Animal Cruelty

Do Vegan Athletes Really Avoid Animal Cruelty?
Do Vegan Athletes Really Avoid Animal Cruelty?
6 min
If you can deal with human ignorance only then there is the chance, we will be more friendly, more compassionate towards animals. Otherwise, a sectoral approach, a fragmented approach will at most make you feel good about yourself. But in the bigger picture, it does no favor to the animals or to the environment.
Stop Calling These as Scriptures
Stop Calling These as Scriptures
8 min
A scripture is a book that tells you about yourself. A scripture has to deal essentially with self-knowledge. A book that talks of dietary choices cannot be called a scripture. A person who talks of the kind of things you must eat to enhance your health and such things cannot be called a Guru. Shastra is what deals with self-knowledge; a guru is one who encourages self-knowledge in you.
Surprise! A Delicious Dish
Surprise! A Delicious Dish
5 min

Acharya Prashant: In general, human beings are not cannibals. We do not eat other men and women, do we? Why don't we ask ourselves: “Why don't we eat other men and women? If flesh is what we want to eat, then why kill animals?” There are many who say, “Eating

सिर्फ़ मेरी बात नहीं है  हज़ारों जानें बच सकती हैं  मुझे जाना होगा!
सिर्फ़ मेरी बात नहीं है हज़ारों जानें बच सकती हैं मुझे जाना होगा!
6 min
15 नवंबर को गीता सत्र से कुछ घंटे पहले, देश की बड़ी पशु कार्यकर्ता, गौरी मौलेखी जी का एक संदेश आया। उन्होंने आचार्य जी से नेपाल में होने वाले ‘गढ़ीमाई महोत्सव’ के विषय पर बिहार के, मुख्यमंत्री, मुख्य सचिव और प्रेस से बातचीत के लिए पटना आने का अनुरोध किया। यह एक गंभीर मुद्दा था—हजारों जानवरों की जान बचाने का और एक सदियों पुरानी कुप्रथा के विरुद्ध आवाज़ उठाने का।
Bleeding Throat, Unyielding Spirit: Acharya Prashant’s Fight for the Voiceless
Bleeding Throat, Unyielding Spirit: Acharya Prashant’s Fight for the Voiceless
5 min
On the evening of November 15, just hours before a scheduled Gita session, a message arrived from Gauri Maulekhi, a prominent animal rights activist. She requested Acharya Prashant to join her in Patna the following morning to meet the Chief Secretary of Bihar and address the press about the Gadhimai festival in Nepal. This was no ordinary request. It was a plea to save thousands of animals and to raise a voice against a centuries-old practice of cruelty disguised as tradition.
What does it mean to Love a Jungle?
What does it mean to Love a Jungle?
6 min

Acharya Prashant: You look at the last few centuries. Even the declaration of the rights of man came just three hundred years back. Then came the declaration of the rights of slaves. And in the last century came the Declaration of the Rights of Women.

I am seeing that in

Is It Better to Let the Poor and the Sick Die?
Is It Better to Let the Poor and the Sick Die?
12 min

Questioner: We know that currently the Earth is overpopulated. People around me very loosely say that the people who are physically, mentally, or economically not so well off, they are better off dead. So, I want to ask, what is your take on this? And what do you think is

He Chose a Wife, Not a Guru
He Chose a Wife, Not a Guru
6 min

Questioner: We have a question by Pooja. So people who try to become self-aware and you know knowledgeable of themselves. They usually became the black sheep of their families.

Question by Pooja is what can we do if our loved ones, that is spouse, parents, friends are not receptive to

The One Species We Are Most Unfair To || AP Neem Candies
The One Species We Are Most Unfair To || AP Neem Candies
6 min

Acharya Prashant: If all those who oppose beef and cow slaughter would really know that the beef industry and the dairy industry are deeply interrelated, would they still be milk lovers? The majority of opposition to beef in India comes from those who love milk. That’s very, very strange.

Look

God Made a Mistake || AP Neem Candies
God Made a Mistake || AP Neem Candies
4 min

Questioner: It is said specifically that butter, milk, and ghee is good for health, and this is what our mother cow gave to us as an offering. What would you say about that?

Acharya Prashant: You see, these are very basic things. To be a believer in the Vedas is

Worse Than a Dog, Higher Than a God || AP Neem Candies
Worse Than a Dog, Higher Than a God || AP Neem Candies
4 min
If dogs were to write a holy text, would they say that “We are inferior to humans”? If chickens were to write a Bible of their own, would they say that “We exist so that we may be slaughtered in factories and packed”? Read more....
These two need some education || AP Neem Candies
These two need some education || AP Neem Candies
3 min

Acharya Prashant: You might be an MBBS, or an MD, or a DM, but you could still be quite illiterate; you might still not have basic knowledge regarding the nutritional value of various food products. You could have a quack graduating even from the best medical college.

And you are

Ancient Man a Carnivore? || AP Neem Candies
Ancient Man a Carnivore? || AP Neem Candies
3 min

Acharya Prashant: There are a few myths that need to be dispelled. Yes, man has had the inclination and the capacity to eat meat since a very, very long time. But even when man was in the jungle, he was primarily herbivore. And this is born out by scientific analysis

The One Most Important Thing About Life
The One Most Important Thing About Life
34 min
“The will to live.” “The will to just continue.” That, he said, is the basic human existential tendency. I’m asking, “Don’t animals have that tendency?” At the root of all consciousness; is the will to survive and continue. We don’t want to die; the animals, too, don’t want to die, right? We feel pain, we suffer; so do animals. The reasons might be very different. Often the reasons are, in fact, not too different. Separate a human mother from her baby and you see the suffering. It’s very apparent. Separate a cow from her calf, and the suffering is much the same. Read more...
With Kabir Saheb, I Am a Fanboy!
With Kabir Saheb, I Am a Fanboy!
6 min
I sometimes say to the ones around me, “If I am very unwell and dying don’t offer me Gangajal and all that, just sing Kabir Saheb to me, not that, that would take me to heaven, that might actually make me get up. I am not interested in heavens or swarg. But, if you bring Kabir Saheb to me chances are I will just spring back to my feet. No mambo-jambo, no miracles, no other worldly stuff. Read more....
The Final Proof That We Are Horribly Cruel People
The Final Proof That We Are Horribly Cruel People
9 min
But, when you look at someone who comes from a meat-eating family or the traditional kind of Indian Vaishnav family where milk and ‘kheer’ and ‘dahi’ are a staple, then it comes as a shock to that person, that milk involves cruelty. It’s a totally alien and a disturbing concept. So, it has to be brought out with due expertise and that does not mean that you have to be especially trained in communicating these matters, just that one has to be sensitive that the other person might not really know.
Deeper Your Empathy, Deeper Is Your Self-Love
Deeper Your Empathy, Deeper Is Your Self-Love
5 min
Who is most like you? You, yourself. So, be empathetic to yourself first. Then, who is most like you? Your mother, father, siblings; show empathy to them. Then, your neighbors, extended family, and finally, be empathetic to all. Lacking compassion for other conscious beings will only harm you. Kill the animal, and in some way the animal is liberated of its misery, at least in the physical sense. But you, having eaten the animal, will suffer. The flesh keeps you alive, and tomorrow awaits—a dark tomorrow as your punishment.
Mass extinction, Ocean depletion and Blind consumerism
Mass extinction, Ocean depletion and Blind consumerism
15 min

Questioner: Pranam, Acharya Ji. I’m Atul Kulkarni, I’m M.Sc. Physics student here in IIT Patna, and first of all, thank you very much for accepting our invitation. Sir, my question is a little contextual, so I’ll read it out if you allow me.

Acharya Prashant: In context of?

Questioner: Contextual

Why Man is highly Unsettled and Restless
Why Man is highly Unsettled and Restless
6 min

Acharya Prashant: The whole issue is because you have left the jungle and yet not reached where you set out to reach; you are stuck in between.

Man is in a very precarious position. Animals are well settled; the free ones, the Buddhas are also well settled. Man is unsettled.

Role of Compassion in True Love
Role of Compassion in True Love
7 min

Acharya Prashant: Love and responsibility have to be reasonless. They have to be mad. One has to be crazy enough to put in everything for a seemingly trivial creature.

I don’t know whether you have heard this story from the life of the Buddha. One man was carrying a goat

Why should one stop consuming eggs and milk?
Why should one stop consuming eggs and milk?
18 min

When consciousness is your only hope, your only liberator,

How can you kill consciousness wherever it is?

If you are the body, then your real benefit lies in appeasing the body.

But if you are the mind that is crying out for liberation,

Then you must be very clear on

The Amul-PETA controversy || (2021)
The Amul-PETA controversy || (2021)
10 min

Questioner (Q): Talking about this recent controversy between PETA and a dairy producer, people are saying that lakhs of people are going to lose their employment if they switched to plant-based milk. So, what do you have to say about this?

Acharya Prashant (AP): See the employment argument, I appreciate

The will to save a life || Neem Candies
The will to save a life || Neem Candies
1 min

If you see an animal being slaughtered for somebody’s diet and something within you cries out, then the animal has been saved; maybe not that particular animal but several other animals. Why was the animal killed in the first place? Because somebody wanted it killed. So, the want led to

That evil menu card || Neem Candies
That evil menu card || Neem Candies
1 min

Every time you walk past a meat shop or come across a menu containing a lot of flesh, let that harden your resolve. No point throwing that menu on the waiter’s face. The waiter is a puny fellow. He didn’t even write the menu; he has nothing to do with

Spirituality and Veganism
Spirituality and Veganism
39 min

You are in grief even when somebody disrespects you.

In fact, you are in grief the moment somebody is not loving towards you.

So, Veganism is, in its true sense, Love.

Questioner (Q): What is spirituality? How would you explain it to someone who knows nothing about it? How is

Man exploits man, how will he spare animals? || Neem Candies
Man exploits man, how will he spare animals? || Neem Candies
1 min

Veganism cannot succeed if you just keep talking of animals. You keep saying, “Oh, it is bad to look at animals as a commodity. It is bad to exploit animals.” If man is exploiting man, why will man refrain from exploiting animals?

So, veganism has to be holistic, comprehensive. You

Deadly happiness ||Neem Candies
Deadly happiness ||Neem Candies
1 min

Australia is one of the last continents that man colonized. Of all the animals that weighed more than 50 kg, and were therefore very useful in terms of meat, 90% are extinct. How many? 90%! Such is the devastating and deadly touch of this new god. Those animal species were

Love some, kill others || Neem Candies
Love some, kill others || Neem Candies
1 min

Obviously it is inhumane to kill an animal to consume its flesh, and that’s one of the biggest indicators of our inner depravity. But then, who are the Americans really to point fingers at China? You kill pigs, you kill lambs, you kill cows—what to say of chicken and fish?

This tech advance may save our souls || Neem Candies
This tech advance may save our souls || Neem Candies
1 min

Find out from where in the world you can get all the nutrients that are not animal-sourced. Let industries come up. If it is required that artificial meat be made in order to satisfy people who necessarily want to have meat, I am all in favor of more technological research

Raping animals || Neem Candies
Raping animals || Neem Candies
1 min

Look at your food, how you kill animals and eat them—is that not rape? If rape is just the violation of body, are we not violating the bodies of animals all the time?

A woman’s body is exposed and penetrated, and you say that is rape. And what else are

Your tandoori chicken costs much more || Neem Candies
Your tandoori chicken costs much more || Neem Candies
1 min

When you eat meat, when you eat chicken, you are actually not paying for the environmental damage that your plate of meat has cost. You are not paying for the climate change. You are not paying for the biodiversity depletion. You are not paying for the loss of tropical jungles,

Perverse entrepreneurship || Neem Candies
Perverse entrepreneurship || Neem Candies
1 min

One can become an entrepreneur, for example, in the field of killing animals, cutting animal flesh, and supplying freshly cut flesh to people at their doorsteps. And this might be a successful business model.

This kind of an entrepreneurship is idiocy, perversion, profanity. The evil was present right in the

Why must kids turn vegan? || Acharya Prashant (2019)
Why must kids turn vegan? || Acharya Prashant (2019)
10 min

Question: Pranaam Acharya Ji! I have watched many of your videos related to Veganism, and I would like to know your take on teaching Veganism to children. I know that Veganism has to be a thing of the heart and just forcing dry ideology is not good for anyone.

As

The mind that slaughters || Neem Candies
The mind that slaughters || Neem Candies
1 min

If you are alright seeing animals slaughtered for food, for consumption, for anything, you are bound to then be alright seeing yourself slaughtered as well.

The attitude that you have towards others’ suffering is bound to be similar to the attitude that you have towards yourself. If you can smilingly

The one source of all problems ||Neem Candies
The one source of all problems ||Neem Candies
1 min

The less you love yourself, the more likely it is that you will be a flesh eater. And the more you love yourself, the more you know your welfare. The more determined you are to help yourself out of this mess, the more loving and more compassionate you will be

Chicken in the office?  || Neem Candies
Chicken in the office? || Neem Candies
1 min

If you can smilingly tolerate an animal being slaughtered for your diet, then you will equally well tolerate you being psychologically slaughtered for the profit of your profit-minded organization. If you are slaughtering a chicken so that you may eat it and fatten yourself, then you will equally well tolerate

The only thing that deserves respect ||Neem Candies
The only thing that deserves respect ||Neem Candies
1 min

There are many who say, “You know, eating flesh is alright.” If eating flesh is alright, why is it not all right to eat human flesh? A line is drawn between the human being and the animal. You say, “No, the human being cannot be eaten because he is highly

What you eat is eating you out || Acharya Prashant, in conversation (2022)
What you eat is eating you out || Acharya Prashant, in conversation (2022)
16 min

Questioner (Q): Dear Guru ji, we are so honored to be here today, Thank you!

Acharya Prashant (AP): I'm glad.

Q: Can you tell us the truth about the dairy industry? A lot of Indians might not know what's going on and for the ones that do know that's going

Chicken lover? || Neem Candies
Chicken lover? || Neem Candies
1 min

Instead of proceeding with a packaged product like meat, why don’t you slaughter the thing yourself? And when you slaughter the animal yourself, why don’t you know it fully even as you slaughter it? After all, even from a perspective of self-interest, if something is going into your body, it

You thought your cruel orgy would continue unchecked? || Acharya Prashant, on COVID-19 (2020)
You thought your cruel orgy would continue unchecked? || Acharya Prashant, on COVID-19 (2020)
33 min

Questioner (Q): Sir, everything was going alright back in November 2019; the world was operating as it does. And within three months, everything has just turned upside-down. We’re talking about the Corona outbreak.

It has always been enlightening sitting with you and talking about life. Most of us today are

May this happen one day || Neem Candies
May this happen one day || Neem Candies
1 min

If an apple and an animal are the same thing, then an animal and a human being are the same thing. Eat the human being as well. And if you do not eat the human being, then extend the same logic to not eat the animal as well.

The best

The big self-delusion || Neem Candies
The big self-delusion || Neem Candies
1 min

The meat eater is a self-deluder. You cannot eat meat without firstly lying to yourself. He will not want to know what the reality of meat consumption is. He will not want to know how animals are kept and how they are slaughtered. He will not know what the conditions

How to upset a meat eater || Neem Candies
How to upset a meat eater || Neem Candies
1 min

If someone comes to you quoting this kind of a logic that, “You know, if I am eating the goat or the chicken, then you too are eating the rice grain and the wheat grain, and the rice plant and wheat plant have been slaughtered. So, if I am guilty

Did you kill it? || Neem Candies
Did you kill it? || Neem Candies
1 min

To be a lion does not mean that you are violent. To be a rat is not necessarily to be violent. In fact, the word ‘violence’ does not apply to the lion or to the rat; it applies only to the human being. The lion kills all his life but

What happens to the cows? ||Neem Candies
What happens to the cows? ||Neem Candies
1 min

There will be people who will be prepared to lay down their lives if they are asked to eat meat. They will say, “We are prepared to get killed, but we will not take meat!” I respect that sentiment. But these are the very same people who have no scruples,

Is eating animals the same as eating plants, because plants too have life?
Is eating animals the same as eating plants, because plants too have life?
26 min

Eat that in which you are causing minimum damage to consciousness.

So, eating an apple and eating an animal are not the same thing.

The less you love yourself, the more likely it is that you will be a flesh eater;

The more you love yourself, the more you know

They don't want this to be known ||  Advait Bodhsthal (2020)
They don't want this to be known || Advait Bodhsthal (2020)
10 min

Questioner (Q): When I see how meat is produced, how vaccines are produced, how wool is produced, how silk is produced, it seems so obvious that I am contributing to that cruelty by consuming those things. But it seems that the rest of the world does not see that; it

I love you. I also love chicken || Acharya Prashant, with MMMUT Gorakhpur (2023)
I love you. I also love chicken || Acharya Prashant, with MMMUT Gorakhpur (2023)
15 min

Questioner (Q): Hello sir, Valentine's Day is coming and for the past few days in our College there has been a an environment of romance and every day there is a new celebration. There is Teddy day, then Rose day and then chocolate day and we often see that these

The biggest disgrace in India today || Neem Candies
The biggest disgrace in India today || Neem Candies
1 min

We worship the cow, and we torture it no end. When people talk about desi gai ka doodh (milk from the Indian cow), desi gai ka ghee (clarified butter from the Indian cow), they do not even know what they are doing to the creature they call as ‘mother’.

Is

मारना बड़ा गुनाह है, या पैदा करना? || आचार्य प्रशांत, वेदांत महोत्सव ऋषिकेश में (2021)
मारना बड़ा गुनाह है, या पैदा करना? || आचार्य प्रशांत, वेदांत महोत्सव ऋषिकेश में (2021)
21 min

प्रश्नकर्ता: प्रणाम आचार्य जी! मैं डेयरी इंडस्ट्री (दुग्ध उद्योग) से जुड़ा हुआ हूँ, विशेषकर गौ-पालन से। ये उद्योग काफ़ी ज़्यादा क्रूर है, इसलिए मैंने आपसे जुड़ने के बाद यह उद्योग छोड़ दिया है।

मेरा सवाल मुख्य रूप से बछड़ों को लेकर था। डेयरी इंडस्ट्री में जो बछड़े पैदा होते हैं