Viral Controversy: Vegan Mom Lets Her Baby Eat Sand and Rocks

Alice Bender, 22, didn't expect a 'harmless' video she posted online to cause such a stir. Or maybe she did.

Bender, who leads a vegan lifestyle, shared a video of Fern, her eight-month-old son, eating sand mixed with stones, dirt, and whatever else he could get his hands on. In her videos, she demonstrates how she raises her child in their vegan household in Arizona. Though he is still nursing, she explains that she lets him eat whatever he desires.

And what about germs? "I'm not worried about them," she says in the contentious video, which has already surpassed 12 million views but garnered thousands of negative comments. "I welcome everything he puts in his mouth, and I have no fears. I trust my baby. Babies have instincts."

Understandably, many parents were alarmed by her claims. "You don’t have to worry about germs from household toys he puts in his mouth, but sand with stones or licking a shopping cart used by thousands before it reached your child’s mouth?! Where are you living?" one mother exclaimed. Bender, who regularly posts such videos and has built a community of 275,000 followers, is accustomed to hearing everything.

"You're taking it too far," another comment criticized, noting the difference between letting a child taste something from the ground occasionally and making it a daily habit. "It doesn't seem logical to me for an eight-month-old who can't chew yet, to eat stones and sticks. I'm sorry," another comment added.

However, some responses argued against shielding the child from everything, claiming Bender's method strengthens her child's immune system. "We grew up like that too, eating lots of dirt and sand, and nothing happened to us. We turned out fine," they said.