“In October, a meeting will shake up your life” : this is the slogan of the SPA, the animal protection society which, all this weekend, is opening its 63 shelters and presenting to you thousands of animals looking for a home. There are nearly 80 million pets in our country. One out of two French people owns at least one pet. It’s a lot. We talk about it with Jean Viard, sociologist and research director at the CNRS.
franceinfo: When did cats and dogs take up so much space in our lives?
John Viard: These animals, at the beginning, they were there for social utility. The Egyptians already had cats to prevent mice from eating wheat stocks. So animals came by utility: the guard dog, the herd guard dog, the hunting dog. And suddenly, these animals have been extremely selected for precisely a unique functionality. And the big problem we encounter if there are 100,000 abandoned dogs is that these dogs are chosen more for aesthetics than for the type of bond they want to have.
So those who are guard dogs, they bark. And they need to get out. There are dogs that are hunting dogs, they run, so they will run away. Each animal, in fact, has a skill, and many people are very surprised because they have an absolutely magnificent dog, but he does not obey when you want, he may not know how to ride in a car, etc., so it It’s complicated because the choice is made on aesthetics and what we create basically is a human bond. It’s as if we only chose our partners on aesthetics, that’s all there is, it’s a problem.
But how did these dogs get from the farm to our apartments?
In my family, for example, my godfather was a veterinarian, so it was a universe that I knew. But at the time, we only cared for animals that brought in money. My godfather took care of the cows, the horses, all that, the pigs, and the cats, the dogs were mongrels and we didn’t buy the animals! Now a dog is worth between 1000 and 2000 euros. So we moved on to a completely different society where we actually started to have a relationship with the animal, we brought it into the house, we almost made it, I was going to say a new child for some of us.
The French also spend more and more money on their pets, clothes, jewelry. He really became a full member of the family, is there a business around that?
Even without going that far, which is still a bit excessive, a dog is expensive, food, the vet is extremely expensive and now people systematically go to the vet. Again, I’m from a generation where we weren’t really familiar with that. We had animals that we hadn’t bought.
How did the animal become so important in homes?
I think it’s because we have moved away from rural and peasant life. So basically the animal that was simply in the field around the house, we brought it into the house. In a housing estate, there are no cows, there are no horses. So, there is no promiscuity between the farm and the other populations… That’s why we developed this relationship. But at the same time it’s good news, you have to see it as good news for a simple reason, it reminds us that we are an animal among others.
And what this pandemic has taught us is that it was an animal that gave the virus to another animal, which is to say a man, and it reminded us of that. We are one animal among others. And so our solidarity with animals goes back to the whole debate on vegans, the whole refusal of hunting, the whole debate on bullfighting. There is a whole evolution.
We were convinced in the West that the animal was not us. We were supermen, we were supernatural. And the animal, basically, was “the lower world”. And what is exciting right now is that the West is rediscovering that it is an animal among others. It is very positive in our relationship with nature, we are a link in the life of nature, and we have an enormous responsibility on the climate issue and we are all united to get out of it.
Do you have a pet?
I live in the countryside, you know. Today I have two dogs, cats, I have horses, sheep. I’m from the baba cool generation.
This weekend, the SPA opens its shelters. As a reminder, since October 1, you must sign a certificate of commitment when you buy or adopt a pet.