PHILADELPHIA, USA (AP) — Are you the “owner” of a dog or cat? Maybe you should consider yourself a “human caregiver” instead. And Fido and Fluffy? Perhaps they should be “companion animals,” not just “pets”.

Such vocabulary shifts will help elevate the discourse about other species and, in turn, improve our treatment of them, according to the new Journal on Animal Ethics.

The foreword in the peer-reviewed academic publication, which was first published last month, even suggests getting rid of terms like “critters”, “beasts” and “wild animals”, along with phrases such as “drunk as a skunk” and “eat like a pig”.

“We do need to examine our language about animals because a lot of it is derogatory in the sense that it belittles them and our relations with them,” journal co-editor Andrew Linzey said.

Linzey, a theologian, heads the Centre for Animal Ethics at the University of Oxford in England. The journal, to be published twice yearly, is the first scholarly periodical to have the words “animal ethics” in the title, according to its publisher, the University of Illinois Press.

It’s not surprising that researchers are re-examining their language as animal treatment becomes more of a social issue, said James Serpell, a professor of animal welfare at the University of Pennsylvania’s School of Veterinary Medicine.

But Serpell doesn’t necessarily agree with the recommended terminology, which he said could be taken to “absurd” extremes.

“Relabelling pets ‘companion animals’ could be misleading as well,” Serpell said. “The fish in the ornamental fish tank aren’t really anyone’s companion.”

More important for respecting animals is how they are perceived and treated in the legal system, said Susan Cosby, CEO of the Pennsylvania Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals.

“Currently animals are considered property regardless of what term we use to describe them,” Cosby said in a statement.

Linzey declined further comment because of previous media coverage that he said inaccurately caricatured the issue as political correctness run amok. He stressed the preferred language does not stem from a desire to avoid “insulting” pets.

“Obviously, animals cannot be insulted in the way in which people can be,” he wrote in an email.

Journal co-editor Priscilla Cohn, a philosophy professor emerita at Penn State-Abington near Philadelphia, noted in an email that the discussion has implications for humans as well.

Cruelty to animals has been linked with anti-social and abusive behaviour in people, she wrote, while overcrowding animals on factory farms has repercussions for both human health and the environment.

Cohn also said researchers continue to uncover fascinating insights into the animal kingdom, including communication among elephants and the social structure of wolves, which “are not the blood-thirsty wild beasts that many people imagine”.

“In other words, there has been an explosion of knowledge about animals that should make us consider them in a new light and perhaps change the manner in which we treat them,” wrote Cohn, who has six cats and a dog.

Send us your petsSend pictures by e-mail to clarkep@jamaicaobserver.com.

Do you have a cute dog that you absolutely love?

Or are you into furballs — cute cats that purr? Turtles, guinea pigs,

snakes, perhaps? Are iguanas your ‘cup of tea’? Or do you own something

fascinatingly exotic? Does your pet — no matter how big or small, no

matter the species — represent an extension of you, a big part of your

life that you must share with others?

Send us photos of your pets (and yourself, if you wish) and tell us why

you love them and why you chose them, and we’ll reserve a space in Pets

just for your loving companion.