Scholar

Would vegan cartoons that have content that might be seen as provocative constitute what we define as inflammatory? I am genuinely curious because I do feel like they are not quite appropriate for this forum but at the same time I feel like they are good tools.

I've gone through the thread again, and on further reflection I do not think I can criticize myself too much for how I was acting in here. I think it was mostly appropriate and I hope it achieved at providing value for Stage Green and beyond, although I do recognize that I was too confrontational for Orange and, as one User said, provoked them into wanting to "poke" me. I think the cartoons are fine to be honest, they are good at showcasing some of the obvious cognitive dissonance that is going on, although again, it is no surprising that they are provoking some people. I do not see however that I was particularly dogmatic, if I look back I tried to keep the discussion about ego development, spirituality and the topics that I found were important. However, the people who criticized me did not respond to any of the information I was trying to provide. On a more general note, it is interesting that whenever there is a vegan topic that it gets a lot of discussion and responses. To me it indicates that this indeed has to do with some of the identites people have attached around this controversial topic, of course for both sides of the argument. I would not say there is a lot of Second Tier thinking here, outside of the moderators. And yes I realized it looks like I am just trying to stroke my back, but I hope to get feedback from some people whose opinion I value, which did not yet happen.

When two people quarrel, a third rejoices. I hear people criticizing Bernie for how he dealt with this, that he was not critical enough of his opponents, like Biden. And that he was too attached to his Socialist label which was not helpful in terms of optics. Do you agree with that? Could Bernie have won if he had better campaiging strategies or was it rather unlikely for him to win either way because of how much of the odds are stacked against him in terms of him being too progressive for many aspects of the establishment or even the population?

Interesting, didn't know about these dynamics. Yes, then it is probably better if Biden gets in office. But if I look at Biden's mental health, I feel like he will get demolished in any debate with Trump. I don't understand why Biden is the top running candidate. Everyone was better than him, Warren, Buttigieg, Bernie of course and even Yang.

It might even be better for Trump to win this over Biden. If Biden wins and things get worse instead of better, next time we might get another reaction towards the republicans. If Trump wins, and things continue getting worse, we might next time get enough momentum to get a progessive into office. However, it's hard to say what will actually happen and what kind of damage Trump can cause in another 4 years.

I am not interested in engaging with you about carnism, I have done so many times in a multitude of ways. Everything I wrote is geared towards people who are susceptible towards what I am writing. I would rather help some stage greens solidify their understanding of identity, three self's, values vs views etc. than attempt in futility to heave orange up to green. Even if I convinced you of a new View, it would change nothing about your Values. See my posts about Identity, Views vs Values etc. This contradicts the most basic understanding of supply and demand. Okay guys, I am calling it. At this point we are just poking each others identities and I don't see value in it anymore. I will only respond to moderators if they wish to add something to this.

And if he read any of my posts he would know that the Meme's purpose is not to persuade carnists or change their perspective. Ah, it's the vegans who are not looking at the other side's perspective... yes, it's not the carnists who are turning a blind eye towards the suffering of the animals they pay to be enslaved and slaughtered. The vegans are the ignorant ones, they need to understand the carnists! Of course, thank you for that valuable insights. I will now go and criticize the vegans who are so ignorant and dogmatic for trying to create a culture that is concerned with the suffering of sentient beings. Man, I wish I could travel back in time to tell all of the abolitionists that they should be more compassionate and understanding towards the slavors. That surely would have made all the difference.

Prefaced with this. This cognitive dissonance is beyond me.

I am not trying to force ideologies, I am pointing to systemic issues in how people in here understanding spiral dynamics and identity evolution. And I don't agree that the cartoons are silly, I think they are very good at what they are doing, I already tried to explain why I thought that was the case. You are telling me to really consider opposing viewpoints and try to understand them, but you do not apply this to me. What about my viewpoints about why I think these cartoons are effective? What about my viewpoints about Identity, Values vs Views and the three Self distinction? Why are you not open minded to that and trying to understand where I am coming from? You are just making assertions that you are correct. When I tried to explain and justify my position I gave all sorts of arguments for why it is the case (namely what I said about Identity, Values vs Views and the Three Selfs). Yet, you just ignore that and call me ignorant for having posted innocent cartoons. Is it my identity that makes me post cartoons, or is it your identity that feels threatened by these cartoons and lashes out by calling them ineffective advocacy? How do you know these cartoons are ineffective? I had great experiences convincing people like this. As I said repeatedly, my goal is not to change your values, I don't think that is possible. One goal was to clear up the misunderstanding of spirituality and identity evolution I see in this community, and another goal is to make people with green values realize the importance of a firm green viewpoint. I see a lot of toxic relativism and spiritual shaming in here that is used to justify lower value sets and identities. This is my view, and I have not seen any compelling arguments from you that challenge that view. I would like to have a moderator give their opinion on this.

I have, I still do not agree with Keyhole's understanding. Can you help me and point out specifically what I need to look at?

I would like to hear a Moderator give their opinion on this, what is happening here between Keyhole and me and in this Thread in general. I don't feel like I am self-deluding myself in the way Keyhole is describing, to me it seems like a very uncharitable interpretation of what I am saying and what is actually going on. I felt at no point like he was attempting to understand or inquire into my position. And I also felt like he was not really contending with my points. But I am willing to listen to a third perspective.

@Keyhole Ask yourself this: I made multiple claims about spiral dynamics, about identity, about how society evolves and so forth and so forth. Why are you not challenging me on a single one of those claims? Why are you sifting through posts I made months ago to prove to me, or yourself, that I am being unconscious and dogmatic? Seriously, ask yourself why you are doing this. The only thing of substance you posted was about persuation tactics, which was a video that I feel like compeltely misses spiral dynamics and how persuation works differently in the context of actual Value evolution. We can gladly discuss that, even though the rest of the points I made about Identity, Values vs Views and Real Self-Authentic Self-False Self I think were far more important. That's where we can have a valuable discussion. Rather you have this weird obsession with whether or not I am conscious or developed or not and how I should focus on self-improvement and conduct. This is what I mean with the pseudo-spirituality. It is used as a defense. As soon as people here feel like they don't want to contend with something, they dismiss everything by calling the person delusional, underdeveloped or unconscious. I know why I am defending veganism here. I know I have identity attachments to other living creatures much like to my family. Now, ask yourself, why exactly are you here? Why exactly are you responding to me and attempting to show me my unconsciousness? Why are you posting videos that make fun of vegan bacon? That suddenly has nothing to do with egoic attachment, bad conduct or dogma? You honestly think you are free from that?

I understand. But this is a problem of identity, not a problem of action. You are viewing this far too superficially. The fact that you have issues adopting a diet that is plant based does mean you must remain in your limited identity. This is the fundamentaly problem of identity. You have a problem of survival, and that evidently limits your identity. This is how identity works, you must contract your Self-identity so that your survival is not compromised. You are not here saying veganism is good, but that you simply had difficult implementing a completely suffering free diet. You are not saying for example that it is wrong to holocaust animals, but that you must act this way for survival. Your survival problems limit your identity to orange, how do you think spiral dynamics works? This is precisely how any constriction of identity works. Our work it to expand our identity despite this. I struggle greatly on the vegan diet, yet because I view animals as an extention of myself, I can deal with the struggle, I am overcoming it. If I could not, I would still contribute to the extention of identity. I would still encourage people to be vegan, to extend their self-identity. Dietary needs have nothing to do with this identity issue. You should really look into what gaslighting is, because this is what you are doing right now. I do not agree that I am throwing my dogma around and I do not agree that my criticisms are ineffective. Just because they do not achieve what you view as important does not mean they do not achieve what I view as important. Notice how you are focusing on me here, when we are talking about the animal holocaust. Notice how you keep changing the topic from what is happening to who I am, to my faults, to my limitations. I never denied I have limitations, even if I had limitations that would change nothing about the substance of what I am arguing. You are literally trying to shame me into the same toxic ideology that I have told you that I have abandoned. It's like you haven't read anything I wrote and all that came to your mind is: "THIS GUY IS SO UNCONSCIOUS LUL LET ME TELL HIM HOW UNAWARE HE IS!" Where is your consciousness? Where is your effective way of helping me see my unconsciousness? Do you believe that calling me out like this is going to increase my consciousness? How can you not see that you have the very same limitations but are denying that you have them? Atleast I admit it, atleast I recognize that there is no way to avoid identity and that it is a process of learning. And a process of being open about it and being vulnerable about it. All you did so far is basically use my vulnerability against me without any hint of trying to actually help me. How can you not see this?

I think I made a good case for why I do what I do. I don't try to come across as healthy, which is the reason why I allow myself to express myself authentically. For example, I do not care if you think I am at stage Yellow, because I myself am not concerned with at what stage I am. This is the fundamentaly difference. The post you quoted is actually when I was starting to realized the toxic and repressive nature of this whole pseudo-spiritualistic attitude many people in this community have. My view previous was: "Identity is bad! Avoid falling into identity, try to be the most open minded, integral person possible. Always come off as reasonable, calm and collected! Try to avoid ALL DOGMA!!!" My view now is: "Play with identity, fall into identity, observe your identity. Notice how it is playing out, notice your authentic expression and actualize your authentic expression. Look at your emotional attachments, feel them, let yourself go in them while you are conscious that they are happening!" This has helped me tremendously, it helped me resolve many dysfunction. In this thread for example I was always aware that I was falling into a green identity. I was enjoying it, I was playing with it. I saw my frustration, I lived my frustration, and I do not judge myself for it. Now I am calm, there is no feeling to protect myself, but rather I can explain to you my authentic expression and thoughts. I view this thread, how you react to it and what I learn from it as an exploration, not merely a utlity. I do indeed have concerns about this community in many ways. I do not view it as an inherent problem of Leo's work, but rather how some people tend to work with it. As I said, I do not agree with the persuation tactics, because I do not believe it is one dimensional. There are enough apologetic vegans around, in here and outside. If my family members got raped and someone was arguing for why it was okay for them being raped, I would not judge myself for being judgemental. And I would certainly not take someone serious who claims it is fine to rape my family member and tell me that I need to work on my persuation tactics, or that I make them want to poke me, or that I am comfortable with my shortcomings and pushing my ideology on them. So no, right now I do not feel like trying less criticism, much like you don't feel like giving up on your position that holocausting sentient beings is all fine and dandy.

One additional problem is that you can't really make an Orange Value person come to value animals like a Green Value person does. You could persuade the Orange Person of a Green View, but it would most likely do nothing to change his core value. He would still look at humans as superior in worth, even if he might not agree with that intellectually. There are however quite a few Green Value people around who have not yet the Vegan View. By showing them how absurd the carnists arguments are, these people can be compelled to adopt the Vegan View, as they already include animals into their self-identity. This dynamic is key. This is why you have so many people who do veganism for health for example, and then sliding back to carnism. It is because they remained at orange and adopted a Green Ideology or View. Their identity as far as the inclusion of animals goes never truly changed. This is not what I seek to change, as I would not even know how to begin grappling with this issue. Vegetable Police is an excellent example of this. His values were always grounded in orange, and even his view of animals is grounded in an orange identity. Sure, he finds animals cute and doesn't like hurting them, but this is not the same as green. Even blue can have compassion for animals. Orange will of course have more compassion and than blue had, yet green has a fundamentally different type of identity. Compare it to for example Blue people having compassion for their black slaves, and then compare it to a orange person viewing it as unthinkable and disgusting to enslave any other race in the first place. This is the "animal welfare" vs "holocaust abolitionist" viewpoint. Yellow is not about "sustainable, ethical animal holocaust", that is part of orange. The argument you think that come from yellow are like as if you would think a yellow person would argue for "Ethical enslavement" and be super concerned about the dogma of people who are fighting slavery. This is so obviously backwards, but because many of you have either not transitioned or integrated green in a healthy and complete manner, you overlook this completely. The problem with yellow is that a lot of their viewpoint and focus is determined by how they have integrated the lower stages. This is essential to understand, this is why any person who has emergent yellow will seek to reintegrated lower stages and work on their shadow. Yellow could for example have a huge lack in green, as most yellow people infact do have, and be arguing in a dysfunctionally systemic way. Because they do not have a complete picture, their view of the system and their concerned for everything to work together in union will be hindered. There could be a "yellow person" (if we forgo the nuance of developmental lines and so forth) for example protecting their incomplete identity that is weighted at orange, or even blue!

Because that is how societal evolution goes. Orange must progress into Green, and humor is one of the best ways to create such progress. The same was true in the past and it will work this way in the future. I am fine making fun of you while you are fine holocausting sentient beings. Your bad feelings are a sacrifice I am willing to make for the evolution of mankind. We made far, far greater sacrifces in the past. Look at how the world dealt with the Nazi's or the slavors. When I am among vegans, I focus solely on the unconsciousness of vegans, their dogmatism, the way their identity makes them vulnerable to blind-sided thinking. I for example extensively criticize vegans for the one-dimensional health claims they make, or when they have black and white thinking about how their diet effects the world. To me for example there are very compelling arguments for why being a vegan body builder is immoral, or why overconsuming in general is immoral. There are also many systemic issues with the attitude and values of stage green. But this is not what any of you here criticize. People in here criticize veganism from below, not from above. You don't go about focusing on criticizing the church or religion in a society in which stage red is prevelant, where they need a healthy transition into stage blue. That is nonsensical, not integral and completely lacks systems thinking. There is no one size fits all solution. In this forum I act in a very specific way for very specific reasons, even in this particular thread I have developed a very particular identity to let the dynamics play out. In the end, I focus on the unconsciousness of meat-eaters because their limited value set poses the biggest threat to the ecology of this planet since the last mass extinction, and it is also the main cause of human-caused suffering in this world. There is no issue that is comparable as far as suffering and destruction goes, there is no issue in which adopting responsibility is more helpful and effective. Most of you are indoctrinated and will not change. The younger generation will use these discriminatory tools to create a culture which self-perpetuates itself. They will make fun of carnists, they will discriminate against them, until that form of mind is going to be extinguished from this planet and only few sparks will remain, much like White-Superiority, Human-Superiority will be viewed the same way in the future. The objections I had in this threadwere pointing at the mechanisms of your mind, not simply veganism. I find it far more disturbing how unconscious people in here are of the way spiral dynamics and integral theory plays out. As I said, the lack in distinction between Real Self, Authentic Self and False Self leads to very dysfunctional behaviour. Don't forget, Tier 2 is able to become the soldier who slaughters the Nazi's, if the situation asks for it. They can fall into unconsciousness, act out what must be acted out, and reemerge from it when other tools are appropriate. Identity is a tool, a tool necessary for the evolution of mankind. You will not get dispassionate nihilists's fight for the survival of mankind. The reason why I am so harsh about this is because I have never personally convinced anyone to become vegan by being compassionate. It always was the case when I was harshly criticizing the carnist position, by for example criticizing a certain person, while another person, who is carnist but who I was not directly talking about, listened to me and was compelled by my arguments. Much like the cartoons are doing. The ones who identify too much with carnism are in my view too hard to convince, it is better to focus people who are already susceptible to the new identity. I don't criticize sv3rige to turn him into a vegan. I make fun of him so that the people who are ready can see the absurdity in it and come to conclude to this themselves. I predict that there will be a lot of division in the future. As the identity of the carnists gets more and more threatened, both position will become more and more extreme.

Says the person who starts his contribution with: I guess slavery was ended by having accepted and shown compassion towards the slavors? You have a very unrealistic view on how consciousness is developing in the collective. Veganism is on the rise, it is becoming more and more self-evident to more and more people. And before you know it people like you will seem as biggoted as the common racist who says that the "negros" need to be put back into their place.

Can you show footage of the way all of these animals are slaughtered?

If you want to become more consistent with your values, transmute shame into courage and love: Do not just look at the harm you are causing with the choices, do not focus on what you do not want to be, rather focus on what you want to be. Focus on that which you can do for your fellow brothers and sisters, the love and compassion you can extend to them. This is who you can become, it does take sacrifice, but becoming that will give you far more than any cheese and any convinience will give you. Who do you want to be? The person who gives his little sister his chocolate to see her joy and share it with her, or the big brother who can't help but pick on his little sister? Sacrifice is a beautiful thing, it is where we find strength and courage. We all know the courage of a mother and father protecting her child, the deep purpose and meaning the derive from protecting and guarding their own. Now imagine all these creatures were your children, what courage that would give you, how much meaning you would derrive from that. Notice the transformative potential of this. Love will give you far more than comfort and convenience ever will. And it will not just transform you, but those around you aswell. True joy is not found in having others serve you, it is found it serving others, in sacrificing your limited, temporary form for those who need it the most. Joaquin is an excellent example of this. Notice how he focuses on our potential for goodness. He is suffering from the compassion he feels for those around him, but yet he seems more joyful than most of those who are hiding in their own limited identity. This is the strength of Green. It is our compassion, our trust and courage in adopting responsibility for the suffering round us. It is in our vulnerability, our ability to self-sacrifice. This is what we want to become.

The fundamental problem here is that by creating an Ideal of High Consciosuness at a lower stage, like orange and green, it is very easy to get through the spiral in a very superficial and repressive way. This will lead to shadows, and shadows will inevitably make this work far more difficult. Authentic expression is key, we cannot skip steps because we want to be "High Consciousness!". I feel like this wisdom is lacking in Leo's teachings, or atleast an appropriate emphasis on that. To be fair, Leo could not predict people developing like this, but now that it is happening, I hope to see some corrections in the way he teaches and clarifies some of this stuff.

But that is not promoting veganism. Veganism is a specific view coming from a specific value set. The value is an extention of identity towards animals, which means animals become part of the self construct. Veganism is then the view that it is wrong to exploit and use that part of self for personal gain. So veganism or stage green identity is not compatible with reducing animal cruelty or promoting better ways to holocaust animals. It is about the adoption of responsibility for our actions and the inclusion of animals into our circle of identity. If you see a difference between a child, or a mentally handicapped person and an animal, you are still discriminatory in the same way a racist is and did not fully extend your identity. Imagine for someone who believes in human rights, or in other words someone who extended their identity to all humans, to say something like "Yeah, I guess the best way to end black slavery is to introduce better ways to enslave black people and more compassionate ways to treat them.". This will seem absurd from the POV of a more evolved identity, much like the slavery argument seems absurd to you. The importance is the value change, not simply a superficial change in behaviour. This change goes to the core of your identity and how you view the world. The best strategy to change behaviour will be meat replacements, like lab grown meat that is planned to be available commercially in the next few years. This will then change the fundamental way people view animals. But us as consciousness workers need to go beyond cultural, unconscious mechanism. Our work is in consciously developing our identities.

He will probably send you this: And claim that it's evidence that all beings need meat. That's the kind of person you are talkng to, just so you know.

Yes, but I think this does not add a lot of value to this discussion, because we all have watched Leo's videos and we all know this. And You have not shown how this is even relevant in this specific context. To me it seems like it is a knee-jerk bypassing. To me, it right now is being used dangerously, not just potentially, but in actuality. If you saw Naz's arguing that they want to holocaust the jews, and then you saw someone disagreeing with that and calling it low consciousness, would you then go to them and say "But you know, all morality is relative! Don't be so unconscious jew-defender!". This is completely backwards and inappropriate. Why are you focusing so much on the unconsciousness of the vegan but not focusing at all on the unconsciousness of the meat-eater, who with his choices his inflicting suffering and destruction beyond comprehension? What you focus on, what you perceive as a threat is determined by your identity. What do you think does your focus tell you about your own identity? Do you bring this topic up in every moralistic discussion? In every political discussion? In every discussion that is about the relative domain? Why do you bring it up here, in the vegan discussion? Why do you gear it towards the vegan side of the argument? Does the world really need more excuses and defense of the carnist position? Is that really the position you hold? That vegans are the problem and that the meat-eaters need to be protected?

@Serotoninluv Thank god you are here, the voice of calm reaso.

You avoided everything I was pointing at and reduced this discussion to the View of Veganism, rather than the values and the importance of Value evolution and how people like you use moral relativism to justify their VALUES not merely their VIEWS. How do you think consciousness works? I can say I deny all dogma and that I hold no position and I become completely nihilistic towards everything and just say "All perspectives are valid!" while profiding absurd arguments that do not apply, and can then call myself "high consciousness" and dismiss everyone who criticizes this position by saying "You are too closeminded to see what I mean!"? You are literally doing it, you are the Frankenstein. You have a view not because your values truly reflect that view, but because you value being the person who would hold such values and views. You want to be that "High consciousness person", not for actual curiousity, but because you want to be better. This is not yellow, this is orange.