fandomsecrets | [ SECRET POST #3182 ]

[ SECRET POST #3182 ]

⌈ Secret Post #3182 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

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Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 03 pages, 059 secrets from Secret Submission Post #455.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

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Why is it always ants that are good insects? Honey, I Shrunk The Kids had an adorable ant buddy as well. Is it because they are social insects?

Oh no, that ant broke my heart. ;3;

Probably because they're both familiar (everyone knows what an ant is and everyone has seen ants IRL) and weirdly cute.

They also represent a lot of "admirable" qualities that jibe with human values I guess: hard-working, cooperative, strong, building and maintaining their colony's home and bringing food back to their colony etc, rather than lazing around all by themselves doing nothing but stuffing their face like other harmless insects.

And they have a lot less douchey-by-human-standards qualities than non-harmless - eg, mosquitoes suck blood, which for humans evokes the idea of mooching off others and being a parasite.

Of course that's a lot of anthropomorphizing, but as a purely metaphorical narrative device they fit with human stories very well.

Those people have never lived in a place where fire ants live. If they did, they would hate them.

Haha, yeah I expect so!

Yup. Step on a fire ant swarm and you'll spend the rest of your life terrified of fire ants. I was 9. Ants along with wasps are the only insects that terrify me.

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kaijinscendre - 2015-09-20 21:28 (UTC) - Expand

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philstar22 - 2015-09-20 21:30 (UTC) - Expand

wasn't the fire ant the one that killed the cute ant in Honey I Shrunk the Kids?

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kaijinscendre - 2015-09-20 23:57 (UTC) - Expand

This. Ants are actually the only insect other than wasps that I can't stand. How about friendly cockroaches?

Our house once had a horrible, horrible cockroach infestation because of a leak in the sewers in the wall. It was horrifying. Try waking up with a dead cockroach next to you on your pillow.

Ugh ugh uh no thanks.

That does sound nasty. I grew up in a country with giant cockroaches. Try having one fly into your face (during mating season they fly). They still don't bother me nearly as much as ants. Never got bit by a cockroach.

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ketita - 2015-09-20 22:03 (UTC) - Expand

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philstar22 - 2015-09-20 22:04 (UTC) - Expand

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elialshadowpine - 2015-09-21 07:01 (UTC) - Expand

fuck cockroaches but there was one in Wall E wasn't there?

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tabaqui - 2015-09-21 00:25 (UTC) - Expand

Gokicha is a manga/anime about a friendly roach (made to look like a tiny, cute girl, though her hair seems to become her shell), but who constantly gets rejected by humans. Milquetoast from the comics Bloom County/Outland was more snarky and mischievous iirc, but sometimes just hung out with the main characters.

archie in "archie and mehitabel" was sweet, and he was a roach. He typed in lower case because he couldn't hit the shift key as his typing method involved jumping all over the keyboard.

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(Anonymous) - 2015-09-21 01:45 (UTC) - Expand

On the other hand, Animorphs' portrayal of ant psychology was the stuff of nightmares. They literally swore never to be eusocial insects again... and later tried to rationalize that termites might be different (they weren't).

Oh man! I remember that. D:

Oh god I forgot about that. It was arghk.

I came to this thread to post about Animorphs. Also, when Jake was taken over by that yeerk? When they kept him captive to starve the yeerk out and they laid an ant trail across the shed door so the yeerk wouldn't be able to sneak out by morphing into an ant. I remember as a kid I was really freaked out when the enemy ant colony attacked them.

Come to think of it, you're right. Most movies about bugs have ant protagonists, or bees, which are related to ants (both are in the order hymenoptera). A Bug's Life, Antz, The Ant Bully, Maya the Bee, Bee Movie... the only one I can think of that doesn't have ants or bees is James and the Giant Peach.

CONSPIRACY!

In the graphic novel "Last of the Sandwalkers" the ants are a menace. The heroes are beetles.

Well, in Honey, We Shrunk Ourselves, it was a spider so...

there are some old fables (Aesop? or predating him/other cultures? I can't remember, I'm drunk) about ants being the hardworking ones that store up food for winter unlike other insects, so they've been used as a parable for good qualities (good work ethic anyway) since ancient times. prolly because unlike bees, they don't sting you.

clearly, the fable-devisers never dealt with fire ants, carpenter ants, or soldier ants. there are some truly terrifying species of ants out there.

Animorphs portrayed ants very differently. In fact, they refused to ever morph into an ant every again. Can't remember if any of them ever did again or not, but there was a big resounding NO after their near death experience and the fact that they all nearly got lost to the drones instincts.

not always good - Empire of the Ants with Joan Collins has villainous ants.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Empire_of_the_Ants_(film)

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