Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
I'm 21 years old, had to go to a picnic today. I got up to throw something in the garbage and at the garbage can noticed a horde of ants bustling around a little ant mound. I was bored so I lifted my foot over them and stamped it down. After flattening them and their little home under my shoe, I walked back to the blanket.
When I sat back down, I leaned over to check out all the crushed ants stuck to my foot. My friend and I sort of snickered because the ants I carried through the grass on the bottom of my feet were only half-crushed and squirming in the treads of my running shoe. Then out of nowhere some guy who I didn't know saw me and called me a "white bully" and "inhumane" because I step on ants. I told him to bend down and kiss my stinking feet. I know, not nice, heh.
I've been stepping on bugs my whole life. I know jains respect all life and believe that my actions are wrong. But how is that explained? I thought they believed in reincarnation but how does that work? Do they believe that bugs are reincarnated from people?
If I'm stepping on someone's uncle bob, is that really such a bad thing? I guess my thoughts would be eh, better luck next time. There was probably a reason he ended up as a tiny ant on the bottom of my shoe and that by contrast, I'm a giant.
Do you think stepping on bugs is wrong - why or why not?
While I can't concern myself with an ant as an individual - is has no sentience and no capacity to suffer - or these particular ants as a species - I think it's safe to say they aren't endangered - I do find myself a bit mystified at your smug feeling of superiority over ants. They're ants. You might as well gloat over your ability to beat a first-grader in arm-wrestling.
It's not the ants that concern me, but your emotionally stunted need to elevate yourself in this manner is setting off all sorts of alarms bells.
I'm 21 years old, had to go to a picnic today. I got up to throw something in the garbage and at the garbage can noticed a horde of ants bustling around a little ant mound. I was bored so I lifted my foot over them and stamped it down. After flattening them and their little home under my shoe, I walked back to the blanket.
When I sat back down, I leaned over to check out all the crushed ants stuck to my foot. My friend and I sort of snickered because the ants I carried through the grass on the bottom of my feet were only half-crushed and squirming in the treads of my running shoe. Then out of nowhere some guy who I didn't know saw me and called me a "white bully" and "inhumane" because I step on ants. I told him to bend down and kiss my stinking feet. I know, not nice, heh.
I've been stepping on bugs my whole life. I know jains respect all life and believe that my actions are wrong. But how is that explained? I thought they believed in reincarnation but how does that work? Do they believe that bugs are reincarnated from people?
If I'm stepping on someone's uncle bob, is that really such a bad thing? I guess my thoughts would be eh, better luck next time. There was probably a reason he ended up as a tiny ant on the bottom of my shoe and that by contrast, I'm a giant.
Do you think stepping on bugs is wrong - why or why not?
That is a good question. And I won't show my working but just give the answer -
If it done with a view to preventing harm to human life and lifestyle, then we are faced with either going the Hindu/Jain route and dying of malaria rather than spray a bug, or taking the buggers out -them or us.
I'm with us. However, stepping on them for fun, I am not with, not so much because one bug more or less counts in the general scheme of things, but because of what it does to us - the delight in harm and destruction. Harming or damaging others for our amusement, and not even the debatable reason of doing it to benefit ourselves. What's wrong is the harm done to us, rather than to the bug.
Oh, P.s as to the reincarnation thing, if your uncle Bob has been reincarnated as a bug, by stepping on him, you are probably doing him a favour. Kneejerk one - liners out of the way, in fact, since it is debatable that anything is in the Bug, other than Uncle Bob's bank balance of Karma, you are not stepping on anything other than an spiritual account book, and of course, the bug.
Last edited by TRANSPONDER; 01-03-2014 at 09:22 AM..
Uneccisarilly destroying something and killing something out of boredom and for fun is certainly not right...
'They are just ants'....are you aware of the job ants do? Have you seen the architectural masterpieces they build for thier homes? Do you know that they have a 'social' order?
And yes, you may have been stepping on uncle bob reincarnated as an ant. But as is said above, probably did him a favor. Bob was a bad boy while human, that's why he would end up as an ant or a cockroach.
You may want to think about that when you go about stomping on bugs for fun.
I've been thinking about this. I'm selective. I had no respect for the termites that were devouring our house. In fact I took out a contract on them.
No problemo terminating termites - or other pests who do us harm. I have thousands of squashed mosquitoes on my resume. But the OP was killing bugs for fun. That's wrong any way you slice, or stomp, it.
No problemo terminating termites - or other pests who do us harm. I have thousands of squashed mosquitoes on my resume. But the OP was killing bugs for fun. That's wrong any way you slice, or stomp, it.
I was thinking about your position and was wondering...if we transferred the dynamic to human beings, would you be arguing that it was acceptable to kill other humans who are pestering us in some manner, such as native Americans being inconveniently in the way of European progress in America, but it would not be acceptable to kill them just for sport?
I'm not really looking for an answer to that, rather I use it to suggest that you may be identifying the wrong problem. If it is okay to kill a bug for purposes which you deem acceptable, then it requires a mindset which places your list of desires ahead of the bug's life. Is that bug's life worth your having an infested, unsanitary home? Your answer would be no. Therefore, your happiness in this particular area is held to be a higher goal than the continuation of that bug's life.
From the bug's point of view, its life would take priority over your desire for an non infested home. From the bug's point of view, whether it was being wiped out so that you may have a sanitary home, or so that someone may get his kicks, there would be no distinction.
So, you have actually declared that killing bugs is okay. The person doing it for fun isn't wrong because he is killing bugs, the problem is that he is demonstrating a cruel mindset which might later be transferred to an actual critical area, that of not respecting the rights and lives of other humans. That...that is what disturbing about our kill for sport bug exterminator, not that he is doing the same thing as you but for bad reasons.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
but just give the answer - 