To wonder when the excess of dogs will die down

[OptimismvsRealism]

There's so much shit everywhere

There are so many feral horrible dogs pissing on front doors or prams or shop displays and barking terrifyingly at kids

I am sick of them!!!!! Is this it or will people learn their post COVID lesson and only get pets they can actually handle in the future?

. . What's in it for cats?
Nothing at all either.

We both have a means to selfishly dominate for our own amusement then.
*
Why do you see it as 'extremist' to think dog ownership is despicable?*

I'm pretty certain it's an extremist view.

Yes but the aim is independence for your children. To fly the nest, to make their own lives, discoveries, freedoms.

That can never happen with a domesticated animal.
They are totally dependent on us until death.

That can never happen with a domesticated animal.
They are totally dependent on us until death.

They certainly are.

I honestly think that one day, the keeping of an animal just because 'we want to' will be agreed as unethical.

Maybe the breeding and creation of animals that are purely dependent on us will one day be seen as extremist.

They make brilliant pets. My dog is good for my mental and physical health. I take her out into green spaces twice, every single day. Many people have dogs as pets for company but also as assistance dogs.

My dog is loved and very well cared for. In return she gives us love and companionship.

Dogs have been domesticated for hundreds of years. What would happen to all those dogs if we did as you suggest and found another muse?

Maybe the breeding and creation of animals that are purely dependent on us will one day be seen as extremist.

Maybe it will . But right now you are the extremist.

The 10 million dogs alone ( never mind other pets etc ) you quoted tells you that.

It would need to be an ethical and slow letting go.
Neutering and the stopping of breeding programmes.

It wouldn't be easy. Humans would need to grieve a huge culture shift and invent new ways of doing the things that captive working animals did. But ultimately it's the right thing to do to allow animals to be truly wild and free as nature intended.

Cats aren't. One of mine is semi feral. Never comes in. If we died he'd be fine.

I'm pretty sure my dog in his younger days would have gotten along ok as well. Bit late now he's an old man.

I completely disagree with you in every respect.

God imagine all the cat/dog shit threads then

God imagine all the cat/dog shit threads then

😁

The flip flopping is amusing. There’s too many dogs. They smell. They make me gag. They shit everywhere. Shouldn’t be allowed around people. People who have dogs can’t form relationships with other people … actually it’s just dog ownership that’s wrong and they should be allowed to roam free.

@NRTFT you are correct in that humans do, in fact, control what pet dogs do. However, if an owner has a solid bond with a dog it will choose to be with you of its own free will - for example, many people can leave a gate open and a dog will go nowhere, whereas if they were prisoners like you seem to think then surely a dog would run away given the opportunity.

Allowing a dog to make certain choices encourages positive mental states thus leading to higher welfare, but a dog with too much choice can become an unhappy or stressed dog. It is often dogs with no structure or leadership that 'take matters into their own hands' with regards to barking, biting or protecting. If an owner is not being the leader/protector then the dog will step in often with disastrous consequences.

But if your argument is 'what nature intended', we should be hunter-gatherers, as nature intended, living under rock shelters, as nature intended, walking around stark naked, as nature intended, and eating raw meat, as nature intended. If we'd stuck with what 'nature intended', we'd never have used fire and would probably never have evolved into modern humans.

Unless, of course, what 'nature intended' was evolution...

I have no ethical issues with owning a dog: they get a good deal out of it, they're happy. Humans and dogs have co-existed for millennia, ever since humans started taming wolves - or wolves tamed themselves, no one knows for certain.

Human culture rests on the domestication of animals and plants.

Actually, no.
Domesticated animals can go feral. There are feral dogs in (I think) Bulgaria who hunt, kill and eat European bison. There are wild ponies in Wales. There are wild horses, in fact, all over the globe, including Namibia. Goats seem to revert to a state of nature pretty easily, as do certain breeds of sheep.

And pigs! Feral pigs are huge problem in places like Australia.

It doesn't take too much for domestication to go backwards.

Though that being said, the vast majority of domestic animals live out their lives around people. As I said upthread, my dogs have had ample opportunity to fuck off over the horizon during the course of their lives (they are off-lead in the countryside almost every day of their lives). They are dogs who are bred to hunt, and they could probably make a go of it. But they don't.

Well put. I have a border collie. His life according to him is to please me, I believe. He looks to me for approval for everything.

He is like my shadow if I allow him to be, but can also detach and stay alone. He goes on a lead by road and on pavements etc, but doesn't really 'need' it. Even when I take his lead off he waits for my ok to go. We never even really trained this into him, it's just how he is.

Well said.

Perhaps I wasn't clear. I do not think pet animals should be abandoned and left 'free to roam'.
I think pet animals, bred to dependent on humans, should one day be ethically phased out (via neutering and the stopping of breeding programmes) and their wild counterparts can carry on with their wild evolution.

I also am not advocating a return to living in a cave. I am advocating a progression in the intellectual and ethical considerations of humans towards other living things, including pet animals, given our supposed intelligence.

All you dog haters go and crawl back under your rocks the world would be a very sad place without dogs there's something very wrong with you

Yes but having a pet dog, or cat, or any pet, has nothing to do with evolution, food production or nature.

It's purely that a human wants a pet, so they get a pet. End of.
It's a selfish relationship based on what a human wants.

To be honest I have bigger issues with cats. Our garden stinks of cat crap and I'm sick of having to clean up after other people's animals.

Humans have always had pets. Even hunter gathers have pet monkeys, birds and other small mammals that they have raised from young. It is just something humans have and always will do.

It's purely that a human wants a pet, so they get a pet. End of.
It's a selfish relationship based on what a human wants.

Everything is based on human wants. Nothing new there.

You don't want lots of other people to have dogs, because you actively don't like being around them in public spaces. Restaurants, cafes, parks etc

Never mind your more extreme hopes for reversing 1000s of years of animal history.

Dogs exist. They're here. A vast population of them are extremely content and suitable to be pets and tbh you've been through quite the raft of arguments before euthanising the species in general.

There might be some place in the far distant utopian future when all creatures run wild and free but in the meantime ordinary people get to have dogs and until then 🤷‍♀️

Blimey this thread took a twist. Started off as some complaining that more people have the time for pets now WFH is more common & then turned into a debate on turning all the pets out to live semi-feral?!

I think it's great that more people are able to own dogs & have a better work life balance due to WFH as long as they pick up the shit & keep it on a lead in public. It probably peaked just after lockdown but don't think pet ownership will die out any time soon.

I haven't said anything about reversing history.

I have only spoken about the progression of the way humans view their relationship with animals and the very real problem of pet animals having no real choice or freedom as that ability had been bred out of them for, as you say, many thousands of years.

However, if you wish for humans to stay intellectually un-evolved and carry on keeping animals as pets for their own satisfaction - go for it, no one's stopping you. But we don't have to agree with you about it.