Riffing off the “Who would you save, your drowning dog or a stranger?” thread, I couldn’t help but notice that a number of the people who said they’d save their dog instead of the person said their dog was a member of the family, just of a different species.
So I thought I’d propose a different question: suppose you have a 7 year old dog (young enough to live several more years, old enough that he’s probably not going to be adopted if you take him to the shelter), and your current rental housing is being demolished to make room for a freeway interchange. Unlike Arthur Dent, you had plenty of warning, but you haven’t been able to find a place you can afford that allows pets. You have no friends or relatives who can take your dog while you rent a place temporarily and continue the search.
Simply put, your choice is: (a) take Fido to the animal shelter, where he’ll likely be euthanized, so that you can rent an apartment, or (b) be homeless until such time as you can find housing that accepts pets, so that you can keep Fido with you, even if it means living in your car or sleeping under bridges for an indeterminate length of time.
OK, sure. But are pets family, or is family just the humans? Are you really going to sleep under a bridge in order to keep your dog?
To toss in an additional wrinkle, suppose you have both a dog and a child? Are you going to have the three of you sleep under a bridge, instead of having you and your child in an apartment while the dog is consigned to the shelter?
At that point, I’d be worried about anyone who failed to say that while pets might be family, there are degrees of family, and sorry, Fido: the kid counts more than you do.
I’ve known a couple of people in similar situations - had to find a new home due to no fault of their own, and couldn’t find a place that would accept a dog. In both cases they begged for extra time from their landlords until they found a place that would take them. I was the back-up plan for one of them, in that I was happy to look after his dog temporalily.
Most dog-owners have similar back-up plans for temporary care because they also need them for if they go on holiday or are ill.
There are also many shelters which are either no-kill or rarely kill, depending on where you live. I’m in the uk, and really it’s specific breeds that might not get rehomed, like staffies. Even then, they stand a chance if they’re good with kids and other animals.
I’ll change dog to cat here, so as not to be biased by my distaste for canines.
My cats are not persons; they are non-human animals. They are my responsibility in the sense that I may not ethically mistreat them, but they are not my family. I don’t owe them the same level of consideration I owe my wife and child. In the event I could not find someone willing to cat Mrs. Who and Mrs. Which in (unlikely; I have a lot of friends, my wife has a lot of friends, and there’s always the House of Mews where they came from in the first place), I regretfully but guiltlessly place the cat in the shelter, even if I know the shelter will [del]put them down[/del] execute them after a few days. I will however do my damnedest to make sure the shelter has a good record for humane treatment of euthanized animals.
I think it’s important to teach children that no one in the family is expendable.
As far as “degrees of family” go, one really married one’s spouse first; before there were kids…does that mean the kids have to go, if necessary, and the spouse takes priority? If not, why not?
Because family is everybody together.
I firmly believe that a child would be reassured to know that there are no expendable members of the family. Children can see through hypocrisy, and if the family had to endure hardship to show everyone counts, at least that’s putting it on the line and actually acting in accordance with stated beliefs. I know I would have respected my parents for that, if it had come to that.
“Sleeping under a bridge” isn’t like going into Dachau. And it probably wouldn’t get to that, outside of hypotheticals like this one. But yes, I am prepared to endure discomfort for my conception of ethics.
I’ll sort-of agree that no one in the family is expendable, with the qualifier that my child’s safety is more important than mine or my wife’s, and my wife’s safety is more important to me than my own is. But neither my wife nor I are expendable in the sense that being a family means facing the world as a unit, not individually.
But the cats aren’t on the same level. Mrs. Who and Mrs. Which are not human beings; they are not persons; they are not my children, my nieces, or my cousins. They are lesser beings, from whom I expect less and to whom I owe less.
And I’ll counter that “lesser beings” is a moving target we very clearly and specifically applied to other ethnic groups, women, and children – even legally – in the past. Thus, not a “fact,” just a current (and changing) consensus.
I’m not willing to assign cats the same moral value as human beings. I don’t deny that they have any moral worth; I wouldn’t idly kill a cat, or even a dog, the way I might a cockroach. But just as I wouldn’t allow concern for a homeless friend to override my responsibility for my daughter’s well-being, I won’t allow my affection for the Ws to override that either.
Would I slaughter my cats, or any cat, for yuks? Nope.
Would I become (temporarily) homeless myself, ALONE, rather than see them put down? Maybe; it would depend on circumstances. as it’s hard to imagine not being able to find a workable solution that would be better for both of us. As I posted upthread, here in Memphis there is at least one non-profit specifically set up to help homeless cats, and as we acquired the Ws there I am quite sure that nonprofit would take them back.
Would I let my baby be homeless with me and the cat, when I could avoid her homelessness by giving up the cat? No way. Not merely because the idea is emotionally unpalatable, but because doing so would be immoral. You can’t have everything; sometimes you have to make choices. I’ll choose my baby’s well-being over the company of any cat–over the life of any cat.
My area tends to have mild winters; I could probably survive a Memphis winter in fine fettle. But my baby’s a baby. Not risking it. And even if she were, say, ten or so, I’d not risk it in Wisconsin or wherever.
Barring all other options exhausted, I would turn my dog over to a rescue group, but not a shelter.
I was sort of in this situation wherein I was renting a house and acquired a fourth pet. Landlady was fine with my menagerie, but my dog pack was rapidly outgrowing the space I had available in this house. Rather than try to look for a rental that would let me have four pets, I bought a house. (And then one cat died almost immediately thereafter, leaving me with only three critters to fret about.) Problem solved.
I can’t imagine not having a single friend or relative with whom I could split up and board my critters until I found a suitable residence. So I think the scenario in the OP is pretty unlikely. However, if those are my two choices: live in a cardboard box under the freeway, or turn in my dog to the shelter… I’d probably go with the cardboard box. Hell, I own a tent and dogs are allowed at campgrounds; I’d go camping indefinitely.
I had to rephrase the question because I strongly dislike dogs, and my wife actively hates them, so as the OP was phrased it had no meaning for me. It’s like asking me “Would you feed the tree rats in your neighbor’s yard if they appeared to be starving, or keep all the lamb chops for yourself?”
One way the question can remain meaningful for me is if I think about it in terms of my little sister, who has a dog she considers her child. If she needed to find a new home, I’d let her and the dog move in (unless the dog ever menaced the baby, which it hasn’t), but that’s because I love her, not the hound.
I suppose this response guts the thread, but in this situation, why not simply board the animal at the vet’s until a suitable apartment is found? Many vets will do this for their customers and a fee, of course. I’ve done it when the family was on vacation.
Okay, if that option was out, I suppose I would temporarily live in my car with my cats. Supposing I couldn’t move in with my brother in Georgia or something.
Unless my animals are too sick to go on, they live with me. I will not take a no pets apartment. I won’t even consider it.
I would never accept a no-pets apartment. In the real world, I’d find somewhere pet-friendly to live…a room in someone’s home or something even if I couldn’t find any pet-friendly apartment complexes in the area.
However, in the hypothetical that the only choice is a no-pets place, I’d be very loathe to give up my pet and I’d probably try to make do with the pet rather than give them up.
If I had to give a pet up, I’d definitely try to rehome the animal myself rather than dumping it at a shelter. I know how grim the statistics are for adult animals at shelters. I wouldn’t do that to an animal that trusted me. I feel that when you own an animal, it’s a commitment for the animal’s lifetime and it would be a betrayal to drop that animal somewhere that it may be killed.
My husband and I like the dogs, they’re only slightly older than those in the OP’s hypothetical, and they’re good dogs, but my kid doesn’t sleep under a bridge because of the damned beasts. Pre-baby, my answer would probably have been different.
I have noticed that the dogs’ status as family members has decreased enormously now that the baby is on the scene, and I am fine with that. I still like the dogs and all, but their existence doesn’t even really appear on the same priority list as my daughter’s welfare, let alone trump it. Of course, she’s not old enough yet to really notice or care if the dogs are gone, which makes it easier.