On the extinction of a species

Being a human is kinda interesting. On one hand, we're animals, just like any other kind of animal. We get hungry, we get tired, we get sick. We die. We are, at the end of the day, bags of meat powered by electrical currents going through our brains, and that's the exact same mechanism that 99% of other creatures on the planet use to exist as well. We have eyes and ears and noses and hairs. We decidedly all came from the same evolutionary starting point, despite the differences that we may now have today. 

And yet, I think there are lots of people out there who see humans as more than animals. Our own special little category that exists outside of the natural order. We do so much more than animals do. We don't exist within nature, we control nature. We beat nature down and mold it how we will. In some ways, our existence spites nature itself. We build huge cities in the middle of deserts. We take the concept of evolution and use it to our own benefit. We have so much control over the planet, and how it looks. 

Many humans, myself included, would say that we humans probably have too much power. I don't really trust humans as a collective to do things in service to making the world a better place for the animals we live on this planet with. Hell, I don't trust humans to make a better world for humans either. But, it's not like we don't have the ability to. Our decisions are based more on profits than they are the desire for change, but what if we did decide we wanted to do something specifically to change nature. Is there ever a way that we could do that and it would be moral, or ethical? Could we, for instance, totally wipe out an entire species and have that be something that we consider good? 

What if we killed every single bed bug? 

Here's the thing about bed bugs.

They're awful, terrible critters.

Not that I need to tell anyone that's experienced them before.

I had a bedbug infestation in my apartment, gotten from buying an air conditioning unit off Facebook Marketplace. I went to pick up the AC from the seller's house, sat down on their couch for a minute while they brought it to the front door, and those little fucks boarded my pants like it was the last life boat on the Titanic. I didn't realize then that I was the vessel now facilitating what very well may have ended up being the worst 6 month stretch of my life. 

After the bedbugs got back to my place, they started to do their thing. They breeded, and they spread. My already not great sleep started getting worse, although I couldn't really say why. I started getting all these itchy spots all over my body. I felt like something was wrong, but I didn't really believe in bedbugs. Not in a way where they could affect me anyway. Which is why when I finally did spot one, I didn't know what I was getting into. I caught it, and then I hopped on Google trying to figure out what it was. With my suspicions confirmed, I looked up a guide on what to do. Step one was to check my mattress for any more, and let me tell you when I lifted up the corner of my bed and saw 40 more of those fucking things I broke down in sheer panic. I didn't know whether to throw up, scream, cry, punch a wall. Maybe all of them at the same time?

Thankfully, the building I was in was very willing to help get rid of them without me paying for the exterminators, but the process of getting rid of bedbugs is not that simple, especially with an infestation like mine. You have to wash and dry everything you own, including stuff that might not necessarily be dryer safe, just in case. You have to look through every item you don't dry super carefully. You have to keep all your clothes in big plastic garbage bags of things that are safe and unsafe. I lived in that hell for around half a year, only finally escaping the bed bugs by just straight up moving into where I live now, carefully checking every single thing that crossed the threshold into my new home. I escaped that nightmare, but every time I'm laying in bed and my leg gets an itch, a chill runs down my spine. 

Bedbugs, for what it's worth, are not actually demons from hell as they may seem. They too, are animals, just like us. Well, maybe not JUST like us, but they are still living creatures that exist on the planet, that theoretically still come from the same place we do. If you pull the timeline far back enough anyway. But, I think they present an interesting question as far as animals go. Bedbugs, much like humans, are not really a part of nature, in the natural sense. They exist somewhat outside of it. "Wild" bedbugs aren't really a thing. There are some that do exist outside of human society, living typically off of birds and bats, but those are almost a different species to the ones that we would call "bedbugs". Bedbugs have been a part of our world since we were first living out of caves trying to avoid getting eaten by bears. Bedbugs have been just as much a part of our journey to escape nature as the dogs and cats that we've domesticated as our companions. But, unlike dogs and cats, their continued existence isn't something that we intended. There's no benefit that exists from having bedbugs living with you. There's no quid pro quo. Likewise, bedbugs don't really contribute to the food chain like most other animals do. They have no natural predators relying on them as a source of food, so it's not like them being removed would lead to other creatures starving. Nor would their departure from the food chain lead to overabundance of another species. Their only prey is us, and it's not like they're doing a good job of being our population control. 

This all begs what I think is a very interesting philosophical question.

Say that you had a button in front of you right now, and if you pressed that button, every single bed bug would explode. Would you press that button? It wouldn't be a big explosion, just a little pop and it's over. The entire species wiped off the planet in an instant. People around the world would rejoice. Parties would be thrown in your honor. Something that has terrorized humanity since the beginning of our existence would finally be defeated. Yay us! 

But like... is that a good thing? Because as awful as bedbugs are, didn't we already decide that trying to act as the overarching arbiters of nature is... bad? I mean, is it wrong of us to exterminate another species? We do it accidentally, or "accidentally" all the time. But to do it totally on purpose like that. Is that stepping past the bounds of what we really should have the power to do? Bedbugs are not evil. They are not actively making the choice to do things that are wrong. They eat our blood because that's what they eat. They do it while we're sleeping because that's when it's safe to do so. They breed because that's what living creatures do. They're designed to replicate. To lay any kind of moral judgement on them feels... wrong? 

Do they suck? Absolutely they do. Do they deserve to no longer exist? Do we, as humans, as beings both a part of but also not a part of nature have the moral agency to decide which parts of nature are allowed to exist, and which aren't? Can we choose to end the lives of species that bother us? Maybe this one time, we can allow ourselves to play god. Or, is that too forbidden of a power full stop? Maybe if we kill every bedbug, next we start thinking about killing every mosquito, and then maybe every roach, and on and on, until we're now killing every species that presents a problem to us, because we understand the convenience of doing so. We certainly haven't historically done a great job of proving our restraint. 

If I had that button in front of me, I'd press it without hesitation. But, I think I'd spend the rest of my life wondering if what I did was right. 



Article written by Tarro (April 2026)

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