests and will fight the partisan fight to keep it off the public agenda.

This highlights another problem with Ruskin's idea that deeds are of more moment than thought. The fact is that ego, imitation and habit tend to rule over deeds and actions. Every time, it is easier to change what people think, know and believe than what they do. As the Qu'ran teaches, a people cannot change until they first purify their hearts and minds. Corporations and governments spend vast sums on advertising to steer the masses their way, but what really is needed is more who live an examined life disciplined by a devotional daily routine. Interspersing reflection and mediation into daily living allows people to plan out their own contribution based upon improved thought, knowledge, belief and actions. The more this happens the more souls will think about what the planet needs and the more vegetarians will sprout up, as it were, on their own. But that does not mean that we cannot, like social agriculturalists, plan for increasing the pace.

There is a shocking interview in Macleans magazine with social researcher Laura Sessions, plugging her latest book, "Unhooked: How Young Women Pursue Sex, Delay Love, and Lose at Both." ("Why are so many girls `hooking up'? Its their parents telling them, `You need to be all that you can be, and love can wait," by Kate Fillion, Macleans, 19 February, 2007, p. 14) She documents how dating has become passé in this new crop of teens. Group outings, rather than one on one quasi-courtships are now all the rage. While parents fondly imagine that this increase in gregariousness is more chaste than pairing off, in practice it leads to the reverse, a behavior known among them as "hooking." (Unlike in our day, this kind of hooking does not involve a financial transaction) In effect, instead of "going steady" as in the past girls are “going unsteady.” That is, in a group date the girls act as the initiators of the contact by flirting with a boy, then pair off, find an empty bedroom and after half an hour come back to the group. This way they can "hook" with several partners in a single evening. By this standard the old "one night stand" is the epitome of long term commitment. Asked why they do this, the girls answer, "Guys do it. So why can't we? What is the big deal?"

Not surprisingly, our researcher found that these adolescent girls, in spite of marked success in other areas of life, live unfulfilled, unhappy love lives. They lack what has been called a “sentimental education.” Reading about this social change makes one want to review the basics, to go back to the birds and the bees. I do that a lot, I know, but I do it because I am aware of how inadequate my own understanding of it is. I do not even want to think about the gross ignorance of young people and the even more inexcusable apathy of parents that has led to the group “hooking” phenomenon in the first place.

We all owe our very existence to the natural drive for sex. But less obviously we owe the quality of our existence to the control of that impulse. Chastity is the virtue that limits and controls this primal force of nature. It is not unlike a hydro-electric dam converting water's potential energy into electric power. Chastity in the same way transforms a brute impulse into a virtue. Chastity cures the glue that will hold a long-term bond between lovers in a marriage. By learning early on how to limit and direct their sexual attraction, permanent couples are freed to devote their full time and emotional energies over many years to educating the next generation.

This reminds me of why Baha'u'llah called chastity the "greatest treasure" of women. It is a treasure because it holds within the key to long-term happiness, not only for themselves but for the men who love them and the children born to them. While men undoubtedly have an equal duty to be chaste, I think what Baha'u'llah meant to say was that the female element is the Sine Qua Non of reproductive health. Chastity is the basis of both family planning and stable marriages and a firm commitment to it on the part of girls and women is the cornerstone. Babies are born to girls and women, not to boys and men, and in these spheres females are the first if not the only movers. It is the difference between designing a rocket and riding in it as an employee of NASA and just driving down to Cape Canaveral to observe the takeoff. Both "launch a rocket," but there is a big difference between their viewpoints. No matter how enthusiastic the space buffs, it is not the same thrill for those who designed, built and staff the space shuttle.

Thus, it is a moral obligation for parents not to wink at, much less praise and support this trend of "hooking" by saying, "Your career comes first, hold off on love." That is unadulterated adultery. No, it is right and moral to marry young and raise a family early in life. This is backed up not only by the advice of the Guardian but by science; it is established that fertility diminishes steadily with every year a couple puts off having children. A family and society that wishes to continue into the future should be aware of its clear duty to teach this.

This is a parent's prime responsibility. But now the legitimate question stands in the way: how can girls have successful careers if they break off study and work in order to give birth to children in the crucial early years of their career? As things are, this is an insuperable barrier. Family and career are made mutually exclusive. But it does not have to be that way.

It is useless for parents to try to instill sexual morality by encouraging early marriage and young families as long as educators continue in failure to support early financial independence, especially for girls. The curriculum should be designed to allow every fifteen-year-old, should he or she so desire, to become fully self-supporting without sacrificing their long-term career prospects. Fifteen is the age of maturity for Baha'is, and indeed many traditional cultures. Taking that age seriously as a time for full maturity would require mixing co-op and apprenticeship programs into the curriculum much earlier than now. In fact work should be the cornerstone of education throughout the primary years. For the little ones this may begin as play and games in proximity to real workplaces –- Plato suggested even taking the little nippers close by a real battle (at a safe distance, of course) in order to witness the blood and killing of war. This would ready them for the citizen’s duty to bear arms for his country. Seeing at first hand through frequent tours of factories and offices the various ways that adults perform useful work would give children a basis on which to judge which trade they would like to enter into. Gradually, their workplace activities would come to resemble work, until at about age 11 they would be ready to enter into a four-year half-day apprenticeship under a tradesperson. This would give real meaning to the coming-of-age ceremony that takes place at age fifteen.

Relevant to this is the Master’s advice that young pupils should be given only six hours of schooling daily, including homework. He also suggested that they be schooled in hardship. This implies that as it is now children are sorely over-schooled, under-worked and intentionally left without credentials until it is too late to raise an early family. A modicum of six hours of learning daily would not only make academic studies more palatable and efficient, it would also allow for that four or five hours daily of employment as an apprentice. Upon reaching maturity at fifteen teens would have several years of experience in a useful trade under their belts. Even those who aim at the learned professions would have at this early stage an entry-level qualification in a trade to help them pay for their own higher education. Done skillfully, there would be no "dropping out" of school at fifteen because there would be little difference between working full-time with on-the-job training and going to school full-time with supplemental work placements.

I know, it sounds like I am talking about education when I should be talking about sexual morality, but they amount to the same thing. The same subtext is behind Al Gore's film, An Inconvenient Truth. It sounds like he is talking about the environment but in reality, as he himself says at one point, he is talking about morality. We are talking about the difference between fooling around while the world slides into oblivion, or really addressing the challenges before us. Consider what Baha'u'llah says in the Temple Tablet,

"Consider a pearl which shineth by virtue of its inherent nature. If it be covered with silk, its luster and beauty will be concealed. Likewise, man's distinction lieth in the excellence of his conduct and in the pursuit of that which beseemeth his station, not in childish play and pastimes. Know that thy true adornment consisteth in the love of God and in thy detachment from all save Him, and not in the luxuries thou dost possess. Abandon them unto those who seek after them and turn unto God, He Who causeth the rivers to flow." (Haykal 1.119, Summons, 62)

Livestock a major threat to environment; Remedies urgently needed

http://www.fao.org/newsroom/en/news/2006/1000448/index.html

29 November 2006, FAO of UN news site

Rome - Which causes more greenhouse gas emissions, rearing cattle or driving cars?

Surprise!

According to a new report published by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization, the livestock sector generates more greenhouse gas emissions as measured in CO2 equivalent -- 18 percent (more) than transport. It is also a major source of land and water degradation.

Says Henning Steinfeld, Chief of FAOs Livestock Information and Policy Branch and senior author of the report: Livestock are one of the most significant contributors to today’s most serious environmental problems. Urgent action is required to remedy the situation.

With increased prosperity, people are consuming more meat and dairy products every year. Global meat production is projected to more than double from 229 million tonnes in 1999/2001 to 465 million tonnes in 2050, while milk output is set to climb from 580 to 1043 million tonnes.

Long shadow

The global livestock sector is growing faster than any other agricultural sub-sector. It provides livelihoods to about 1.3 billion people and contributes about 40 percent to global agricultural output. For many poor farmers in developing countries livestock are also a source of renewable energy for draft and an essential source of organic fertilizer for their crops.

But such rapid growth exacts a steep environmental price, according to the FAO report, “Livestock’s Long Shadow; Environmental Issues and Options.” The environmental costs per unit of livestock production must be cut by one half, just to avoid the level of damage worsening beyond its present level, it warns.

When emissions from land use and land use change are included, the livestock sector accounts for 9 percent of CO2 deriving from human-related activities, but produces a much larger share of even more harmful greenhouse gases. It generates 65 percent of human-related nitrous oxide, which has 296 times the Global Warming Potential (GWP) of CO2. Most of this comes from manure.

And it accounts for respectively 37 percent of all human-induced methane (23 times as warming as CO2), which is largely produced by the digestive system of ruminants, and 64 percent of ammonia, which contributes significantly to acid rain.

Livestock now use 30 percent of the earths entire land surface, mostly permanent pasture but also including 33 percent of the global arable land used to producing feed for livestock, the report notes. As forests are cleared to create new pastures, it is a major driver of deforestation, especially in Latin America where, for example, some 70 percent of former forests in the Amazon have been turned over to grazing.

Land and water

At the same time herds cause wide-scale land degradation, with about 20 percent of pastures considered as degraded through overgrazing, compaction and erosion. This figure is even higher in the drylands where inappropriate policies and inadequate livestock management contribute to advancing desertification.

The livestock business is among the most damaging sectors to the earths increasingly scarce water resources, contributing among other things to water pollution, euthropication and the degeneration of coral reefs. The major polluting agents are animal wastes, antibiotics and hormones, chemicals from tanneries, fertilizers and the pesticides used to spray feed crops. Widespread overgrazing disturbs water cycles, reducing replenishment of above and below ground water resources. Significant amounts of water are withdrawn for the production of feed.

Livestock are estimated to be the main inland source of phosphorous and nitrogen contamination of the South China Sea, contributing to biodiversity loss in marine ecosystems.

Meat and dairy animals now account for about 20 percent of all terrestrial animal biomass. Livestock’s presence in vast tracts of land and its demand for feed crops also contribute to biodiversity loss; 15 out of 24 important ecosystem services are assessed as in decline, with livestock identified as a culprit.

Remedies

The report, which was produced with the support of the multi-institutional Livestock, Environment and Development (LEAD) Initiative, proposes explicitly to consider these environmental costs and suggests a number of ways of remedying the situation, including:

Land degradation

Controlling access and removing obstacles to mobility on common pastures. Use of soil conservation methods and silvopastoralism, together with controlled livestock exclusion from sensitive areas; payment schemes for environmental services in livestock-based land use to help reduce and reverse land degradation.

Atmosphere and climate

Increasing the efficiency of livestock production and feed crop agriculture. Improving animals diets to reduce enteric fermentation and consequent methane emissions, and setting up bio-gas plant initiatives to recycle manure.

Water

Improving the efficiency of irrigation systems. Introducing full-cost pricing for water together with taxes to discourage large-scale livestock concentration close to cities.

These and related questions are the focus of discussions between FAO and its partners meeting to chart the way forward for livestock production at global consultations in Bangkok this week. These discussions also include the substantial public health risks related to the rapid livestock sector growth as, increasingly, animal diseases also affect humans; rapid livestock sector growth can also lead to the exclusion of smallholders from growing markets.