I react to the idea that you would be “furious” if someone saved you, the man, at the expense of the dog. The assumption is that it’s a small nuclear family with mother and father and infant child, since nobody’s wearing identifying job title tags, and if nobody is able to extricate themselves, we might as well assume everyone is unconscious or otherwise unable to quickly and conveniently describe their relation to each other. Now, if the man really isn’t the child’s father (or father figure) and is anything from J. Random Hitchhiker to Drunk Uncle Joey, then sure, I’d say pull out the dog first if you feel you must, though my Women and Children First Order of Priority still lists dogs below humans, personally. I won’t judge if you apply your logic that way to a guy you are certain the infant is not largely reliant upon in a filial fashion. Not too harshly, anyway.
But absent any evidence indicating otherwise, I’m gonna assume the dude is the baby’s parent or guardian, and thus prioritize his rescue above the dog’s. Because even if I valued a dog’s life exactly as highly as I do any random human’s (and I don’t), the guy’s life-value would be greatly enhanced by his value to his child. And yeah, relatively few pets are as long-lasting, as vital, as precious to any person as a parent is. Especially when one is still an infant, with many years of utter parental dependency in the near future.
My point is: I think it’s foolish to be furious at a rescuer that pulled you out but didn’t save your dog first. You and your child owe that person a debt of gratitude, not only for saving your lives, but for making a choice that does not result in your kid growing up with a living dog that can never take the place of a dead father. And the reason I’ve been somewhat sharp in my defense of this point was this sentence:
Pets are not children. They are not morally or ethically interchangeable. If they were, your own order would have been listed as “baby or dog, whichever was most convenient, then the second of those two, then woman, then bloke.” Instead, you listed the dog third, not first or second.
So please refrain from saying that people who value human children somewhat differently than animal pets are too “inhumane” to have a valid opinion. I get that you love the animals in your life, which is a thoroughly laudable mindset. But I do believe it’s disingenuous to insist that dogs are “deserving of the same considerations” as our human children.
If nothing else, we don’t let our kids eat cat turds, and most of us don’t walk them around on leashes, either.
