This thought occurred to me the other day. When you eat a vegetable, you have killed the entire plant (with a few exceptions). Whereas, when you eat a fruit, you haven't killed the original plant - you have only prevented it from reproducing. It's kind of like performing a plant-abortion. So, if our goal as vegans is to subsist without being cruel to other lifeforms, and killing them is being cruel, should we eat only fruits in order to avoid killing any plants?
Let's ignore the health effects of eating only fruit for the moment, and focus only on the ethical side. What are your thoughts on this?
existential1 wrote (edited )
This is a false premise. Other than root vegetables, you can harvest veggies without killing the entire plant.
For cruciferous vegetables, you can harvest nearly all (or all in some cases) of the plant (except the root) and it will grow right back as if nothing happened. I actually just harvested some kale last week that grew from a stub (I harvested kale seeds from the plant, cut it down to about an inch above the ground, and it grew fresh kale a couple months later surprisingly even though it had already gone to seed). In fact, you can harvest beet greens a few times in the beet's lifetime before harvesting the beet.
For nightshades like tomatoes, peppers, eggplants, etc, it is actually no different than fruit from a tree. You are harvesting the fruit of a plant. Doesn't harm the plant at all.
For squash, it is the same as nightshades. The plant "itself" is the root and stem while the squash is the fruit.
I'm thinking that you may have not ever grown veggies before :) One of the nice things about growing your own food is you learn a lot about how dope nature is and how "ethical" you can be without even trying that hard.
EDIT: Spelling