[Fwd: Mark Morford: Stray Dogs Deserve Back Rubs]

[Guest guest]

January 14, 2005

 

This is an extraordinarily good piece, especially for those who think

that we bunnyhuggers " care more about animals than we do the homeless. "

Don't be put off by the opening paragraphs, read the whole thing, then

disperse accordingly.

 

Cheers,

 

Eric Mills, coordinator

ACTION FOR ANIMALS

 

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Mark Morford: Stray Dogs Deserve Back Rubs

Fri, 14 Jan 2005 07:53:03 -0800

SF Gate Newsletters <mmorford

dailylist

 

 

 

 

 

============= MARK MORFORD'S NOTES & ERRATA =============

SFGate.com - January 14, 2005

 

 

 

== Stray Dogs Deserve Back Rubs ==

We kill millions of pets every year. Who cares if a few get posh

shelters and humane laws?

(By Mark Morford - SFGate columnist)

http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/g/a/2005/01/14/notes011405.DTL & nl=fix

 

 

OK. So I tend to think people who insist on calling themselves pet

" guardians " instead of " owners " are exasperating and a bit wrongheaded,

and that such uber-PC thinking does almost nothing to change or improve

the behavior of the thousands of animal abusers in this country.

 

And I tend to agree with fabulous dog writer Jon Katz that such

semantic sidestepping does more harm to the animals than good, and

leads to naive treatment, lack of decent training and an outright

ignorance of the creature's very cool dogness.

 

What about all those new ultra-posh pet boutiques and the concomitant

trend toward the wild overpampering of our " companion " animals? Silly

if not outright depressing, really, given how we appear to be

projecting ourselves, our desires and habits and need for intimate TLC,

onto an animal that really couldn't care less.

 

Further, I think the shift toward treating dogs and cats as full-blown

family members, as surrogate kids or surrogate mates or surrogate

babies, is even worse, as we are loading up our animals with far too

much emotional liability and psychological complexity, granting a

completely unique species an impossible array of human traits and

emotional responses they don't have or need or understand, which then

only causes stress and resentment and chewed shoes and deeper personal

depression as you, the " guardian, " slowly realize the dog can't have

meaningful sex with you or take you to dinner or help decorate the

Christmas tree or talk to you calmly about just what the hell is going

on with your hair.

 

However ....

 

 

(click this URL to read the rest)

http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/g/a/2005/01/14/notes011405.DTL & nl=fix

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