When pets rule the world

> Humans now have become slaves to the animals they have taken to their hearts and homes

EVIDENCE has been found that a Stone Age person made friends with a beast from the wolf family, and turned it into the first domestic dog. Probably someone had the following thought: “I’m being attacked by wolves! I think I will ruffle the fur around the neck of one, and say: ‘Who’s a good boy, yes, you are’ in a silly voice.”

Last week, I stumbled on the report which said archaeologists discovered the skull of a ‘canid’ with a bone in its mouth in a 26,000-year-old human settlement in the Czech Republic.

A canid is a long-snouted mammal, a group which includes wolves, dogs, hyenas, Pete Townsend, Adrien Brody, Owen Wilson, etc.

Researchers say they have no idea why a Stone Age family adopted a canid, 260 centuries before the invention of the pooper scooper.

My theory is that it can be blamed on the ‘keeping up with the neighbours’ syndrome.

“Mama, the family in the next cave have their own baby hyena.”

“Really? Tell your dad to go out and get a full-sized wolf.”

The family dog then became a thing – and now pet ownership is growing in every country.

My Japan correspondent claimed that his country takes this to the ultimate extreme.

The latest fad in the Land of the Rising Sun is full-scale funerals for pets. The bereaved family pays according to weight.

A regular 20-kilo dog is 114,800 (about RM4,310), but a Chihuahua weighing a kilo is only 15,000 (RM563).

But wait. My correspondent from America, Dan Hill, argued that his countrymen are ahead in the Insanity Over Pets category.

The US government has issued a new official classification for dogs: “Emotional Support Animal”.

This gives any dog all the rights of a blind person’s guide dog, except the dog doesn’t need to be trained, and the owner doesn’t need to be blind, just ‘emotionally fragile’.

Since every American is emotionally fragile, apparently a legal requirement for citizenship, dogs are now everywhere.

In a recent case, a woman boarded an aircraft to find four Emotional Support Animals on board. She was allergic to dogs.

“Although she had paid for her ticket, she was taken off the plane and the four Emotional Support Animals, whom airlines are not allowed to charge, travelled free,” said Dan.

A late entry for the Most Extreme Pet Lovers title came from the UK.

A man there found a tattoo on the dog he adopted from a shelter. Believing that a cruel previous owner had tattooed the dog, he got the same symbol tattooed onto his own arm as a gesture of solidarity.

It was only when he uploaded pictures onto the internet that he learned that those tattoos are put onto dogs by rescue services, and mean “testicles removed”.

Clearly, he should take his desire for solidarity a step further by actually getting neutered.

Meanwhile, my wife will exploit the new US policy if we ever go there. “I’d like to buy a regular air ticket for myself, and a free-of-charge seat for my husband who is my Emotional Support Animal.”

Woof.