Is it ok to kill spiders?

[jackpipsam]

I don't think it's bad.

I don't want them around where they could byte or whatever.
Put them in the backyard, chances are they will end up back in the house.

Better to just remove the problem entirely.

 

[Psychobabble]

Not going to say it' wrong, but I wouldn't do it. I have 2 spiders that live in my shower. The steam doesn't seem to bother them. I call them Ronnie and Reggie.

Mwahaha. And they said disguising my live web cams as spiders was insane!!

Small spiders are fine for me unless they start leaving their webs everywhere, and then that's really more a penchant for tidiness than arachnophobia. However, when the spider in question is big enough to carry off small dogs, I draw the line. When a spider that large invades my personal space I do what any real manly man would do. ... Which is sadly run away from it like a little kid and have my girlfriend shoo it back out the bathroom window with a broom. 'sigh' I'm never gonna live that down.

 

[Gavmando]

Me: I do my best not to kill them. I dont like killing things, and they have just as much right to live as I do.

My girlfriend: KILL IT! KILL IT! KILL IT NOW!!!

 

[manaman]

I'm the sort of guy who will catch a Red back in a jar and put it out side. So yeah, not recommending you do that, but try to play nice with them if they aren't a threat to you or your property.

Sounds about right. Im paranoid if i put them outside that they will just return with their friends for revenge, but thats just me being an idiot.

Which means you sentenced them to death. Spiders that live inside houses are adapted to living in homes. They cannot survive for long outside.


As for killing them, would you feel bad smashing a machine? That machine probably has as much going for it as that spider. It's little more than a bundle of organics reacting to simple stimulus in a way that it was basically hardwired for.

There is only one known species of spider that appears to have learned behavior, and that is it adapts a series of hunting techniques to different bugs based on the ones that work. The spider rolls through it's bag of tricks find the one that works for that bug, then when the bug is reintroduced later it goes right back to using the trick that works.

 

[Ix Rebound]

NO IT IS NOT OK!
Spiders are living creatures just like us and if you kill them you are nothing more than are heartless MURDERER

That's why I get my pet lizard to do it for me

 

[00slash00]

Are you a Jayne or something? why do you feel guilty about killing a bug? Surely this isn't the first one you've killed. Is it immoral? No, I don't think so. If it is, then a I am a horrible horrible person because I've killed hundreds

 

[Evil Smurf]

I don't like to kill things if I don't have to. That being said, I'm not above a mild freak out if one's next to my face, say, like "here I am!"

I don't kill spiders, I talk to them.

Do they talk back?

Australian spiders are all called Bruce and talk about cooking snags on the BBQ. They also describe each other as "mad cunts" as a term of endearment.

 

[Something Amyss]

Australian spiders are all called Bruce and talk about cooking snags on the BBQ. They also describe each other as "mad cunts" as a term of endearment.

Are they related to Bruce the Shark?

Fish are friends, not food.

 

[Fijiman]

Any insects that come into my house have a 90% chance of dying before they would have died naturally. If it's some small thing that's tucked itself into some out of the way corner that I can't be bothered to get to it can live. However, the moment it comes out into the open, and especially if it comes into my personal space, it dies. Spiders are in no way exempt from this fate and I have no problems killing them if I see them.

 

[Evil Smurf]

Australian spiders are all called Bruce and talk about cooking snags on the BBQ. They also describe each other as "mad cunts" as a term of endearment.

Are they related to Bruce the Shark?

Fish are friends, not food.

Bruce the Shark was made up

 

[rednose1]

You mean it was waiting for when you were most vulnerable to strike? Sure, spiders are great and eat lots of bugs, but the majority of those bugs are outside. My hose has few if any bugs, so the only reason a spider would come here would be to feast on my soft flesh.

Indoor spiders aren't there to be your friend. They are there to ruthlessly murder and eat you. Kill them before it's too late.

 

[nexus]

Killing something instantly the moment you see it is a very childish and reptilian thing to do (read: reptilian portion of the human brain). It's kind of ignorant, and you should probably exercise more control over your own emotions and brain. I mean this is really important for a human being..

If I see a spider when I'm about to go to bed e.g. -- I will lightly pick it up with a tissue and walk into my garage or onto my porch, and set it down somewhere. I do the same for beetles or what have you. The only time I kill an insect is when I see one stuck in the sink, likely dying a slow drowning death for 2 hours - so I stamp it out of existence, making sure I'm not maiming it and crippling it instead of killing.

 

[KoudelkaMorgan]

Spider out in the woods, I watch it for a bit and go on my way.

Spider indoors, I enter the Con Darr, and will hunt it down no matter how long it takes or the furniture I have to move.

I have a pair of black leather gloves within reach of this computer at all times, as well as a sword. For the ones in hard to reach places.

The funny thing is, I have probably 12 or more in my room, under my bed, and elsewhere. Yet I have no end of "mosquito eaters" aka huge flying bugs the size of ping pong balls or bigger that will come into my room, fly right on to my screen and scare the crap out of me.

If I found even one of those fuckers in a web in my house instead of scaring the bejeezus out of me I might see a benefit to spiders.

But the many spider bites I get in my sleep would still outweigh that. I'm also not a spider expert, only knowing a black widow is bad news on sight. I've also seen so called "harmless" spider bites result in necrosis or partial liquefaction of tissues, though not on me personally.

I also used to wake up screaming almost every night as a kid having spider related nightmares, and one time I woke up and discovered I couldn't open my left eye because it was swollen shut due to a bite.

I got taken to the hospital a few other times when bites caused my arm to swell up dramatically.

Still spiders are ok compared to carpenter ants. We rented a house out in the middle of no where once that had a huge ant problem.

Fun fact: the ant's head will keep biting you long after you pull its body off of you. That place also had black widows and I was 6 years old so they probably could have really hurt me. Fun times...

 

[jamail77]

This is relevant (Sorry, I couldn't resist):

 

[Dimitriov]

It's always okay to kill spiders. Now I personally only kill them if they're in my territory (i.e. my room, house, car etc.), but asking whether it's okay to kill a spider is just kinda weird: if you were the same size as it, it would not only kill you it would eat you alive

Remember that worrying overmuch about killing other organisms is just silly. A creature the size of a human being kills thousands upon thousands of living things every single day (spiders, all kinds of small insects as you walk around, flies, bacteria, viruses, fungi, meat for food, vegetable matter for food... the list goes on).

 

[Doom972]

Personally, I don't see non-human life as precious. If you feel bad about killing that spider, you can just spare others to avoid the guilt in the future. Putting them in a jar and releasing them outside is a good way to get rid of them non-violently, if that's what you want. I let the little spiders stay in my house, but I capture the bigger ones and release them outside.

It's only OK to kill an animal if it's threatening

Spoiler: IT'S COMING RIGHT FOR US!!!!

I live in a basement unit of an apartment. I kill at least one insect creature (lately it's been worms; why the fuck are there worms in here!!!?) on a daily basis. If I don't, they get into my food and on me and it's just kind of icky.

So to answer your question, I have absolutely no problem squishing the little bastards.

I agree. But for some reason many people look at me funny for sparing spiders (they kill flying insects which I find annoying), but thinking that aggressive dogs should be killed. Personally I don't perceive spiders as a threat. They don't seem interested in fighting with anything bigger than themselves. With that said, I don't judge those who do perceive them as threat and choose to kill them.

 

[game-lover]

Oh hell yeah. Not gonna be ashamed about it.

They're horribly freaky creatures.

Now granted, I can let the really small ones live because they tend to stay out of my way. So generally if they're alive, it's because they hit themselves so well.

But the big ones? Death in their futures.

 

[Feedmeketamine]

Yeah, no intelligent designer. Your avatar and solution to the design makes me want to smash you with a shoe.

Anyway, I think we should embrace and then worship the spiders like the pharaohs did with cats. We already fear them even when we know most of the common ones are harmless, so we're already half way there. Then we can get to the meaningless sacrifices and crossbreeding later.

You wouldnt be able to find a shoe big enough unless it were the shoe God himself.

 

[Owyn_Merrilin]

He didnt mean me any harm, he had no concept that i will inevitably use the toilet role, and encroach on his territory.

It's your house, it's your territory. A spider outside is in his own territory. A spider inside is trespassing.

Anyway, my question is, is it right to murder spiders just because we dont like the way they look?

I'm not sure that I know anyone who kills spiders just because of how they look. They murder them because they don't want them inside the house. We do the same to mice, which are inarguably adorable.

FTFY.

Other than that, you're totally right. The OP didn't encroach on the spider's territory, it was the other way around. Besidsm spiders breed just as surely as mice do, and the really big ones have a way of taking over. [sub][sub][sub]I really hate Huntsman spiders.[/sub][/sub][/sub]

 

[Sack of Cheese]

No! Absolutely no! You have to crush them, burn them, tear them apart, squish them into a pile of unrecognisable mud!