As a society, I think it’s fairly accurate to say that we love dogs. Or, at least, a lot of us do. I’m a member of a Facebook group called Dogspotting, and each post is a picture of a dog with cute captions like: “What a good boy,” “Look at this little floofer,” so on. I love the group, and, for that matter, the dog loving mentality we’ve taken on. What I don’t love is how a lot of us think about and treat the dogs around us.
I’ve seen too many people basically jump onto dogs to cuddle with them or talk about dogs generally in a way that makes me uncomfortable. What I think is often forgotten in our culture of cuteifying and romanticizing dogs, is that these are living things with feelings. When you just start aggressively petting a dog without any warning, you’re invading their space. Imagine if you were walking down middle path, and all of a sudden a bunch of strangers would run and hug you without so much of a hello. Weird, right? Uncomfortable?
We need to respect the fact that dogs actually feel things and that just petting them without warning can make them nervous. There’s a way to approach a dog, and with good reason. First, ask their owner if you can pet their dog and if they say yes, let the dog smell your hand. If (and only if!) the dog responds well, then you can pet them. This gives the dog an introduction to you and your scent without it overwhelming them, and respects their space. It also allows the dog to be a part of your interaction, instead of it just being a human jumping onto a dog. If a dog doesn’t want to be pet, then don’t pet it. It’s that simple.
As living things, dogs’ space and boundaries matter. Often, when a dog lashes out and bites, it’s likely because those space and boundaries haven’t been respected—either in the present or in the past—, and the dog is most likely scared. As someone with two dogs with anxiety, I can tell you firsthand that dogs can be anxious. They can have their own specific set of behaviors that aren’t always conducive to the image we hold of them as perfect, cute creatures. My dogs, for example, have leash aggression. When they’re on a leash and see another dog, they just freak out. Barking and jumping around, they get themselves into an anxious tizzy and have to be dragged away. It’s not cute, and it’s not fun. But this anxiety can also arise because they’re anxious, not well socialized, or untrusting of other dogs. Furthermore, by not respecting the existence and the personal spaces of these dogs, you might be jeopardizing your own health in addition to theirs. Unexpectedly approaching a dog who might have experienced trauma in the past may elicit violent and even dangerous reactions that can put both of your well-beings in danger. These aren’t bad dogs. Like my own dogs, they’re sweet, loving animals who don’t behave perfectly and who aren’t always the easiest to take care of. But by pretending all dogs are perfect, we deny the existence of dogs like mine and make their behavior simply “bad” or an exclusion from the perfect pupper rule. You can love dogs and acknowledge that, as living things, they are not perfect. You can love dogs and understand that they don’t live to simply be cute for people, but as their own beings with their own feelings. Instead of just viewing dogs as our own personally live teddy bears, let’s take the time to respect and empathize with them. Who knows, you might just make a friend for life.
Image credits: Gabrielle Ivanier