The film spends the majority of its running time describing an unusually adventurous day for this particular group of New York City companion animals, but it also gives the viewers a hint about what they get up to in a typical day; for some of them, it’s not much, actually. It’s the seemingly lightweight question at the heart of The Secret Life of Pets — or, at least, at the heart of its ad campaign: What do pets do all day? Max, the canine protagonist and Louis C.K.’s voice actor, is one such character. K. — waits impatiently for his beloved owner Katie to return home for the majority of the day, gazing longingly at the door of the small apartment they share.
However, the movie only sort of poses and sort of responds to a different question. As much as people love their pets, some critics have already pointed out how self-centered the pet-human relationship actually is. “The movie makes every effort not to explore the intriguing tensions in the subtext.” (Does human love compensate for being imprisoned in a 600 square foot apartment for 22 hours a day? Is it better to be a free pet or a pet in fealty to humans?) The Atlantic noted in its review.
If the ethics of pet ownership serve as The Secret Life of Pets’ most basic subtext (and, as a result, left me feeling slightly uneasy as I left the theater), a recent book approaches the topic in an agonizingly direct way. The bioethicist Jessica Pierce’s book Run, Spot, Run, which was released by the University of Chicago Press in May, is a compelling example of her careful consideration of the “ambiguous ethics” of pet ownership. She writes that it’s a more complicated commitment than it’s typically perceived to be, and as a result, sometimes even our best intentions go awry. (Reminder: Dogs hate hugs. ).
In the U. S. According to Pierce, there are 316 million people and 470 million pets worldwide, and far too many of them aren’t given the care they need. (Quick note: Pierce’s book covers a variety of animals, including cats, dogs, birds, reptiles, rodents, and even exotic ones; for the sake of simplicity, I’ll be focusing on cats and dogs here. “On average, pet owners spend far less on veterinary care than they should,” she writes. At least a quarter of dogs and cats never visit a vet, and millions of them suffer from slowly progressing illnesses or chronic pain that go untreated because their owners either don’t notice them or are too cheap to take care of them. On the other hand, there are those of us who spend outrageous sums of money on veterinary care; Pierce contends that we are also not exempt. We have so much joy and meaning in our lives because of our furry friends, but is that feeling always reciprocal? Also, and perhaps more importantly, how many pet owners have even thought to ask this?
It seems, at first, like a fairly ridiculous question. Pets have it easy because you buy and serve them their food, so they don’t have to go out and hunt for it. You provide them with shelter and a place to sleep, which is probably your own bed, so they don’t have to worry about predators. You give them medical attention, you take them to the gym, you literally clean up their poop, for goodness’ sake. What more could they possibly need? Pierce stated in an interview with Science of Us that “all of these things are pretty clearly good for our animals.” The drawback is that they don’t really have anything to do. We socialize them to be indoor animals, which makes them very reliant on us. We leave them at home alone after that, which is difficult for many animals. ”.
In her book, Pierce quotes a seemingly incomprehensible statistic from the American Time Use Survey: pet owners devote just 40 minutes on average each day to “pet care,” which includes feeding, grooming, exercising, and playing with their pets. That number merits skepticism because it is only an average and it is frequently difficult to draw meaningful conclusions from averages. Undoubtedly, some people spend a lot more time with their pets than others. Although Pierce agreed that the number seemed unusually low, she speculates that it may be similar to the TV-watching statistics, which initially appear to be extremely high.
In any case, she claims in her book that even the most cherished pets frequently experience boredom and loneliness; in a sense, this is a paradox that many zoos experience with their animal residents. “You hear this all the time,” she said. They claim that because they don’t have to obtain their own food or defend themselves from predators because we provide those things for them, the animals are very well off. The issue is that they have behaviorally changed to perform those tasks on their own. So it’s leaving all these behavioral needs unmet. A recent definition of enrichment opportunities by a group of scientists reads, “making changes to an animal’s environment that provide the animal with added stimulation, choice, or control. Some zoos are now starting to address this problem by looking for these opportunities. Although most academic research on enrichment as it relates to domesticated animals is concentrated on zoo animals, animal behavior experts do have some suggestions for improving the lives of your pets.
Let’s start with cats, who Mikel Delgado, a cat behavior consultant and Ph.D., said are not always the simple pets their reputation would lead you to believe. D. student at UC-Berkeley, where she is studying psychology. She visits people’s homes as part of her job as a behavior consultant, where she observes things that owners aren’t even aware they’re not providing for their feline friends. These owners, presumably, have the desire and resources to give their cats the best possible lives given that they, you know, called a cat-behavior consultant. Delgado asserted that most people don’t intentionally disregard the welfare of their pets. “I think there’s a perception that cats are low-maintenance pets,” ” If only.
Even elderly and lazy cats want to play and need to do so by imitating their natural hunting instincts. And the majority of them require interaction from you rather than “just leaving a bunch of ping-pong balls and mice toys lying around,” according to Delgado. She suggests using one of those string and feather toys on a stick, which you can move around slowly so the cat can keep his eyes on it and wait for it to pounce. (Delgado informed me that a cat that keeps you awake at night probably hasn’t had enough exercise during the day. ).
Additionally, using food puzzles like Kongs to make cats and dogs work for their food would be beneficial for both. “We took away one of the biggest things they used their brains for, which is to get food, when we brought them into our homes, we provided all their food at once,” Delgado said. Playing with your pet is a crucial part of providing them with social enrichment, which is important for all animals. Marc Bekoff, an expert in animal cognition, suggests that for dogs, social interaction with other dogs, such as at a dog park, is also very important. (Of course, there is a ton more to enrichment for pets; if you want to learn more, I suggest starting with Pierce’s book. ).
Although Pierce doesn’t mean to criticize pet owners, it’s a good thing if she’s succeeded in making them feel guilty. She advises you to look into that sensation and realize that having a pet isn’t something you should take lightly. Our pets bring us such joy, and this is the least we can do to show our gratitude.
Dog Breeding and the Dog Trade
If a domesticated dog is lucky enough to not to be bred with numerous intentional deformities (and some breeds are even forced to go through surgery to alter their appearance), it is still yanked away from its parents at a young age to be sold to humans as a “pet” through ‘pet’ stores or breeders. Dog ownership has grown to such popularity that many ‘surplus’ dogs languish in shelters, waiting to get adopted by the species that created them, and often unsuccessfully.
Because they make poor “pets,” dogs with “behavioral problems”—often dogs that express their natural, suppressed instincts—are put to death. Due to their size, color, and general unattractiveness to prospective adoptive families, other dogs may also experience the same fate.
Most dog owners are advised to “spay or neuter” their pets in order to reduce the “pet overpopulation problem.” These phrases are a polite way of saying that the dog’s reproductive organs were cut out or castrated. Numerous studies demonstrate that such a procedure results in hormonal imbalances and an increased risk of some diseases, so would you want your genitalia cut off in the name of human population control?
Most dogs who undergo this procedure are then fed dry kibble that is unappetizing and insufficient, far from what their natural diet should be. These subpar diets cause sickness, bad breath, and potentially fatal dental conditions.
What happens when you work regular 9-5 hours like the majority of Americans? Dogs have to wait unnaturally long periods of time for their owners to come home. No dog, no matter how carefully we breed them to fit our lifestyles, prefers to be alone. Dogs who are less resilient to this mistreatment occasionally develop psychological issues known as “separation anxiety,” but owners often disregard this and confine their pets to crates with barely enough room for them to turn around as a result.
In captivity, dogs have been reported to experience depression, OCD, and other mental and emotional issues. Some dogs may become unnaturally lethargic due to under-exercising and under-stimulating them, which can result in weight gain.
Many dogs have adopted behaviors that are so dissimilar from their natural ones that they struggle to get along with other canines. When available for adoption, these dogs simply state that they must go to a household with only one dog, but they frequently have severe anxiety disorders and neuroses.
In the name of aesthetics, people will pay top dollar for some dog breeds that are deformed.
Dog ownership helps spread disease among the public. Brucellosis, campylobacteriosis, cryptosporidosis, giardia, lyme disease, rabies, ringworm, salmonellosis, toxocariasis, and other illnesses are spread by dogs to people.
Additionally, because dog-related illnesses are frequently underreported, dog owners are more likely to ignore the risk. Dogs not only transmit many diseases to humans, but also to other animals and the environment through their waste.
While many owners pick up after dogs, there are more than enough remnants of their fecal matter to transmit illness to children who play in the areas where they have eliminated. Not all dogs are vaccinated for rabies (and dogs love to chase and fight with animals that carry rabies) and can acquire the deadly disease and spread it unbeknownst to the owner through a bite or scratch. Recently people have even acquired diseases from commercial pet food. Raw diets for dogs are closer to their natural diet but also can transmit germs.
Tim Wass, the chair of the Pet Charity, an animal welfare consultant and a former chief officer at the RSPCA, agrees. “It has already been decided by market forces and human nature … the reality is people have pets in the millions. The question is: how can we help them care for them correctly and appropriately?”
According to Dr. Hal Herzog, a psychology professor at Western Carolina University and one of the pioneers of the emerging field of anthrozoology, which studies human-animal relations, “It is morally problematic because more people are thinking of pets as people… They consider them part of their family, they think of them as their best friend, and they wouldn’t sell them for a million dollars.” The emotional lives of animals, even relatively “simple” ones like goldfish, are far more complex and rich than we previously realized, according to research (neuroscientist Gregory Berns claimed in a 2013 New York Times opinion piece that “dogs are people, too”). As a logical result, Herzog claims, “we have less of a right to control every single aspect of their lives the more we attribute them with these characteristics.”
Importantly, our pets are unable to express to us whether they enjoy having us as pets. The abundance of animals on social media who are plastered with clever captions written by their “parents” leads Pierce to claim that there is “an illusion that pets have more voice than in the past… but it may be more that we are putting words into their mouth.” “Perhaps we are making them so human that they become invisible in the process.” ”.
“Rats have a sense of empathy, and there has been extensive research on what happens when you take babies away from a mother rat – not surprisingly, they experience profound distress,” says she “How can we treat animals like this? It was a slap in the face.”
Both Pierce and Francione have pets despite their shared belief that having pets is wrong. Pierce has two dogs and a cat, while Francione has six rescue dogs that he refers to as “refugees.” The debate over whether we should own animals is largely theoretical at this point because we already have pets and believe that keeping them would be detrimental to our well-being. Furthermore, as Francione points out, many people believe that caring for pets is the only way we can treat animals with kindness; persuading them otherwise is difficult.
Dogs are often kept in crates
Many dog owners mistakenly believe that their “pets” are members of their families and that they love them, but in reality, these animals are being denied the freedom that they mistakenly believe they no longer want because they have been “domesticated.”
People frequently believe that because a practice has been in existence for a long time, it cannot be unethical. Although dogs and humans have coevolved for centuries, the relationship began as one of symbiosis when wolves would freely roam alongside humans in a wild and natural existence. The reciprocal relationship between humans and dogs eventually turned into one of exploitation and abuse.
Many dogs are forcibly “selectively bred” (and their puppies abducted) to have unnatural traits and suffer from health problems, shortened life spans, and impaired mental development. These once wild and magnificent animals have been altered to be entirely dependent on humans, with only a few dog breeds capable of providing for themselves in the wild.
People believe they have successfully changed nature to the point where this formerly wild wolf is now mentally stunted and ideal for captivity, comparable to a human child. Most dogs are forced to live with people because of their social, physical, and psychological needs; however, these needs are frequently not met on a large scale.
FAQ
Is it inhumane to have a pet dog?
Due to the manipulation of animals’ bodies, behaviors, and emotional lives, the institution of pet ownership is fundamentally unjust. The bodies of companion animals have long been molded to fit human tastes and fashions, especially those of dogs, horses, and rabbits.
Why should we not keep dogs as pets?
Even though dogs can be good for their owners’ health and happiness, owners should be aware that even young dogs occasionally carry dangerous pathogens that can make people sick. Numerous illnesses, ranging from minor skin infections to serious diseases, can be brought on by dog germs.
Is it justified to keep dogs in our house as pets?
Studies have even shown that dog owners are much happier and more active than non-dog owners because dogs secrete a hormone that fosters happiness in both parties. They will always be there for you as long as you look after it as well, so it’s kind of a give-and-take arrangement, but the ideal one.
Are dogs happy living with humans?
Science supports what we already knew: most dogs actively choose to be close to people, and within a few months of birth, a puppy is clearly attracted to people rather than other dogs. When their owners are absent, dogs display varying degrees of separation anxiety.