Dogs are better than women. Cats are better than men. Or flip the genders and insert your mammal of choice — cats, horses, rabbits, ferrets, pigs, monkeys, whatever. I will talk about dogs, because it’s what I know. Most of what I say will apply to other pets, too. Since I’m a guy, I’ll be talking about how dogs are better than female romantic partners. If you’re a woman reading this, just substitute men, and most of what I say will fit.
My point is that pets have many advantages over romantic partners. Sure, they have some downsides, too — for example, you can’t have sex with your dog (well, you can, but I wouldn’t recommend it), and you can’t have deep conversations with your dog (well, you can, but it would be rather one-sided). Let’s put that aside and focus on the ways pets beat companions beat the opposite sex.
Simple
The first thing I would point out is that romantic relationships are complicated, because they involve human beings, who are complicated. You’ve got gender issues, interpersonal communication issues, insecurities, defenses, job stress, money issues, and all the rest.
But animals are simple. Keep your life simple and uncluttered. An animal is a low-complication companion.
Living Alone without Feeling Alone
I never really liked living with other human beings in the same house. It always felt cramped. I wanted my own space. So I prefer to live alone — and yet, not completely alone, because the house feels too empty that way, too isolated. I need some life in the house besides just me. Houseplants don’t cut it. An animal companion — a dog, in my case — is the ideal solution.
Animals allow you to have your own space, but without feeling isolated.
No Ego, No Performance
There are two difficulties when you’re in a romantic relationship. Well, there are more than two, but let’s just focus on these two for the moment. First, people have egos — self-esteem concerns, image and reputation concerns, concerns with how they are seen by others. Second, romantic relationships require performance, particularly for men. If you are a boyfriend or husband, there are certain prescribed requirements of that role — e.g., provider, protector, initiator, shoulder to cry on, validator — and if you don’t enact those role requirements, the relationship will fizzle.
Both of those dynamics constrain your behavior in relationships. With regard to ego, couples learn to communicate in ways that support and validate each other, sidestep both their insecurities. Even their thoughts come into alignment, a process I call “couplethink,” where they come to share similar views over time and suppress contrary views.
With regard to performance, men learn to play the role and to prune their personality. I would describe many of my married male friends as “domesticated.” Tamed. Trained. They have learned how to act around their wives and, by extension, other women. This is one reason that married men appeal to women: they have been broken in; they know how to enact the proper role, vis a vis women. I don’t think the men are aware of this — they’ve been enacting the role so long, it’s ingrained and unconscious — but it seems obvious from the outside.
With an animal, you have neither of these constraints to contend with. An animal does not stir up the public self-consciousness that ego concerns rest on. For instance, you don’t care what your dog thinks about how you look. Likewise, you don’t have to enact a role performance for an animal. Sure, there are minimal requirements — food, water, affection — but nothing akin to the requirements with a woman. You can be complete self. The animal is domesticated, not you.
Control
I like being in control. I can put a leash on my dog and pull him wherever I want to go. Most women frown on that. No, actually, I’ve got no interest in controlling others. But I do want to be in control of my own life. I want to chart my own course, call my own shots. You inevitably sacrifice some level of self-direction in a long-term romantic relationship. You negotiate; you compromise. You give up some things you’d like to do for the sake of other things you’d rather not do. That’s part of the price of being in a relationship: you surrender some degree of control over your life.
Animals don’t require that sort of compromise. Sure, there are times I take my dog for a walk when I don’t feel like it. But that’s small potatoes compared to the concessions you make in a romantic relationship. Pets allow you to maintain control of your life.
Reliable Affection and Loyalty
If having a soul means being able to feel love and loyalty and gratitude, then animals are better off than a lot of humans.
James Herriot
Dogs are known as “man’s best friend,” and it’s no accident. They are always happy to see you, even if you’ve only been away ten minutes.
Fact is, romantic love is highly conditional. It depends on the performance standards I mentioned above, as well as others (e.g., looks, status, generosity, parental investment). It is not difficult to lose a woman’s love. Look at the divorce statistics, for instance: women initiate about 80% of divorces, 90% if they are college educated. Or look at the infidelity statistics, where women’s rate of cheating runs about 50% (this is based on self-report, so the actual figure is probably higher).
A dog’s love is not quite unconditional, but it is pretty close. There’s an old joke. Lock your wife and dog in the trunk and leave them there for half an hour. Then let them out and see which one is happy to see you.
If you have the love of a dog, that love is locked in for life. There is very little you can do to shake it. I assume the same is true for cats and other animal companions.
With a pet, love is nearly unconditional, and loyalty is virtually guaranteed. With a romantic partner, love is highly conditional, and it’s basically a coin toss whether it will hold.
Peace and Quiet
Cats don’t run the TV. Dogs don’t yap on their cellphones. Gerbils don’t play music. Horses make idle chit-chat. They sit there quietly.
I love the quiet companionship of a dog. I hear an occasional bark, but that’s about it.
It’s Much Easier to Find a Good Fit
It’s much easier to find a good fit with a pet than with a romantic partner. The reason is straightforward enough: we have many more criteria for a human partner than a pet. When selecting a long-term, serious romantic partner, we evaluate them for the basics like age and physical attraction, but we also consider a range of other criteria — personality, common interests, lifestyle, values, emotional maturity, worldview (politics, religion, etc.).
It can be tough to find a good match sometimes. For instance, I once calculated the odds of finding a good “fit” for myself in my local area. The result was a 1 in 1000 chance of finding one such woman in my area. Note, that only included my criteria; it didn’t even account for hers. The odds of us both agreeing would be absurdly miniscule.
Now, that’s just me. I don’t mean to imply that your odds are that low. I’m an odd bird, and that makes my odds longer. Your odds may be better. But it can still be tough to find a good match.
None of this obtains with an animal, though. You don’t have to worry about physical attraction, lifestyle, core values, common interests, politics or spiritual beliefs. It’s a much simpler process. You take a few factors into account — age, temperament, breed, and activity level — but that’s about it. It usually doesn’t take more than a few months to find a match, a friend for life. I wish I could say the same about romantic partners.
The odds of finding a good fit with a pet are much better than finding one with romantic partner.
If there are no dogs in Heaven, then when I die, I want to go where they went.
Will Rogers
Emotional Damage
You may have noticed, people can be real assholes sometimes, especially in romantic relationships — controlling, critical, judgmental, shaming, belittling, and neglectful. In some cases, they can be physically abusive, financially ruinous, or bent on destroying your career and reputation.
There are plenty of crazy people out there looking for love — borderlines, narcissists, sociopaths, people with unresolved trauma, addicts of all sorts, people with severe mood or anxiety problems, liars, manipulators, and users. Getting involved with any of these types can make your life miserable. Note that one out of four women in the US are on psychiatric medications. While I’m not saying this makes them “crazy” (sometimes, psychiatric medication is necessary), it is an indication of how common emotional disturbance is in women.
If you stick to animals, you avoid the crazy. Emotional disturbance is rare in animals. A dog won’t nag or verbally abuse you. A cat won’t divorce you, take half your stuff, and alienate you from your children. A horse won’t cheat on you. A rabbit won’t file a false sexual assault charge against you. A weasel won’t lie to you (well, he might — he is a weasel, after all).
Everyone needs to take risks in life, but the risks should be intelligent ones, not ones based on hormones and emotions. If you tally up the risks, animals pose a lot less of them than women.
Cheaper than a Kid
Raising a child from 0 to 17 will run you $310,000. That’s an underestimate, because it doesn’t include the costs of college and the costs of feeding and housing the kid if they live with you beyond 17, which most do. A more realistic estimate would be $400K.
A dog, on the other hand, will run you about 1K a year, maybe 2. Over an average lifespan, let’s say that’s 18K. So, 400K vs. 18K. A dog is 5% the cost of a kid. Cats and other animals are cheaper still.
I know I’m being crass and materialistic, but it’s one advantage to consider. You save a lot of money.
Cheaper than a Girlfriend and Wife, Too
Let’s continue our crass, materialistic analysis. I estimated the cost of a girlfriend once. It came out to about 6K a year. I’m including clothes, regular dining out, entertainment, dating app costs, transportation, gifts, and the occasional vacation. That was nearly ten years ago, so it’s probably above 7K now. That’s just my estimate; your own cost depends on the girlfriend and lifestyle.
How much does a wife cost? Well, it depends where you order her from. But seriously, my very rough estimate is that your average wife costs about 100K over the course of the marriage. I’m including costs such as everything under the girlfriend tab plus the wedding, a bigger and nicer house, nicer furnishings, extra payments for cleaning and lawn maintenance that you wouldn’t have bothered with otherwise, vacations, anniversary and other gifts. Then add 50K for the divorce.
Those are just my rough estimates, but they suggest that a dog is 14% the price of a girlfriend and 8% the price of a wife. What a bargain. Think of all the money you saved, and what you can do with it instead. Now go buy Rover something nice.
No Baggage
Women on the dating market (and men, too, to be fair) have a lot of baggage. They’ve been on the singles market for many years. A lot of water has passed under that bridge. As they get older, their baggage carts get stacked to overflowing. They seem friendly and open at first, but eventually, the jadedness and cynicism shows.
I understand. They have had a long series of failed relationships with men, none of which have worked out or else they wouldn’t be here (unless widowed). When they are mistrustful, guarded, and suspicious, I’m not surprised. When they project on to me their past disappointments, I am not offended. It is tiring, though, to be on the receiving end of those projections. I don’t have much baggage myself, because I spent most of my life outside romantic relationships, not cycling in and out of relationships on the dating market, so it feels like a drag to me, to have to deal with other people’s overflowing baggage carts.
But animals don’t have baggage. Ok, maybe if they are older dogs adopted from a shelter (as mine are), they have one suitcase, but that is pretty easily unpacked. Even when they’ve been hurt and disappointed, animals are remarkably resilient in their ability to trust and love again.
I could say more, but that’s enough. Some of you may do fine without an animal companion, and that’s great. For me, they are an essential part of a contented bachelor life.