I can still remember that in our English grammar books in first grade, there was a chapter on pronouns. We learned that you use “he and him” for male and “she and her” for female. “They and them” were used for multiple people or objects regardless of their gender. But I also remember that the pronoun taught to us to be used for an animal such as a dog or a cat was “it.” The same pronoun was used for inanimate objects too. This was as clear to me as all the other pronouns and I may have used “it” for animals hundreds of times without even giving it an extra thought.
After moving to America, for the first time I got to experience English as the first language. Because of having formally learned the English language in school and being very familiar with the American accent from Hollywood movies, I felt entirely comfortable speaking this language in my daily life. Some immigrant friends felt the need to acquire an “American accent” and tried hard to sound American but I never understood the significance of striving to do so since I believe that your accent should reflect where you are born and raised regardless of the language that you are speaking.
Other than language differences, there were a lot of aspects of life that were different between the two countries. One thing was the attitude towards pets in general and dogs in particular. In Pakistan, very few households have dogs as pets. Even if there is a dog in the house, it is kept outdoors since there is a general religious perception that a dog is “unclean” and if you have touched a dog, you cannot pray. It is generally believed that a dog should only be kept as a pet either for watchkeeping or hunting but not for any other reason. My grandfather had two dogs, Leo and Doozer, a handsome German Shepherd and a cute Coker Spaniel. They used to live outdoors and most other people in the household rarely had any physical contact with them. If by chance, any of them got even close to my mom or aunt, they would start panicking and rush to go and take a shower and a change of clothes to “cleanse” themselves before it was time for the next prayer.
The situation I found was completely different in America. Dogs are considered to be family members and given as much love and care as children if not more. Dogs live indoors and use the same couches and beds as other family members. They get better medical care than most humans in poor countries do and eat better quality food than a majority of the indigent human population in the world. They have rights and prerogatives. Their feelings and emotions matter. Their birthdays are celebrated and their deaths are lamented. Even the “bumper sticker family” on cars includes them right next to children. Dog owners are called dog moms or dog dads.
A couple of years ago, I received a work-related email from a colleague. Under his signature was an additional line that just said, “him/his/he.” I had never seen pronouns listed with a signature so I asked him what it meant. He told me that this is a new movement to recognize the right of transgender people who may biologically belong to one sex but psychologically identify as the other. In other words, you could have been born with male genital organs but want to be called a woman or the other way around. I thanked him for informing me and totally respected this idea. I said to myself that I’m not one to judge anybody’s right to self-determination and I will respect a person’s wishes who wants to be called by a certain pronoun. In later months, I saw a movement against this movement from those people who were opposed to transgenderism in any shape or form. Like so many other controversial issues in life, both sides have strong opinions and people with extreme views keep clashing with each other.
A couple of weeks ago, I was in a park enjoying an unseasonably pleasant evening. I had found a nice spot on the grass and was sitting there soaking up the sun and reading an engaging book. I was having a refreshing iced tea that I kept to my side between sips. An elderly lady passed by and she had the cutest puppy that was hopping around and was becoming the object of attention of anybody that was around in the park at that time. The puppy jumped close to me and started licking at the straw of my iced tea. The lady quickly jumped forward and apologized to me and pulled on the puppy’s leash.
I wanted to say, “Don’t worry, that’s OK. It must be thirsty.”
Although I had thought of these words to say in my mind, I hesitated because I could not bring myself to address the puppy by the pronoun “it.” The puppy was like the lady’s child and how would one feel if rather than asking if it’s a boy or a girl, you call someone’s child “it?”
At that moment, I tried to make the best estimate of what the gender of the puppy might be. It appeared nice and pretty. The colors were brown and black. The nose was cute and the face was adorable but for the life of me, I could not guess the gender of the puppy. It could have been a male or a female. The genitals were not easily visible as it was happily hopping around. I had to assign a gender and say something so I just went with my instinct and said, “It’s OK, she must be thirsty.” The lady responded, “Sorry about that. He is just being impatient here. He is really enjoying the weather and has been running around a lot and that’s why he is trying to drink anything that is coming his way!”
They both left but I was left with an uneasy feeling that I used the wrong pronoun for the puppy. What if the lady did not like that I had used the wrong pronoun for the puppy? She must be thinking that I made an assumption based on the puppy’s appearance which I should not have. Maybe I should have used “it” for the puppy but that would have been even worse. After all, he was a puppy and not a lifeless toy. What if the puppy understood what was going on and got offended? Does it really matter?
We all know that dogs have feelings. They cry, and they frown. They feel pain; you can see it in their eyes. They get upset and angry. They smile and get excited when they see their owner-parent at the end of a long day when they come home from work. Do dogs also feel embarrassed or offended if they are addressed with the “wrong” pronoun? If we care about all the rest of their feelings and emotions, should we also care about trying to know what their pronouns are?
When it comes to humans, if you ask a transgender person’s parents, many of them will tell you that their children behaved in a transgender manner even before they developed a conscious thought process. Dog parents could perhaps say the same about the puppies and they would have an idea of the gender their dog-child identifies as.
In a world where human transgenderism still faces profound hostility, would it be all so crazy if the next time I meet a dog in a park or at the vet’s office, I ask the owner, “What are your dog’s pronouns?”