On My Ambivalence About Keeping Animals

Charles' collar and the small gate on the courtyard symbolize the same concept for me: He is trapped.

Sure, his life was worse at the home of the people who returned him to the adoption group. They left him kenneled for 12-14 hours during the day and ran with him for 30 minutes each night. He was put back in his kennel for the night.

And that was (arguably) better than being at the track, where he was kenneled for 22 hours a day, probably with a muzzle, and "turned out" a couple of times to relieve himself, usually while running.

But at my home, beautiful as it may be, and where he doesn't even have a kennel and has four beds of his own throughout the house (as does Violet), he still isn't in control of his life. He pees when I decide to walk him or let him out back. He eats when I decide to feed him, and when he goes for a walk or run, he must wear a collar and a leash. I must admit to the reality that I dominate him.

Imagine having a collar around your neck. Imagine someone walking you. Yanking--if you go in a direction undesirable for the person "in charge" of you. Pulling--if you sniff or nibble on some grass for more time than they want you to. Imagine someone is walking you and you see one of your kind across a village green. All you want to do is go to that person and say hi and acknowledge your shared situation, but you're tugged away as you look back and cry out to your brother.

Imagine wearing a collar all day and night.

I don't even wear my wedding band unless I'm leaving the house and going to a meeting or to dinner. I can't stand the feeling of anything remotely constraining. That's probably why Charles and Violet don't wear collars in the house. I bought them, along with tags, and I understand why they need to wear them (you know, if they bolt when my concrete house somehow catches fire), but most of the time I simply can't stand the idea of putting them on. And the same is true for Emily, who drew a fair amount of blood from my hand when I tried to put her pretty new collar around her neck.

All three animals are dependent on me, and though I didn't breed them and I wish the breeding of all animals by humans would stop immediately, this is what I choose to do in the meantime. I choose to rescue and care for cats and dogs with the hope that someday I won't be in this position anymore, as it's fraught with moments that make me feel terrible about keeping sentient nonhumans in my home, even though the alternative would have been worse for them. And it must be said that the keeping of sentient beings involves compromises of all kinds, particularly when I examine what it takes to produce their supplements, food and medication. But when you specifically request a special-needs animal whom no one wants, you have to be prepared for compromise. Lots of it.

Lee Hall recently wrote (and the connection will become clear after the first paragraph):

"Refuges are a bandage. They depend on cleared land and systematic food production, and raise dilemmas about whether and how to control insects and rodents, not to mention the shepherd’s traditional competition, the carnivores who would eat confined animals.

On a small scale, this is the case with me and the animals I’ve offered shelter. I buy them commercial food, and sometimes medicines, sold in too much packaging material from corporations I want nothing to do with, from malls built on the land that once belonged to free animals. I clean up, and the waste has to go somewhere. I offer the cats physical space: a bigger patch of Earth than I’d otherwise need. I don’t consume animals, which helps contain my ecological footprint, and yet I’m walking the planet with an entourage of animals. As individuals, I love them. But I don’t believe they should have come into the world to depend on me. . . .

We didn’t ask to live together; they were in need, too near for me to turn away. I love them dearly, yet I’m not convinced it’s fair to call them companions. At times it seems to me they are the trapped souls of wildcats."

The animals I live with are all trapped--by me. For that reason, I have a difficult time calling them "pets" or "companion animals." I offer them a home and try to meet their needs as best I can while not allowing them to be free. At least two of them would be dead in several days or less without me, and I understand that because we have domesticated certain animals we have an obligation to care for them. But that doesn't make it any easier for me.