No One Could Know

Did you know more than 9,000 plants are federally protected? But not humans. So is the pomace fly. But humans aren’t fully protected.

“Flies…but not humans” is a column I wrote that published today in The Valley News in response to a letter to the editor. I’d love to hear your feedback on the topic.

In my column, I state: More than 200 invertebrates (animals without a backbone) are federally protected. They include oyster mussels, white abalones, armored snails, American burying and delta green ground beetle, several species of butterflies, pomace flies, spruce fir moss spiders, cave crayfish, fairy shrimp and elkhorn coral.

A type of flies is federally protected. Flies.

But not humans.

Microsoft Word’s synonyms for “abort” are: terminate, end, abandon, call off, cancel, and stop midstream. What is it, exactly, that we are aborting? An abortion is more than “calling off” a pregnancy. Although it seems like it, we’ll not be pregnant forever, because pregnancy is “self-terminating,” right? It comes to its own end, naturally after nine months. It’s the result of pregnancy we’re dealing with. What is that, exactly? When we abort, we’re “calling off” – a life.