EA Forum Podcast (All audio)

“Killing the wasps” by Aaron Boddy🔸


Listen Later

I've been pushing a moral dilemma to one side in my mind for a few months now. After Killing the ants and Killing the moths, here's the third installment in the unofficial "invertebrate trilogy."

One of the bedrooms in my flat keeps getting wasps in. I think they're crawling through gaps in our old English windows.

They arrive low-energy. Some fly around briefly, but mostly they just crawl up and down the glass (or along the floor) and slowly die. Sometimes I gather them up in a cup and release them outside. But given it's getting colder, I'm not sure that's much better. Is it better to slowly die in my flat or out in the cold?

We also had mice recently. For them, we found a humane trap and released them outside [1].

Wasps are scary too.

It's easy to have sympathy for them when they're crawling around slowly. But when the higher-energy ones get in, it's easy to lose that sympathy (which then makes me feel bad).

It's also easy to worry about how much of my attention this is taking up. I could be helping way more invertebrates by focusing on my job. But instead I'm [...]

---

First published:

January 26th, 2026

Source:

https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/xYcfpm5wmCdhYkzpM/killing-the-wasps

---

Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.

...more
View all episodesView all episodes
Download on the App Store

EA Forum Podcast (All audio)By EA Forum Team