:oAs a spider nut,I really have to wonder where HOLLY(WEIRD)WOOD gets their dumb ideas about snakes and TARANTULAS. "Tarantulas-The Deadly Cargo" and "Kingdom Of the Spiders"have absolutely NO facts about these creatures! No wonder why people are so afraid of them-so TERRIFIED they lose their COMMON SENSE about dealing with tarantulas! At least the ones here in North America are generally harmless. Why are some folks so GULLIBLE to believe everything HollyWEIRD feeds them,without bothering to learn the FACTS!?! What is your opinion? :(

I was 8 when I first saw Kingdom of the Spiders.  That movie freaked me out.  Of course, now when I watch it I just laugh.  It is pretty dang cheesy.  

I have a serious fear of spiders, but it isn't because of those movies.  Heck, when I was 10 we had a pet tarantula.  I think it is just because they are creepy.

Another "creepy-crawly" movie to add is "Frogs".  The scene where the guy trips and falls and simultaneously shoots himself so that he cannot crawl away and  escape from the tarantula nest he falls in.  The spiders start ominously approaching while dropping webs on him from the trees above.  The guy thrashes about a bit before dying.  Ugh.. i'm a certified arachnophobe.  :P

Personally, I think tarantulas are way cool. My high school biology teacher had one in his classroom. She was a Texas Brown tarantula named Pearl,and she did not mind us students holding her. At first I was afraid,but when I saw how docile she was,I began to handle her too. It's sad that some folks have the wrong idea about spiders,especially since they are beneficial insect killers. ;)

I like spiders too and when I lived overseas, was visiting some folks, and the cutest tarangula (a brown and black variety about the size of a man's hand) decided to come out and say hello!  There were maybe 15 folks in the parlor, from kids to elderly people, and not one person paid the spider any mind.  The man of the house gently shooed it back into the rafters with a broom.  They called this variety un arana.  There was a more dangerous variety, reddish brown, called una cacata, and they were killed when encountered.

Aracnaphobia is a learned fear.  If taught to understand  spiders, or any animal, which are dangerous, beneficial, etc. people learn to respect and coexist with, rather than fear nature and her creatures.