Living With Honour
An Interview with Emma Restall Orr

When did you first start to get involved in animal issues and what lead you there?livingwithhonour

My first memories of animal issues are of being five or six years old. My father would go to the bird market in the old part of Madrid, where we lived, usually taking me along with him, and moving from stall to stall he'd look for the little native song birds that fluttered in little crowded dirty cages, buying as many as he could afford.  My memories are scattered and imperfect now, but I remember sitting in the car driving home with cardboard boxes of terrified little birds clutched tightly in my hands, feeling the fear in them, their hearts beating so fast, the confusion in the darkness, and I'd whisper to them that it would all be ok.  At home, the top floor of our house was filled with aviary cages, small and large, and my father would feed these little creatures, holding on to those in poor quality until they were strong, and now and then we'd drive out to some appropriate place in the countryside and set them free.  That feeling, of opening the cage, or sometimes holding the bird in my hands and opening my fingers, or even throwing it up into the skies to give it a head start, and watching a wild creature regain its sovereignty, that feeling is the one I remember when you ask me that question.  

So formative was it for me that I made sure my son had the same experience when he was a little boy.  Brought up, as I had been, by an ornithologist, not just spending time in the wild places of this earth, but finding the wild of nature even in the heart of urban civilisation, I was always reminded that each creature has a right to live its own life.

My mother, a botanist, was even more sensitive than my father, and animals were seldom killed in my childhood home, each wasp or spider carefully guided out through a window or door (ants, cockroaches and mosquitoes, I believe, were the only exception).  However, it was not a vegetarian or vegan household.  That decision I made myself in my late teens, and at first it was entirely for health reasons that I stopped eating meat or bovine dairy produce.  At around 21 I became vegan, my decision to explore the animal industry having shifted my reasons from self focus into ethical principle.  It took around five years for me to establish that completely, a period that was one of intense spiritual work and the beginning of my training within Druidry.

Is there a special kind of animal out there that inspires and guides you?

The equality of animals is far richer an inspiration than any particular creature for me.  In other words, to perceive all creatures as equal - the human, the nonhuman animal, and the nonanimal in nature - is what more poignantly inspires.  We are all a part of the fabric of nature, integral to its ongoing flow of creativity.

However, if I am to soften my answer to your question with a little more poetry, yes, there are a few nonhuman animals with whom I feel a special empathy.  The crows are always friends to me; I had a most beautiful and intelligent crow live with us when I was a child.  He was hardly a pet, but had been given to us in a poor state and we had nurtured him back to health.  We'd fed him and cared for him, and he'd shown great loyalty to us.  He was battered to death by a neighbour who objected to his husky persistent calls: another moment that guided me towards my vegan philosophy.

I am known as a cat, but perhaps I am too much cat, for I tend to dislike domestic cats.  I am very much an adult solitary cat, with no inherent desire to meet another cat.  

Why do you think the issues of things like factory farming and meat consumption should be of concern to Pagans today?

pigfarmMy feeling is that it is all too easy to feel empathy with nonhuman animals in a sentimental way, and sentimentality is a very poor basis for ethical decisions.  I am not a vegan because I love animals.  In truth, I don't particularly like animals, or no more than I like trees, stars, rivers, pebbles: I respect their nature.  A sound ethical basis, I think, has to be based upon honour, not sentiment.  If Paganism is a nature-reverencing religion (and for the majority in Britain it is), then we need to live in a way which does honour nature.  

How we honour nature is for each seeker to explore, for 'honour' is as potent and profound a word as love, and anyone who has lived and loved and lost knows that it takes a lifetime or more to understand what love really is.  Honour, for me within my own tradition of Druidry, is about neither controlling or being controlled by another (of any species), but learning how to live with others, in peaceful company.

By nature, like many I would include human nature as well as nonhuman nature, and of course by our living we are bound to restrict others' freedom, prioritising our own needs.  However, just because we are bound to intrude upon another's freedom, we need not shrug and give up our attempt to live with perfect honour.  It is enough to say that through our actions we will do all we can to cause the least unnecessary harm.  

Poignantly, that means thinking carefully about what our needs are, and what our desires are.  If we are doing something for pleasure, not out of necessity, it is less justifiable to cause suffering.  For most of us, in Western culture, eating meat or dairy produce is not necessary.  With a little knowledge and a shift in skills, it is absolutely possible to be well nourished without being complicit or responsible for that unnecessary harm.

However, veganism is not just about animals, nor is it just about food.  All industrial agriculture, nonfood uses of animal products and other ways in which our species causes damage to the environment, affecting others, creating unnecessary harm, needs to be considered.  

Further, for many Pagans, there is a powerful foundational belief that our individual actions are affective : we do make a difference.  That is the basis of magic, that through our will or our relationship with the spirits of nature, ancestors, the gods, we can create change around us.  If that belief is there within our religious or spiritual perspective, then it accompanies an obligation, surely, to make sure that every action, every decision, is affecting the world we live in positively.


In your writing it looks like your spirituality fuels your activism. How has living a cruelty-free lifestyle helped you to grow as a spiritual person?

As an animist and a polytheist, my Druid religion thoroughly fuels my activism, and has done for twenty years and more.  I am utterly devoted to the gods of nature, and as my spirituality deepens that devotion grows.  I am amazed at nature's beauty, subtlety, intricacy, her very existence, and the exquisite fabric that is crafted by the gods, each current weaving together in perpetual tides of creativity.  Furthermore, my desire to ensure that my ancestors, and my descendants, are proud of me, is a very powerful and constant motivation.

To know that I am doing my utmost to express that devotion by living wakefully, listening to the songs of the gods and the spirits of nature, always learning more, treading more lightly, singing my own song of life respectfully and responsibly, courageously and generously, is an active part of my daily devotion.  If I weren't, my religious practice would be flawed; it would crumble upon its own lack of coherence and integrity.  Not to walk my talk would be a flagrant act of dishonesty and dishonour.

And it is not about being pleased with myself; there is no space for self righteousness.  I make new decisions each festival, or each rite that honours a new moon cycle, to take a step further.  Some are simple (most recently, never to buy tea bags : what a waste when we can use wild herbs or buy loose herbs and use a strainer; also, to return to using a fountain pen with a refillable cartridge, and a bottle of ink, instead of buying or being complicit in the use of plastic disposable pens).  Some are broader, such as changing the car we drive to something with much lower emissions, or vowing not to fly until the fuel and pollution issues are solved.  Every month I see another part of my life that can be improved, and each improvement is a gift of devotion to my gods and my ancestors.  Each gift adds to the depth of my connection with them, clarifying that bond, enriching it further.


In your chapter, The Ethics of Paganism, in the book Pagan Visions, you talk about relating to animals when you say "There is no line, there is only connection". Why do you think it's so difficult for some people to make that connection?

There are two reasons which spring to mind when you ask this question.  The first is complex; it is hard to put into language but easy to understand perhaps on an intuitive level.  This is the simple inability that most of our society has to make or perceive a true connection or to understand what it is.  In many ways, this is metaphysics: what do we mean by connection, how do we perceive that, and indeed what are we connecting with?  In my experience of teaching, I find that it takes a fair amount of work for a student to grasp this concept of connection as more than just words which describe an idea in their head.  When we begin to realise what it is, we start to realise that it is has very many layers.  It isn't digital, an on/off switch, but an understanding of relationship, and every relationship requires a great deal of us in terms of trust, respect, responsibility, courage, and so on.

The second reason is that making the connection is deeply challenging.  When we do find that deep soul to soul connection, what comes with it is a sense that we are part of the same tribe.  The result is a profound sense of our duty of care, as we embrace the other within an ethical understanding.  In other words, connection with another creature means that we can no longer use that creature without full consideration for its well-being.  That can mean we have to do without things we like, things we find comforting or convenient.  Sometimes the sacrifices are beyond what we are willing to make.  That is very sad indeed.


Your new book Living with Honour: A Pagan Ethics, is scheduled to hit the shelves this month. Can you you tell readers a little about what they can expect to find inside?

Where in The Ethics of Paganism I had 10 000 words or so to express what I wanted, in Living with Honour I have 120 000 words.  As a result, I am able to go much more deeply into each idea and the reasoning behind it.  

I have always felt that the worst crime of a spiritual or religious writer, let alone a philosopher, is to answer a question with some variation on the line 'Just because'.  It is so dismissive of a child when a parent or teacher silences her questions with that dreadful response.  It is so frustrating when a theologian answers a question with something that requires faith.  My aim was to ensure that I didn't do that in this book, despite talking about the essential premises of animism.  

The book, then, looks at Paganism and its history, exploring animistic nature-based Paganism as one perspective within the spread of Pagan diversity.  I think explore ethics, the question of choice, and how we commonly make or justify our decisions about how to behave.  The various ways in which various Pagan traditions address ethics is covered, and then I talk more fully about the ethical tenets of animism as a modern Pagan religious perspective.  The second half of the book looks at how this ethics plays out in practical decision making, in how we value each other in our relationships, how we value human life, nonhuman animal life and the environment around us.  I cover most issues from abortion and euthanasia to animal testing and over population.  The final chapter looks at motivations and free will.

I hope it is accessible to people who have read no philosophy at all, while at the same time being useful to those studying ethics.  I know of a couple of folk doing MAs in environmental ethics at various universities who have read and used the book for their degrees.


I have met many people in the Pagan community who defend eating animals because of the ties to ancient hunting archetypes, or because they "honor" the animal they're eating. What do you say to that?

The defence that eating meat is natural is a wonderful one.  My usual response is that my lust is natural too, and is of significant evolutionary value.  I love sex, I love the exploration of attraction, the experience of love and intimacy.  It fills my soul with delight, brings me into powerful connection with my gods, nourishing my confidence and inspiring my creativity.  

Yet, if I followed my lustful cravings wherever they took me, it would very quickly be dishonourable.  In order to be respectful I must not seduce another woman's partner, however easy or delicious the adventure and its sensations may be.  As human beings, we must use another aspect of our human nature - reason - and not simply follow our passions.  Only then do we craft honourable, respectful, responsible relationships.

Further, if we look at the use of land and energy to create animal products, at this time when we need to produce more food to feed the world, eating vegan makes environmental sense.  No argument has convinced me otherwise.   



How do you feel like being veg has changed your life for the better?

Having been vegan nearly all my adult life, I can't imagine not being vegan, so the question is hard to grasp.  I am quite sure I would be less healthy, happy, energetic or have had such deep religious experiences of connection.



Is there a certain delicious vegan food that you especially like to indulge in?

saladThere is nothing more delicious than fresh vegetables grown locally.  Broad beans, asparagus, purple broccoli in the late spring, and then the first new potatoes, the bite of roquette and coriander and watercress.  I use plenty of olive oil, supporting those ancient olive orchards of the Mediterranean, extra virgin and organic, of course.  I just love fresh raspberries, with hazel nuts, watercress and black pepper: strange but true!   



What advice would you give to someone who wants to give up eating animals, but just has yet to take that step?

Go step by step, and don't try to replace meat or cheese in terms of finding processed substitutes.  Let them go and find another way of thinking about food, about meals.  Also, make sure you are eating plenty of protein, at least in the beginning: pulses, lentils (sprouted or cooked), a little organic soya tofu, millet, nuts (soak them for 12 hours before eating).  Explore.  Adventure ... 

But also look at the idea of veganism more broadly.  It isn't just about eating animals.  It is about how we use animals, and how we use the environment in a way that is destructive of habitat for animals, killing animals as a side effect of industrial agriculture.  Look at the clothes and shoes you wear, leather, silk and lamb's wool.  There are alternatives to all these, the most ethical, of course, always being to buy secondhand.

When we are seeing the whole picture, our sense of how much space and resources we use up as human beings becomes evident.  The reasons for not eating animals becomes a part of a more integrated coherent understanding of nature, life, need and joy.



Is there anything else you'd like to say to any potential animal advocates out there?

Be brave.  Courage is an integral part of being honourable in the way we live, and it can take enormous courage to make significant changes in our lives.  Go for it, make decisions, act!  Lose the hypocrisy of caring for the cute creatures and romantic landscapes, while being complicit in abusing the rest.  Stride out in your living, knowing you are a part of nature, using your human advantages to benefit the world.  Stop justifying desire by pretending it is need.  Each action, each penny or cent that is spent, each dollar or pound, is a vote of approval for what we are buying, and how it is produced.  

Nature is beautiful and brutal.  We have a choice to add to its beauty or its brutality.

 

Emma's book is now available!
Place your order here.