On a day when the UK celebrates its love of cats, dogs and all the other nonhuman animals we bring into our homes and commonly refer to as ‘pets’, Claire Hamlett explains how through words and actions she respects the boundaries and agency of her two four-legged companions.

On National Pet Day, first thing’s first: here at Surge we dislike the term ‘pet’. We call our animals our companions, and we their guardians or caregivers. Legally, this makes no difference. My two dogs are my property, according to the law, regardless of what terms I use to describe my relationship with them. But morally and practically how I view this relationship matters a great deal. To think of our animals as our ‘pets’ implies not only ownership but also something frivolous; indeed, it likely has roots in the word ‘petty’, and was historically used to mean “domesticated or tamed animal kept as a favourite”, suggesting the animal would have been subject to the whims and changing preferences of the owner. ‘Companion’, by contrast, implies a two-way relationship, friendship, and equality.

This isn’t just about treating an animal ‘well’. Many people spend lots of money on luxuries for or pampering their animals, for example, but whether these things increase the animal’s well-being is questionable. Many other people also need to be told some quite basic things about how to treat animals well; take Germany’s recently introduced law, for instance, which stipulates that dogs must be given a minimum of two walks a day totalling at least one hour. Beyond meeting basic needs or ‘spoiling’ our animals, what it means to live with them as companions, and which is much harder to do, is to prioritise their interests, taking cues from them as to what those interests are and how they are best fulfilled.

My understanding of what this actually requires has been evolving since I adopted my dog Leela five years ago, and my second dog Arlo in 2020. I by no means get this right all of the time, but I do work hard to be guided by their agency as individuals. Some examples: letting them lead our walks - or rather, letting Leela lead since Arlo is happy to follow her - or deciding whether they want a walk at all. Paying attention to whether something is making them unhappy (people randomly trying to pet them, e.g.), or making myself available for play if they pick up a toy or a stick. Putting forming a bond with them above teaching them to obey commands (the latter, for us, has come more easily after working on the former). This may sound obvious, but it’s a matter of sustained, daily practices of attending and responding, which can be difficult when there are competing claims on your time and energy and meeting your animal’s basic needs can sometimes feel like a matter of checking items off a list.

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Of course, certain companion animals require some training, but even that can be too human-centric. Because of the way our societies function, companion animals are required to fit into environments and situations that frequently limit their agency, and conform to social norms that are imposed on them by another species. But who they are can get lost in this effort to make them fit these moulds. “If we are frequently deciding the behaviours we want them to learn and then teaching them, where are their voices in the process?” writes Dr Risë VanFleet, who works in animal-assisted play therapy in a blog post. “Do they get to choose the behaviour or simply react to our training process? Do we stop and listen to what they want, even if it’s not quite what we had in mind, at least some of the time?”

Here it is worth pulling back to acknowledge a lot of unspoken assumptions about even having a companion animal in the first place. Even if we as caregivers can enable their agency and learn to attend carefully to their preferences, not all animals ought to be companions. While we ought to give homes to domesticated animals who end up in shelters, as animal rights theorists like Gary Francione argue, we ought not to breed and sell them. Moreover, many species that are not domesticated wind up as companions - or perhaps more accurately, as pets - thanks to trade in ‘exotic’ animals. 

The penchant for keeping exotic animals as pets, such as big cats, in America has received more public attention in recent years after the Netflix documentary Tiger King. But here in the UK, there is also an exotic pet trade that sees many animals unsuited to captivity being kept by people who can’t always adequately provide for their quite specific needs. Reptiles are the most common of these, and indeed the country’s largest reptile market has been held for years in Doncaster - though this is set to end after Doncaster Council decided last week to no longer allow it. 

While some people no doubt love their snakes and tarantulas as dearly as others love their dogs and cats, it’s hard to imagine how the agency of these animals can be properly respected when they are often subject to even more restrictions than our mammalian companions due, for example, to the risks of them escaping into the wild. We should do what we can both to avoid the commodification of animals and bringing any more species into domestic settings, especially those that may not thrive under such conditions. 

So for National Pet Companion Animal Day, let’s think not just of why we love our animals, but also about how and whether our relationship with them can truly be one of companionship and reciprocation.

Claire Hamlett is a freelance journalist, writer and regular contributor at Surge. Based in Oxford, UK, Claire tells stories that challenge systemic exploitation of and disregard for animals and the environment and that point to a better way of doing things.

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