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Permalink Reply by Lyndi Rogers on February 8, 2011 at 3:11am

I always wonder why people say cats are better pets.  I mean, one thing people like about cats is that they are independent.  That CAN be nice but why own it at all then?  A pet is meant to form bonds with their owner.  They are not just meant to be a presence in the house and give you attitude and only affection when it deigns to enter the same room as you.  I've found that cat owners love that their cat (for the most part) is attached to only them and will only show THEM affection.  It makes them feel special i think.  I am sorry if this sounds hostile at all but my best friends are cat people and all they ever do is talk about how much better their cats are than my dog.

 

To me, dogs are true companions and they really do become members of your family.  Their level of interaction with you is much higher than a cat's.  That is a product of their evolution.  Domesticated dogs were bred to be closer to humans and their families for one reason or another.  Whether that was to be a protector, a herder, or a lap dog.  

 

Please also understand that I am aware that YOUR cat may be an exception to my above observations.  However, the majority of cats fits into my generalization.  Because, you know, I am speaking in general terms.  Sorry this has gone on for so long.  As I said, this has been building up in me for a little while.  Lol.  Thanks for reading. :-)

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Permalink Reply by T A A on February 8, 2011 at 3:58am

Cats and humans form very strong bonds... cats just aren't co-dependant! :P

Did you ever watch that Animal Miracles show on TV (or whatever it's called), cats can save our lives too! :)

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Permalink Reply by Mo Trauen on February 8, 2011 at 9:46am

I have owned a number of cats.  I never had one that was truly independent in the sense you mean.  I bonded with all of them and they with me.

 

I like your observation about cat owners liking the selectivity of cat bonding.  I think there may be some truth to that.  Though I have found that cats will bond with others who treat them well even if they have a fairly tight bond with their owner.  And cats seem less loyal.  So, it's not completely true.

 

I can understand how you feel considering the behavior of your friends.  I have friends with dogs and I don't recall ever doing anything so boorish.  Though when I was much younger, I might have said something more boorish than what I have here.  I will just say that with cats there is always an implicit threat that they will disapprove of how you treat them and leave.  With dogs that threat is almost nonexistent.  I suspect that and the shape of a cat's eyes explains why some people are so hostile to them.

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Permalink Reply by Snowcrash on February 8, 2011 at 1:13pm

I've had a cat for 16 years and i was devastated when it died, perhaps thats why i never adopted a new one, i didn't want to go through the heartbreak again but i still love em to bits.

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Permalink Reply by Ryan E. Hoffman on February 8, 2011 at 7:33pm

I love all animals, but I like dogs more. I'm a burly, rough housing, bear huggy, slobber loving guy. Cats are definitely less maintenance, and I may try my hand at caring for a cat for a while after Tiki dies as I'm not sure I could replace him right away. My girlfriend has a cat, and she (the cat) is a bitch.

 

That being said, I prefer cat people more... because cat people keep their depression INSIDE their house (part of my stand up routine).

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Permalink Reply by Doug Reardon on February 8, 2011 at 8:21pm

I've got two dogs, two cats, and fifty chickens, but at heart I'm a wombat person.

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Permalink Reply by Doug Reardon on February 11, 2011 at 6:24pm

Gamey, really really gamey.

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Permalink Reply by Rocky john on December 4, 2011 at 5:05am

A dog person for sure and for a variety of reasons.

Firstly , as alot of people here have said, dogs require more patience, work and attention but they will pay you back tenfold. A dog forms a lot more profound and stronger bond to its family than a cat could ever dream of. And what better example is there of this  than how a dog will often put its own life in danger , without a second thought, to protect someone it loves. There are stories of dogs taking on mountain lines, alligators, bears etc etc to  protect one of its family, Even a chihuahua will do its best to protect its owner against a threat 50 times or more its own size. Now that is not something you can expect from a cat and that is because cats are selfish and the only thing they really care about is themselves,  everything else comes a distant second

Secondly dogs are the only animal that knows to read our emotions from our faces. Humans have this thing called left gaze bias when looking at faces, where our gaze unconsciously looks at the right of someones face first because emotions are better displayed on that side of the face. Now dogs do the exact same thing but only with human faces. When it comes to other animals dogs no longer show this trait. This is why Dogs almost seem to have a 6th sense at telling how we feel, well that and their amazing sense of smell.

Thirdly dogs were the first animal ever domesticated and the only large carnivore to be domesticated, Even at the most conservative they were domesticated thousands of years before any other animal and their is some evidence that they may have been domesticated as much as tens of thousand of years earlier. There is also alot of evidence that even from the beginning we developed a distinctive social bond with this species as dogs were buried like humans or even with humans,  clutched within their arms , likely to act as a guard and companion in the afterlife.

Lastly the only reason the  cat was ever domesticated was because it is to small to eat us. If cats were the size of wolves they would have been hunted  nearly out of existence, just like most every other large cat and would in no way have become a true domesticated pet

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Permalink Reply by basement kitteh on December 5, 2011 at 8:26pm

I've been owned by a bunch of cats in my life. Currently by two...

Hmm - I didn't think there would be a connection, but now that I think - most of my friends that I think first about when I think of cat people friends, tend to also be atheists.

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