Borg Perfection
TMF Expert
- Joined
- Nov 13, 2009
- Messages
- 408
- Points
- 0
I used to kill insects that I'd find in my home, "house centipedes" and silverfish especially. Though smaller, and much less approachable and cuddly than a dog or a cat, it is still a living creature.
For a few years now, I've been practicing Buddhism and Taoism (the principles, not the deity worship) and since have ceased to kill or harm even the smallest, most seemingly insignificant creature. It may be unsightly, or repulsive, yet it is living and I have no business disturbing it so long as it is no threat to me.
What I find even more repulsive than hundred-legged worms crawling around my home, is the fact that people find justification in torturing or killing another living creature based on size alone. In a way, it's similar to the "out of sight, out of mind" philosophy in the psychology of killing from great distances (dropping bombs from planes, and sniping kills for example) you just don't feel that bad about killing a victim you can't connect with.
Just because something is smaller, less intelligent, or of a different species does not necessarily make it any less alive, or any less able to feel pain or fear. The worth of a life is all subjective anyway -- to another race somewhere in the universe, our level of intelect or significance may be analogous to how a dog's may seem to us, but that doesn't change how our experience would feel, being tortured or killed by them.
It makes me sick that people do this.
For a few years now, I've been practicing Buddhism and Taoism (the principles, not the deity worship) and since have ceased to kill or harm even the smallest, most seemingly insignificant creature. It may be unsightly, or repulsive, yet it is living and I have no business disturbing it so long as it is no threat to me.
What I find even more repulsive than hundred-legged worms crawling around my home, is the fact that people find justification in torturing or killing another living creature based on size alone. In a way, it's similar to the "out of sight, out of mind" philosophy in the psychology of killing from great distances (dropping bombs from planes, and sniping kills for example) you just don't feel that bad about killing a victim you can't connect with.
Just because something is smaller, less intelligent, or of a different species does not necessarily make it any less alive, or any less able to feel pain or fear. The worth of a life is all subjective anyway -- to another race somewhere in the universe, our level of intelect or significance may be analogous to how a dog's may seem to us, but that doesn't change how our experience would feel, being tortured or killed by them.
It makes me sick that people do this.



