To dare to think that the Cult of Dog has gone too far?

[MariLlwyd]

There is now not a single public space in my home town that is dog-free - and that includes cafes, restaurants and even the library. Local beaches, once a quiet escape, have turned into asylums for the fur baby/pupper brigade to inflict their poorly trained animals on others with children getting chased, people jumped on and tripped over and all to the sound of hysterical barking and frequent dog fights.
80 year old woman knocked over by uncontrollable dog? 'You got in his way'.
Ask politely that you take your dog away from our lunch table? 'Go fuck yourself'.
Sit on the most remote bench you can find? Peri-menopausal wild eyed harridan lets loose 3 dogs from her 4x4 to jump all over you and laughs that it's 'their spot' and turns unhinged when you push them away.
Yes, this is a rant and yes I hate most dog owners.
This weird cult that values darling dogs over human beings is actually pretty worrying.
I shall await the inevitable and hilarious 'incoming' from the emotionally stunted Doggo Nutters.

yes I do, you mustn't have read my first post that pp was replying to.

Sorry, my mistake.

no worries, just noticed myself that she only quoted part of my post.

In my part of the world there are designated dog beaches and dog parks. There are clear signs saying dogs are allowed off-lead in these spaces. There are often water bowls kept outside cafes/restaurants/gyms, etc., where dogs must be tied up. Generally works well!

I had a dog in the family in the early 90s. My mum was supposed to train it. It was some kind of mongrel with some sheepdog in it. It was beyond her powers. I think now the sheepdog part was too strong. It would escape and run for miles. When it died, my mum vowed never to get another dog.

I would like a dog as a companion but my circumstances don't allow it at the moment. These threads and social media inform me on how NOT to look after dogs. It's good the threads are started because people are pissed off.

I hate the fur baby phenomenon too. When we had our family dog, it was a dog. You did what you did to keep it healthy and happy. Now dogs are treated like babies. Eurgh, no. It doesn't serve them well. They need to get dirty, to explore and sniff and get wet. Dressing your dog up is just stupid. I would never take a dog into Peter Jones or a posh restaurant, I'd leave it at home. I might take a (well-behaved) dog to a pub garden but not inside the pub itself. It's a dog! Not a child!

The overwhelming smell of dog shit every time you pass a grassy area is the final nail in the coffin for public spaces. The dogs have won.

can’t even sit on a park bench without smelling poo, playing hop scotch dodging poo piles on the street. At dinner and a dog decides to shake itself off and now you’ve got dog dust in your food.

nowhere is safe

The owners of the dog are permitting it to wander streets and your takeaway is that you shouldn’t upset the owners by mistaking an XL bully for another relatively dangerous breed of dog?

This is why people think many dog owners are on glue…

Indeed. There is a certain type of dog that looks happy and able to rip you to shreds, and I definitely wouldn't be getting close enough to tell you the precise breed with any certainty.

Dogs losing their minds on beaches does ruin the beaches for other people and wildlife, though.

And all the dog-friendly zones do is encourage owners to push their luck and treat the entire coast as dog-friendly.

Shingle beaches where I live, and the amount of dog poo camouflaged on the stones is unreal. The worst was when I was swimming last summer and realised some foolish woman swimming near me had brought her dog and left it loose on the beach, where it merrily shat everywhere while she pretended not to notice.

People prefer animals because they assume the animal loves them. They are nice to you because they rely on you to feed and water them, it’s. It’s a bit like Stockholm syndrome.

People were staring at me like I was the child catcher the other day for smoking a fag in a pub garden. The three other groups there all had dogs. Felt like I was in a doggy day care centre

We went to a small high street bar last Friday to see a duo of musicians that we like. The place was heaving, loud with both the music and the crowd. A bloke brought his dog, which must have been distressing for it, and proceeded to roll a ball along the floor for it to play with. We saw several people trip over it. I don't get it. We always had a dog growing up, but there was always someone at home, we had a small garden.and it got taken for walks everyday, either after we got home from school, or out to the local woods or fields at weekends. I don't remember my parents ever taking one of the dogs into town, or shops as they didn't think it was fair on the dog to take it to busy, crowded places. We have always worked, apart from when the DCs were very young, and have never had a dog or cat as we don't think it is right to keep an animal locked up indoors all day while we are out. Our daughter has a cat, that we reluctantly look after when she has to go away, but don't think it's fair that it is locked in the house on its own for 10 hours a day or more sometimes.

its people who allow their disgusting animals to sit on the people seats that drive me insane - that includes park benches. They are just spreading poo particles it’s absolutely vile.

@inthetyreshop imo all bull breeds and scary status dogs should be banned anyway. Cane Corso’s are flipping terrifying, aggressive. No one needs an animal capable of killing I their home. A couple of years ago a woman who was far too small to be doing so, round us lost complete control of her big bully type dogs and they ran up and down the road. I dread to think about what would have happened if they had ran into a child on a scooter. The woman stood pathetically asking passers by to help wrangle them - not many takers, funnily enough.

I found out last week that a cockapoo furbaby is now a regular congregant at my synagogue!. I'm not religious but love Jewish culture and attend a service around 5 times a year. Turns out that a regular attender has recently got a dog that doesn't like being home alone so he brings him every week. Spent the hour trotting up and down the rows to get petted, at one point went up the steps to get some attention from the rabbi. Unbelievably ridiculous!

@CarmelaBrunella they aren’t blind to it, they do it on purpose!

It’s called epistemological and ethical denial and has been studied specifically in dog owners. Essentially it boils down to 1) that didn’t happen (seen widely on this thread and if that is undeniable 2) okay that did happen but you are wrong for being upset about it

I find that astonishing, and so selfish.

and suddenly dogs are not able to be left alone at home for more than ten mins so must accompany their owner on wvery outing

Recently attended a yoga class and the teachers dog was in attendance because his sitter cancelled

ffs

Spot on. I have kids and a dog and I often comment to colleagues that it’s much more socially acceptable to say I can’t do something (eg a call) because I have to walk the dog, than I can do it because I have to get the kids from school. This is meetings/ calls outside of core working hours btw.

I love dogs, but eff me there are some irresponsible owners. Cycling to work the other day and I slow down to pass someone on the tpt. Dogs off lead, her with her ear buds in and looking at her phone. And she has the cheek to tell me to mind out. I'd rang my bell a plenty, but if you're gonna wear ear pods, not my effing problem.

Move to London, people!
Dogs are not allowed in the vast majority of cafes or restaurants, shops etc. and it is enforced.
Weirdly one shopping centre allows it but the only shop that does is John Lewis so you don’t see many around.
Dogs and cats are allowed on the tube because that’s the only way to get around for millions and I’m fine with that.
They are everywhere and off lead in parks though.
(I love dogs but don’t think they should be allowed everywhere).

I'm sorry but i've never seen any of the dogs in public spaces behave this way. Generally, they're better behaved than humans.

I was a bit bemused to see someone bring in their dog into a charity shop. Never used to see that.

I used to work in a lovely indie bookshop in a village; dogs weren’t allowed on the grounds – you had to walk through a garden courtyard area to get to the shop – because there were chickens. Also the owners didn’t like dogs and didn’t want them in the shop, which is fair enough. They provided water and a place to tie up dogs in the shade; clear signage in multiple places. An insane number of owners would march past all this, make it to the shop, then profess outrage when asked to walk back and tie up their dog: “But I’ve already made it past the chickens, why can’t I just start browsing/buy a card/go upstairs to the cafe?”; “What do you mean, not allowed – I’m here, aren’t I?”; “I don’t understand, you want me to walk back the way I’ve come and leave my dog there?” faux-bafflement. And my favourite: “It’s not the shop’s garden.” Uh, yes it is? Why would you think it isn’t?

I did enjoy marching them back out, usually with them chorusing “I won’t be shopping here again”, because the owners were nuts and rich and would bellow back, “Good, we don’t want you to!” or “Who says you’re allowed to shop here again?” and other hilarious customer service don’ts.

Humans are in charge .... they artificially created your pet. It did not arise in nature. It was deliberately fashioned by human inbreeding. Your dog is not a natural phenomenon.