Absolutely not! Prejudice, unfortunately, is a human trait and in my experience, can be passed down through generations. This morning I was reading about multi-racial couples and their struggles in the 1960’s. These individuals, for the most part, are still together after all of these years, while others have lost their spouse to death. It was against the law to marry someone outside of your own race in those days. I grew up in the 70’s in a segregated part of town; it was a rough neighborhood, but we always felt safe. I have mentioned this in past blogs, but I’ll mention this again; I am multi-racial. We felt safe until we had to join the other community children in our ONLY junior high school across town. This was stressful. The kids we grew up with in elementary school never really associated with the “new kids”, but we always hung out together until we graduated high school and, for the most part, we lost touch and went our separate ways. Once I left our small community, it was freeing but still terrifying. Did I still experience prejudice? Of course I did, and still do. However, not like I remembered as a child. So why are we wanting this younger generation to be a part of, American History that was horrible? Why are we wanting to perpetuate hate not only into our children but our pets too. In a nutshell, that way of thinking was based in hate, and control.
There has been discussion for a number of years regarding black dogs and their struggle to get adopted out mainly because they are black. This is called Black Dog Syndrome, (BDS). Some individuals (ASPCA), have said this isn't based on their color but the population of black dogs, is far greater than those of other color. So this stands to reason why there would be more black dogs in shelters. I think it's also due to the face and eyes being dark and people might not be able to "trust" the dog if they can't have a good view of their (dog) eyes. I don't believe this is a "thing" but another way to divide and control the populous.
In an article available at https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/what-colors-do-dogs-see/, “Humans on TikTok are using a dog vision filter to help answer this question. With the filter on, you’ll see the world in shades of blue, yellow and gray—the only colors your pup can perceive.” However, most scientists disagree with this theory. How useful is it, if our dogs can only see these colors, it isn’t?
I raised our daughters to understand that dogs don’t care what color we are. However, they will judge you from the inside out. So why do we get so hung up on color when it’s our dogs? Again, in my opinion, it’s because we want to control the other person. Do we want them (dogs) to judge from the outside in? Like many humans today? Dogs are more honest than humans, and we should be happy our animals love us despite of what they hear, smell, and see in us!
Three years ago when one of our Bordoodle families was picking up their puppy. They shared with me that one of their dogs didn’t like black people, and they liked it that way. I believe the dog was encouraged to “not like black people.” Unfortunately, I hadn’t heard this during the application process or I would NOT have sold our puppy to them. This is disgraceful. When seemly sweet dogs appear to be wary of a person, black, white, yellow etc., it’s because they sense something that they perceive as a threat - pure and simple!
In my experience, I have observed in Bronwyn that she can actually see blue (which most dogs can see), but she can also see red, and orange too. This is unusual. I believe it’s smell more so than vision. I will ask her to find the orange ball and she heads right to it. Is this because I labeled them? No-the balls are identical. Bronwyn however, can see them from a distance too, and will still retrieve the correct ball color.
I don’t know why I felt I needed to write on this topic, perhaps there is someone out there that might benefit from this today. Our furry family members don’t care how much money you have, how you smell, or look AND, they don’t care what color we are. So why are we asking them to judge others from the outside in?
Dogs, love without prejudices. Let us learn and appreciate how they view humans without the human lens of prejudice.
Happy Tails 🐾
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