Labels exist nowhere in nature, and nowhere in nature can we find rules about how things should behave toward one another. But that reality is just too unsettling and untidy for us. So we create words that artificially frame reality and provide markers for behavior. Even living, dead, plant, and animal are concepts that exist as clean categories only in the heads of word makers. Nevertheless, once labeled as living, dead, plant, or animal, we then behave toward the thing defined in a certain way. We treat dead things differently than living things, and animals differently than plants. The problem with this categorization is that nature is homoge­neous and continuous. Naming things does not change that.
 
For example, we tend to think of plants as dumb, insensi­tive, photosynthetic food produc­ers. Yet, re­searchers have electrically monitored plants and discovered a sort of ner­vous system that is sensitive to and re­sponds to its environment. Studies also show that tenderness in the care of plants—singing and talking to them, touching them fondly—results in the plant's enhanced growth and better health.
 
Plants and animals even communicate. For example, certain parasitic wasps must find appropriate caterpillars to incubate their eggs. A wasp paralyzes a cater­pillar and inserts an egg that then develops into a larva that slowly consumes the living host caterpillar. Although caterpillars have developed a variety of hid­ing mechanisms within plants, wasps are still able to find them by tuning to signals that plants emit when caterpillars feed on them. That means insects listen to plant communication.¹
 
So, plants are neither inert nor insensitive, even though the word plant implies otherwise.² Who is to say plants do not have a form of feeling and intelligence, and that they deserve to be treated with ethical disregard? This is not to suggest that we should all start petting lettuce heads—at least not that we spend a lot of time on it—but it does mean ethics and considerations do not end when we call a thing lettuce or plant.³

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Similarly, things we label as inert, such as dirt, rocks, air, and water are tied into the intricate web of life. If all things are interconnected to life, then treating anything with disrespect is never justified. A wise person comes to see that reality is a continuum, not disconnected parts and pieces. Self and other are different manifestations of the same thing. Disregard for other is disregard for self.
 
This is not to suggest that a dust ball in the corner of the closet, a carrot, and a neighbor should all be treated the same. Ethics is not a matter of one action toward all things, but judgment and discernment in determining the role that all things play in reality. Using trees to build a home is one thing; cutting down all trees on Earth just because profit can be made is another. Growing food is one thing; using toxic chemicals in the process that then leach into the water supply is quite another.
 
Word labels oversimplify reality and provide excuses for behaviors. Labels are easier than exercising conscience or thinking. Justification for abuse and destruction is always linked to mere words like: plant, animal, pagan, witch, Buddhist, Indian, enemy, evil, bloods, whites, blacks, and so forth. Once the label is in place, thought stops and mindless behavior begins. How else, through the millennia, could people have visited such inhumanity on one another and on nature? Labels cannot and do not define the bounds of ethics.
 
A label-based mindset lies at the root of disrespect for and dismantling of the environment at large. Water, air, dirt, animals, and plants, become just labeled commodities for our use and disregard. Things not extended the courtesy of the human label are thought of as inconsequential and not deserving of ethical treatment.
 
If we excuse abuse because something is just sod or animal, it's not that far of a reach to excuse abuse of Eskimos, whites, Taoists, or capitalists. All that is necessary is to construct word definitions and word rules. That line of thought and manipulation of reality with words can then transition to the psychopathology of disregard for anything other than me. On the other hand, those who worry about consideration for bugs, trees, dirt, air, and water, are less likely to have trouble seeing the immorality of harm to fellow humans.
 
Seeing beyond the artificial words humans impose on reality is necessary for a truly compassionate, sustainable, and better world. It fosters respect for the oneness of all things and provides hope for a better future.
 
Only when the last tree has been cut down
 
Only when the last river has been poisoned
 
Only after the last fish has been caught
 
Only then will you find money cannot be eaten.
 
— Cree Prophecy