Julie is an author, artist and animal activist.
In these Sentientist Conversations we talk about the two most important questions: “what’s real?” & “what matters?” Sentientism is "evidence, reason & compassion for all sentient beings."
The video of our conversation is here on YouTube.
We discuss (with Luna barking in the background):
- Growing up reading the Children's Encyclopaedia
- Julie's life in public service & social work
- Studying Judaism, Christianity and Buddhism
- Spirituality & inter-connectedness & diversity
- Naturalistic and mystical versions of awe, wonder and inter-connectedness
- "There's some spirit in everything"
- Being comfortable not knowing. Humility and open-mindedness
- "I've always had more questions than answers"
- Starting every day in prayer and meditation to god, but not a god defined by any established religion
- "god" as an energy in the universe
- "Humans are like ants in a big machine" Our perceptions are limited
- Being a freethinker. Interested in all cultures and all religions
- Shifting from being focused on human issues to becoming a non-human animal advocate
- Albert Schweitzer's reverence for life
- Having ancestors that profited from animal exploitation
- Hating injustice, oppression and abuse
- Bertrand Russell's analytic philosophy
- Being a teacher and educator. The importance of a holistic education about all aspects of life
- An experience with a stray dog. Being talked into looking after it
- Seeing a council worker take the perspective of non-humans seriously
- Visiting an egg farm and seeing the hens crammed in to cages
- Reporting the egg farm to the RSPCA and being told "it's legal"
- The danger of a reverence for nature leading to excuses about animal product consumption "life consumes life..."
- Experiencing unconditional love as a child
- Patterns of abuse
- The importance of animal law and regulations
- The range of ways individuals can drive change, both personally and through our roles influencing and driving institutions
- Are we at the beginning of a huge movement for non-human animals?
- The power of social media to help us drive change
- The influence of education and indoctrination
- The influence of films and fiction. Dominion, Gunda, Seaspiracy, books
- "Within one generation - everything will be very different"
- Millions of animals are exploited, tortured and killed in research & testing
- "If it was ethically justified they would't need to hide it." "Most people don't want to needlessly cause suffering & death".
- Tapping in to latent decent human ethics?
- Fighting indifference.
Sentientism is “Evidence, reason & compassion for all sentient beings.” More at https://sentientism.info/. Join our "wall" https://sentientism.info/wall/ using this form: https://sentientism.info/im-a-sentientist.
Everyone interested, Sentientist or not, is welcome to join our groups. Our main one is on FaceBook https://www.facebook.com/groups/sentientism.
Thanks, Graham for the post-production: https://twitter.com/cgbessellieu.