It used to be that comparing a dog to a child was considered gross anthropomorphising. This idea of anthropomorphising being tantamount to the worse kind of sin,  originally came from the Anglo-Christian religion being highly uncomfortable with the idea that animals could have emotions. The reasoning? If animals had emotions then they might have souls…. this was a concept that many western religions have a huge problem with. It made people very itchy, that a snail might have a soul worth saving as much as a human.

Then in the mid 17th century Descartes came along and soothed all the itchy, uncomfortable thoughts by explaining that animals can’t feel pain.  His hypothesis was that animals were like machines, they could not think and therefore could have no souls and just as a dropped clock makes a noise when it shatters, so goes a cat when nailed to a board and vivisected live.  Simply the noise of a broken machine.

This made every one feel better. Man was still the higher being, no need to share God or heaven with mere animals, put on this Earth for our use.

Later as science progressed this hypothesis was upheld by the requirement of using animals in scientific studies, and yet science needed an out on the whole “religion” issue. So it was generally decided that animals were in fact organic machines and had no language to boot! Without language they could never tell us if they really had feelings or could experience pain. Hence, if we could not prove that emotions existed, then we could not assume them to exist. To do so would be humanocentric. And apparently it is better to be mechanomorphic than anthropomorphic. For some strange reason, never suitably explained, it is better to assume animals do not have emotions (so that we can feel OK about continuing to use them for scientific research, and turn them into slave labour) rather than assume they probably do have similar emotions to us (our brains work the same, drugs work the same on humans as they do for dogs in many cases) so then bringing up the old uncomfortable itchiness that maybe animals are deserving of a  little more respect.

This may sound a bit hyperbolic and I am not saying I believe snails have the same emotions (or any necessarily) that humans do. But what I am saying is, isn’t it better, isn’t it more humane and ethical to assume that any animal with similar physiological characteristics, probably have similar emotional lives to us as well? And if so, then shouldn’t we be treating them with more respect than our societies do now?

You may think that I am a fundamentalist when it comes to animal rights however,  I am not suggesting we don’t use animals for medical research, or that we should all become vegetarians. I am extremely darwinistic in my beliefs and I actually think that if we feel it will benefit our species (and frequently their species as well) to use some animals this way, then fine.

What I AM saying is that lets do it with a little respect. Lets stop hiding underneath  this blanket like we are children not wanting to face our terrible mistake. Lets face up to what we are doing and not pretend like we are ignorant to  an animal’s pain.

Maybe if we do, violence against animals will decrease. If children are taught  to respect an animal as another living, thinking, and emotional being perhaps it will help people relate to each other as well.

The answer is: your dog is NOT a child or a toaster. Dog’s are their own, they have become our partners in life and as a species. Sometimes it’s useful to compare them to a child, it helps some people relate better, when they can view their dog’s antics as they would a 4 year old child’s. Sometimes it’s even useful to relate them to a toaster, (there are a few children I would relate to a toaster as well). But to decide that since we can’t prove something, it doesn’t exist… well there are a lot of religions that would argue that point and a lot of scientists too.