Just because they happier with us than in the streets or in a cage waiting to be sold doesnt make the whole thing right...
If my dog wants to live with me, then isn't that her choice?
Note: She isn't fenced in. She isn't kenneled or tied up at night. She has a dog door that she can come in and out of the house anytime she wants. She's 140 lbs and can hold her own against the coyote packs around here,. Any night she chooses, she could go live in the woods - it's just a few hundred feet away.
I have pets, Id die and kill for them
I wouldn't die for my pet. I'd die for my siblings/parents, but not my pet.
I wouldn't kill (humans) for them either. I'd certainly kill other animals to protect my dog.
Lets talk about the fact they eat totally tasteless food, while they can smell our food better than we can even taste it, its torture.
Yes, my dog eats that crap food when we can't get anything better... but luckily, for large portions of the year she's either eating frozen chicken legs/heads, or bone soup frozen as popsicles (which she loves).
And during winter, she gets to go on an all-meat diet on pure venison - lucky gal. We didn't get any venison last year. It's been three years since I had venison (I don't hunt). But every winter, she gets a month and a half to two months of raw venison from an uncle who does hunt. The uncle takes the human-edible meat for himself, and offers us the rest for our dog.
But yes, when she has to go back to her processed corn and fake flavored junk, the look of disgust she shoots my way is very saddening.
Do you know the only reason ppl shouldnt eat dogs food is because the quality control on those are lame?
I've never eaten dog, but I'd imagine it'd be way to stringy and not make very good meat. It'd probably be like eating a horse.
But, if there was a real serious long famine, I'd kill my dog to feed humans, for sure.
Lets talk about the fact they dont like to demonstrate suffering, its theyr weapon.
Tell my dog that. She whines when she's hurt, and then we fawn over her 140 lbs of adorablemess.
This comes specially obvious with tooth decay. With by the way, 99% of pet owners fails to take care of dogs teeth. (Which btw again, should be brush as much as ours)
The vast majority of our tooth decay is related to sugar. Some sugar-less human cultures have fantastic teeth, without brushing.
I don't feed my dog sugar - she has much better teeth than me. That doesn't mean she shouldn't ever have her teeth brushed, and you're right I neglect it more than I should, but your comparison to humans - despite entirely different diets - doesn't make sense to me.
Lets talk about the fact we dont have the slightest interest in taking care of them,
Speak for yourself - don't generalize to everyone else.
You keep saying "btw" and "the fact", but your facts are your own situation, and the situations you are familiar with. 90% of your "facts" don't relate to me or my dog.
which is why we take them to those pet shops, where we dont give a shit and cant know what the hell happens there.
My dog gets brushed daily (sometimes by me, but usually someone else) - she has a heavy coat, and sheds like crazy, so brushing her is important to reduce her overheating during summer, as well as preventing our kitchen flooring from looking like a carpet.
We don't get her fur shaved because her breed actually grows a summer coat (that increases ventilation) instead of a winter coat - instead we just brush her enough for her loose hair to come out.
We also regularly check her for ticks, because she lays in the grass alot.
today I give shower to my yorkshire myself,
Seriously, it's good you do that - I don't want to underplay the steps you've taken...
Every shower my dog has had has been from us - most often, from me personally. I get myself half soaked, and smelling like oatmeal-scented dog shampoo, giving her a shower.
I mean, you think the guys at the pet shop manage to clean so many dogs a day cause they skilled fast or cause they dont give a fuck?)
Well, I don't know about your local petshop. We do occasionally (once or twice a year) bring our dog into the vet because of her ears' yeast infections, or when her joints are hurting (seems to be weather related; currently she's fine), and we have them clip her nails while she's knocked out cold.
Yes, we trust our vet. They don't hold her long, and don't process many animals a day. Since they have a smaller region they cover, I'd imagine they pretty much know each of their regular dog patients by name. As well as the regular cats, horses, and other animals.
If we have any complaints, I'm sure the veterinarian would like to hear it, next time we see him - which, seeing that he goes to the same church as us, and sits in the row behind us, is pretty often.
Lets face it, most ppl dont even have the time to care.
Naw, you are generalizing your personal experience to everyone everywhere.
I'm not saying my dog lives a perfect life - I don't know any human who lives a perfect life. But she lives an extremely good one.
She does mostly what she wants, mostly when she wants, with only a few things off-limits. For example, despite having access to the kitchen, she isn't allowed to take anything off the counters. Such boundaries are actually psychologically good for dogs, and make them more relaxed. If dogs have no boundaries, they get anxious and confused and tense, because they think they are the alpha dog and become overly aggressive trying to lead and protect the "pack", because the pack (the humans) isn't leading the dog.
One example of a good boundary is that my dog isn't allowed into the living room. There's no gate, door, electrical system, or anything like that. She was just trained that she's not allowed in there, and that "invisible wall" actually helps put her at ease, because she knows she's not the pack leader.
Im not even going to talk about pets that are kept on cages like birds and mouses...
I'm not sure why you think it's acceptable for a flying animal with wings to not be able to stretch its wings and fly...
But anyway, my dog's "cage" is a freakin' folding fence I put in the kitchen, because at 140 lbs, nothing smaller would work well.
She's only put in the cage for a limited few minutes when guests are arriving/exiting the house. Once the guests are in the living room, the dog just doesn't come into the living room.
While in the "cage" (which has no ceiling, btw - it's literally like an open fence), she just lays down and either takes a short nap or sits patiently. No barking or anxious behavior. Being overly friendly, she does get too excited if a guest gets near it though.
Mostly, my dog sleeps half the night outside (according to her own whims) and half the night inside (according to her own whims), by going in and out as she pleases through a dog door.
Castrating is awfull, its like operating dogs vocal coords so they stop barfing (oh yeah, ppl really do that btw), but its necessary..cause the whole thing is fucked up. It would get worst without castration.
At night, my dog is often barking. She has taken it upon herself to inform the coyotes in the neighborhood that this territory belongs to us, and if they come too near, she chases them off - sometimes chasing them half a mile or so, so they get the message.
During the day, she has on a leash, so we can grab her if she gets too excited - but she's not tied up. At night, she's lease-free, just incase she decides to explore the nearby woods or chase off an animal, we don't want her lease getting caught in underbrush.
Oh, and I genuinely think cropping our dog's ears would help her ear infections and cause her less frustration, by helping prevent bacteria growth in her ear by letting in more air and light - that said, we didn't think it right to crop her ears, so decided against it.
Speaking of choices, whenever I get in my SUV to drive into town, my dog decides for herself whether she wants to come or not by walking up to the SUV and sitting down, which, if I don't veto her choice (because of needing the space in the vehicle for other purposes), I then lift her shaggy 140lb butt into the vehicle.
She's happy, and has a good life. I'll phrase it this way: 99% of the time, everything's perfect in her life. And with the 1% that's not, most of it is minor, and only a few things (her joints and her ears) are a real nuisance to her
She also happens to be spayed, so spayed does not automatically equal unhappy, and neither does unneutered automatically equal happy.
My previous dog was a neutered male (~90 lb), and his life was great too - especially once we moved to a more rural area where he could free range. He once traveled about 13 miles in a single day with us, as four different people (at various different times of the day) went for long walks and he delightedly chose to join each one. He also learned how to "knock" on my bedroom door by shoulder-checking the door, at 2AM every morning, to come take a nap on my bed with me. I really miss that ![:( sad.png](http://public.gamedev5.net//public/style_emoticons/default/sad.png)
![:( sad.png](http://public.gamedev5.net//public/style_emoticons/default/sad.png)
- he only did that for several months before he died.
Of all three dogs I've had in my life, I think only the first wasn't incredibly happy - the first dog had immense health problems and three separate traumatic medical experiences, being the runt of her litter with actually some weird internal mutations. That was the only dog that shouldn't have been neutered, because when the surgeon cut into her, her internal organs weren't in the right place and he hit some arteries instead, that sprayed blood everywhere. ![:blink: blink.png](http://public.gamedev5.net//public/style_emoticons/default/blink.png)
We still had some great experiences with her, but I question whether she was more despondent than happy. At the time, we just weren't experienced enough to know how to help her process her trauma. Now, if we had the exact same dog, I'd be confident she'd have lived a great life despite the trauma.