• Rose Thorne(She/Her)@lemm.eeEnglish
    8·
    28 days ago

    They creeped me out as a kid. It didn’t help that I had this concept that they were like “evil” butterflies. Child brain hardcore taking my grandmother’s complaining about moths eating clothes and being a nuisance too far.

    Absolutely adore them, now. Go ahead and enjoy some lamp, little friend, you’ve earned it.

    • Cris@lemmy.worldEnglish
      8·
      28 days ago

      Its worth knowing that lamps are bad for moths, they think nighttime light sources are the moon which they use for navigation, and so they get confused and lost

      If you wanna help moths, combatting light pollution so they can enjoy the moon is the best thing we can do for them :)

  • azertyfun@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
    2·
    28 days ago

    I didn’t even know disliking moths was a thing until recently.

    Guess why? In French they are called “night butterflies”. It’s just a nocturnal butterfly so of course it’s brown, duh.

    This feels like the Orca/Killer Whale debate again. Why do the English give such terrible names to animals like they’re trying to give children nightmares?

    • Couldbealeotard@lemmy.worldEnglish
      2·
      28 days ago

      What do mean regarding terrible names? “Moth” isn’t inherently a bad name; any negative connotations of the word come from the creature itself.

      • azertyfun@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
        1·
        28 days ago

        The phonology of “moth” is just bad (not just subjectively but in a way that I’m sure linguists could pick apart). It’s adjacent to “moist”. That’s the kind of name you give something you don’t like, a name made to be spat out. Contrast to other monosyllabic names like “fly”, a decidedly more despicable insect but with a much prettier name. Which one would be easier to use in a song?

        Also I just checked and moths are butterflies, etymologically it’s just that old Germanic peoples assigned a different name to the less colorful butterflies.