"All that mankind has done, thought, gained or been: it is lying as in magic preservation in the pages of books."
-Thomas Carlyle

by Paul Lytle

Many people, including myself, have high hopes at the dawn of the twenty-first century; hopes that we might be able to do better this time. We cannot say that the twentieth century was all bad. After all, it was in that century that we made great advances in how we treat the rightful inhabitants of this planet, and perfected ways of killing each other off, which is never a bad thing. And yet we have so far to go!

The twentieth century brought about many great advancements in the understanding of our world, and our reactions to all of those living things on this planet that only wish to possess their own rightful part of this world. Yes, we are very close now to at last becoming civilized and moral, in that we have become very compassionate toward those whom have had their planet stolen by humankind. I am, of course, referring to all the wondrous and many forms of life that can be found on this small blue planet (except humans).

However, though our understanding has brought us far, there is one area of life in which we are still neanderthals, and that is in our eating habits. Yes, my colleagues in the Animal Rights groups have done a wonderful job showing to us the importance of treating animals with the utmost respect, to not use them for food and clothing, et cetera, and to avoid displacing them with our careless digging and building. For that I applaud them. Surely everyone understands by now that humans have no place on earth, but we were rather placed here by malevolent aliens who instructed us to destroy the planet gradually by killing everything we see and erecting concrete buildings over their corpses. All this, of course, has been proven true by numerous signs at protest rallies, and anyone who disagrees is an ignoramus, so I will not waste time reviewing the evidence.

Yes, we have done well protecting our animal friends these last few decades, but let us not be content with small successes, for we have much farther to go. Let the twenty-first century reveal to us the further sins of our own actions, and that is the mass slaughter of our forgotten friends: the plants.

Plants Are People Too

We have learned from our comrades in the Animal Rights groups, and no one but the reactionary talk radio crowd, that a civilized person respects the right of other forms of life to live. Such beings should not be cut short by our doing, not for food, not for clothing, and, gasp, surely not for sport.

But do you not know that plants are living too? Do you not know that they grow and reproduce and die, just like all living things do? And yet, while we so valiantly protect the cows and the pigs, we have turned up our noses to the most helpless of the Earth's children — corn, wheat, and rice.

Allow me to describe the conditions in which these beings live. They are corralled into cages, made to stand crowded into rows, lined up like prisoners. Their children (our opposition refers to them callously as "seeds") are taken from them and either eaten or forced into another concentration camp. If they felt like stretching their stalks about, yearning for freedom, nasty human guards come and bind them into the place. At the prime of their lives, when they are sprouting and blooming, they are cut down maniacally by such wicked instruments as a sickle and machines of dark torture they call tractors.

Still other people forbid blades of grass from growing to their full potential by chopping at it with metal blades on a weekly basis. For what reason would they do this? Not for clothing, not for food, not even for sport, all of which are wrongful reasons to do such a thing. Why then? For appearances only. Because it looks pretty!

Oh, the humanity! Surely we can understand how brutish a people we really are by the way we treat other living species in our midst. Even my tree-hugging colleagues have been known to eat a salad before chaining themselves to trees in their protests. There they stand, forcing the majestic plant to smell the blood of his or her kin on the breathes of his so-called protectors! Can we do no better for the plants of this world?

The Food Chain Fallacy

I will have many critics rise up against me, I am sure, for no one wishes to acknowledge the truths of his or her own actions. Some will say to me, "But what of the food chain, which every living member of this world participates in? There are a great many animals who eat plants, and plants, in a way, eat each other, for one will die and his remains fertilize the others."

Oh, do you not see how these people reveal their own twisted and perverted thoughts? Has not the Animal Rights movement long ago proven that humans have no Right to be part of the food chain? Have they not shown us that we are but evil parasites to nature, uncivilized, a pest to the great balance of Nature? That we are prone to extraordinary excesses, in a way that the Earth cannot support?

Humans everywhere have upset the Great Balance, breeding to excess, building to excess, waging war against the planet and its rightful inhabitants. After all, without humans, it is a known fact, all of Nature would live in harmony. It is not as though the deer, for example, would breed to starvation. It is not as though the lion would slay the lamb for food. Why, it is widely known that, without humans, there would not even be a forest fire on this Earth, for humankind has begun every one of them.

But we have tainted the planet, pillaged the soil. And now you wish to join in the food chain? No, we have not the right for such a thing. We are invaders to this world, unnatural creations. We have no place in Nature.

Discussing Pain

Still the evil ones will say, "But plants feel no pain. They do not care one way or another if we kill and eat them."

Yes, my animal loving comrades have had to deal with this issue as well, and yet their response is forgotten when plants are mentioned. Alas! Such repetition only proves humanity for the destructive force it is, but I will repeat it anyway.

First, we would not even accept a painless murder of a human, and we all know humans to be the least important aspect of this planet. Surely we are still uncivilized if we use painless methods to slay a cow for a hamburger. Why then assume it is okay to kill a plant if it feels no pain in the process? The life is still destroyed, ripped from the group with metallic instruments of evil. The destruction of a life is a great sin, no matter how it is done. We do not deny such a truth when it comes to humans or animals, and we do not deny it when it comes to plants. To say that painless murder will be allowed when it comes to vegetation only suggests that we believe ourselves abovethe vegetation, when, in fact, we are far below.

And even so, why do we believe that the plant feels nothing? Just because we hear no scream? No pleading? We have already seen how most animals are considerably more intelligent than we are, because they have no language, no industry, no art, no buildings, and no clothes. It is a great intelligence that can live here in harmony with the Earth, and we are still failing to do just that. Surely you have been instructed on how a dolphin is many times more intelligent than humans, because a dolphin can nod and jump out of the water to catch fish. Oh, how I wish I understood their complex ways.

But I digress. Surely if we understand that, we can understand how plants may just be the most intelligent of all, for not only do they not need the industries we need, they do not even need such things as voices or movement to be in harmony with Mother Earth.

I will prove their intelligence. Go outside and bury your feet. There you should stand for the rest of your days, absorbing nutrients from the sun, wind, and Earth. Content in all ways to grow and to live. Surely no human could survive so long. And yet we mock the plants, though they can do what we never could. We should study their ways and seek to emulate them, not eat them.

The Solution

Even after their arguments have been destroyed, still they will debate, saying, "But if we cannot eat plants, we will die." As though health could ever be a legitimate excuse for vegecide.

We have long understood that meat gives us important nutrients we simply cannot get by any other means, but that does not give us the Right to kill the helpless animals of the Earth. So it is with plants. We must learn to survive by other means. By eating, for example, gravel or asphalt.

And if we perish then, not having adjusted to civilization, well, it is perhaps for the best, for nature would be much better off without us. Besides, our rotting corpses will make great fertilizer for our more intelligent brothers. Until then, we should seek to make ourselves as harmless as possible by refusing to eat anything living, by wearing 100% unnatural clothing, and by defecating on the lawn.