Americans love dogs.

, and practically all owners see pets as – 51% say pets belong “as much as a human member.” The pet industry keeps generating more and more jobs, , . Schools cannot keep up with .

It all seems part of what Mark Cushing, a lawyer and lobbyist for veterinary issues, calls “”: the more and more privileged place that pets occupy in American society. In his 2020 book “,” he argues that the internet has caused people to become more lonely, and this has made them focus more intensely on their pets – filling in for human relationships.

I would argue that something different is happening, however, particularly since the COVID-19 lockdown: Loving dogs has become an expression not of loneliness but of how unhappy many Americans are with society and other people.

In my own book, “,” I explore how today’s dog culture is more a symptom of our suffering as a society than a cure for it. Dogs aren’t just being used as a substitute for people. As a philosopher who studies the , I believe Americans are turning to dogs to alleviate . For some owners, dogs simply offer than other people do.

And I am no different. I live with three dogs, and my love for them has driven me to research the culture of dog ownership in an effort to understand myself and other humans better. , dogs are who can . But I believe many Americans are expecting their pets to address problems that they cannot fix.

Dogs over people

During the pandemic, people often struggled with the monotony of spending too much time cooped up with other humans – children, , roommates. Meanwhile, .

Rescuing shelter animals , and on social media people celebrated being at home with their pets. Dog content on Instagram and Pinterest now commonly includes hashtags like #DogsAreBetterThanPeople and .

“The more I learn about people, the more I like my dog” appears on merchandise , Amazon and Redbubble.

One that dog owners tend to rate their pets more highly than their human loved ones in several areas, such as companionship and support. They also experienced fewer negative interactions with their dogs than with the closest people in their lives, including children, romantic partners and relatives.

celebrated her 90th birthday with . She stated in an interview with Stephen Colbert that she preferred dogs to chimps, because .

Fraying fabric

This passion for dogs seems to be growing as America’s social fabric unravels – which .

In 1972, 46% of Americans said “.” By 2018, that percentage dropped to 34%. Americans than they used to, a phenomenon called the “,” and avoid having conversations with strangers because . People are .

Today, millennials make up the . Some cultural commentators argue dogs are especially important for this generation because other traditional markers of stability and adulthood – a mortgage, a child – or simply undesirable. According to the Harris Poll, a marketing research firm, 43% of Americans .

Amid those pressures, many people turn to the comfort of a pet – but the expectations for what dogs can bring to our lives are becoming increasingly unreasonable.

For some people, dogs are a way to feel loved, to relieve pressures to have kids, to fight the drudgery of their job, to reduce the stress of the rat race and to connect with the outdoors. Some expect pet ownership to improve their physical .

And it works, to a degree. Studies have found ” and than cat people. Interacting with pets can improve your health and may even offer some . Dog-training programs in prisons appear to .

Unreasonable expectations

But expecting that dogs will fill the social and emotional gaps in our lives is actually an obstacle to dogs’ flourishing, and human flourishing as well.

In philosophical terms, we could call this an extractive relationship: Humans are using dogs for their emotional labor, extracting things from them that they cannot get elsewhere or simply no longer wish to. Just like , extractive relationships eventually become unsustainable.

The late argued that the present stage of capitalism creates a dynamic called “,” a cycle in which “life building and the attrition of life are indistinguishable.” Keeping up is so exhausting that, in order to maintain that life, we need to do things that result in our slow degradation: Work becomes drudgery under , and the experience of dating suffers under the unhealthy .

Similarly, today’s dog culture is leading to unhealthy and unsustainable dynamics. Veterinarians are concerned that the rise of the “fur baby” lifestyle, in which people treat pets like human children, , as owners seek unnecessary veterinary care, tests and medications. Pets staying at home alone while owners work , which can cause and . And as the number of pets goes up, many people wind up giving up their animal, .

So what should be done? Some philosophers and activists advocate for , arguing that treating any animals as property is ethically indefensible.

This is a hard case to make – especially with dog lovers. Dogs were . They have evolved beside us , and are a central . Some scientists argue that , not the other way around.

Perhaps we can reconfigure aspects of home, family and society to be better for dogs and humans alike – and , for example. A world more focused on human thriving would be more focused on pets’ thriving, too. But that would make for a very different America than this one.