AIBU to think the UK is more tolerant of dogs than children

[playgroundwarrior]

This morning an entitled dog owner shouted at me for pointing out that she wasn't allowed her (offlead) dog in our local playground. The dog was nosing around in our pushchair and hurtling around. The owner said she had seen the notices to say 'no dogs allowed except assistance dogs' but that hers was a puppy and that I needed to get a life! She genuinely thought her dog was as important as our children (she didn't have her own child and was with a friend)

This made me think about all the threads I've seen here about noisy toddlers in cafes and small children blocking the stairs. Last night I read someone moaning about the sounds of Peppa Pig on the bus.

I appreciate that the above examples of toddler behaviour are objectively annoying (mine frequently annoys me) but I'm beginning to think there's greater tolerance of dogs in this country than toddlers.

I've seen so many toddlers knocked over by offlead dogs and our 3 year old neighbour was pinned down by one last year, which was sort of just accepted as something that happens.

Since the pandemic, everyone seems to have a dog and the culture feels much more dog orientated than child oriented. I'd love a nice cafe or pub with a sign welcoming kids and a nice play area for them but have never seen one in my area, yet there are many signs welcoming dogs with treats and bowls.

Fully appreciate there are inconsiderate parents of toddlers and great dog owners who have perfect recall etc! I quite like most dogs but am
starting to feel the UK has its priorities very muddled.

AIBU?

Me! Hahaha... I have a scar on my arm from where my sister bit me, she was a really savage little biter.

People draw comparisons between dogs and children because, particularly at around the 1.5 - 2 year old stage, there are significant comparisons.

These similiarities are, in part, why dogs are dogs, why they are domesticated on a level nothing else is, and the latest evidence is that we've had this close relationship with dogs for 150'000 years!

They make us produce oxytocin like children do.
As puppies they are needy and require our care.
They have large eyes, forward facing and as puppies, proportionally big round eyes, big heads, larger ears - which reminds us of human babies (and look at the most popular breeds, pugs, frenchbulldogs, chihuahuas, etc that maximise that characteristic).
Dogs and kids of around 2 are about the same level of mental ability.
Dogs and small children learn the same way and bond with their primary care givers the same way too.

Of course theres plenty of differences - dogs toilet train far faster than kids, never grow up asking for a car or start demanding stupidly expensive trainers. Dogs can sniff out cancer, diabetic blood glucose levels and locate people trapped under building rubble using their noses, things your child will never do.

On the other hand children will generally progress from a 2 year old level of mental capacity, will leave home eventually and go and be independent, which dogs will never do.

You may not like that these comparisons exist, I can't help you with that, sorry.. but they do exist!

Hearing the term 'furbaby' makes me cringe. Pets are not babies, they are animals.

People are less tolerant.
People are selfish.
Dogs are mostly lovely. It’s not the dogs, or children’s fault- it’s the adults raising them who wonder how it’s all gone so wrong!

🥴😂

I keep hearing this 'they're not babies, they're animals'...

What do you think we are exactly?

Very young animals need lots of care, but even as adults, many of our pet species are wholly reliant on us for absolutely everything (pretty much only cats aren't, and even then, many would suffer and wouldn't survive as feral cats), which does make them pretty comparable to babies.

I don't call my dogs furbabies (I call them hairy freeloading twats) but I really couldn't give a shit if someone else does.

Every time we try to find ways to mark out our difference from animals, to show how we're superior... we fall flat on our faces.

We're the only ones who have casual or recreational sex rather than strictly for reproductive purposes ...

Ah no - lots of primates do that, ditto dolphins, lions, sea otters, sheep, goats... the list is too long really.

Ok so we're the only ones who use tools - nah, lots of primates do but also birds do, otters, elephants, octopuses, and more can learn if shown.

Right so.... we're the only ones to use language ... wellll, that depends on how you classify language. Lots of animals communicate vocally and have specific sounds that mean specific things, I'd say the fact that for some of them we're able to learn it and recreate it and be understood by that species means we're not alone in that. We just talk more shite than they do.

Empathy... animals can't empathise or 'care' once maternal hormones no longer drive behaviour... Nope, studies with rats show otherwise. Also other primates manage this, and elephants, and dogs.

Morals, we have much better morals and animals are not capable of morality.... and again, no, firstly, we definitely don't - we steal, lie, cheat, kill, are greedy, break social rules... Studies with primates and rats show examples of moral behaviour and emotional intelligence.

Fun - we have fun we do things just for fun - again, no, so do lots of animals. Not just domesticated animals either, if anyones seen the video of a crow sliding down a snowy roof on a tin lid, over and over, you know this is true, that behaviour has no purpose but fun. There are many examples of this across many species.

I could go on, but I've got better things to do. We're animals, we might be top of the pile (At the moment but that won't really last long!) but we're not the best at everything, we're not the most moral or the kindest or nicest or cleverest.

We are however, currently the dominant species on much of the worlds land-mass. We have created environments that do not leave space for other animals to behave freely and if we permitted them to do so, it would cause us problems, so we don't.

I find dog obsessives are barely disguised misanthropes. I get liking animals. Ok, fine. But this sizable group, who also bum rush every DM comment section to defend dogs who attack people, are cultish and quite unhinged. So, I hear you OP.

I do separate "I quite like dogs" club from the "dogs are better than humans" mob. I only refer to the latter.

@WiddlinDiddlin I like the cut of your jib. I tried to say something similar on another thread and ended up getting my arse flamed off so I’m thankful it’s not just me.

Tell you one difference - humans are the only animal that does something that’ll likely cause the planet it lives on to become inhabitable - realises this, and keeps doing it. The most powerful selfish animal alive.

@WiddlinDiddlin

Of course we're all animals.

We're not canines. We're not the parents of animals we choose to take care of - be that the dog, hamster, goldfish, tortoise, cat, tarantula, whatever.

We are Homo sapiens, and we have advanced far beyond our common animal ancestors. We have advanced so much that we have developed the ability to engage in extreme flights of fancy and wallow in sentimental codswallop when it comes to our relationships with dogs.

We are not the parents of our pets. To say we are is troubling in many ways because it equates human children with animals. It equates the bond between parent and child to the bond between human and animal. They are different bonds. The bond with the child fulfills a deep human need. So too does the bond with the dog, for many people - the need to be needed. But the step of perceiving your dog as your child with you as the parent is a step too far into self serving delusion.

Anthropomorphism is the attribution of human characteristics onto animals. It's how how humans project their own needs onto animals. The dogs are not able to see it so they don't push back, and besides, it involves treats. But people who feel their dog is their fur baby and they're their daddy or mummy are not recognizing and respecting the fully Canidae nature of the dog. It's a disrespectful breach of an emotional boundary.

Haha, I was sat having a little picnic near a lake. Had a sandwich in my hand, and this duck just came up and brazenly took it off me... like "thanks, this is mine now". Little bastard 😂

I don't get this.
I refer to my dog as my fur baby... and I call myself her mum. My own mum calls herself gran when referring to my dog (my dog gets excited hearing the work 'gran').

None of that does any harm whatsoever to anyone else. Leave us be.

Ha this made me laugh 😂 a duck took off with DH's flip flop once and he had to chase it 😂

@XenoBitch the next step after calling your dog a fur baby is to anthropomorphise it and decide it is appropriate to treat it like a baby and for example take it into a children's playground, as OP mentioned. I think when you are calling an animal a fur baby, it is easy to forget it is actually an animal with big sharp teeth and may in the right circumstances be unpredictable.

Obviously what you choose to do in your own home is fine.

Went to the pub today with family and the dog. Dog sat under table. Across the way there was another family with small children and a dog. The two dogs ignored each other and the children sat and behaved themselves and didn't disturb anyone.
Guess none of them are in mumsnet

I'm a mum and a dog owner and so look at posts on mumsnet as well as dog owner groups on Facebook. Mumsnet is full of posts about entitled dog owners and dog forums are full of posts about entitled parents allowing their kids to run up to/bother their dogs.
In reality we all need to live alongside either other and be as respectful as we can to each other. Whether your a dog person, a child person or neither!

Well, people rarely post online to say how well behaved some random dog or child was. It is almost always complaining.... but then on MN some people complain that dogs exist to start with.

Very true! When people say we are a nation of dog lovers, I think mumsnet shows its not true with everyone 😅

Fucking dogs. A dog is a dog, not a person. We live near a beach where dogs are banned between 10am-6pm. Not that you’d know it.

I have never seen anyone refer to a dog as a person, or treat them like one.

Dogs are animals. Tolerance does not come into it.

If you choose to have a pet, you make sure it doesn't inconvenience others.

YANBU I am sick and tired of dogs everywhere. I live in wales and there are many sheep injured by stupid dog owners thinking their dog is well behaved. Not to mention people attacked! This spring our local farmer said 3 of his ewes died in labour as they were stressed from recent dog attacks / harassment.

We went to St Ives over the summer last year and I was boiling with rage. Signs on the beach saying £1k fines but no one gave a toss. And as you said dogs making mess coming up to you while your trying to enjoy a picnic. Making the place dirty.
We went to a secluded cove with seals and pups and again stupid dog owner allowing their dog free reign - again beech says no dogs allowed so should NOT have been anywhere near the beach. And that most likely resulted in the Seals amandoning their pups! Idiots! I am still fuming about it.

St Ives has more dogs then bloody people.
Sorry but these people.are complete nonces. Keep your dogs home and stop ruining places of natural beauty.

Regarding the Peppa Pig in public thing, I don't understand why the volume had to be so loud!! Children have sensitive ears, it can't be good for them listening to such loud devices.

But guinea pigs are little fuzzy overlords. They rule the world, we are their slaves, our function as hairless two legged slaves is to bring them their lettuce and give them cuddles and timothy hay. They cannot be compared to other mammals!

Certainly the lady in your example shouldn't have been letting her puppy nose in your pushchair! I own two large breed dogs who I take into work with me (shop). They've been trained not to approach customers without getting the ok from me first. Even though I know they're well behaved I still want to be able to be physically close to them to supervise interactions, just to be safe. I still get parents with young children regularly calling out to them to come over to them without even checking first who they belong to and that they're friendly dogs. I'd be more than happy for them to be 'there but not there' rather than seen as entertainment for bored children.

I don't understand why people of any age play their music/ shows out loud in public when we live in an age of decent wireless headphones.

It seems some people on MN are "inconvenienced" by seeing a dog that is just minding it's own business.

I don't think the key issue is dogs vs kids, but that we have more than doubled the amount of dogs in this area over a decade and it is causing problems.

In my suburban area there was a huge influx of dogs during covid and it is causing real problems. Too many dogs competing with each other and humans to share small patches of leisure land.

We also have too many cats in this area, and it's making the cats miserable.

We should be able to discuss this in a grown up way!

@fitzwilliamdarcy "Tell you one difference - humans are the only animal that does something that’ll likely cause the planet it lives on to become inhabitable - realises this, and keeps doing it. The most powerful selfish animal alive."
This is just wrong and a misanthropic view on humans, plenty of herbivores will overgraze a land until they die of starvation with no thought to the future, the thing that stops it is a prey population boom causes a predator population boom, it's not their own virtue making them take care of the land.