The Totems of Abydos by John Norman Page B

surfaces, had achieved carefully constructed neoprimitivisms, by means of which they sought to exercise ecological caution and liberate the processes of natural selection. On such worlds, by a sort of progress in reverse, were the rights, the ranks, and the glories of nature restored. Some of these worlds were of the sort which Rodriguez would presumably have characterized as “strong.” To be sure, there were features of such worlds which Brenner would doubtless have found deplorable. On them, for example, martial arts were practiced; and on them might be found warring camps, and not infrequently, it must be admitted, slave markets.
    So do not fear the forest,” said Rodriguez, closing the weapon, which action restored it to the appearance of a simple telescope.
    “I do not want anything killed,” said Brenner.
    Some brief indications of Brenner’s concerns are in order. On his home world, long ago, the horrors of killing anything had become clear. This was no longer viewed as the way of life. Life had been improved upon, succeeded by certain moral postures. It had begun in particular with the illegalization of utilizing certain privileged sets of life forms as food. One popular expression was that it was wrong to “enslave animals for food purposes” which slogan indicated a confusion of slavery with animal husbandry, two quite disparate institutions, and was not regarded as requiring any plausible explanation, defense, or justification. Shortly thereafter it was pointed out by botanically sensitive individuals that vegetable matter, too, was alive, and might well have some dim sort of consciousness. Various bills intended to outlaw the enslavement of vegetables, fruit trees, and such, for food purposes just failed of enactment in certain areas, after lengthy expert testimony was taken from the scientific community on the minimalistic, if that, nature of the mentality of these various plants, and such, as though the mere minimality of the mentality were at all germane to the question. Where the bills were enacted they tended to be popularly ignored, though some individuals, as a moral duty, starved to death, attended by widespread publicity in the press, rousing general sympathy but in the end accomplishing little with respect to altering the ultimate fate of most vegetables. It had also been observed that the meaning of the command, “Thou shalt not kill,” had only recently been discovered, after several thousand years. It was noted that the original community to which this directive had been issued and which, presumably, would have been in an ideal position to understand it, had failed to grasp its import. Several members of that community, for example, had been shepherds, and others had been farmers and vintagers, and such. Too, one supposes that some amongst them would not have been above angling. Also, they seem to have had few scruples about putting tribal enemies to the sword, and, indeed, in certain cases, seem to have undertaken it as a duty incumbent upon them in virtue of obedience to the will of the very entity which had issued the original injunction pertaining to killing, an anomaly, at best. The injunction against killing would apply, of course, not only to animals and plants which might be utilized for food, but, naturally, more generally. An obvious, even painfully so, life form, was the insect. Insecticides, of course, were banned. A number of other accommodations were also in order, such as screened bulbs to prevent injury to flying insects and special shoes designed both for comfort and support and reduction of the number of contact surfaces with the ground, the latter to minimize the danger to crawling insects. Children were warned to be specially watchful not to step on six-legged brothers, and so on. These were, of course, negative precautions. The next logical step was insect welfare, putting out food for them, encouraging their breeding, etc. In some communities of the more enlightened