Compassion is defined as “the sorrow or pity someone feels at the suffering of another living being.” It is one of the greatest contributors to peace within human communities and comes first in our moral priorities. Compassion requires the ability to empathise, to perceive another’s pain and sorrow and take it to heart. In that sense, it is among the foremost qualities a human being should possess.
From philosophy to religion, every system of belief and thought speaks of the need for compassion, describing it as a divine grace breathed into the human essence. In this respect, compassion is one of the most fundamental elements of living together in society. In modern society, our understanding of compassion and our effort to show it have diminished, while popular culture has pushed the idea that it is a sign of weakness. Compassion has become the weak link among the values of a globalised world. It is an outdated possession. Compassion is now the cardboard box sitting in the corner of the storeroom whose contents we have long forgotten.
At its heart, compassion is neither a performance nor something offered only to those who shout about their pain. Today, anyone who can truly empathise and feel compassion can find someone whose suffering or difficulties they can share, materially or emotionally.
For modern people, compassion often emerges less as a natural response, a requirement of being human and of understanding the world, than as a consequence or demand of their beliefs, social pressure or encouragement within the family. That forced effort contains a hidden arrogance. Modern people, shaped by the ambition to protect and increase their possessions, offer a thin performance of compassion. It is thin because they have failed to make compassion part of their character, to embrace it as something arising from the substance of their life and existence.
No one who has truly understood compassion would equate it with pity. In religion, pity belongs to the Creator. He is al-Rahman and al-Rahim: gracious, merciful, compassionate. For one created being to pity another is arrogance, not compassion. Although the difference between “pity” and “feeling sorrow and empathy” may seem too slight in words to dwell on, there are enormous differences—perhaps discernible only to the person feeling them—between what someone offering compassion through pity experiences and what a person who feels sorrow and empathy experiences.
Now let us turn to the contradictions modern people encounter between compassion and love for animals. Compassionate modern people love animals for the sake of their Creator, yet cannot explain the centuries of cruelty towards nature and animals throughout human history. They approach animals, driven from their natural habitats by cities and trying to live among us like unwanted dependants, with a feeling dominated by pity. That pity may even extend to sharing food with the animals living nearby. It may lead them to defend animals against neighbours or local people who do not bestow the same compassion. But there are always limits. They dispense their gifts of compassion as far as their own values allow. Those limits may be an animal-hating husband, the point where criticism of government animal policies requires action, the birth of their own human child, or a pet beginning to make too much mess in their living space. Those animals are, after all, something through which they exercise their compassion. They are not part of their life. Because that person is not an animal lover. Compassionate, yes. They may even put so much effort into compassion that they stand out in modern society. Yet they never compromise their sense of being the superior being. They cannot, because that is how they were raised. It was not their fault.
Love for animals is part of environmental activism. It begins with following and criticising the animal-rights policies of the state and all relevant institutions and authorities. It begins with going out into the streets and supporting collective action. It begins with protesting industrial meat production. Even if you are not a vegetarian, the moment you say, “There are so many people; without those factories, how would we produce enough meat for everyone?” you are not an animal lover. Or if you say, “All these creatures were made for humans,” you may indeed be compassionate, but you are not an animal lover. Refusing to eat meat as a protest against industrial meat facilities is an effort too. But, contrary to vegan claims, let us be realistic: it is an effort that will do little beyond move meat prices rather than close those facilities. There are dozens of industries around the world today that use animals as experimental subjects. There are no effective sanctions that could stop pet shops selling live animals. Believe me, poorer Middle Eastern countries such as ours are more tolerant of animals living on the streets than European countries or America. In countries such as the United States, stray animals are routinely killed. Pet shops are modern people’s only chance of encountering animals. And these countries lead the pet-food business. In the modern world, pets are commercial commodities. They are an industry. They amount to a profit-and-loss calculation. Our country will begin entering that process in the coming years too, because the reality of a rapidly changing and supposedly developing modern world is unwilling to leave living space for other creatures. Love for animals is part of animal activism. You may be a compassionate person. You may even swear furiously at videos of animal torture and killing shared on Facebook. But coming back to reality: if you have not signed a petition, attended a protest or paid a visit even over your local municipality’s violations of animal rights—if you have not put yourself on the line—and have not recognised that the system is responsible for the terrible conditions in which animals, particularly the domesticated lives sharing our world, find themselves, then please carry on sharing cat videos on Facebook and writing, “Oh, how sweet.”
Respectfully,