Loving your pets

In a recent post Helen Smith stirred up something of a hornet’s nest in her criticism of people who treat their pets as though they were children. I’m largely in agreement with her and have frequently been substantially harsher on people who treat dogs as though they were human beings than Helen is although perhaps for different reasons.

You see, I love my dogs. My wife and I are committed dog owners as should be obvious by clicking on the category, Dogs, in my sidebar. Dogs are not human beings. Treating them as though they were is not in the best interests of the dogs. It is not good for the mental health of the dogs nor of the human beings with which they share their lives.

However…(have I mentioned that one of my college professors, Bergen Evans—also an early television personality—frequently said that he paid no attention to an undergraduate paper until the first “However”?) there’s an undercurrent in the post and, especially, in the comments that I find a little disturbing.

Some people buy yachts; some purchase summer homes; some collect guns; some collect art. Others have dogs. There’s nothing improper about any of these things. You can even love your yacht, your summer home, your guns, or the art you’ve collected. There’s nothing improper in any of those things, either, as long as the love does not go beyond proportion.

English is in many ways an admirable language but it is impoverished in using the word “love” in so many different, even conflicting senses. The sense in which you may love all of these inanimate things is possessive love which is roughly approximated by the Greek word eros (which is also, although not exclusively, used to describe sexual love).

You can also love your pets this way.

But I believe that dogs are persons and as such selfless love, which was called in Latin caritas and in Greek agape, is appropriate for them, too.

As with the other virtues love, like a muscle, is strengthened by exercising it. Loving your dog, when that love is a selfless love, doesn’t take anything away from loving your children any more than loving your human friends does. Indeed, as your capacity to love grows through exercise you become more able to love and, consequently, a better parent, spouse, friend, citizen, and human being.

The same is true of vices, by the way. Cruelty grows with exercise. It’s no coincidence that serial killers frequently start their careers with cruelty to animals.

But selfless love means doing what the object of your love needs rather than what you might want and that means treating your dog like a dog and loving your dog in addition to rather than instead of the people in your life.

So I say love your dog, your cat, your ferret. You’ll be the better for it.

One more point. In the comments to Helen’s post there’s a crack about canine agility as a “stupid dog sport”. Presumably, this means by comparison with tennis, golf, bowling, soccer, football, basketball, and baseball which are all very intelligent. Folks, if it weren’t stupid it wouldn’t be a sport.

I think that anything that gets people who otherwise would be sitting around watching TV (or using computers ;-)) moving around is a good thing and canine agility certainly does that. In addition it’s loads of fun both for dogs and for people. Just leave your ego at home.

There are loads of other great “stupid dog sports”, Helen: flyball, rally obedience, lure coursing, tracking, and earth dog competition just to name a few. What’s not to like about a bunch of people standing around with shovels looking at a hole in the ground? If you’d like me to explain any of the others I’d be happy to do so. They’re all a blast even if you don’t own dogs.