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What makes a human different than the rest of the food chain is not that we are at the top of it.
When I got my first pet ever, a leopard gecko, back from the pet store I was distressed.
"No, no, don't do this to me... What do you mean leopard geckos can't climb walls?
The whole freaking point of getting a gecko is so you can send them on spy missions!!"
I learned to love him for what he was not.
I named him Sizzler, after my favourite restaurant,
where you could get chicken nuggets in the shape of dinosaurs
Let me tell you: there is no more inspiring buffet item than a lump of reconstituted chicken parts that styles itself as a Stegosaurus!
So Sizzler was a fitting name for a leopard... gecko.
A truly aspirational beast.
The earthbound gecko, that lives his life not as some wannabe green reptilian Spiderman, but as a vicious jungle cat.
Following in the glorious tradition of the Whale Shark, the Cat Fish the Egg Plant,
and of course... the Horseshoe Crab. A crab that dreams of being... a horses shoe.
I fed Sizzler crickets that lived in a terrarium that sat in the bathtub, so in case they somehow managed to escape the cage,
they would struggle fruitlessly against the impossibly high slick porcelain prison walls.
I'd shake the crickets up in a paper bag full of protein powder like some *** up death maraca
until Sizzler crunched in, a wing or spare leg hanging out his lower jaw like salad greens.
I couldn't figure out why I was feeding my pets to each other.
I had this little secret...
Sometimes I would slip into the bathroom and carelessly -whoops- glance the terrarium and slide the roof a crack
to grant crickets that could climb that granite slab a fighting chance.
In case they made it over, they were honorary geckos.
A few escaped into the wall paneling, where they played their tiny violins as long as they had music in their legs.
I gave Sizzler back to the pet store.
I stopped eating at his namesake restaurant.
I started thinking if chickens wanted to be dinosaurs we should let them enjoy the privilege while they were still alive.
It was years before I came to the conclusion that you can't stop the brutal beauty of the food chain by removing yourself from it.
There is no life without death, there's no way to live perfect.
So flush that dream down the toilet;
anyone who's ever owned a teakettle knows that even water screams when you boil it.
Anyone who's driven a car on the freeway has committed bug genocide.
Even if you're a vegetarian, your super market produce is sprayed with a product called insecticide!
How do you rectify that there are people dying and Watsky, you're worried about crickets?
In a world not yet rid of *** and ***,
you're talking beef and pig on baconburgers, when kids still beef with pigs on Hegenberger?
I'm not saying we don't need to take care of us.
Just that we lose nothing by expanding our definition of "us".
What makes humans special is not our ability dominate those more vulnerable than ourselves, it's our willingness protect them, to empathize.
And no, ***, it's not an excuse to dress your dog like a sailor on shore leave, that's obnoxious!
I'm aware that geckos don't want to be leopards and crickets don't dream of being lizards,
that those are human projections onto animals that are simply out here trying to function!
I do, however, believe in the horseshoe crab. The crab that dreams of being a horse's shoe!
And maybe you've never seen four living crustaceans glue themselves underneath a thoroughbred's hooves;
go ahead and tell me: "There's no way that thin exoskeleton could support the weight of a two ton Clydesdale, man!"
Come at me, bro! I've seen it. And I believe!
Brave New Voices, do you believe in the horseshoe crab?
I looked at that horse, and I said, "Hey Horse, nice shoes!"
And that horse said: "I'm really touched. I didn't realize that humans were actually capable of feeling.
You know... I'm not naïve, dude, I know that horseshoe under me is no horseshoe at all.
Hell, don't tell him, but it's not even a horseshoe crab.
If you lean in close, you can tell by the shell it's actually a hermit crab -- the genuine article.
And I'm no horse—***, I'm a barnacle."