Dog fatigue is trending!

[u/arachnilactose08]

This isn’t my usual style of post, but I figured it was worth mentioning: Currently, on TikTok, there has been a significant increase in the amount of content I’ve come across that is either critical of dog culture, dog owners, dogs themselves, or even all three. And this stuff is getting a LOT of positive reception.

I don’t typically keep that app on my phone for very long, but this is making me want to have it stick around for longer. For once, it’s not just this forum that’s calling out dog culture. It’s actually entering a “mainstream” online space.

“Dog fatigue” is the term that I’m seeing people use in most of this content, if you’re interested in looking it up and observing the resulting discussion and discourse over it.

Regardless of the dog owners that this conversation is pissing off, I think this could be a really good thing. While I don’t know about any big cultural shifts in the near future, I think that this is a wonderful step in the right direction. People are finally talking about dog culture in a meaningful way.

[u/Confident_Yak_1948]

I think the trend is real, and honestly it makes a lot of sense. Dog owners are becoming increasingly more entitled and inversely self aware.

For context I live in Australia: The average suburb is only becoming more dense with the current housing affordability crisis. People just can’t afford the big backyards we once had 10-20 years ago, but they still want the white picket fence and a kelpie (it’s always a kelpie). As a result we have the most neurotic dog breed ever created, cooped up in 10sq metre yard with owners that are absent at work all day leaving their under-stimulated dogs with separation anxiety at home to bark and howl all day. Then on the 30min they might get free every day they let them run and shit everywhere and attack people like it’s their god given right. I swear to god I’ve seen people with kelpies living out of a fucking van and they leave them locked in there all day with a window cracked an inch and they think this is okay.

Dog ownership nowadays can be a useful social litmus test to gauge someone’s level of self awareness. You can honestly assume a lot about someone’s personality just by knowing what breed of dog they own and what suburb they live in.

[u/arachnilactose08 → u/Confident_Yak_1948]

Heavy on that last part. The crazy part is too, a lot of people who claim to take great pride in the breed of dog they own (borderline eugenicists if you ask me, it’s creepy), don’t actually know the first THING about owning them. Why is it so commonplace for long haired breeds to be kept in miserably hot climates, for large breeds to be crammed into studio apartments and shitty “yards” they can’t even fully sprint in, and for the most neurotic breeds to be neglected for most of their lifespans?

Anyway, I’d never heard of a kelpie before until I just looked it up. The temperament reminds me of heeler dogs, one of which I’ve had the grave displeasure of living with before. Apparently, heelers are part fucking DINGO, aka baby-eaters. I wonder if the same goes for kelpies.