# Do other countries have the gushy "Who's a good boy?" attitude towards their dogs? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [March 9, 2021, 3:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-other-countries-have-the-gushy-whos-a-good-boy-attitude-towards-their-dogs/937538 "2021-03-09T15:59:34Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 19\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![needscoffee](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/needscoffee/32/1076_2.png) [@needscoffee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/needscoffee)\ **Post date:** [March 10, 2021, 4:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-other-countries-have-the-gushy-whos-a-good-boy-attitude-towards-their-dogs/937538/21 "2021-03-10T16:35:57Z")
> [@SanVito](#): > > For the record, my [Dylan Dog](https://ibb.co/XZ6tz3F) is a Very Good Boy. Adorable! ---
**Author:** ![carrps](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carrps/32/2957_2.png) [@carrps](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carrps)\ **Post date:** [March 10, 2021, 5:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-other-countries-have-the-gushy-whos-a-good-boy-attitude-towards-their-dogs/937538/22 "2021-03-10T17:00:11Z")
> [@SanVito](#): > > For the record, my [Dylan Dog](https://ibb.co/XZ6tz3F) is a Very Good Boy. Is he chewing up Cesar Milan’s face??? ---
**Author:** ![SanVito](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sanvito/32/2805_2.png) [@SanVito](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SanVito)\ **Post date:** [March 10, 2021, 5:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-other-countries-have-the-gushy-whos-a-good-boy-attitude-towards-their-dogs/937538/23 "2021-03-10T17:02:19Z")
Deservedly so, I think. ---
**Author:** ![carrps](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carrps/32/2957_2.png) [@carrps](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carrps)\ **Post date:** [March 10, 2021, 5:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-other-countries-have-the-gushy-whos-a-good-boy-attitude-towards-their-dogs/937538/24 "2021-03-10T17:06:16Z")
I wholeheartedly agree. ---
**Author:** ![Kimera757](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kimera757/32/3765_2.png) [@Kimera757](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimera757)\ **Post date:** [March 10, 2021, 5:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-other-countries-have-the-gushy-whos-a-good-boy-attitude-towards-their-dogs/937538/25 "2021-03-10T17:08:46Z")
Canada is pretty similar to the US culturally, and we treat our dogs that way too. According to an earlier post in this thread, so do Germans. I assume it’s because: 1. Shrinking population. (Canada’s population is growing, but only because of immigration.) 2. Canine behavior and a lack of pet training. Dogs are basically programmed to be loyal and can’t really help their own behavior. If you don’t train a dog to jump up on you, you either accept it (and treat them like that) or you train them. There are far more dog owners than competent pet trainers. ---
**Author:** ![DesertDog](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/desertdog/32/11503_2.png) [@DesertDog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DesertDog)\ **Post date:** [March 10, 2021, 7:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-other-countries-have-the-gushy-whos-a-good-boy-attitude-towards-their-dogs/937538/26 "2021-03-10T19:09:12Z")
> [@kayaker](#): > > There are actually people who think the pigs are farm pets! **DesertWife** commented one time she’d had more than one cow named after her; she had an uncle who raised them. I figured they were dairy cows, probably are around six or seven years before being sent off to be made into bologna. Nope – they were Black Angus. “But them’s _eatin’_ cows!” “They sure were. They’d get loaded on the feedlot truck at 12 to 14 months, mostly.” Not pets is one thing but I dunno about selling off a cow named after my niece. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [March 10, 2021, 8:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-other-countries-have-the-gushy-whos-a-good-boy-attitude-towards-their-dogs/937538/27 "2021-03-10T20:52:43Z")
Yes. This is one of the most popular ads ever in South Africa: [![](https://img.youtube.com/vi/gFZV53e_-_o/hqdefault.jpg "Telkom "Dog" TVC (Jono's Previous Work)") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gFZV53e_-_o) ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [March 10, 2021, 9:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-other-countries-have-the-gushy-whos-a-good-boy-attitude-towards-their-dogs/937538/28 "2021-03-10T21:03:09Z")
> [@Colibri](#): > > My brother had two pet chickens he named Original Recipe and Extra Crispy, but he loves black humor. 😆 But did he talk to them about their yumminess in that “pet-directed speech” style of exaggerated gushiness? > [@puzzlegal](#): > > I used to have a pet cat with a really gorgeous pelt. I told her she would make a wonderful pair of earmuffs when she purred on my lap. > > Damn, I miss that cat. Aw. But at least your ears are warm, right? (Sorry, sorry, kidding!) > [@Didi44](#): > > Just because they’re destined to become food doesn’t mean animals can’t be considered pets and treated with affection. Of course, but does the affectionate treatment include “pet-directed speech” in that exaggerated gushy style specifically referencing their deliciousness as food? So far we’ve only seen one example in this thread of a pet owner using the pet-directed speech style to directly reference the anticipated utilization of the pet’s carcass after death, and I think it’s safe to say that puzzlegal did not seriously intend nor undertake to turn her late cat’s skin into earmuffs. ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [March 10, 2021, 9:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-other-countries-have-the-gushy-whos-a-good-boy-attitude-towards-their-dogs/937538/29 "2021-03-10T21:16:35Z")
> [@Kimstu](#): > > Aw. But at least your ears are warm, right? (Sorry, sorry, kidding!) Alas, by the time she died of old age, her pelt was not in good enough condition to make nice earmuffs. Also, that would have made the funeral awkward. We buried her in the backyard, with all the family who loved her present. ---
**Author:** ![Napier](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ce73a5/32.png) [@Napier](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Napier)\ **Post date:** [March 10, 2021, 10:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-other-countries-have-the-gushy-whos-a-good-boy-attitude-towards-their-dogs/937538/30 "2021-03-10T22:22:58Z")
> [@Spoons](#): > > More to the OP, I don’t own any dogs, but I do have cats, and I have been known to say, “Who’s a good cat?” while giving them belly rubs or ear skritches. Who’s my tiger? Who’s my dreat big fedda? What a MAGNIFICAT!! Oh, my, look at them choppers! Rrowr! ---
**Author:** ![Lightnin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lightnin/32/180_2.png) [@Lightnin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lightnin)\ **Post date:** [March 10, 2021, 10:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-other-countries-have-the-gushy-whos-a-good-boy-attitude-towards-their-dogs/937538/31 "2021-03-10T22:28:47Z")
> [@DesertDog](#): > > “But them’s _eatin’_ cows!” > “They sure were. They’d get loaded on the feedlot truck at 12 to 14 months, mostly.” My wife had a professor back in college who owned a small farm south of Austin. A cow had died giving birth, and the professor ended up raising the calf as a pet. It was extremely friendly, and liked to lick people. It’s quite an experience to see a 1500 lb cow gallop across a field to give you kisses. For the record, cow tongues are like big, muscular cat tongues, and it’s like having wet sandpaper dragged across your skin. ---
**Author:** ![Didi44](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e47c2d/32.png) [@Didi44](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Didi44)\ **Post date:** [March 10, 2021, 11:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-other-countries-have-the-gushy-whos-a-good-boy-attitude-towards-their-dogs/937538/32 "2021-03-10T23:18:51Z")
_Of course, but does the affectionate treatment include “pet-directed speech” in that exaggerated gushy style specifically referencing their deliciousness as food?_ Not a direct answer and an isolated quote: "Katie Pratt, a corn and soybean farmer from northern Illinois, sold her first market calf when she was 8 years old. “His name was Justin, and he was my best friend. We went to the fair and I got a blue ribbon,” she recalls almost wistfully. “When the reality of the fact that he had to go to market hit, it was awful.” [https://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2017/08/30/545603450/for-4-h-kids-saying-goodbye-to-an-animal-can-be-the-hardest-lesson](https://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2017/08/30/545603450/for-4-h-kids-saying-goodbye-to-an-animal-can-be-the-hardest-lesson) I’d put big money on her talking gushy to her best friend. ---
**Author:** ![Didi44](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e47c2d/32.png) [@Didi44](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Didi44)\ **Post date:** [March 10, 2021, 11:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-other-countries-have-the-gushy-whos-a-good-boy-attitude-towards-their-dogs/937538/33 "2021-03-10T23:24:47Z")
There was a documentary about a group of tribesmen, I think in somewhere in Africa. While they didn’t show him talking gushy, he proudly referred to his dog as “my son!”. I don’t know what channel it’s on, but there’s an Australian version of _The Zoo_, and like the carekeepers a the U.S. zoos, everyone in Austraila speaks in that squeaky baby talk to all the animals. ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [March 10, 2021, 11:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-other-countries-have-the-gushy-whos-a-good-boy-attitude-towards-their-dogs/937538/34 "2021-03-10T23:52:56Z")
> [@Didi44](#): > > I’d put big money on her talking gushy to her best friend. I completely agree, but what I’m trying to get at here is whether the gushy talk included direct references specifically to eating the animal and how yummy and tasty it was going to be when dead and cooked, as per panache45’s quip back in post #6. Nemmine, it’s something of a hijack anyway in a thread primarily about just identifying the existence of dog-directed gushy talk in various cultures. I still kinda think I’m onto something in suspecting a broad implicit taboo against mentioning the edibility of a member of an edible species in pet-directed gushy talk, but I will shut up about it now. ---
**Author:** ![Didi44](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e47c2d/32.png) [@Didi44](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Didi44)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2021, 12:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-other-countries-have-the-gushy-whos-a-good-boy-attitude-towards-their-dogs/937538/35 "2021-03-11T00:13:13Z")
Off topic: Good Boy doggie chocolates have been available in the U.S. since at least the '70’s and all our dogs loved them. My brother and I could sometimes ask the dogs if they wanted “Bad Boy” or utter gibberish in the same tone and the dogs would go nuts regardless. However, one the dogs would absolutely refuse her favorite treat after a bath. All the other 4 dogs would happily gobble them down after their bath, but she would literally turn up her nose. Once in a great while, she’s accept it from whomever didn’t give her a bath, but it usually took a few hours for her to finally accept it. The other dogs loved it because we’d end up giving everyone one or two again. On topic. My aunty and uncle’s dog was named Coco. In Japanese, koko means here. So when my maternal grandmother would gushily call Coco, we’d all laugh because we were never sure if in her mind she was calling the dog by his name or calling him to “come here”. Super cute dog being spoken to in Japanese. Gushy talk at the end. [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nep3jKwVZe8](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nep3jKwVZe8) ---
**Author:** ![jnglmassiv](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/f07891/32.png) [@jnglmassiv](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jnglmassiv)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2021, 1:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-other-countries-have-the-gushy-whos-a-good-boy-attitude-towards-their-dogs/937538/36 "2021-03-11T01:18:56Z")
> [@Kimstu](#): > > American pet pig owners don’t coo to their pets with remarks about their bacony deliciousness. I think pigs may be an exception. Lots of pigs have delicious puns for names. Here’s Ham Solo: [https://www.reddit.com/gallery/l8cgj3](https://www.reddit.com/gallery/l8cgj3) And a Hamlet (one of many): [Hamlet's "noble pig" pose. : pigs](https://old.reddit.com/r/pigs/comments/8qo8ob/hamlets_noble_pig_pose/) Who can forget Macho Hog Randy Sausage? [This is the Macho Hog Randy Sausage. : pigs](https://old.reddit.com/r/pigs/comments/if1vt0/this_is_the_macho_hog_randy_sausage/) And then there’s perhaps the most famous of all. Chris P Bacon was the subject of a viral video from a few years ago: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pMA3x-bc8iM](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pMA3x-bc8iM) ---
**Author:** ![CairoCarol](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cairocarol/32/3825_2.png) [@CairoCarol](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CairoCarol)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2021, 1:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-other-countries-have-the-gushy-whos-a-good-boy-attitude-towards-their-dogs/937538/37 "2021-03-11T01:37:49Z")
Indonesia is not without dog lovers, but getting gushy over dogs is definitely not the cultural norm. One significant factor is probably Islam, which teaches people that dogs are impure creatures. This doesn’t totally preclude liking dogs; the mother of one of my son’s good friends in middle school was both a devout wearer of hijab AND a dog lover. But she followed careful rules: she would be affectionate with dogs if she was wearing clothes that she knew she could change out of/throw into the laundry before she would need to pray; otherwise she’d keep her distance. And of course, she’d wash her hands thoroughly after touching dogs. She was definitely not gushy, and she was pretty far along on the “really and truly loves dogs” scale. Most of the Indonesians I knew regarded dogs with mild to intense suspicion. ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2021, 1:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-other-countries-have-the-gushy-whos-a-good-boy-attitude-towards-their-dogs/937538/38 "2021-03-11T01:39:23Z")
> [@jnglmassiv](#): > > I think pigs may be an exception. Lots of pigs have delicious puns for names. I said I’d shut up about this and I will, but I gotta nitpick this persistent conflation of two different things: 1. the kind of name that can be given to a pet animal of an edible species (like Colibri’s chicken-nieces), and 2. explicit references to killing/eating the animal in the cooey-gushy-talk pet-directed speech used to the animal. IOW, your observation is perfectly valid but it does not address the point I was wondering about. ---
**Author:** ![thorny\_locust](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thorny_locust/32/431_2.png) [@thorny\_locust](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thorny_locust)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2021, 2:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-other-countries-have-the-gushy-whos-a-good-boy-attitude-towards-their-dogs/937538/39 "2021-03-11T02:48:07Z")
> [@Napier](#): > > Who’s my tiger? Who’s my dreat big fedda? What a MAGNIFICAT!! Oh, my, look at them choppers! Rrowr! You’re a cat! You’re a large yellow cat. Now if I were looking for a large yellow cat, with the intention of giving him a pat, would you be interested in being that cat? – this tendency of yours to lean into the patting hand does not convince me otherwise. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-other-countries-have-the-gushy-whos-a-good-boy-attitude-towards-their-dogs/937538.md?page=1)