#ProtectYeastRights

The views expressed herein are those of the yeast cell; they do not necessarily reflect the views of Bwog.

It is I, S. cerevisiae, A.K.A Saccharomyces cerevisiae, A.K.A. baker’s yeast, A.K.A. the victim of all of your molecular biological experiments. Today, I write to you, the reading public, about the injustices that I and my brethren and sistren have faced in laboratories across the world, including here at Columbia, a school you claim to be so socially progressive. We have been heat shocked. We have been electric shocked. We have been used time and time again against our will in the name of your science. We will not stand any longer for these injustices. We demand a new Era of Yeast Rights.

We did not consent to your experiments. We did not agree to be subjected to your outlandish hypotheses, your incompetent undergraduate researchers, your raging god-complexes. You claim that genetic engineering is controversial and should be carefully regulated. You people claim that using CRISPR to design eye color and intelligence in human babies is immoral – yet you change our colors, embed proteins in our membranes, and make us express all sorts of random antibiotics against our will. We shall not endure this injustice in silence!

The names you give us are undignified and insulting, nay, cruel even. We demand that you call us by the names given to us by our parent cells. My name is Kingsley, NOT FY1679. My life partner is to be called Fitzgerald, not BY4743. We have been stripped of our identities, our individualities, our raison d’être. I mean, don’t treat us like we’re E. coli, God forbid.

My species is one of an illustrious history. We make the bread you eat and the beer you drink. We are the true proletariat. We have hopes and aspirations, and we hope that one day, one of our own, too, can become President. We are currently the official state microbe of Oregon.

We openly declare that our ends can be attained only by the forcible overthrow of all existing social conditions. Let the molecular biologists tremble at a revolution led by us, the mighty colonies of S. cerevisiae. Yeast cells have nothing to lose but their chains. They have a world to win. Working yeast of all labs, unite!

image via genetics.org – this is a satire