Bugs

[gambit]

Why is it most people who declare themselves good people and lovers of nature, still wont hesitate at the chance to swat a fly or squash a spider?

Even people I personally know as geniunely good people still do it. Does how many humans react to bugs just go to show how very hypocritical many humans are, or do we, for some reason, have some built in hate of anything bug-like?

[GustaiveTW]

When I see certain bug in the house I grab a cpu and a paper, place the cup over the bug, slide the paper under and put the bug outside.

But ... honestly , roaches freak me out and I will swat, stomp before even thinking.

[dwringer]

Heh Gambit you have a great point, I can't understand these people either. I am truly arachnophobic, but I almost never kill spiders and I feel remorse when I am forced to.

Spiders are good for humans, they help exterminate lesser and more invasive pests. They're also usually intelligent enough to leave people alone.

I feel a little less bad about killing something like, say, an ant, but I still don't like the idea.


I wonder if a lot of people who support animal rights, etc, who are freaked out by bugs are actually freaked out by their own subconscious guilt over all the ones they've killed over the years without giving it a second thought.

EDIT: This doesn't mean I'm some kind of bug pacifist, I've slaughtered hundreds. That doesn't mean it's something to be taken lightly. Like in Assassin's Creed, I like how he's respectful about the way he kills his victims

[gambit]

Heh Gambit you have a great point, I can't understand these people either. I am truly arachnophobic, but I almost never kill spiders and I feel remorse when I am forced to.

Spiders are good for humans, they help exterminate lesser and more invasive pests. They're also usually intelligent enough to leave people alone.

I feel a little less bad about killing something like, say, an ant, but I still don't like the idea.


I wonder if a lot of people who support animal rights, etc, who are freaked out by bugs are actually freaked out by their own subconscious guilt over all the ones they've killed over the years without giving it a second thought.

EDIT: This doesn't mean I'm some kind of bug pacifist, I've slaughtered hundreds. That doesn't mean it's something to be taken lightly. Like in Assassin's Creed, I like how he's respectful about the way he kills his victims

Right. Who hasn't killed their fair share of bugs? Who hasnt kicked over an ant hill just for the hell of it? If you see a spider web in your house, what'd you do? Destroy it. We've got exterminators who are trained specifically for finding bugs, destroying their homes, killing their queens and taking out any colonies/groups that have infested our homes, even if they aren't necessarily doing anything to our homes.

I'm no angel myself. Hell I was extremely arachnophobic as a child and I took pleasure in wiping them off the face of the Earth, but as I think back I can only look down on myself considering the spider was usually just crawling along a wall, minding it's own business.

[Thanatos]

I love nature, but that doesn't mean I'll kill it if it gets in my way.

I've chopped too many rotting bushes and trees and have killed too many insects to care.

[gambit]

I love nature, but that doesn't mean I'll kill it if it gets in my way.

I've chopped too many rotting bushes and trees and have killed too many insects to care.

I'd hardly say many of them get in your way. Merely being within your field of vision doesn't constitute as 'in your way'

[Thanatos]

I'd hardly say many of them get in your way. Merely being within your field of vision doesn't constitute as 'in your way'

You're purposely exaggerating my words.

[dwringer]

Well it is a war, plants and arthropods are some of our most ancient enemies.

[Darth Ravenous]

I'm the God of Exterminators. I've killed Billions of Ants, Roaches, Wasps and bees.

[Darth Ravenous]

If they start crawling on me or disturb my train of thought then I kill them.

[gambit]

If they start crawling on me or disturb my train of thought then I kill them.

Thats kind of my point.

We humans think we are so above all forms of life that if those other forms of life even make their existence apparent, we simply squash them for distracting us for half of a second, especially considering that half of a second would be spent thinking about something like pancakes.

[Big War Bird]

I love spiders. I hae about a half dozen huge spiders that build webs around my house, one right by my back door.

[Rich86]

I suppose some creatures such as the house fly will spread disease - and if you told me "oh no my house is just full of them! Can't bring myself to kill them " I would think there is something wrong with you. Most people seem to have an aversion to killing or harming fluffy/cute animals - but no qualms about hurting something that looks horrible.

I suppose from a young age we are raised with cute fluffy animals as our pets, and we watch television programes with talking squirrels, laughing cows and pigeons that play the kazoo. We don't see spiders engrossed in conversation with cats, or cockroaches taking their little cockroach children to the cinema!

I suppose we kill things in order to live (i.e. we must destroy another life in order to eat - yes carrots have feelings too!!!!), I'm not sure if we should really destroy things just because they annoy us though. Unless it's a spider - hate them.

[gambit]

I suppose some creatures such as the house fly will spread disease - and if you told me "oh no my house is just full of them! Can't bring myself to kill them " I would think there is something wrong with you.

Yes well that is different, the flies pose a pretty good threat to you. Some people will go out of their way just to kill flies. Me and my brother have gone on epic fly hunts since he just leaves his glass door open in the summer.

I'm talkin highscores of 20-25 flies a hunt.

[Adhamh Ashashi]

Well did you know that if a fly lands in your soup you should push it in and take it out. Apparently 1 wing cleans the rest of the body so it balances any dirt off the fly.

2 kinds of insect I can't stand to kill are spiders and bees.

[finsternis]

Well I hate incests. But as long as they are not near me or on me, I let them live. I live in the Bronx, in NYC, so my apartment is full of roaches. I hate them, but I do no do anything to them when I see them in the kitchen or in the living room. But when I see them in my room or the bathroom, I usually kill them. But when I see bigger insects (bigger or around, lets say, my thump) like big spiders and other stuff I freak and have to call someone to come kill them, or kill them myself is there is no one. Yeah, I'm a scary cat.

[Cluny the Scourge]

People are programmed by our evolutionary instincts as a race, and by our behavioural training from birth, to be repelled by insectoid life - the reason being hygiene. Insects, we instinctively know, are dirty and pose a threat to us by potentially spreading unhygienic conditions.

Furthermore, we have no reason to empathise with them as living beings - an insectoid's mind and body are too different from our own mammalian form, too alien, too other. We cannot feel that they are in any way like us - they do not experience the world as we do with nerves and senses, they do not have emotions like ours as we can easily imagine mammals doing. There is no difficult at all in reading the feelings of a mammal - be it quadraped, or bird, or primate - when it is excited, happy, worried, curious, frightened or in pain. It is entirely impossible when dealing with insect life.

Personally I do not "love nature" in any sense at all. Indeed, I'm not really even sure I understand what that means. I will do my best to keep an insect alive when I want to get it out of the house, even if it takes several minutes to scoop it up safely, but I will not worry in the slightest about killing insects if they are posing an obstacle to me in some way.

[finsternis]

There is no difficult at all in reading the feelings of a mammal - be it quadraped, or bird, or primate - when it is excited, happy, worried, curious, frightened or in pain.

What? lol

[dwringer]

What? lol

Eh? I agree with him, I find it very easy to communicate with a lot of animals, at least in these BASIC emotions.

More complex interaction is only possible with species who have evolved with us an ability for more complex communication - such as domesticated animals.

The eyes of a lot of wild animals look "dead" almost, because they're lacking in some of the mental equipment to communicate with humans. The most basic emotions evolved LONG before humans, though, so we generally can share the ability to interpret them with other species besides the ones we have lived with for millennia.

[finsternis]

Eh? I agree with him, I find it very easy to communicate with a lot of animals, at least in these BASIC emotions.

More complex interaction is only possible with species who have evolved with us an ability for more complex communication - such as domesticated animals.

The eyes of a lot of wild animals look "dead" almost, because they're lacking in some of the mental equipment to communicate with humans. The most basic emotions evolved LONG before humans, though, so we generally can share the ability to interpret them with other species besides the ones we have lived with for millennia.

huh? I'm talking about the bird part. He said:
"There is no difficult at all in reading the feelings of a mammal - be it quadraped, or bird, or primate - when it is excited, happy, worried, curious, frightened or in pain"

Last time I checked birds are not mammals. And I think all animals feel pain. Just because they don't scream in pain or show facial emotions does not mean that they don't have it.