There is a difference between being offensive and being incorrect. I’ve heard jokes that some people call offensive but to me they are simply not funny.
For instance I am gay and on “Family Guy,” Seth McFarlane makes a lot of parody at gay’s people’s expense. A lot of gay people find that as offensive. I find some of it funny and some of it not funny, but I don’t think of any of it as offensive.
I tend to find the comparison silly, but for the opposite reason. I chose to have my dogs and cat - far too many parents just let having children happen. I have my dogs and cat because I want them - many children are born to “save the marriage” (dumb idea and unfair to the child), because the birth control failed, because they didn’t get the “right” sex the first time (or the first six times), because grandma wants grandkids and other reasons that have nothing to do with the baby itself. My mother had all three of my brothers because that was “the plan”, not because she really wanted a baby at that time. A co-worker had baby number four because the other three were getting too old to do little league baseball and her husband just loves coaching.
When I am out with my dogs, I am aware of what they are doing and make sure they are never in danger or causing any trouble. When many parents are out, their children run amok and I am expected to put up with trouble they get into, and to make sure I don’t squish them with my car.
Based on what I see and hear from many parents, to assume that they love their children more than I love my pets is silly.
Yup.
Apples and kumquats. You’re comparing a learned skill with an inherent emotion.
You make it sound like that’s the standard. And yet you fail to mention all the pets that are bought, owned, given as gifts etc. for stupid reasons.
In fact, your other quote bears some scrutiny
You’re basing the quality of a parent’s love for his child, through your dog-owning-loving prism. Do you honestly think that the majority of children are treated by their parents, and allowed to get away with stupid things by their parents, as you’ve described?
It would be like me saying that because my uncle used to leave his dog tied to a tree in the back yard and never let him inside, that’s proof that you couldn’t love your dog.
A parent’s love for a child is definitely not comparable to a person’s love for a pet. Not saying your love for your pets isn’t great, just not comparable.
It’s apples and oranges.
I’m convinced some people do love their pets just as much as I love my kids. I think it’s a little odd, and it does seem disproportionate given the higher value I place on human life than on animal life, but I understand the impulse and it doesn’t offend me in the least. But if someone neglected their child while lavishing love and money on their pet, I would be seriously pissed off.
Stop right there. How do you know? You think you know. You paint with a broad brush and make assumptions based on what you think experiences ought to be, but how do you KNOW, person-to-person, that a pet owner’s love is not comparable? You don’t. You think it unreasonable, you think it dysfunctional, but it is not. If it exists in the heart of the person, it is true, it is right and it is natural, at least for them.
Many things defy convention in this world, love, as compared to anything else, is chief among these.
So what we needis an Einsteinian theory of pet/human relativity.
When it comes right down to it, sometimes nothing beats a ham sandwich.
At this point, I’m ready for some poodle steaks with a side of cat fritters.
(Would you like some baby back ribs with that?)
Here is where the divide happens that makes the most sense, if you ignore your child in favor of your pet, that is dysfunction. Loving a pet completely, INSTEAD of a child, is, to those who experience it, natural.
As a child, I had a Shepherd/Husky. He lived for 23 years. He was my constant companion and best friend and I would have laid it down for him just as I would for any stranger on the street in the discharge of my duties or member of my family. There was a love there that, like most love, defies what we consider convention. He knew me, I knew him, as well if not better than any parent can know their child. That was then and is to me now a true thing. I could not love a child any more than I loved that dog.
Your turn to stop right there.
The reason I say they are not comparable is because one is the love of an offspring and the other is the love of a pet. Offspring and pets are not the same thing. Therefore the love someone has for them is not the same. I never said it’s unreasonable or dysfunctional, just different. And not really comparable.
What I think is unreasonable or dysfunctional is people who treat dogs as children and not dogs. Love your dog as fiercely as you like, but if you don’t realize it’s a dog … then I’d say you got problems.
You compared the situation to gay marriage, and you are complaining about MY analogy? 
The point is not that one is a skill and the other is not, the point is that one person knows that the other is wrong in both cases.
Other analogies suggest themselves:
“I know just how you felt, WW2 vet, wading ashore on Omaha beach. I had a really nasty job interview that was just as stressful.”
“I may be a virgin, but I feel just as much passion watching anime porn as you do in making love to your wife.”
Of course I realize it’s a dog. Said so in the post, that does not mean you or anyone else has the right define my feelings or determine what they are. It’s a petty difference really, between “not comparable” and “just different” but it is still a difference. The way and depth which a person loves that which is moral, right and legal, (lest anyone suggest pedophilia or beastiality) be the love directed at pet, kid or toaster is closed to interpretation. It IS different, but that’s not what people are saying. Rather, it’s “not comparable” suggests that “mine is better, yours is marginal and what you have can’t compare to what I have”. I disagree. My dogs are dogs. They eat kibble, drink from the toilet and play with sweaty socks. Rest assured though, you see my dog on the street and you kick him, I am going to kick your ass. Likewise, you see my child on the street and you kick him or her, I am going to kick your ass.
Some things are not comparable, going to war as opposed to going to a bad job interview. There is little to no risk of death at a job interview. Peddling a trikie is not comparable to piloting a 747. One person cannot KNOW another is wrong in something so subjective as that which is almost undefinable. There are definate skills necessary to fly a plane, all you need for love is to show up.
If someone claims to love their toaster as much as I love my kid, I’m gonna think that they are either a nut or attempting to insult me. And not because I’m “threatened” by the comparison.
Agreed. But does that feeling of YOURS invalidate the feeling of THEIRS?
Let me put it this way, I see the love one has for a pet to be more comparable to the love one has for a best (human) friend as opposed to the love for a child.
Adopting a pet and caring for it is a fabulous thing. I think everyone should do it. And I admire the ones who do it well. But it just isn’t the same as raising a child.
And yes, I know there are tons of parents who fuck that up on a regular basis too.
I’m childless by choice and a pet owner, and although it doesn’t offend me when people compare the two, I do wonder about that person’s ability to ‘put the shoe on the other foot.’ I know there’s lots of folks that can’t look at things logically and understand where another is coming from, but often I see many that don’t even try. And I think this (extreme) attitude is just one example of that. Like WhyNot mentioned up thread, even though she’s never worked in a circus, she can imagine what it’s like to fly on a trapeze or similarly, not having been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s, it’s easy to sympathize with all the feelings of disorientation and panic.
So, I can imagine that even though I think my pup is the greatest friend in the world, I still understand in my heart that love for human being (ergo a child) would trump that in spades. I mean, all I have to do is think back to how I’ve felt over the loss of a pet versus the death of a beloved family member. There just not comparable for many and more of the reasons, I’m sure, that maggenpye listed. Despite how they feel, I think it behooves them to understand this intellectually.
Also, is this okay? I love my pup as much as I humanly can, yet I’d have a hard time finding a way that it would be acceptable (as in, face myself in the mirror each morning) to kill another person for him. There has to be some reason that society finds attitudes like this so far outside the norm. Why do y’all that feel this way think that is?
I’ll ask a question of my own.
If someone is really, really nervous about job interviews, does it make sense for them to insist that strangers regard their going to a job interview as the equivalent of wading ashore on D-Day in terms of bravery?
Funny that this would come up, because one of my best friends called me recently to complain that our other best friend did this to him.
Friend 2 was back home visiting Friend 1 - who has 2 children - and Friend 2 kept going on and on about “I know how it is. I have dogs. etc etc.”
I dunno if I’d call it “offensive” but it’s annoying, oblivious, clueless behavior. I have a dog that I love very, very much, and my wife and I are having our first child in March. He’s not even born yet and I already care about him more than I care about the dog - and it’s hard to stress how much I care about my dog.