Sociology Essay

Animals

Analyse recent changes in the relationships people have with animals, drawing on Adrian Franklin’s ideas about changes in family life.

Introduction
In order to analyse recent changes in the relationship people have with animals there are a few changes in family life that can drawn on from Adrian Franklin. We can look at the new flexible family unit with various aspects of individualism. Family structures have also adapted within the many types of modern homes. Using Franklins views of ‘Ontological Insecurity’ that has developed in post modernity an analyses can be made of the change in western cultural perspectives toward animals, in particular pets. Also how animals have gone from being something just to eat or a working tool into something loved and protected by laws. As a developing and progressive civilisation, people have found ways to express their affections toward animals in a trusting and committed way that has been the consequence of diminishing human to human relationships. With a career focus for some family members and the many opportunities for sport, hobbies and other interests people have created families of individuals all trying to negotiate internal roles, affection and even time. In this emotionally unfulfilling environment, pets have been given more prominence and their emotional stability is the plug filling the emotional gaps.


History of Human Animal interaction
In tutor England people saw animals from the Christian perspective that they are here to serve humanity. They saw it in the same context as Adam and eve in the Garden of Eden. (Franklin, A. 1999 p11) In early modern England people lived in close proximity with animals, it was common in winter to live under the same roof (Franklin, A. 1999 p11). When people became more urban they no longer needed to “place a difference” with humans and animals with “rituals of separation” that where “brutal and cruel” (Franklin, A. 1999 p12). Now the culture of difference had already been established, people allowed themselves to have pets. They then started to see the old way of treating animals as bad. As society grew into an industrial world, under Fordism animals become a consumer item for capitalists to make profits. With experimental systems they introduce “chemical and hormone additives to fine tune animal health” (Franklin, A. 1999 p131). Animal’s movement is limited and they are taken out of their environments for cost cutting and more manageable “in order to improve yields and profits” (Franklin, A. 1999 p131). Some aspects of our history with animals can still be seen in some capitalist formations such as the meat preparation and farming industries. However also to come from Fordism was the higher incomes that workers could get and the average lifestyle got better. This allowed more working class people to afford pets (Franklin, A. 1999 p39). Since the 1960s pet keeping has become more prominent. A growing pet food and pet service industries show this. “In Britain the number of dogs rose by 66 per cent between 1963 and 1991”, a higher rate with cats, “with a 75% increase between 1963 and 1995” (Franklin, A. 1999 p89). Franklin also provides evidence of the rising amount of money spent on pets in the 1990s. This shows an increasing trend toward a more accepted and loving attitude toward their pets.

Animal Protectionists
There are extreme groups of animal rights campaigners who don’t eat meat and want to separate humans from animals to allow animals to have their own natural habitats and that they should be protected (Franklin, A. 1999 p32). With the change in the perspective about animals society has new ways to show care and attention, animal rights groups have pushed for laws and with advertising the realities of some ‘in-human’ aspects of modern capitalist treatment of animals, they have brought more public awareness and support for their causes. This has brought people from loving the animals in their homes to loving all animals. Treating animals like they have feelings and that as a dominant species we must protect them not hurt them. People see helping animals now as an “outlet for ‘good works’...”, “where humans form a cast of saviours, champions and heroes” (Franklin, A. 1999 p197)


Most people in post modernity are considered to have a ‘sentimental’ view of animals. They have had or currently have a pet, believe in the fair treatment of animals and they like activities related to animals, like the Zoo, safari parks, National parks and watching TV programs about animals, “they are most likely to eat meat, support a limited application of animals in scientific experimentation, be concerned about endangered species and have ambivalent feelings toward hunting” (Franklin, A. 1999 p32). Franklin shows in this how the majority of people have become balanced about animals.


Emotional Needs
Some feelings of tension between humans in modern families have helped to develop relationships with animals (Franklin, A. 1999 p5). As we have shifted our focus more onto our pets as part of the family we have also begun to accept them as having human rights within many homes, Animals are now being treated like they have the same rights as humans in many homes (Franklin, A. 1999 p5) “Animals are uniquely positioned relative to humans in that they are both like us but not us” (Franklin, A. 1999 p9). Our relationship with animals has grown because animals are more stable than human relationships, “they make long term bonds with their human companions; they rarely run off with others; they are almost always pleased to see ‘their’ humans; their apparent love is unconditional (and therefore secured) and they give the strong impression that they need humans as much as humans need them” (Franklin, A. 1999 p85). As they have proved their worth within the home of many kinds of family’s pets have become more important and treated more like they are humans. One of the signs that pets have become part of the family emotional system in post modernity is the higher rates of human names given to them in the UK and Australia and of personalised nick names they have in the US (Franklin, A. 1999 p95). Even rats can have human names and be seen as part of the family and treated as though they are human (Knight, J. 2005 p134).


As part of sustained pet involvement in modern homes relationships with pets and their owners have become “highly individualised and personal” (Franklin, A. 1999 p84), pets have become signifiers of a pet keeper’s image. Lap dogs for women and effeminate men, aggressive dogs for men displaying a ‘Tough guy’ image and traditional hunting breads have become popular family pets because of their intelligence and loyalty. The Rat has gone from being a disgusting beast to a pet that is loved and cared for. In its natural setting it is filthy and diseased. In its pet role it is clean and rewarding for some people (Knight, J. 2005 p119). Rats have a long history of being bread, with evidence of hobby rats as far back as the 1800s (Knight, J. 2005 p124). They are now a fairly common pet and reflect another type of Pet owner like Punks and Goths (Knight, J. 2005 p131). As people have lived longer with pets they have adopted them and present their pets with personalities and rights on an equal bar as humans. Their importance to the people they share homes with has evolved them into being more humanised. They are now more like a child who never grows up then an animal.


Practical implications of pets
Pets have become the playmate of an only child or children with working parents, a companion for the single person and part of therapy for the sick and infirm. Elderly people are able to feel more productive and have a purpose in their day if they have to get up and feed a cat or put him outside to go to the toilet, the cat will make noises until it gets what it wants. Pets also give the sick and infirm company. (Franklin, A. 1999) Elderly with pets can live longer than those who don’t. Pets can replace children in some families and can give an only child an emotional supportive companion. These animals can teach children interaction skills, how to care for another living creature. In some families animals are part of the entertainment for children, something to play in the park with and to help get kids away from the Television and gaming technology.


Conclusion
Western society has become more driven with careers, individual interests and a more flexible family unit has appeared. This has created an Ontological Insecurity in our society that has drawn people into closer relationships with animals (Franklin, A. 1999 pp194-195). As the decline of ontological security developed in late modernity pet numbers increased and people’s attachment to animal relationships grew more predominant. Family members have become more unreliable and less available in regards to many of the humans emotional craving. On the other hand animals are dependant and loving providing a child like attachment that fulfils the need for a reliable emotional bond. The need for a stable companionship and other “ordinary but significant embodied benefits-touch, someone to come home to, someone to doze with, cuddle, groom, feed, even clothe.” (Franklin, A. 1999 p195).













Bibliography
Franklin, A. (1999). ‘Pets and Modern Culture’. Animals and Modern Cultures. London: Thousand Oaks.

Franklin, A. (2006). Animal Nation: The True Story of Animals and Australia. Sydney: University of New South Wales Press.

Knight, J. (2005). Animals in Person: Cultural Perspectives on Human-Animal Intimacies. Oxford, New York: Berg.

Smith, N. (1999). ‘The howl and the pussy: feral cats and wild dogs in the Australian imagination’. Australian Journal of Anthropology, 10(3), 288-305.