Showing posts with label happiness. Show all posts
Showing posts with label happiness. Show all posts

Saturday, October 03, 2009

Would YOU like to teach the world to sing?

Making connections for plant-based diets: teaching the world to sing vegetarian songs

In the process of making connections for plant-based diets, which I've been doing actively since 1993, when I started the Vegetarian Resource Center, I'm seeking vegan musicians who compose and either perform or sing pro-vegan pro-animal lyrics about what we and all others can do right - that are wholesome lyrics, not hateful, and help enable the good side of the general public in making the switch towards plant-based diets and vegan values.

http://launch.groups.yahoo.com/group/VRC-Vegetarian-Music/

The TEXT on that VRC-Vegetarian-Music group list at YahooGroups.com (which is VRC's official discussion list for this very project) is:

The VRC-Vegetarian-Music e-mail discussion list is for volunteers of the Vegetarian Resource Center working in projects of developing vegetarian-supporting music.

Think about every value you hold dear to yourself. Wasn't that communicated through relationship, image, deed, song, and poetry?

Yes!

The 1960's movement for nonviolence throughout Europe, North America, and the rest of the world was spread through music and song. But though there IS an extensive body of lore and song which COULD do the job, vegetarians have never collected that set of resources into one site, nor have many modern vegetarians deliberated on the task and worked intently at creating a modern body of lyric and song, poem and prose, which effectively communicate poignantly, pithily, and powerfully the vegetarian message, and deep as it is in all its lifechanging dimensions.

And if you already HAVE such music already (or know of it), share it with us so that we can get a better idea of what we're doing.

And we're happy at present with commercial produce and condiment jingles.

Let's teach vegetarians to sing!
No, let's write the songs the WHOLE world sings!

We're all interested, too, in developing and collecting literature, music, art, and other resources for vegetarian families.

But in all our months, years, or decades, we've found precious little written BY vegetarians FOR vegetarians.

What do you think YOU can develop, collect, or inspire OTHERS to develop or collect?

Once you join this list, we'd like you to hold up, not only YOUR end of the conversation among all these volunteers, about our respective portions of this culture-building project, but THEIR ends of the conversation, also.

Your contributions to improving our rationale, our social marketing, and/or our persuasiveness in motivating the skilled pro-vegans for this project is sought.

Wednesday, August 26, 2009

I want to wish you a Happy Chinese Valentine Day! August 26th

China's Qixi Festival takes place on the seventh day of the seventh lunar month (mid-August by our calendars) and has its root in an ancient legend about two lovers separated by the Milky Way who can only meet once a year on this night. This year the festival takes place on Wednesday, August 26.

Some conservative Chinese citizens have criticized the traditional festival for its Westernization as couples have participated in Valentine's Day rituals on the day. In recent years, the West's Saint Valentine's Day on February 14 http://www.edu-cyberpg.com/Arts/Valentine_Clip_Art.html has exploded in popularity in China. Flower vendors hit the streets, convenience stores sell stuffed animals (though not much chocolate, given the Chinese traditional aversion to sweets), and tables are full at restaurants.

In China's metropolitan areas, it's not difficult to find young men who complain about the difficulty in finding girlfriends or wives. Not only is there a well-known shortage of available women because of the country's "one-child" policy, but Chinese women are increasingly practical and look for suitors with promising jobs and those who already own cars or apartments. In China's countryside, arranged marriages are still the norm.

Qixi festival tells the story of Niulang, the cowherd, who fell in love with a beautiful fairy Zhinu when grazing his cow. But their love was interfered with by Wangmu, wife of the Jade Emperor, the Supreme Deity in Taoism. She separated the couple by drawing a river, the Milky Way, with her hairpin between them.

Touched by their love, magpies come in flocks every Qixi festival to form a bridge spanning the galaxy with their bodies so that the couple can meet.