What if scientists discovered that eating a portion of squirrel poo everyday protected us from cancer? How would our attitudes and ethics switch then? Would we be suddenly be happy to cut down all our valuable non-squirrel-eating species and replant with tasty sycamore and beech, make squirrels a protected species and encourage them into our woods?
And what about diseases themselves. Aren't they living organisms too. Viruses, bacteria etc. Don't they have a right to live? If we try to live in a completely harmless way, then wouldn't we just perish pretty quickly? We'd have little to eat and fall prey to the first nasty disease that attacked us. I know I'm being ridiculous with these ideas but it's food for thought when trying to decide whether you are comfortable with what life to eradicate.
My attitude is changing all the time. I have seen loads of massive black slugs in the woods. Now, having had allotments and been a keen gardener, I would have had no compunction to chuck some slug pellets around my precious lettuces and bedding plants to annihilate the slugs. But I have not the slightest concern over them in the woods as I realise they are a valuable part of the woodland ecology, helping to break down vegetation into loam enriching components. I'd say that is big moral dilemma for me. So my comfort level regarding big black slugs is - if they not harming me or my property then leave them alone but if they are - I'm in my rights to get rid of them. I can kill them or remove them to another place. Unfortunately we don't have the option of removing squirrels to another place other than squirrel heaven.
My brain's hurting. I need a lie down and a glass of red.
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