Elephants possess immense emotional intelligence and form lifelong social bonds, making this brief gesture of shared comfort both deeply touching and utterly heartbreaking.
Yeah but every single pig would eat the one right next to it. I’ve seen it happen. Pigs aren’t “evil”, but they don’t have some type of affection for each other that goes beyond the next meal.
Most people won’t do that, most will starve first, or at least for a couple days.
I was taking a butcher training course, this guy had his own herd of pigs that he kept. Well fed, he had some thing feeding them walnut shell and stuff for their skin. The idea is that they have one bad moment in life.
I won’t go too far into the details, he selected two and after dispatching one, the other ran over to eat. Like, excitedly.
Not the person you're responding to but I've been to plenty of ranches in my life. Pigs will eat almost anything you put in front of them. They are nature's trash compactor.
This kind of thing is largely why I stand so hard with Billie Eilish's statements about how most people who say they love animals are hypocrites. If all the people who say they love animals across the world would mobilize, they could largely stop the enslavement and torture of animals. Some animals can be and are working animals who can coexist with humans. But this type of treatment, and the refusal to acknowledge other species desire to live and exist freely, and to wholly respect that, needs to stop.
We as a species are so incredibly and ignorantly selfish. And that destroys everything around us and just causes despair. I mourn the lost love, hope, and life in all of these animals, from big to small, from marine to land to air. They deserve to be free of us.
I don't think it is that easy calling someone a hypocrite, just because they could do more to help animals after saying that they love them.
I would say I do, but I'm still not perfect. I'm only vegetarian and not vegan. I donated a while to help animals, but stopped doing so, because I wanna safe a little bit more money, just to name two examples on what I could do better myself.
Being vegetarian for example is a step in the right direction to support animals and that is more than most people do.
When people ask why I'm vegetarian I say it's because I love animals. Which largely makes them uncomfortable, but it's the truth. I don't care if my truth makes anyone uncomfortable. I'd be a liar if I said I loved animals but still ate them. It's simple.
I was vegetarian in the 90s when it was more uncommon so I'd have to explain about factory farms. People are horrified but then just compartmentalize/lie to themselves and eat it anyway. I daresay if everyone had to visit one and understand it viscerally, it might change. It's hard to understand why there's not more outrage! But I realized it's not just the food industry, it's our whole entire society, like our clothes are basically made by slaves, there's suffering behind most goods we rely on in modern society even plant based food.
Now I keep sheep and chickens, dote on them every single day like pets and make so many sacrifices for them, never get to travel etc. Then every year I fight against my emotions, remind myself of my convictions and kill some to keep their numbers down, so at least in this one small way I can choose to opt out of the brutal industrial machine and feed myself without making anything suffer.
Something like 80% of farmland is used just to grow food to feed animals to then keep in horrible conditions and kill, which supplies something like 10-20% of the calories for mostly rich westeners. We could easily solve world hunger several times over and massively reforest the earth if more people just faced the reality of the numbers and changed their habits.
If you fly across Europe or the US in google satellite view, you'll see nearly every square inch outside of cities has been converted to farmlands, unless it's on a mountain top, is arid, or is in one of the remaining protected forests which all look like they're being chewed out from the inside as excuses are found to cut down more and more. Wild animals are nearly extinct and don't really exist outside of our imaginations of there being some happy natural place they all live still. Nearly every inch of land has been clear cut and turned into farmland to keep animals in horrible conditions for an unnecessary luxury for a small percentage of humanity.
There are massive reforestation programs going on in the U.S. and around the world, the U.S. actually has more trees than it did in the early 1900s and is increasing the plantation of more trees.
Considering the gross overconsumption and food waste in the US, I believe it. Everyone needs food portions 5x larger than necessary or else they feel cheated.
You consider that a lot? That's less than three whole chickens in a month... I'd argue the average here in Brazil (and in Africa, where chicken is heavily favored over beef) is even higher.
There's also a bunch of foods that have some chicken that you don't even notice
And millions aren't even eaten, just given a short life of torture and suffering because you want the option to eat whatever you can think of at any time.
No, I know it's painful and horrible to be slaughtered. I wish regulations were enforced strongly. I wish conditions were better for the animals. But I'm an omnivore and killing something to eat is always gonna end badly for prey.
many of the poorest places in the world are vegetarian, for most of history slaughtering your animals was very wasteful and only done for holidays or special occasions, so it's not privileged at all so suggest not eating meat
oh shut up it is not privileged to think killing animals is unjust. Vegan diets are often way more affordable than eating meat which even with all the subsidies and nonsense used to reduce the price is still more expensive than vegan and vegetarian food. As a species we have developed an agricultural and logical system so efficient that its possible for practically everybody to not eat meat. It's one thing if you live in some crazy remote area where nothing grows and or some war zone where you have no option but to eat meat but that is not the case for 99.99999% of people on the planet. Sure with capitalism some people are starving but that doesn't somehow make it mean that they have no other choice but to eat meat.
Saying a vegan diet is "often more affordable" just is not true for the average American. Protein substitutes and vitamin supplements can get extremely expensive very quickly for several reasons.
Some people with certain genetic/health conditions find it much harder to stay healthy without eating meat because it can be extremely difficult and/or expensive to replace the nutrients they receive from meat with an alternative.
This isn't a black and white issue and you know that but you choose to frame it in such a way to try and shame people into eating a vegan diet.
I'm vegetarian on a cut and I get 160g of protein with 1600-1700cals. Protein is actually quite cheap - I get a soy protein isolate for $8.69 / lb, about $0.51 / 24g protein, compared to optimum nutrition whey ($2.06 / 24g). Textured vegetable protein (alternative to ground beef) is only $6 for 14 servings - all you have to do is season it. Not to mention seitan, pea protein, peanut protein, hemp protein, lentils, beans, etc.
The only vitamin that you can't get naturally on a vegan diet is b12, but that's actually quite cheap. This is 200 supplements for <$10 - enough for a year. Or you can get it through foods fortified with B12, such as nutritional yeast or most plant milks.
Overall, a vegan diet can be a lot more affordable, even with high protein. Meat is actually a luxury. For 90+% of Americans, a vegan diet is more affordable and healthier.
I don't know how you can say protein is quite cheap and then say it's basically $9/lb. In what world is that cheap compared to chicken or pork which can be had for $2/lb or less depending on the amount of work you want to do. You can buy a whole turkey for less than $1/lb, realistically more like 1.50-2 by the time you work the bird but it's all useable. Mediocre ground beef here is $6/lb and $9/lb for higher quality stuff.
You're doing disservice by saying vegetable protein is cheap and that meat is a luxury when it's basically the opposite. I'm all about vegetable protein and eating little to no meat too.
then say it's basically $9/lb. In what world is that cheap compared to chicken or pork which can be had for $2/lb or less
They posted soy protein powder, so it's hard to compare them. Powder with zero water vs meat which is full of water.
But also shows that they're disingenuous. Could have posted beans or Tofu but no they went for fucking protein powder....
Takes ages to turn that stuff into something edible
Saying it's cheaper for 90+% of Americans is crazy work.
The average price of a whole chicken in the US is $2.06/lb, literally less than 25% of the cost of your soy protein. The average price of boneless, skinless chicke breast is about $4/lb, more expensive yet still literally less than half the price of your soy protein. Bone-in drumsticks and thighs and are both about $1.90/lb on average, literally less than 20% of the price of your soy protein.
ETA: at best, TVP is 10-25 cents more expensive per pound than chicken breast, and has essentially no better nutritional value overall per cooked portion. It's both higher in certain nutritional values than chicken, and lower in certain values than chicken. Also it's not a complete protein, unlike chicken, and the protein density is notably lower than chicken per cooked portion. So it is both more expensive and arguably less nutritious than chicken.
There are many more nutritional needs other than just B12 deficiency that can occur for the average person trying to sustain a vegan diet. Vitamin D for instance, without supplements, vitamin D deficiency can be a real problem for people who try to sustain a vegan diet. Certain electrolytes as well are much harder to keep up on without supplements. Traditional supplements also vary wildly in price depending on region/source.
A vegetarian diet is much more sustainable from both a cost and nutritional perspective for the average American than a vegan diet, I'll give you that much. To say it's more affordable for 90+% of Americans when meat costs literally less than 25% of most alternatives is just incredibly factually inaccurate and out of touch.
I am a meat eater and you will never convince me that most meat eaters could go through the whole process of raising and slaughtering an animal. If that was the only way we could eat meat most would quickly become vegetarian.
I understand that I’m probably worse than Hitler to a bunch of cows, pigs, and chickens, but I don’t think an elephant neurologically is in anyway equivalent. An elephant is like literally just one wrung down from us.
There's no evolutionary ladder with humans at the top and elephants one rung below. Pigs are actually more closely related to us than elephants are.
Elephants are obviously intelligent, but there's no real evidence they're smarter than pigs overall. In fact, pigs have successfully followed human pointing and body language to find hidden food, while Asian elephants failed similar tests. Pigs can also use mirrors to locate hidden objects and have even learned to play simple video games using joysticks.
That doesn't mean pigs are smarter, but it shows how daft it is to pretend there's some established ranking.
Every animal preys on something. We humans are the top dog and hence just do not care about our cruelty since we are still mostly driven by need to make money, we are still mostly animal.
We just think we are intelligent and better than animals but time and time again it is proven that collectively we are just another animal, just look at all the democracies.
We're considerably worse than other animals. We have a capacity to understand more, to empathize more, and yet we inflict cruelty for sport. Other animals feed on their prey, or use force to maintain security. We make up gods and religions to justify making spectacles of death. Sarcrifice, cheering wars. We're not on par with other animals. We're below.
I'm sorry but no. Every species which has been shown to display high levels of intelligence have shown equal capacity for cruelty. Chimpanzee committing deliberate genocide against other tribes, Dolphins carrying out acts of rape, Killer Whales inflicting suffering on prey for the fun of watching them in pain.
Morally wrong acts are not the sole domain of Humans but every species. Intelligence nearly increases the scale on which it can be inflicted.
Not really for fun, they lack the capacity to understand cruelty and sport. Their perceived cruelty is almost entirely instinctual drive to hunt and kill.
A cat also lacks the mental capacity to ever understand the word 'sadism' while we do. They get a dopamine hit for catching squirming animals. That's all they know. They can't grasp the idea that this could be wrong because 'right' and 'wrong' don't exist in their world, only 'feels good' and 'feels bad.'
For whatever reason our brains evolved to be able to construct and exercise the idea of 'right' and 'wrong.' We also constructed 'responsibility.' These concepts were created by us, can only be understood by us, and thus, only apply to us.
We are intelligent to solve our problems but the worst part is we use intelligence to create societal and environmental problem. I am guessing we can be called crazy savants.
Worst part is: most animals will stop the cruelty when they have enough space and food to eat. But humans do not, we go on ego trip like say Putin and start war based on our fantasy. Or we want to topple democracies like say Elon Musk. The whole world is broken because of elites wanting everything for themselves and the masses voting without a care.
Captured in 2016, the emotional moment went viral, with many believing the elephants were saying their final goodbyes before being separated forever.
As the trucks stood side by side, the elephants stretched their trunks across the gap, briefly connecting despite the distance between them.
Elephants are incredibly emotional and intelligent animals, known to form lifelong bonds, mourn, and comfort one another through physical touch.
Although it was never confirmed whether these two elephants were being permanently separated, the photograph became a powerful symbol of the bonds these gentle giants share.
Sometimes, a single photograph can say more than a thousand words.
Yeah my first thought was are they actually being separated? I mean it can't be easy to transport a single elephant in a vehicle let alone two. Maybe they were just bringing them somewhere and needed to use two trucks. Otherwise why would the trucks be so close together while driving on the road?
Then again it may just be me wistfully hoping that this is the case.
Funny part is Mr. Smith became what he hated in the end, the same creature multiplying over and over again. Populating and replacing everything with his own image just like we are now.
They’re not being separated. Stop karma farming with decade old Facebook slop. You try transporting 2 elephants on the same truck and then tell me how it goes.
Animals near forests often end up wandering off into small cities around it. They could have been tranquilized and taken back. Maybe some treatment, you can't tell
I mean... Maybe they're on their way to the same refuge and just couldn't be put together on one truck. Maybe they were previously separated and are now back together and pulling into a new facility that's ready to have them together... who knows?
Without context it's hard to know whether this is a sad image or a happy one.
What does that even mean? "There's literally no source for the image". We see the image, so it has a source. What that source is, can be questioned. I looked online and found the reported photographer. So you're lying.
imagine no choice in this world and alone oneday you see someone like you same situation and you only get 5 seconds. this timeline is just cruel or as humans aren't supposed to know too many things around the world.
Why are so many people this cruel..Keep them together as they have more feeling then a lot of so called humans..Shame on you.. I have a big lump in my throat...
Here is less cropped version of this image. Credit to the photographer, Bandeep Singh. This page used to provide the following information:
Two elephants are trying to get one last moment together. It is a heartbreaking photo that was taken on a Bangalore, India city highway. Sowmya Vidyadhar posted the photo on Facebook on December 22, [2016] and it has gone viral. Elephants have families and strong family relationships. They mourn and protect their young – not unlike human beings.
Baby elephants will stay with their parents for many years. Did you know elephants are very intelligent and can even experience jealousy? They can. They are living creatures, not tools for humans to use and abuse as we see fit. It is likely that these two elephants will never see each other again. They are being sent away and will now serve humans.
(For this post on Facebook Sowmya Vidyadhar stated "Photograph courtesy: Bandeep Singh")
This picture is old af and OP is just another karma farmer. That being said, If you go to any country, Vietnam, Thailand, India, etc. anywhere with elephant rides, Do not take them they all exploit these poor elephants.
No signboard over toll booth is fudged with lot of spaces, a critical Hindi word is missing. Also very rare to see NHAI on toll booth signboard that too in so much detail.
Vehicles and toll booth also look very off from general in India
You people need to chill with the AI paranoia. It's ridiculous. This picture is at least seven years old, I've seen it before. The sub rules don't let me post it, but I was able to find it on a thread from seven years ago.
Its also worthless. Even if they can tell some pics or clips apart they certainly wont be able to in like 2-5 years. On top of yhat trying to police every image or clip that gets posted to the internet is a fruitless endeavor. Its just straight impossible.
Their time would be much better spent calling up their local politician and trying to get legislation passed that would force all AI gen'd images/vids to be watermarked with something like "created by AI"
All this effort analysing the picture when you could've just done one reverse image search to see this picture has existed for over 10 years, well before AI.
Yeah that’s ai bullshit. There’s no independent information on this actually happening at all. Even the photo has no links to any official sources or even reliable ones
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u/lonewolff321 14h ago
Elephants possess immense emotional intelligence and form lifelong social bonds, making this brief gesture of shared comfort both deeply touching and utterly heartbreaking.