In an article in the New York Times, Natalie Angier has challenged some of the basic principles that vegetarians like to cling to. Namely, that plants are a gift to humanity to be eaten, while animals don’t want to be eaten. She is hardly the first person to tell the world about this, but doing it in the New York Times certainly helps it reach more people than the average plant research paper.
The truth is that no living thing wants to die, which means they certainly don’t want to be eaten. One easy way you can prove that plants don’t want to be eaten is by how bad they taste. No, seriously, they are gross, but there’s more. Just because they are stuck in the ground, doesn’t mean they are waiting to be eaten. In fact, according to Monika Hilker of the Institute of Biology at the Free University of Berlin, “…[plants] respond to tactile cues, they recognize different wavelengths of light, they listen to chemical signals, they can even talk [with chemical signals]…”
These plants are constantly battling insects with chemical reactions. Make no mistake, these plants want only to live and Angier has helped show people these truths. Of course, the average vegan will ignore articles like this, but no living thing, be it plant or animal, wants to be a meal. To eat, something must die.
For helping share this information with the world, Natalie Angier, you are a true Unvegan Hero!
(via New York Times)