I Am My Dog’s… What Exactly?

Legally, a dog is property, and the human who acquires the dog (whether by purchase, trade, adoption or owning the bitch) is the owner.  The owner is responsible for any damage his or her property might cause, and because a dog is alive, ownership also has responsibilities, such as dog registration, and providing food and shelter.  While ownership can be accompanied by pride, emotional attachment to property is generally proportional with its purchase price.  Not so in the dog-human relationship.  Most people love the dogs they own.  To them the term “owner” limits the relationship and denigrates the dog to one of an object of trade.  A dog is worth more than the monetary investment made at date of acquisition.  

The human who owns a dog is often described as a dog’s Master.  This term implies not only ownership (historically) of another living creature, but also identifies the person in charge, the one who issues the orders.  While leadership should certainly never go to the dogs, some people again hesitate to use the term Master to define themselves.  The connotations of slave ownership are distasteful to them.  

Pack leader, alpha, top dog – are terms that were borne out of the misunderstood pack structure in wolves.  The terms do not apply to dog packs, where terms like hierarchy and dominance behavior have no real meaning.  A group of dogs is still called a pack, but dogs are not merely tame wolves, and their behavior in a group differs from wolves.  Further wolf pack structure was misunderstood, and continued studies are casting new light on the interactions and complexities of social behavior.  

The word that comes close to defining most relationships between people and dogs is that of “parent”.  A parent has legal responsibilities toward his or her dependents, has emotional ties with his or her offspring, should provide the basic necessities of food, shelter and medical care, is responsible for education of the minor, and a parent makes the decisions, sets the rules, while the child is supposed to obey them.  

But dogs are not child substitutes, nor does keeping a dog qualify a human for parenthood.  Often dogs are companions, partners, or buddies, more than would be advisable for children to be.  Parents usually shelter their children from their emotions and worries.  Most dog owners share those freely with their dogs, and while they cannot understand the words, they surely respond to the feelings.  

A parent’s primary obligation is to raise children to become adults.  This is of course not applicable when the dependents are of the canine variety.  Dogs can never reach maturity or be emancipated in the legal sense.  

A word that implies legal caretaker, responsibilities of a parent, but without defined end point, is guardian.  A guardian usually takes on the role voluntarily, and provides for his or her charges indefinitely.  The relationship can have an emotional component, is certainly accompanied by obligations and responsibilities, denotes leadership, and yet it lacks the connotation that dogs are substitutes for children.  

Thus I have assumed guardianship over my canine wards.  I am their guardian.  They are my guard dogs.