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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

to think it's time we stopped keeping "pets?"

254 replies

Hullygully · 14/11/2011 08:13

Why do we still do this?

Apart from working animals, guide/guard dogs etc, isn't it odd that we keep animals in our homes? Expensive, huge amounts of waste that has to be dealt with, extermination of songbirds etc etc

Yes?
No?

Am discussing with dd, so interested in views!

OP posts:
MumblingAndBloodyRagDoll · 14/11/2011 08:56

People who have a dog or cat are proven to get less colds....so they're good for health. Other people keep them because they have no family....so they help with lonliness. YABU

FellatioNelson · 14/11/2011 08:56

But pigs are fed meat products somethimes and we use pig manure to spray fields do we not? How so? I'm starting to wish I hadn't come on this thread. It's making me think too hard.

Peachy · 14/11/2011 08:57

'A puppy's birth is engineered by humans, money changes hands, and said puppy is wrenched from the snuggly litter before they're even weaned.
Puppy cries all night, new family hopefully integrates it as a member of their household. Then the poor thing only gets to go out when its owners choose, unless it's a farm dog or the like.
Not much of a life, is it?

Probably not

Except that for many of us our pets never came from that background: we have picked up the ones other people didn't care about. Which when all you knew was pain and horror, is a pretty good life I would guess.

Esta3GG · 14/11/2011 08:58

My dog of 13 years has just died. The sense of bereavement in this family is enormous. I have lost one of the best friends I ever had.

It seems odd referring to animals in the home as 'pets' - for us the dogs have always been a part of the family and asking why we keep them is like asking why we bother to eat. A home without dogs in it would be miserable. We only ever have rescue dogs and would never dream of buying a puppy from a breeder.

I really loathe the idea that the only an animal with a function (i.e. guide dog) is of value. What a grim view of the world.

I suspect that anyone having to question why we keep pets has never had the privilege of forming a close bond with an animal.

OrmIrian · 14/11/2011 08:59

ninja - we all draw our line somewhere different don't we? I eat welfare friendly meat, I only use free-range eggs. I am aware that makes me a massive hypocrite in the eyes of vegetarians and maybe vegans see vegetarians as hypocrites too [shrugs]. Some people happily eat anything without a worry, including dogs.

Let's be honest, what's to stop us eating human flesh apart from a massive wide-spread taboo. We're meat. Why not eat dead people? But we don't. That's where most people draw the line.

You can't throw the word 'hypocrite' around in a world with so many different cultural norms. Hypocrisy is relative.

OhDoAdmit · 14/11/2011 09:04

I am a vegetarian and I dont understand why you think I think you are a hypocrite. Not just any old hypocrite but a massive one Confused Grin

Not all vegetarians are opposed to the eating of other animals. A lot of us stopped eating meat because of the way the animals are treated.

Robotindisguise · 14/11/2011 09:05

If you look here it suggests that cats decided to domesticate themselves 8000 years ago. Bit late now.

OrmIrian · 14/11/2011 09:12

Sorry - should have said 'some' vegetarians! And unfortunately I do know 'some' veggies who are a bit hardcore and they will happily tell me the pointlessness of caring about animal welfare if I eat any meat at all!

Original poster
Hullygully · 14/11/2011 09:13

Personally I would drastically reduce the human population with a one child policy (yes I know the drawbacks and we'd have to address murdering all the girls and feeding the one child until it explodes), but we have to do something.

And I would get rid of all the cows and turn the land over to food, I would stop feeding dead animals to vegetarian animals and only allow licensed breeders to breed and licensed owners to own and and and

But what about the pets?

OP posts:
Original poster
Hullygully · 14/11/2011 09:14

Oh sorry, the point of th ebaove was that I think it's specie-ist and wrong that we hog the planet.

OP posts:
ChickensHaveNoEyebrows · 14/11/2011 09:21

It is selfish to keep pets. There is rarely much in it from the animal's point of view Apart from your more intelligent animals, cats/dogs etc which form an attachment to their human masters. But our hamster, for example, does not give a shit about us. Yet is utterly reliant on us for food, water and cleanliness. If she had the brains, she'd probably be plotting a coup. As it is, I think she's just bemused to find herself running her arse off and never getting anywhere. Oh, and our budgie actively hates us. I have to use gloves to do anything in his cage. And when we let him out to fly around he dive bombs us with talons spread wide and a screech from his vengeful heart. My conclusion is that budgies are smarter than hamsters.

Original poster
Hullygully · 14/11/2011 09:28

things in cages.

no no no no no no

Free the Chickens' Budgie 1

I inherited a friend's hamster (didn't collect it after a holiday). The torment. Nocturnal so I stayed up so it could go out and play wat night, it went in the speaker and made a nest, ditto the sofa, I worried about it far more than the dog.

Hamsters aren't even real animals, they don't live in th wild but were bred specifically to be pets.

I love you Chickens but I utterly disapprove of things in cages/tanks unless gene-pool reasons.

OP posts:
WhatsWrongWithYou · 14/11/2011 09:31

That's true, at least cats and dogs are (relatively) free. I can't bear to see a creature caged up - and it bemused me that a lot of people who claim to 'love' animals often have several cooped up in various prisons around their homes.
I know someone with a bloody guinea fowl in a cage in her garden - but she'd class herself as an animal lover and a fair part of her day is taken up with feeding, cleaning cages generally tending to.

cory · 14/11/2011 09:31

why do tanks have to be bad?

assuming that they are nice big tanks and well maintained, it's not necessarily a worse life than in the wild: some of my fish live in very small pools of water naturally

MackerelOfFact · 14/11/2011 09:32

It's no weirder than a lot of other wasteful, expensive things we choose to fill our homes with. We don't need cushions or blenders or lightbulbs or clingfilm, yet we have them because as a society we have evolved to believe they are necessary and they exist to perform a function in our lives.

At least with pets the benefit is mutual, provided the pet owner is knowledgeable and responsible enough to fulfil the needs of the pet.

WhatsWrongWithYou · 14/11/2011 09:33

Hully's response much better.

SarahStratton · 14/11/2011 09:34

They're my family and friends. It is as simple as that.

Original poster
Hullygully · 14/11/2011 09:35

yes cory

gene pool and mimicry of natural habitat properly = ok

OP posts:
Original poster
Hullygully · 14/11/2011 09:36

sarah - not judging (apart from cages)

I have a v large dog

just interested

OP posts:
OddBoots · 14/11/2011 09:37

We have guinea pigs kept in a large indoor cage, they live on bedding I wash, eat veg scraps and their poo goes on the compost. I am not someone who feels they must have a pet but they have been valuable in teaching my children (especially my ds with Asperger's) about care and concern for living things.

We have one elderly piggie left and when she dies she won't be replaced but over the past 5 years I have loved having them and found them worthwhile.

Original poster
Hullygully · 14/11/2011 09:38

See we all love them (me too), but is that a reason to keep keeping pets?

OP posts:
SarahStratton · 14/11/2011 09:40

Mortimer isn't caged, just in case anyone wonders about him. He has the run of my fairly decent sized garden during the day. At night he has his own Mortimer House to sleep in, which has a 6ft run attached to it. He goes in that if I am out , too, as he can't escape if a cat comes into the garden.

I know you're not Hully, tbh it's a good question. I don't like caged things either, but it depends on the animal's natural habitat and the cage.

FellatioNelson · 14/11/2011 09:40

Arf at 'hamsters aren't even real animals.'

ChickensHaveNoEyebrows · 14/11/2011 09:41

The budgie does make me sad. He really does hate us, no matter how many toys/treats/trips out of the cage to terrorise us he has. I have toyed with trying to rehome him to someone with an aviary, but not sure he'd adapt now at 4. He gets his revenge by refusing to talk to us but imitating the washing machine on full spin cycle. The hamster doesn't seem distressed by her hamster city, unless you move her strategically placed loo roll constructions. But when she shuffles off, there will be no more. I also have 10 chickens currently, and they are not fully free ranged. All animal ownership is selfish, imo, but I still have pets. And I sacrifice a hell of a lot of my day/time/money to making sure that they are properly cared for.

mumeeee · 14/11/2011 09:42

No we shouldn't stop keeping pets. Event my DD's were younger it taught them responsibility and to care for others. Pets often give companionship to people.

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