No Thoughts, Head Empty

 So I remembered what I wanted to write about yesterday! There is a new meme among cute animal appreciators, which is to say things like, “No thoughts, head empty,” or “There is not one thought in that head,” or “He has only one thought, eat.” when referring to goofy looking animals. This is especially common for some reason on appreciators of crested geckos and ball pythons, I find, but most reptiles, all but the most threatening looking dogs, some cats, and honestly really any animal at all can be accused of this.

This is pretty much exclusively used by people who appreciate animals, but in particular people who appreciate them primarily for their cuteness. I also often see it overlapping with behaviors that I would terms dismissive of considerations of an animals rights as a sentient being. I use sentient here to mean “a conscious being capable of feeling things” not “self aware and of comparable intelligence to humans.” It can technically mean either and I usually mean it the second way, but here I only am asserting the first. It seems plainly obvious to to me that all vertebrates at the very least (I’d probably say all animals with a nervous system to be honest or even just all life but I’m deliberately hedging here a bit on my actual beliefs to be more scientifically justified) can feel things and make decisions, even if those emotions and how they make those decisions may not be the same or as complex as ours. This is also simply logical and common sense if you believe in evolution - our intelligence and self-awareness likely developed over time, and thus vertebrates, who are all fairly closely related to us in the grand scheme of things and all have advanced nervous systems have at least somewhat similar methods of experiencing the world, and if they seem to react to stimuli in a similar way to humans do its reasonable to assume they experience something similar to what we do, even if not identical.

So when I say they are dismissive of an animals rights as a sentient being, what I mean is when they interact with an animal, they don’t worry about what the animal is feeling and assume the animal will forget any interaction and not hold a grudge. Squishing an animals face to make it look cuter. Scaring an animal on purpose because its reacts funny, like hyperactive dogs or hognose snakes playing dead or cobras displaying or baby snakes biting and hissing. Splashing an animal with water to see what will happen. Generally a casual disregard for how the animal experiences its world and what it might think about how you treat it. These people usually aren’t outright cruel or harming animals - they are animal lovers, after all, but they think animals lack internality and thus treat them as objects. Objects they love, but objects.

Animals are not objects. You can establish a relationship of trust with any vertebrate over time. I’ve done it. I honestly think the same is true for most animals, and while I do not think it is possible to truly establish such a relationship with plants or fungus or bacteria, that is only because of the difficulty communicating, and that it makes sense to respect them as well and not intentionally disregard their likely preferences. This does not mean we cannot harm them if we must - we have to eat something to survive, plants or animals or both, after all, nor does it mean we should not make them uncomfortable if its for their best - our dogs surely would prefer to run free across the towns, but we leash them and fence them because if we did not they might be killed by cars, wildlife, or dog-hostile neighbors - we are more intelligent and their caretakers, after all, but we should keep in mind that they have minds too, and make sure we do not inflict harm or annoyance unnecessarily, so we can coexist with a relationship of mutual trust and respect.

I should maybe also say that although this behavior annoys me, I don’t necessarily think people like this are bad people. Some of my favorite youtubers, Snake Discovery do this regularly, and they certainly know better and show it at other times - but they do also engage in some behaviors objectifying their animals. I know they are good people and would like them to do better, but they are still in like the to 90% of people who love and respect animals, so the fact I disagree slightly on how they handle some things shouldn’t erase that. But like, it’d be nice if we moved off this trend and towards a more respectful tone to animals.

Geckos have several thoughts.