Yes. If you read up on industrial meat production, the industry is rife with human rights abuses as well.
I’m not like super into trigger warnings, but if you’re gonna read up on industrial meat production, you need to be emotionally prepared.
At least in very dramatic extremes, yes there’s at least a correlation between horrific animal abuse and psychopathy.
No idea if that extends to more run of the mill actions.
I think it’s taught there’s some correlation between psychopathy and malicious treatment of animals, even small insects (capturing ants or spiders to pull their legs off, or similar behavior), but not casual disregard of the value of insect life or animals considered vermin (like stomping on bugs that startle you or using mouse traps to deal with infestation)
Even everyone is a psychopath, no one is.
Serial killers often start out by torturing and killing animals in childhood.
I kill bugs all over the place. Only a matter of time before I take my neighbor out.
No but seriously, the torturing animals thing is a big sign.
“Killing destroys the root of compassion”
— buddha
I’m pretty sure my opinion on mosquitoes does not reflect my attitude or behavior towards humans.
Well, it did say harmless. Mosquitoes cause more than 700000 deaths per year.
I agree
I asked myself this the other day: Why do I have empathy for most animals, but when it comes to insects, I just don’t give a single fuck? If I accidentally stepped on a kitten I didn’t see, I’d be emotionally fucked up. But when I step on a snail I didn’t notice until hearing the crunch, I don’t feel bad in the slightest.
It’s not because they are pests, I don’t think. I don’t like killing mice and rats, either and opt for non-lethal means of removal if and when I have a problem with them in my home. But I’ll straight genocide bugs in my space.
idk I’d feel bad stepping on a snail…maybe it’s the size or the crunch. But smaller insect ye i dont care.
I feel awful when I step on a snail. But stuff like gnatt flies, it’s like I’ve given your friends so much leverage letting them out and now you’re taking advantage by breeding in my plants and flying into my nose
I think there are two main reasons:
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insects don’t emote in a way we can perceive. The ones that do typically express it by secreting some kind of chemical which we either can’t perceive or can’t intuitively interpret. So if it’s in pain, we can’t really tell.
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a lot of insects pose a challenge to our own survival. For example, insects getting into our food can make us sick. Some insects spread disease by contact or biting. This has caused humans to develop an instinct to fear, avoid, and/or kill insects on sight.
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I think there is a difference.
Basically all animals will attack other animals when they invade their home space. Even insects do so and it can be brutal. Speaking outside of human moral constructs, you wouldn’t be out of line for killing a rat or even a cat that was unwelcome in your home. Life will do what it can to ensure survival.
But it’s easier to feel empathy for what is more similar to us. So, mammals, for example. Domesticated and tame animals that have adapted to humans.
I suggest making small efforts to cultivate compassion even for the creepiest insects, by taking a cup, bowl, or piece of paper and taking them outside. Now it could be argued whether this is doing them any favors, but I feel better about that compared to just smashing them.
It may sound ridiculous but yes I did reach the point where I am affected by any life I take, and really strive to avoid it where possible. I have “mutual arrangements” with a variety of insects in my house, such as small spiders. They stay out of my way, and I let them take care of other insects that slip through the cracks.
Probably because most invertebrates are not known to be sentient?
What is sentience?
Baby don’t hurt me :-D
I dunno, I’ve met some bitterly unkind vegans that might answer this question for you pretty conclusively.
Were they bullies?
Kinda. We referred to them as “militant vegans”
Maybe I just need to meet nice vegans. Lol
I’ve met a bunch. Usually takes a while to find out they’re vegan. Aside from maybe having something in their cubicle, I’ve never found em to be preachy or anything. Honestly I’ve only experienced harsh vegan kickback online.
It’s not easy to like someone who is telling you to change your behaviour especially when they clearly think you are a murderer.
I don’t like fishing.
It’s not because “eww, worms” or “eww, fish”. It’s two things. The big thing is, I don’t want to hurt some small animal like a worm or bait fish, just so that I can hurt some other animal by dragging them into an environment where they can’t breathe. Oh, but the humane thing to do is toss them back? Imagine being pulled out of an airlock into the vacuum of space, photographed, measured, and then put back in the airlock? I don’t need to do all of that to some critter just for fun. Which brings me to the second thing about fishing that I don’t like : It’s not fun. It’s boring. It’s so boring. Just stand here and hope a fish eventually bites.
The fun in fishing is that you get to just sit there, have a beer, and turn your brain off. There really isn’t an expectation to be super busy while fishing. If you have a busy lifestyle, then an occasional “turn your brain off” is super nice.
There are a bunch of other ways to do that without hurting animals too, though.
This is why I hate fishing
I feel bad about killing them out of the blue, but sometimes they’re really asking for it
I mean, I feel horrible when I kill innocent NPCs in video games.
I had to stop playing a recent BG3 save where I was trying a character who sometimes randomly kills people.
A lot of serial killers were cruel to animals when they were young.
Isn’t dehumanization a tool to allow mass cruelty towards people?
Those were some really mature answers you got there. /s
The reason imo why we think its ok to treat bugs bad is because of hierarchy. We expect bugs to be beneath us and those who treat other humans bad largely come off as if others were beneath them. It is enforced through our competitive capitalist system. It gets drilled into us by playing mostly competitive games.
I think to solve this, one could ask why we rarely play cooperative games. Its always about domination and „proving yourself“. This benefits those in power because we‘re less likely to cooperate and not need their approval anymore. Its even in most movies.
Thats how we devalue bugs and other „vermin“. As someone who has lizards I touch grasshoppers (food) a lot and they are quite interesting and I cant stand if they die slowly. I‘m aware that their lives are worth something but I also aknowledge that my lizards need protein at times. I view it through the lens of potential. Humans have the potential to fly to the stars, bugs have the potential to keep our biodiversity running (=very important).
First humans started to treat animals bad.
Later they started to treat other humans ‘like animals’.
No. Bugs can get fucked.
I teach my kids not to kill bugs unless they are doing something bad or dangerous, otherwise just move them.
Killing things should not be a default action for convenience sake.
Existing too close to me with that many legs is a crime.
Spiders eat mosquitoes and centipedes eat roaches, you do barely any work all day and contribute nothing back to society. Which one deserves being squished?
The other day my coworkers and I made literally 5 million wrappers for dum dum suckers in 2 hours. Suck it.
You eat Twinkies and your mom eats you. Which deserves to be squished?
Point proven.
Y’all think you’re above the ick while you’re going around trying to drag people down.
Cmon now, don’t really need to roleplay here
I’m glad someone got it. 🤣
Oh you’re a zoomer. That explains it.
Nope. You seem to like deciding things about people. Try playing your own character. Ohhh right, your character is shit. I bet it’s got an edgy backstory too.
Oh you’re older? And you act that way? That’s worse.
Including ladybugs?
No, they’re ok unless there’s way too many and even then I dont super mine them.
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Had just clicked away from this post when I saw you comment. I need you to know that I came back just to ensure I upvoted your post (or whatever we call those here).
Had just clicked away and had to come back to let you know we call those pointless here.
(protip: if something is actually worth fake internet points give it a boost instead or as well)
A boost? I’m not familiar with what that is. That’s not a Lemmy thing is it?
it’s a fediverse thing. think of it like a re-tweet.
I sometimes forget Lemmy is a totally different place. Gave you a boost, let me know if it does anything there.
By you maybe
