Some of you will remember this, as it got passed around quite a bit 12 years ago when it got said, recorded, and turned into a semi-official document. This is a conversation between me (SB), ProgressiveChagrin (PC), So Many Monkeys (SMM), and Dug (DUG), who is blogless so far as I know. This exchange took place in our shitty 1st apartment in Sarasota, FL, which was one gleaming aluminum aboveground Raisinhead Sanctuary with plastic fists filled with rattlesnakes and lottery balls away from New College. This is being posted because for the first time in a while 3/4 of the people involved were recently in a room together and started talking about it.
DUG: There was an article today in the Catalyst about a pig roast...four pigs...that'd be a fun day...
SB: Does anybody at New College, like, eat meat? (laughs)
DUG: Rocky Swift.
SMM: (laughs)
SB: your roommate...
DUG: My roommate does in fact eat -
SMM: I eat meat.
SB: Well...
SMM: Why - that's not good, what is that look?
PC: It's like, 'Finally, someone else!' (laughs)
SMM: I love eating meat, y'know I went to a naked party at the beginning of the year, they passed around a big, beef jerky thing, y'know like, (unintelligible) took a bite, and then they all got me later, they're like, "Who took a bite of this?", y'know, and everyone denied it except me. But I know somebody else had some, too...
SB: (whispered) Bastards...
SMM: Fucking closet omnivores...
DUG: (laughs)
SB: (in crying, repentant voice) "I had a hot dog yesterday...And I enjoyed it!" (makes shotgun noise)
PC: That's something I don't understand about the beef, the vegetarian culture, they're always talking about, you know, stepping off the wagon...
EVERYBODY: (laughs)
PC: That's like the main topic of conversation among vegetarians, steppin' off the wagon...
DUG: And they all love to do it...
PC: Yes!
DUG: All real vegetarians looove to step off the wagon once in a while.
PC: I don't know one vegetarian who I haven't seen step off the wagon...
SMM: Laura wanted to so bad today...
DUG: I never did until I started eating fish again. But then, I never had a big hang-up about -
PC: ...'cept for maybe Jesse...
DUG: I never had a hang-up about being a vegetarian, I just always liked to be, until I started eating fish again, but it's not, like...
SB: I'm telling you, fish is not an animal. The Church will back me up on this…
DUG: Fish is an animal.
SB: It is not!
DUG: You can see the things flop around when you...
SB: It's an extremely advanced plant.
SMM: (laughs)
DUG: I would agree with you about things like, shrimp, but fish I wouldn't.
SB: Fish - aw, c'mon, they stay together like crops, they stay together like a crop, fishermen go out and harvest them, they don't do anything...
SMM: They're closer to us on the evolutionary...
PC: Yeah...
SB: Give me a fucking break...
PC: What about a jellyfish?
SB: Yeah, what about a jellyfish? It's like fucking water with legs.
DUG: A jellyfish is fucking water.
EVERYBODY: (laughs)
SMM: Starfish are plants.
DUG: I only feel like fish are creatures because I've caught fish before, and I've watched them like, flop around for about a half an hour in that fucking bucket...
SB: You ever killed a Venus flytrap?
DUG: No.
SB: They flop around! Fish are fucking plants!
SMM: (laughs)
PC: You wonder why Venus flytraps eat flies...
SB: Flat, disc-shaped things, kind of, they have fins, leaves, they have gills like y'know...
SMM: No, because have you ever had an emotional attachment to a fish?
SB: NO!
SMM: I have!
SB: It's like a fucking plant! People get attached to plants, too!
PC: ...and rocks...
SB: Yeah! And cars. "Well, we shouldn't wreck the car. Why? Well, it's destroying an organism." No, no, no, no...Doesn't quite work that way. Just because you're attached to it doesn't mean it's not a plant. Fish are plants.
SMM: (laughs)
SB: (laughs)
DUG: They breathe oxygen...
SMM: Yeah, they have language. Sort of.
PC: Plants?
SB: Wait, wait, trees have a language?
PC: You, you and Heidi Harley...I swear...
SB: (In "hippie" voice) We are all one unified force, it matters not that we are vegetable, or a human or animal, we're all one big sphere of life. (normal) Fish are plants!
SMM: Well, so are humans.
SB: (pause) Well, some of 'em, yeah!
EVERYBODY: (laughs)
SB: Haven't you ever been to a party where some guy's in the corner with a bag in front of him and a pipe, and he's just goin' "uhhhhhh"? 'Cause he's a plant, that's why!
SMM: No, all humans are plants.
SB: No, not all humans. I don't know, okay, I might be willing to retract that. I've seen old people shrivel up like raisins...
DUG: (laughs)
SB: ...alright, I've seen people root to a spot, too, I've seen that.
SMM: See, we're all plants...
SB: Some of us are more aggressive plants, some of us are more the Venus flytraps, I think. And Aaron Olk is a briar bush.
DUG: (laughs) Rock on, SB.
SMM: And Dug's a broccoli stalk...
SB: Dug's not a broccoli stalk.
SMM: He totally is. Look at his hair...
SB: No, no, no, it has nothing to do with appearance...it's a personality kind of thing.
PC: (in disbelief) You're personifying plants...
SB: I can be anthropomorphic here, if I wanna be, okay?
DUG: No, he's plantonifying...
SB: I am.
SMM: What are you, then?
SB: I dunno.
PC: But, the only way you can classify humans is by assigning them the personality of a plant.
EVERYBODY: (laughs)
DUG: What we've got here is a sort of cross-breeding...
SB: You don't think Venus flytraps have a personality?
PC: Are you kidding?
SB: No, I'm not kidding.
PC: NO!
SB: They sit, they turn towards sunlight...
PC: Like every fucking other plant...
SB: ...meaning that they all have personalities..."I think I've made my point!" Yeah!
PC: Doesn't mean shit!
SB: I think you trapped yourself there!
SMM: (laughs)
PC: I never agreed to that...