I originally joined Reddit in 2011, and in the beginning it was dominated by cat content. It was rare to see a post about dogs. Sometime in the mid 20-teens this phenomenon reversed. It’s always been a “pet theory” of mine that this reversal was due to Reddit becoming mainstream, and that it’s initial nerdy/techie user base preferred cats to dogs.
I think my theory is further supported by Lemmy. It’s pretty clear that most of Lemmy’s user base are techies, and currently it’s dominated by cat content. Just a shower thought. May be wrong.
NOTE: I love dogs and cats. This post isn’t arguing favoritism.
Comments like this demonstrate how people just don’t understand cats.
If you don’t bond with your cat that is a YOU problem. You are doing something very wrong.
Dogs can be just as destructive if not more destructive than cats.
I think ultimately you lack experience and have never had your own cat.
I think it’s great that you love dogs so much, but every single person I’ve ever met who thinks dogs are flat out better than cats are people who always lack experience and don’t actually know any better because they are ignorant and won’t accept anything else.
I don’t think he’s saying they’re better, he’s saying it’s a preference thing and he prefers dogs because you can bond more with them.
Cats are way easier to take care of because they don’t need as much attention, which makes them better for a lot of people
Yeah, that’s not just a preference.
That’s not my comment, genius…️
I thought you cat people were supposed to be the tech guys! How come so many of you can’t even keep track of who you’re arguing with here!?
It’s because their minds are riddled with toxoplasma gondii, obviously
Did you respond to the right user?..
I have had cats in my household when I was a kid before my allergies presented. I’ve been around cats a lot (wearing a mask) as many of my family has them.
Maybe you should refrain from pre-judging me and jumping to conclusions. I’ve cited the claims I’ve made above. Whether you want to believe it or not, dogs are capable of understanding human body language better than cats, or any other species on our planet. I value that deep level level of connection, which definitively exists.
Cats are like a mirror. If you love cats, they will give you love back. If you respect them, they will respect your boundaries. If you’re strict with them and want them to respect you just for being their owner, they will look at you like wtf and won’t care about you at all. If you mistreat them once, they’ll remember.
I agree with everything you’re saying. I responded to a user hating on cats telling them not all cats are like that. But because I shared scientific information about dogs/domestication, people are responding to me like I’m the user who was hating on cats.
I love cats. I am just severely allergic to them and admittedly have a preference for dogs. I also acknowledge science and anthropology. Apparently some people are just biased and only capable of emotional reasoning in the face of information they don’t like. I was not saying dogs are an objectively better pet; that is down to subjective individual preference. But dogs having a greater ability to read human body language than cats is supported by overwhelming scientific evidence. I personally value that in particular. It doesn’t make them the best pet for everyone tho.
I just find that subject fascinating and wanted to share. Crazy cat people can stop acting like I hate cats now… Talk about blinded by emotions…
This thread right here is the reason I think that Lemmy users can be just as toxic as Redditors, They are just dealing with folks now that they disagree with.
For sure… but I think the percentage of extremely toxic users (e.g., racist trolls) on Lemmy pales in comparison to reddit. But this sort of defensive emotional arguing transcends social media and is so pervasive in our societies now…
People have grown conditioned to segregating themselves into echo-chamers thru various social media over the last 2 decades. But I see that in the real world now (in the US) in work settings, families, fucking beer brands…
We have grown to insulate ourselves from opinions and information we don’t like. We’re conditioned to believe that disagreement in conversation is a bad thing and unhealthy. We have grown to both struggle to differentiate opinion from fact, and to internalize our opinions/beliefs so deeply ingrained into our personality, that we interpret any challenges to our beliefs as a personal attack.
This makes dissenting on the most trivial issues immediately devolve into emotional reasoning, personal attacks, and just toxic behavior… Our society needs to deprogram the dysfunctional thinking instilled in us largely thru social media. Our levels of empathy in our societies have deteriorated in conjunction with the growth of social media into what it is today.
I don’t know how we change this when it’s so pervasive throughout our world… I guess acknowledging the problem exists is a start…
Completely agree on all points. I think that cities dealt with this quite a bit early on as they grew and they largely have not solved internal conflicts outside of causing people to leave and go to other cities/areas. If we cannot solve it or mitigate it in real life outside of creating dedicated spaces, how can we get after it virtually? Maybe there are some lessons learned from real life that would be easier to implement on the internet.