I may be overreacting but i needed to vent about it.
I (27 M) have been dating my boyfriend (29 M) for about a year. He comes from a wealthy family and I come from a much poorer family. He’s fairly successful in tech industry and him and his family work very hard and deserve all the money they have. Our different upbringings have not caused any problems with us so far, but this situation irritates me.
He has an old dog who has many medical problems and he’s been able to keep him alive for much longer than any vet would ever have predicted. I’m happy about this because I love the dog, but my boyfriend has made some comments about how he doesn’t think people love their dogs as much as his family does and that’s why they live so long. I tried explaining to him that not everyone has the resources to pay for all the vet specialist visits and medication. He spends about 10-15k a year on this dogs medical treatment alone. He’ll usually just roll his eyes at me and talk about how much work her puts into his dogs health, which admittedly he does, but the whole topic just irritates me. It makes me think about the dogs that I’ve had in my childhood who we’ve had to put down because we couldn’t afford treatment, and my boyfriends comments make me wonder if he would think we just didn’t love our dogs as much.
He’s not usually like this. He’s down to earth, and generally very understanding and empathetic to less fortunate people, and I’ve never gotten the sense that he’s spoiled, but these comments really ticked me off and I’m thinking about confronting him about it.
TL;DR
My boyfriend thinks that other people don’t love their dogs as much as he loves his because they don’t pay thousands of dollars a year treating their medical problems and I find it to be an insensitive way of thinking about it.
Comments
I agree with you, normally people have to accept their pets death because it’s either that or pay 5k or more for a surgery that isn’t even guaranteed to work. And tons of people just don’t have the money for that. I guess he’s never been in a situation where he doesn’t have money, so he can’t fully understand it.
Lots of people work hard and aren’t wealthy.
If I were you, I’d use this as an opportune time to clarify what this means to you.
Also, in what ways could that insensitivity impact you and your own goals.
Why even make an issue out of this? You say he is very understanding and empathetic towards less fortunate people… I think the only reason the dog comments ticked you off is because they made you feel defensive. You assume his comments imply that you didn’t love your dogs as much. You don’t care about him acknowledging his privilege, you care about indirectly being judged by him
Honestly, I don’t entirely disagree with your bf. That doesn’t mean he’s not also privileged, but two things can be true. Being able to pay for expensive medical treatments for a pet is a privilege. It doesn’t change the fact that paying vet bills is part of having a pet, and must be taken into consideration, when deciding to have a pet. Nonetheless, most people don’t think it’s unethical to adopt a pet, without considering whether they can afford medical treatment.
Our society simply does not value the lives of animals. Poor people don’t euthanize their family members, when they get sick. It’s super true that a poor person is more likely to die from a treatable disease, because they can’t afford treatment. However, the “can’t afford it” threshold is dramatically lower for a pet. Many people would euthanize a pet who needed several hundred dollars worth of testing. If it was their own health, they’d borrow money, go into debt, and exhaust all options. Furthermore, MANY people say “I can’t afford the vet bill”, when what they really mean is “that’s too much money to spend on a cat”.
I’m not trying to make an argument about mortality, here. Just stating facts, as I see them. I’m not trying to argue whether it’s ethical to view animal lives as less valuable. I’m just saying that priorities are actually VERY easy to identify, in this situation. A vast majority of people do not love their pets enough to seek out all options to prolong their lives.
Lots of vets also give up very easily themselves. That’s a factor too. It’s all about avoiding the suffering of the animal.
This is usually what happens to the privileged. The more money people make, the more justified their worth and actions. People tend to forget their past struggles and lose the ability to stay humble and if they were born rich? Pffft, good luck trying to get them to have any empathy for the poor. Use this a way to reflect on his morality. You can either dig more into this or pretend it never happened. I suggest you at least communicate so you get an answer for your own sanity. You may not like the answer but it will open your eyes more.
Definitely confront him about it! Not with anger. Maybe confront is the wrong word. But do talk to him about it. If you don’t, you’ll stew with anger and that’s bad for both of you.
He’s just unaware, that’s all. He doesn’t know better. If he doesn’t have people who care about him calling him out on his bs then he’ll suffer from it forever. So it’s important that you do that. With care.
It’s probably very difficult, but try to have empathy for his perspective. He literally just doesn’t know what it would have been like to not have the resources to take care of his dog like that. He’s not rotten on the inside. He literally just doesn’t know better.
Maybe he’ll stick to what he believes now, that other owners just don’t care as much. You can laugh at his ignorance if that’s the case, you don’t have to be offended by it. If you make light of it he’ll be much more likely to get the right message. If you attack him, he’ll double down. That’s how people work.
Hopefully this helps.