herp keeper vertebrate feeding psychosis

DanSB

Avid Member
I've noticed (more in people I know and other forums than here) this odd tendency of many herp keepers to get all excited and think it is awesome to watch their pet kill a vertebrate. I wonder if this is some sort of psychosis, or whatever mental illness. Or am I weird and it is normal for people to get a kick out of killing, the more brutal the more exciting.

Now I understand this is a necessity, it is how life works, and I have fed quite a few living animals to animals that require it (or at the time I thought so at least). The thing that bugs me is this pride and joy people get out of it. There are many herps that will eat verts but it isn't good for them, which experts and vets agree, yet these people persist, why? Because they have a psychosis. Many insist on feeding live food to animals that need verts but will eat dead, why? I think it is a psychosis. Just getting this irrational thrill of watching brutal killing.

Am I off my rocker myself, or has anyone else noticed this? The gleam in someone's eyes as they describe their pet ripping apart a mouse or other animal.

Again, I am okay with life killing life to survive, it is the psychotic joy of the brutality of it in captivity that rubs me wrong.
 
People that enjoy the sight of death or pain to another animal are sadastic. They do have a mental illness. Im sure it ultimately starts with having such loving/normal parents.
 
I feel bad feeding walking sticks to my chams. I still feel guilty about the luna moth I fed off over a month ago.

Harming animals for pleasure often stems from sexual abuse as a child. Jeffrey Dahmer was a classic case. I'm required to have training on recognizing the indicators of child abuse since I'm an elementary teacher, and that's one of the things we have to report :(
 
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