Incase you ever have an event like this. Grain of salt though, I’m a youth worker but dont have a degree in child psychology. You ask the child to imagine how the animal feels. Even if the child does not have empathy, the imagine part forces their brain to try to understand. If it persists also seeking professional help never hurts.
This exact thing happened with my cousin. We were staying at a cottage with his family and he had a day where started really enjoying catching frogs and yeeting them against rocks to kill them for some reason. He must have killed like 30 when his mom found out. Then she explained to him that frogs are living animals with mommys and daddys of their own and my cousin suddenly became so traumatized he cried for hours.
I drowned some ants when I was a little kid in our backyard because I was scared of them and also curious. My neighbor told me to think about what I did. I was mortified. I’m a vegan now.
Kids need to learn that kind of empathy. Although I don’t think I would have ever thought about about ripping limbs from frogs.
I was horrible to animals as a kid. I teased the neighbourhood cats so much. I once put salt on a snail just for fun, without knowing it would die a gruesome death with just one grain of coarse salt. I’m vegan today…
I wasn’t very nice to plants as a kid. I would often pluck wood sorrel off the ground and eat it right there. I once burned a hole in a leaf using my glasses. I’m a meat eater today.
