Amanda DeSalme, Snyder and Sacrificial Existence

from Gary Snyder's The Practice of the Wild:

"When they arrive their 'armor is broken'- they are killed- enabling them to shake off their fur or scale coats and step out as invisible spirit beings. They are then delighted by witnessing the human entertainments- sake and music. (They love music.) The people sing songs to them and eat their flesh" (Snyder, 93-94).

In this passage Snyder talks of how the original inhabits of Japan, the Ainu, would sing to the fish or game and say grace for them. The people showed great respect for the sacrifice of other lives that made it possible for them to live. The world today is so far removed from the process of killing animals for food that many do not appreciate the sacrifice and the spiritual exchange involved in it. Every food we need for existence is readily available in a grocery store. For the natives of Japan and other countries, the food they collected (whether plant or animal) was given much respect, understanding that they were partaking of a life that had a spirit, and that was something to be honored. Today, the meat industry is completely inhumane in their treatment of the animals. We have domesticated them and bred them in masses and placed them in tiny cages with the sole purpose in life to be food for humans. Snyder alludes to this modern flaw as well: "But weeding out the wild from the natures of members...gradually changed animals which are intelligent and alert in the wild to sluggish meat-making machines" (Snyder, 85). This is one reason why I personally have chosen to be a vegetarian. I'm not going to get on a soapbox about it, but I do believe that any living being does not deserve to be processed and exploited like we have done to various animals in the meat industry. I respect others who do choose to eat meat, but they gain my full respect if they truly understand the sacrifice of life in the flesh that they are eating and the spiritual exchange that should happen between wild animal and human. The natives believed that if humans maintained their proper hospitality towards the animals, music and manners, the spirits of the beings would be reborn over and over again. This is an example of one of the many cycles that exist in nature. Plants sacrifice their lives to animals which sacrifice their lives to humans whose bodies decompose in the ground to fertilize new plant growth. It is a constant cycle of sacrificial existence and every natural thing is connected in it.