What long term benefits? The show does a poor job of addressing that question making the moral fall short. Fluttershy has a reassurance that the bats will help the trees grow faster and stronger but that's freaking vaughe and unless we have an explanation how that sounds like false reassurance. The only solid explanation we have for how the bats are supposed to help is by spreading the seeds by spitting them out. This is a real reason not to kill off the bats because that activity helps the enviroment in general but farmers already plant trees where they want them after eating the fruit themselves; so thanks bats for not removing all hope for the future as well our current crop and we appreciate your work for the forest but your not a posative influence here.
In reality there is many reasons fruit bats help. They tend to prefer overripe fruit, and overripe apples can be bad for Apple crops because they attract pests. They might actually be insect bats going after pests in the fruit. Some fruit bats pollinate fruit. Bats can create fertilizer.
Hazarding a guess the vampire fruit bats benefit the apple crop by eating them all leaving many local pests without food one year greatly reducing their numbers in the following years and then move on allowing Apple Orchids a chance to actually benefit from the lack of pests. (I don't know of any specific species who do this but it sounds plausable.)
Applejack comes off as right in the show because the show could not bother to give a logical explanation for what those long term benefits they mention actually are.
Edited by 64.131.4.234
So while I agree that the Strawman Had A Point, I do think we should note that Fluttershy's core moral was more about "think about long-term benefits" than "think of the poor innocent monsters!" I'll leave it up to someone else, though, since I don't have the best track record on this site when it comes to staying neutral. :P
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