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[-] OttoVonNoob@lemmy.ca 230 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago)

Incase you ever have an event like this. Grain of salt though, I'm a youth worker but dont have a degree in child psychology. You ask the child to imagine how the animal feels. Even if the child does not have empathy, the imagine part forces their brain to try to understand. If it persists also seeking professional help never hurts.

[-] bionicjoey@lemmy.ca 182 points 7 months ago

This exact thing happened with my cousin. We were staying at a cottage with his family and he had a day where started really enjoying catching frogs and yeeting them against rocks to kill them for some reason. He must have killed like 30 when his mom found out. Then she explained to him that frogs are living animals with mommys and daddys of their own and my cousin suddenly became so traumatized he cried for hours.

[-] feedum_sneedson@lemmy.world 93 points 7 months ago

That was extremely good parenting.

[-] thefartographer@lemm.ee 96 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago)

I used to love doing these types of things as a child and I was terrified of dismemberment in movies. One day, my dad told me that what I see in movies is what the frogs, fish, and bugs that I'd torment (essentially anything that didn't make terrifying noises) would endure. That was a massive turning point in my life.

[-] dudinax@programming.dev 62 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago)

When I was four I stomped on ants for fun. Then one day my big sister rushed over and buried one of them and put a marker on its grave.

I still stomped on them, but kept thinking about what she did and I eventually stopped.

[-] thefartographer@lemm.ee 30 points 7 months ago

That's a good sister.

[-] imPastaSyndrome@lemm.ee 15 points 7 months ago

Nah fuck ants. But mostly just the queen. Support ant workers rights

[-] rynzcycle@kbin.social 36 points 7 months ago

Yup, you don't need poison. Just sprinkle some miniaturized union pamphlets on the infestation and the colony will collapse in few weeks. Of course you risk a new infestation of ants with free time, safety regulations, and disposable income.

[-] imPastaSyndrome@lemm.ee 9 points 7 months ago

I think you just knocked out 80% of sales people who read ants with disposable income when the blood ran to their junk so fast they blacked out

[-] unreasonabro@lemmy.world 12 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago)

FREE THE ANTS

DOWN WITH THE MONARCHY

SUPPORT ANT COMMUNISM!

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[-] Flax_vert@feddit.uk 116 points 7 months ago

Go to 4chan for parenting advice

[-] bionicjoey@lemmy.ca 24 points 7 months ago

Perfect idea honestly. Just take whatever they say and do the opposite

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[-] SigmarStern@discuss.tchncs.de 115 points 7 months ago

I drowned some ants when I was a little kid in our backyard because I was scared of them and also curious. My neighbor told me to think about what I did. I was mortified. I'm a vegan now.

Kids need to learn that kind of empathy. Although I don't think I would have ever thought about about ripping limbs from frogs.

[-] wizzor@sopuli.xyz 78 points 7 months ago

When I was six, I was fishing with my father and uncle in a boat. We got a fish, and my uncle swiftly killed the fish immediately. I asked why he did it, it would've died anyway.

He said something along the lines of "All life should be respected enough not to let it suffer" and nothing else. A useful lesson that changed my view on suffering of animals. The man was later listed as one of the 10 most sought after criminals in my country, but I take the good and leave the bad.

[-] bionicjoey@lemmy.ca 29 points 7 months ago

This has the same energy as the jumper cables guy

[-] minibyte@sh.itjust.works 27 points 7 months ago

Perfectly balanced, as all things should be.

[-] kautau@lemmy.world 21 points 7 months ago

We can have solace that he applied the same philosophy to all his victims

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[-] jol@discuss.tchncs.de 24 points 7 months ago

I was horrible to animals as a kid. I teased the neighbourhood cats so much. I once put salt on a snail just for fun, without knowing it would die a gruesome death with just one grain of coarse salt. I'm vegan today...

[-] Sotuanduso@lemm.ee 29 points 7 months ago

I wasn't very nice to plants as a kid. I would often pluck wood sorrel off the ground and eat it right there. I once burned a hole in a leaf using my glasses. I'm a meat eater today.

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[-] Droggelbecher@lemmy.world 10 points 7 months ago

I once ate 10 live ants as a kid and I'm vegan now too, just thought that was interestingly similarish

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[-] GBU_28@lemm.ee 99 points 7 months ago

I knew someone in elementary school who brought us other kids to his backyard. His older brother was a few years older, and showed us a nest of ducklings. Before any of us knew what was going on he:

  1. Picks up a shovel and swings on the nest several times
  2. Pulls out a small tin of lighter fluid and and a lighter, douses them and lights it.

I was so fucking stunned. It is still seared in my memory. I don't even remember being scared, just immediately outside my body.

Eventually we ran home. I remember feeling nauseous for days. I never told my parents, out of fear, and I regret that.

I later learned that kid was sent to a disciplinary school after threatening his dad with a knife, and soon after the family and my peer moved away.

Wanna guess what the evil brother does for work now?

[-] SonnyVabitch@lemmy.world 96 points 7 months ago
[-] GBU_28@lemm.ee 83 points 7 months ago
[-] xantoxis@lemmy.world 45 points 7 months ago

Three people guessed it correctly before you responded, that's, uh, that sure says something

[-] Chriswild@lemmy.world 15 points 7 months ago

Not just that, but those were the only guesses.

[-] Raiderkev@lemmy.world 13 points 7 months ago

Of. Fucking. Course.

[-] TostiHawaii@feddit.nl 37 points 7 months ago

He's a cop now

[-] Mycatiskai@lemmy.ca 37 points 7 months ago

Prison guard, j/k

He's a cop right?

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[-] GlitterInfection@lemmy.world 53 points 7 months ago

Teach them to only kill serial killers?

[-] sverit@feddit.de 49 points 7 months ago

~~Eye for an eye~~ Leg for a leg. You know what you have to do.

[-] starman2112@sh.itjust.works 37 points 7 months ago

I'll add mine to the pile. When I was a lad, probably 10 or so, my family's back porch would frequently get overrun by slugs. I eventually got sick of accidentally stepping on them, so I got the salt shaker and a bunch of paper towels. To my memory I poured salt on a good 30 of them, though it was probably only 10 or so. Salted them, put the paper over them, then the next day came out to collect the bodies and throw them away.

28 year old me would beat 10 year old me's ass for that. Gotta hand it to him, though—those slugs never did come back to the porch.

[-] UnRelatedBurner@sh.itjust.works 58 points 7 months ago

I get the poor animals part, but this just seems like avarage shit you have to do in the countryside. Any good country folk know that (some) animals are your enemy, if there are wasps near your house? You kill them, their nest, wait for the extended family to search for their homes and kill them too. Now it's a much safer enviroment. Same with all rodents, same with all insects, same with slugs.. I guess, I never heard of a slug problem.

[-] Baines@lemmy.world 17 points 7 months ago

if there’s kittens in your barn and one gets in front of your tractor that’s just life

farmer relative

country folks can be just cold blooded

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[-] derpgon@programming.dev 9 points 7 months ago

I used to have a can full of salty water and a little piece of wood with a big nail extending out one end (looked like a prison shiv). I'd impale the slugs and put them in the can. Leave the can overnight, dump em by the field in the morning, rinse and repeat whenever needed.

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[-] oillut@lemm.ee 36 points 7 months ago

I did this as a young kid. I can confirm it was a complete lack of empathy and likely a power thing. It’s something thats haunted me more the older I get, as it should. Moments like this made me realize empathy is something I wanted, so I actively worked on it, and it grew like a muscle. I’d say I’ve improved quite a lot but others can judge that

As far as advice goes, yeah teach em about empathy. While this is also psychopathic behavior, I see equally bad feeling based reasons for being that cruel, the same ones that motivate bullying: power and superiority shit

[-] SuddenDownpour@sh.itjust.works 31 points 7 months ago

Anon wants parenting advice

...And he looks for it at 4chan.

[-] pensivepangolin@lemmy.world 23 points 7 months ago

Growing up, a neighborhood kid did this. All the other kids were scared of him and we all used to hide when he came outside to play. No one knows what ever happened to him…he dropped off the face of the earth after leaving home during high school, and his family moved out of the country a year later. Sometimes I wonder what he ever wound up doing….

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[-] Thcdenton@lemmy.world 12 points 7 months ago

I stomped a lizard flat when I was five. My mom had me bury it and say a prayer for it.

[-] Sanctus@lemmy.world 12 points 7 months ago

Anon fathers Michael Myers

[-] ladicius@lemmy.world 11 points 7 months ago

Psychopath. Torturing and killing animals as a kid is the most significant identifier for psychopaths.

[-] voracitude@lemmy.world 26 points 7 months ago

Yes, but they might just not understand. Other comments in this thread show that those children do exist. I think the advice to ask the child how they think their victim feels is best. A sociopath understands, and cares more about their own gratification than the suffering they're causing.

[-] themakara@lemmy.world 10 points 7 months ago

At this point? The frog is broken, can't fix that. Maybe get a new one?

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this post was submitted on 22 Feb 2024
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