Dogs are not people, does anyone else find it weird how some seem to equate the two?

[Hekate]

278. "I wish I was the man my dog thinks I am"

That's an old saying I read in childhood, and can't track the origin down now for attribution.

It's not too much to say that humans created the dog, and according to human needs -- that is, from the time that "dog" DNA separated from "wolf" DNA has been up to 100,000 years ago. That's further back than any other domesticated animal.

Humans and dogs as species have evolved together in the same households for a long, long time, influencing each other's behavior even as the human part of the equation dominated the breeding of dogs for specific tasks useful to the humans. A well-trained dog will do just about anything its master asks of it.

Unlike wolves, dog's faces have expressions that mirror ours, and that is not just an anthropomorphic fantasy. Dogs also carefully watch their owner's facial expressions and body language, and are attuned to their emotions. This is science.

Emotionally, they are the only member of any household that gives unconditional love and loyalty. This is of tremendous psychological importance to any dog-owner, no matter how socially-connected that person is. Unconditional love is available almost nowhere else.

You may think that some dog owners go overboard, and that their expressions of sentiment are not to your taste, but an inter-species relationship that goes back nearly 100,000 years isn't "whacked out" -- it's practically symbiotic. Not everyone gets it, not everyone needs to, and no one is required to.

Personally, I raised two human kids to adulthood, and never considered my various dogs as being my children. But over time I have recognized that dogs are people -- not human being people, but people nonetheless -- and we owe them much.

"If you want a friend in Washington, get a dog." Harry S. Truman