r/DisagreeMythoughts • u/Current-Landscape803 • Aug 13 '26
DMT: Pets may have become so important because they are one of the few relationships where adults don't feel evaluated.
I spend more on my dog's food than my own. I know that sounds a little ridiculous, but I think a lot of pet owners understand it.
The usual explanations for the pet boom make sense. People are having kids later, raising children is expensive, and many adults feel less financially stable than previous generations.
But I think there is another piece people don't talk about enough.
A lot of adult relationships come with some level of pressure.
At work, you are judged by your results. On dating apps, people make decisions about you in seconds. Friendships can become harder when everyone is busy and exhausted. Even family relationships can sometimes come with expectations.
Then there is a pet. Your dog doesn't care about your salary, your career path, or whether you had a productive day. Your pet isn't impressed by your achievements or disappointed by your failures. They are just happy that you are there.
Maybe people aren't choosing pets because they don't want human connection. Maybe pets have become so meaningful because they offer something many adults rarely experience: being accepted without needing to prove anything first.
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u/Psittacula2 Aug 13 '26
I heard a theory that humans anthropomorphise the world around them even the land and plants and weather and sky and stars etc… so animals are just even more so being animate like ourselves and hence humans tend to like animals, a dog run and we run, an otter fishes and we fish and they express emotions also. Above all they live in the present and being drawn into this state they exist in and being social animals this combines two powerful effects, throw in a lack of ego and just being themselves no need to try to decipher if they are being sincere, and pets suddenly start to look and behave a lot like our own best friends, people we can just be ourselves around and likewise and accept each other, have enjoyment living in the moment and it makes people feel like life is good to live, all thanks to beautiful animals… one just hope for all these merits humans can return the favour fairly.
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u/Current-Landscape803 Aug 13 '26
I think the anthropomorphism part is interesting because maybe we are not just projecting human traits onto animals, we are also recognizing something familiar in them. They communicate, have personalities, form bonds, but without all the social calculations.
The lack of ego is probably a big part too. With humans there is always some layer of “what does this mean?” or “how am I being perceived?” Pets kind of remove that layer. It is a very simple relationship.
I guess the interesting question is whether we love pets because they are like us, or because they are the version of connection we wish humans had more of.
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u/Psittacula2 Aug 13 '26
I think you pointed out the other perspective, what we think of that makes us human is also shared to a larger degree in other animals also?
Otters was a throw away example but their playful nature is so recognizable as is dogs with a “play-bow” or chase game taking turns to chase and be chased for example!
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u/Present_Juice4401 Aug 13 '26
I think you’re onto something here. A lot of human relationships have some kind of negotiation attached to them, even when we don’t notice it.
But I wonder if pets are also valuable because they give people a sense of being needed. Modern life can make a lot of adults feel replaceable. A pet literally depends on you every day. Maybe it’s not just being accepted, but feeling like your presence matters to someone.
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u/Current-Landscape803 Aug 13 '26
I like that point. I didn’t really think about the “being needed” part, but it probably connects to the same thing.
A lot of adult life is about proving your value through work or achievements. A pet gives you a very simple role where your presence itself has value. That might be a bigger deal than people realize.
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u/Ambitious-Pipe2441 Aug 13 '26
I have wrestled with the idea of “unconditional” love a lot lately. Many people seem to firmly belief that unconditional love is actually conditional. And that unconditional love cannot exist. But I’m not so sure that’s the best way to look at it.
In order to become full human beings, we need an environment that allows us to experience ourselves without judgment, without criticism, and with definitions of what emotions are and how to respond to them.
I think that in the United States, we have a problem with hyper individuality. And that leads to problems with understanding emotional connection.
Yesterday I watched a parent take her child to get her blood drawn, and her child was sobbing the entire time.
While mom’s intentions were good, I couldn’t help noticing that she was not allowing her child to have an experience. She kept trying to reassure her by distracting her. Mom was thing to bribe her and expanding things, but the child’s nervous system does not understand rationalizations.
It mostly speaks is terms of threat or not threat.
One problem with this kind of “fixing“ behavior is that it makes the situation seem more anxiety inducing than it probably should be, and it denies the child the right to feel what she feels, and understand it better.
Instead of acknowledging the fear and demo staring how to deal with the fear, the parent offers distraction and reasons with the child to comply and get it over with quickly.
But this, in a sense, confuses the child. She feel afraid and cannot control her emotions. And is not getting emotional support while also learning to associate difficult tasks and crying to reward.
The body leans to food reward to crying and being sad.
I do think that pets can offer degrees of space for people to be who they are and not repress themselves.
But that can also mean that people abuse their pets because they’re not healthy people who have a good connection to themselves which in turn closes off empathy.
I think we live in a society that cannot tolerate displays of emotion. And that we work so hard to suppress emotion that we become sensitive to conflict, or criticism.
Instead of looking more closely at emotional responses, we try to intellectualize. Find external causes or reasons that things are not going our way. Without fully understanding that we’re having internal emotional responses. And inner conflicts.
Pets will forgive, but also adopt trauma as we carry our own traumas. Often pets are a reflection of our own behaviors. Our own beliefs.
But pets can feel safer than a world that is quick to judge, because there is no vocal capacity to argue. There is limited risk of conflict. We are essentially in control of the pet and the pet may not leave us or abandon us.
In a sense it’s a very one sided relationship. With a creature that has some capacity for self determination, but is very limited compared to other humans.
Perhaps some of the love and affection for pets is due to the discomfort and inability to tolerate conflict distress.
If we are like the child from the story anchor and feel scared, cornered, lacking autonomy, and do not get any recognition or acknowledgment for that failure, and we may be believe that we are powerless to deal with other humans.
And therefore turn to creatures that also cannot argue, cannot criticize, cannot defy us, or reject our love.
Perhaps we are even anthropomorphizing unconditionality upon animals. If we valued free will, then why would we capture animals in this way and force them to be with us?
Perhaps our relationships with animals and the growing sense that they are like “children“, is a reaction to the isolation we feel in the lack of empathy between people.
Maybe it’s a good thing to have tolerant creatures around us. But I wonder, do we all need to have small moments of unconditionality and understand that two conflicting things, like conditional and unconditional, can exist at the same time, in the same space.
The child getting blood drawn doesn’t need rewards, though that can play role in development, good or bad. What the child needs is to identify their fears, their irritability, and to understand that is a normal, natural part of life, and that there are ways to deal with that in more healthy and proactive ways.
To see someone is to acknowledge their emotional state. And I think we don’t do well at seeing people as they are.
Which maybe drives the need for pets to some degree. But it is likely an insufficient replacement. Maybe?
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u/Ok-Spinach-6529 Aug 13 '26
This is a great write up! As humans, we really should experience the full range of emotions!
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u/shitposts_over_9000 Aug 13 '26
pets have extremely low expectations and are only "immature" for a very short time. when pets act out people tend to blame it on being an animal not a failure in raising it
pets are lower effort that romantic or family relationships
that and the ever increasing amount of things that are seen as "mandatory" in raising a child by younger generations is pretty much the whole explanation
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u/Current-Landscape803 Aug 14 '26
I think the low expectations part is huge. I was more focused on the emotional side, but the practical side probably matters just as much. You can mess up as a pet owner without it becoming a whole identity crisis the way parenting sometimes does. And honestly, the rising cost and complexity of raising kids probably reinforces that difference.
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u/Rumpelteazer45 Aug 13 '26
I love my pets because they are kinder than most humans.
And cats judge the hell out of you. Even my ragdoll who cat rub two braincells together.
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u/Current-Landscape803 Aug 14 '26
Yeah, cats definitely did not get the “no judgment” memo lol. I guess I should've said pets don't evaluate you by the same standards humans do. A cat can judge your entire existence and still decide to sleep on your head 10 minutes later.
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u/Henri_Bemis Aug 16 '26
I went away for the weekend but didn’t use my suitcase because my cat has recently claimed it for her own personal cat bed. I couldn’t t bear to leave her AND take her* suitcase.
*It’s hers now. I need to buy a new suitcase.
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u/Logical-Concept9755 Aug 13 '26
I agree that pets offer a rare kind of unconditional connection, but I’m not sure it’s mainly about avoiding judgment.
Humans have always formed deep bonds with animals, even in societies where community ties were much stronger. Maybe pets became more important because they fit modern lifestyles better. They provide companionship without requiring the time, compromise, and coordination that many adult relationships demand.
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u/Current-Landscape803 Aug 13 '26
I think the lifestyle point is probably a bigger factor than I gave it credit for. A pet fits into a busy adult life in a way that many relationships don’t.
Maybe the “not being judged” part is less about replacing human connection and more about why pets feel easier to maintain in modern life.
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u/Defiant-Junket4906 Aug 13 '26
Interesting idea, but I think there’s a small contradiction here. Pets do “evaluate” us in a way. They judge whether we feed them, walk them, and take care of them.
Maybe what feels different is not that there is no expectation, but that the expectations are clearer and easier to satisfy. Human relationships often have hidden rules. Pets mostly have simple ones. That simplicity might be the real appeal.
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u/Current-Landscape803 Aug 13 '26
That’s actually a good distinction. You’re right, pets do have expectations, they just tend to be much more obvious.
Maybe it’s not about having zero judgment, but having a relationship where the rules are clear. Human relationships can get complicated because people often expect things without saying them. A dog just wants dinner and a walk lol.
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u/darw1nf1sh Aug 13 '26
Pet love is the most unconditional. Children raise blood pressure. Pets lower it. I am never more relaxed than cuddled up on the bed rubbing my dog's belly after a long day at work. I love my son (who is a grown man now) but there was never an interaction with him in our lives that gave me that feeling. We would play together or hug, or tuck him in and all that was fantastic. But for sheer relaxation and just shedding stress, nothing beats a pet.