Plop the Frog #
Once upon a time, there was a frog, who had no name, but we’ll call Plop. Plop hopped along as best he could. However, Plop had a few extra legs, which didn’t work so well. Environmental activists, tall bald chimps of the sort that builds factories and complains about factories, thought it was because of pollution from the factories. But actually, it was a parasite that entered Plop’s egg and lived in Plop while he was a tadpole, eventually altering his development during metamorphosis.
Eventually, since Plop couldn’t hop like his fellow frogs, he was eaten by a snake, and Plop’s parasite infected the snake’s intestine, where it would reproduce, and create offspring to make other frogs hop like Plop. (A snail was also involved, but this story is already more than complicated enough.)
The moral of the story is that nature is fascinating in its utter and complete lack of empathy. Evolution doesn’t give any fucks about anyone. Genes do whatever they have to do to get ahead, even if it means ruining the lives of frogs like Plop, and sending them through an agonizing existence into an early grave in the belly of a snake.
Factories are bad for lots of reasons. But the opposite of bad isn’t good, and “natural” is not a synonym for “healthy”.