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Comment by robbrown451 | Hacker News Reader

I am very happy that the children's hobby of collecting butterflies seems to have nearly disappeared. When I was a kid, other kids had butterfly collection kits that included a "killing jar." It struck me as a bit morbid at the time, but it was common so no big deal.

Even if the species isn't endangered or anything, isn't that kind of messed up? Not a great way for a kid to learn empathy.

My seven year old enjoyed taking close up photos of butterflies a couple days ago using my phone. All the while saying sweet things to them, treating them as friends that she didn't want to frighten. She'd be offended with the idea of catching them to kill them and stick a pin in them to then admire their beauty in all its deadness.

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We're lucky to have inherited a lovely garden that we've been doing our best to keep up with. Ever since my son was born, he's spent tons of time running around and exploring every section of it. My mom (grandma) and him spend lots of time finding insects, and making friends with them (COVID limited human friendships). He loves snails and will run outside after a rainfall to find the whole snail family. He'll say hi to the ants, and bumblebees. We love finding butterflies, and seeing the variety of birds in our garden. He's always been super gentle and interested in everything we showed him.

He's close to 3 now, so he's exploring life & death. Previously, if we accidentally stepped on a snail, we'd hide it from him. Now, we talk it through and say "Oh no, we accidentally stepped on the snail! Let's apologize to snail and say sorry snail, I didn't mean to step on you. I'll try to be more careful next time." I use the opportunity to explain how the ants & wasps will come and eat the snail now to clean it up. That we try not to kill any insects, plants, or animals unless we plan to eat it.

We have close family with a 5 year old that actually takes very much the opposite approach, even singing a song to kill the ants. Internally, I was horrified, but kept my mouth shut. My son picked it up and was deliberately stepping on ants the next time we were outside. I just reaffirmed the fact that this is the ants' home, and that we should be kind and not hurt ants like that. Can we apologize to the ants please? Now the ant's mama and daddy are going to be sad because they'll miss him, etc.

He's young. I just want him to grow up appreciating and respecting all life. I figure if we can continue being kind to small life, it will extend to our friends as lockdowns lift. So far so good.

That's good parenting on your part, in my opinion.

> Now the ant's mama and daddy are going to be sad because they'll miss him

Perhaps you could try to acculturate your son without deliberately lying to him. The only true claim this sentence makes is that, when you step on an ant, the ant's mother exists.

Calling that a deliberate lie is not accurate, in my opinion. Do you think it is a lie to speak as if dolls and stuffed animals have feelings? (for that matter, do you think it is a lie to speak as if characters in a fictional movie have thoughts and feelings?)

Pretend play is important. My seven year old understands the distinction between humans, bugs, and toys. But she still pretends, and uses the latter as "empathy practice." This is normal, healthy child development.

There is a time and a place for reminding children that bugs probably don't have feelings per se, and that dolls and stuffies especially don't. If you remind them constantly, and never let them go into "pretend mode" without spoiling it with such reminders, let's just say I recommend you avoid situations that put you in much contact with kids.

> That we try not to kill any insects, plants, or animals unless we plan to eat it.

How do you deal with termite infestations?

Kids don’t collect butterflies so much anymore because (a) most people live in more urbanized places than 50+ years ago and kids spend more time indoors or in structured activities, and (b) there are a lot fewer butterflies around, as they die to insecticides, habitat loss, and climate change.

Edit: A web search turns up that butterfly populations have declined by more than 30% in Europe/USA in the past 25 years or so, and were in decline for long before that. One estimate is that they have declined by more than 80% in Western Europe since the late 19th century, with many species disappearing entirely.

Easily capturing images of butterflies (or just downloading them) probably is a factor, that wasn't really possible with cameras children had access to 30y ago.

Raising butterflies is quite a common class project in UK primary schools.

We live in the middle of a city (San Francisco) and there are lots of butterflies around. There may be less, but I stand by my theory that the main difference is that killing bugs as a hobby is not seen the same way as it used to be.

This isn't obvious at all.

The best advocates for healthy duck and deer populations are people who enjoy killing and eating them.

Butterfly populations are declining throughout the developed world, it seems like a safe bet to me that more amateur lepidopterists would serve as an advocacy group for arresting and reversing that decline.

Any individual butterfly is not long for this world, after all. Killing it and mounting it isn't a threat to its species; no one caring if they live or die is.

You've missed the point entirely. It's not only a matter of protecting a species, it's a matter of learning empathy.

You raise a good reminder about the decline of butterfly populations around the world.

I do feel that it should be possible to use new technologies to share/capture what a butterfly looks like and then for others to view that. The actual killing and mounting shouldn't have to be a pre-requisite for being a lepidopterist, I feel.

I dunno, I find having children have experience with real death is better than insulating them from it. I bet you're thinking about some psychopathy cascade where the poor not-helicoptered-enough Billy goes from gassing butterflies to burning cats to murdering hitchhikers and, well, I don't think that's a very likely thing outside of TV.

> Even if the species isn't endangered or anything, isn't that kind of messed up? Not a great way for a kid to learn empathy.

I think most kids are smart enough to understand the difference between insects and the higher forms of life that are capable of experiencing suffering.

I would say that isn't the point. Bugs are perfectly fine to practice empathy with, as are dolls, stuffed animals, etc.

Recently my daughter befriended a tiny ant while at the blacktop at the local rec center. She was sort of taking a time out from interacting with her human friends for a bit.

Then one of her friends came over and squished the ant, thinking it was funny, saying "it's just an ant" when my daughter complained.

It really bothered me. Not the death of the ant, obviously. (so what, I step on them all the time)

I don't know if you have kids, but I think there was something a bit off about that girl and her choice to kill the ant. Maybe you would consider her "smart." I didn't.

I do have kids.

I observe a correlation between overattachment to animals and lack of empathy toward other humans.

In other words, people with "fur babies" are far less likely to have well-formed consciences.

My observation is the opposite. Maybe someone should do a study. I've especially noticed that dog owners and dog lovers tend to be kind to people. I tend to agree with this quote:

“He who is cruel to animals becomes hard also in his dealings with men. We can judge the heart of a man by his treatment of animals.”

― Emmanuel Kant

https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/13607-he-who-is-cruel-to-an...

On the contrary, the link between animal torture and psychopathy appears to be pretty well-established

"Fur baby" overattachment is a very different thing from manifesting the appropriate amount of kindness and care for a being that can experience suffering.

You're the one who brought up "fur baby attachment." I'm not entirely sure what it is, given that this discussion is simply about kids being kind to non-domesticated animals.

I'm sure there are people with unhealthy attachments to animals, and who knows the extent of their issues and how they manifest. But a child who rejects a hobby that, at its core, is the deliberate killing of animals that they find beautiful, isn't that. As a parent, I say it is exactly how a child should be at that age.

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