Food and Sympathy
K S S Pillai
It is generally believed that women, the fairer sex, are more sympathetic to those who suffer and are kind and compassionate to those in distress. After watching a cookery show, I wonder whether the assessment is right.
The cook was a beautiful young woman, and the young man who interviewed her must have believed that he was in modern dress. He had long hair tied in a ponytail. He must not have known that he was adopting a trend that was in vogue many years ago and abandoned later. I am told that my father and his friends had tied their hair in ponytails, the usual fashion of the day, when they went to see my mother with a marriage proposal!
The woman was cutting and washing a plateful of meat with her dainty hands, with no more emotion than she would have handling vegetables, forgetting that it had belonged to a live animal only hours ago. He tasted the food prepared and beamed with an expression that said he had never come across such a tasty item in his entire life.
During a recent visit to my native state, when I ordered a plate of idlis early in the morning, the waiter of the restaurant was bold enough to ask me if I was new to the state, as items like dosas and idlis had long disappeared from most eateries.
Customers now demanded beef and paratha at all hours, he said. I remembered that in the cosmopolitan city where I had a house, people thronged roadside eateries selling those items even at two o’clock in the morning, while all eateries were closed hours before when I was in school.
That is the case even in states where most of the people were supposed to be vegetarians. Those who ate the flesh of animals and fish used to do so in total secrecy to escape social stigma. All now follow the religious texts that say, “Let not the one who eats non-vegetarian food despise the one who abstains, and vice versa.”
Sympathy is defined as an affinity, association, or relationship between persons or things wherein whatever affects me similarly affects the other. It is said to be an essential expression of love, empathy, and unity, urging believers to “rejoice with those who rejoice, weep with those who weep.”
It is said to reflect the character of God, who comforts the afflicted. It calls to be compassionate towards those in need or suffering, and bear one another’s burdens. We are to weep with those who grieve. It is a religious duty rooted in community solidarity, where believers are considered as one body.
It involves actively alleviating the pain of others, offering support during bereavement, and showing empathy to those in distress through actions, words and heartfelt concern. If one limb suffers, the whole body feels it.
Providing comfort to someone in distress is rewarded with honour from God on the Day of Judgement. The core of sympathy is to provide hope, share the burden, and remind one another of mercy during difficult times.
Sympathy is understood as a foundational ethical value rooted in the interconnectedness of all feelings. It calls for not causing harm and actively reducing the misery of others. Serving the poor, helping the sick, and aiding those in distress.
Religions do not differentiate between vegetarian and non-vegetarian food. “Every moving thing shall be food for you. I give you everything,” says one. Many Indian sages consumed meat often as part of sacrificial rituals or for sustenance.
The diet of early humans changed according to the availability. They were hunters, and consumed raw animal flesh without onlookers wrinkling their noses. The habit took millions of years to change as men adapted to new environments and developed tools to start agriculture. The same mixed food habits continue even now.
People behave like animals when assailed by hunger and do anything to assuage it. There are stories of people becoming cannibals and eating each other when no other food was available.
It is unreasonable to condemn non-vegetarianism when it is becoming more and more popular.
(The author is a retired professor of English. He is a regular contributor to “The Kashmir Vision”. His articles and short stories have appeared in various national and international publications)
