The People’s Dispensary for Sick Animals (PDSA), a UK veterinary charity, estimates that half of Britons own a pet. Many of these pet owners consider the 11.1 million cats, 8.9 million dogs, and 1 million rabbits living in their households to be family members. Is it ethical to keep pets in the first place, even if we love them, care for them, celebrate their birthdays, and mourn them when they die? Some animal rights activists and ethicists, like us, believe it isn’t.
Pet-keeping is inherently unfair since it entails manipulating the bodies, behaviors, and emotional lives of animals. Companion animals’ bodies (especially dogs, horses, and rabbits) have been formed to fit human fashions and fancies for centuries. And this often results in serious physical damage to these animals.
For example, some breeds are more vulnerable to painful and often fatal genetic defects. Physical characteristics that are coveted, such as small and broad stature or pushed-in noses, can cause discomfort and make breathing, birthing, and other normal functions difficult.
Also non-purpose-bred animals are subjected to bodily manipulations that compromise their comfort and protection. Confining clothes, uncomfortable leashes that tug at the neck, docked tails and paws, and declawing (the severing of the first digit of each toe in cats) are all examples of this. Pets are often restricted in their everyday activities, crated or caged at times, and held indoors on a regular basis – all at the discretion of their human owners.
Pets also serve as a metaphor for the idea that poor people can be owned and completely regulated for the enjoyment and comfort of more wealthy and affluent people. And this has ramifications for people who are disadvantaged. For example, patriarchy is sustained in part by referring to women as pets (e.g., “kitten,” “bunny”) and confining them to the home to appease and support the family patriarch.
Social workers also recognize the strong connection between pet cruelty and domestic violence against children and women. The notion that manipulating the bodies and minds of an oppressed group to serve the needs of more powerful groups is appropriate is consistent with oppression’s cultural logic.
Companion animals’ lives are almost entirely dominated by humans as a result of this forced dependence and domestication. They may be put down at any time for the most insignificant of causes, such as behavioral “problems,” membership of a stereotyped breed, or the owner’s inability (or unwillingness) to pay for veterinary care.
Sociologist Erving Goffman coined the term “absolute institution” in the mid-twentieth century. Residents are cut off from the rest of society and are governed by a single authority in a closed social space. Natural boundaries between social spheres are artificially removed, and inmates are forced to adhere through a rigorous socialization process.
For example, sociologists also research jails, asylums, and other physical spaces. However, we believe that pet ownership is a kind of dispersed “absolute institution.” This is due to nonhuman animals being placed under human control, restrained, and re-socialized in an unhealthy manner. True consent is impossible to achieve under such circumstances. Animals are groomed to participate, and any who do not adhere to the laws of human social life is likely to be punished – often fatally.
This isn’t to say that dogs, cats, and other animals can’t show affection and enjoyment as “pets.” However, it is critical to recognize that their complacency within the pet-keeping institution is entirely created (sometimes cruelly) by humans by behavior “corrections” and the coercive mechanism of domestication.
Have you ever imagined a world without pets?
Some companion animal activists, such as Nathan Winograd, director of the No Kill Advocacy Center in the United States, claim that eliminating pet ownership would be a violation of nonhuman animals’ right to live. Winograd claims that by reorganizing the sheltering industry, the systematic killing of healthy companion animals can be reduced. Given humanity’s abundance of compassion and adoption potential, he opposes the need to abolish pet ownership.
Winograd’s pro-pet stance represents the No Kill movement’s deep opposition to certain animal rights organizations that advocate for “euthanasia” measures to reduce pet populations. Many of the ethical breaches – physical coercion, non-consensual isolation, enforced dependence, and susceptibility to sexual violence – would remain if a no-kill society were to be achieved. Even though, as Winograd believes, more legal rights could be achieved to enhance the living conditions of domestic animals.
Companion animals are not and cannot be equals because of their place in the social order. The institution of pet ownership maintains a social hierarchy that prioritizes humans and places all others on a lower level of priority, whose right to exist is solely based on their ability to support humans. However, the population of dogs, cats, rabbits, and other domesticated “pet” animals now outnumbers that of humans, implying that they will continue to be a part of human social life.
And while it may not be ethical to pursue the future breeding of nonhuman animals for comfort, humans do have a duty to serve, protect and care for them. Recognising the inherent inequality in human and nonhuman relations will be vital in making the best of an imperfect situation.
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