It’s hard to admit you’re wrong. So David Leonhardt doesn’t. The title given his op-ed is It’s Time to End the Scam of Flying Pets, is curious, given that it’s mostly an apologia for scammers.
One day, we may all owe a debt of gratitude to Dexter the peacock.
At Newark Airport last weekend, a woman tried to board a United Airlines flight with Dexter. She described him as her emotional-support animal. But given that peacocks are large birds and there is not much evidence of their therapeutic benefits, United said no, Dexter could not board.
Since when did the size of a bird define the comfort it brings to someone? Sure, a peacock seems ridiculous, because, well, that’s how it seems. But is it any less ridiculous than other animals?
If you spend any time on planes, you’ve probably noticed the surge of animals. There have been pigs, monkeys, turkeys, snakes and oh-so-many dogs, often sprawled across crowded cabins. Delta alone flies about 250,000 animals a year — not even counting those tucked inside carry-on bags or checked in cargo holds — more than double how many it flew in 2015.
So peacocks are over the line, but pigs are totally normal? Or is that not the problem at all.
This story begins with progress, in the form of a 1986 law forbidding discrimination against handicapped air travelers. The law made sure that physically disabled people could travel with service animals. It also rightly applied to nonphysical disabilities. Some autistic children, for example, function better with a trained dog.
The trouble started when pet owners realized that they could game the system, because airlines did not require much proof of medical need.
See what he did there? A law was enacted for the sake of the disabled to end discrimination against their service animals. Think seeing eye dogs for the blind. This was an objectively-verifiable disability. This was a highly-trained animal. This was a limited, controlled imposition based upon a determination that it was worth whatever consequences might ensue to enable the disabled to keep a service animal by their side. And few would argue otherwise.
But then, Leonhardt makes a huge leap, without even pausing, by adding almost as an afterthought that it “also rightly applied to nonphysical disabilities.” Why? No need to say, since it was “rightly,” and that’s close enough to bridge the gap.
The problem wasn’t that there were credible, even strong arguments, to be made in favor of animals providing therapeutic benefits to people suffering from nonphysical disabilities. The problem was that these were of an entirely different nature than service animals.
And so was born the “comfort animal.”
A service animal was highly trained. A comfort animal was whatever the person desiring comfort wanted them to be. A service animal was put to an objective use. A comfort animal was held. The blind person using a seeing-eye dog was still blind, but incapacitated, without it. The person denied the ability to hold a comfort animal was less comfortable than he would have been otherwise.
It’s true that some people honestly believe they have an emotional condition that an animal solves. But they are often confusing their preferences with actual medical needs.
Having created an entire ideology around the conflation of facts with feelings, how does one distinguish the scammers from the feelers? What makes one bad and the other good? Why is a peacock too much but a turkey just right?
The whole bizarre situation is a reminder of why trust matters so much to a well-functioning society. The best solution, of course, would be based not on some Transportation Department regulation but on simple trust. People who really needed service animals could then bring on them planes without having to carry documents.
Not only does this conclusion emit the stench of an absurd Utopianism, people being what they are, but it ignores the acceptance of other people’s emotional reality. If they believe their snake is emotionally therapeutic, then it is. What matters more than trust to a well-functioning society are facts, and the fact is that while others will gladly suck up their discomfort for the sake of a service animal, they will not do so for an emotional-support peacock.
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In an age where the ostentatious display of victimhood is in vogue, an emotional support peacock is too perfect to be satire.
I hadn’t considered peacock as victim accoutrement, but does make a rather forceful statement.
Ah, but would a more apt statement incorporate a molting peacock or, more appropriately, a peahen? Because the post-humanists among us would say it’s species-ist to assume that the fight against the patriarchy begins and ends with homo sapiens. (Gad, it’s hard work to be woke.)
I tried being woke once, but it made my head hurt.
Someone (not me) should catalog all the times you’ve said you are woke. Were you lying then (and then and then and then …) or are you lying now?
How dare you question my lived experience, hater.
There are practical implications to be considered. While the proclivity of peafowl to eat snakes is not constrained to gender identification. It is the serenade of the peacock that will keep you woke.
I don’t see this as any big deal. The airlines have never allowed me to board with my emotional support Colt.
Ponies, colts, why is it always about horses?
Because there’s a vas deferens between a show pony and a war horse? /ducks/
Note the capitalization. I think he was referring to a different type of Colt.
smh.
A horse can be a bird, so said Judge Blue in Regina v. Ojibway.
But what would Lincoln say?
And here I thought this was going to be a rant about NBC’s always terrible prime time coverage of The Olympics. Coming soon to a TV near you.
Bill’s got nothing on you.
I have a Honey Badger Emotional Support Animal. It’s wonderful, though when it rummages in the First Class in-flight kitchen or corners the Air Stewards, it’s a bit of a sticky situation.
Pit bulls are adorable too. People are just so judgmental.
I have minor anxieties that I can prove my dog helps. My blood pressure drops 20 points when I pet him. I have a fear of flying so I pay the neighborhood kid to watch my dog because I am not the center of the universe. (My dog thinks I am but that another story.)
Cockpits used to come equipped with comfort companions. That worked out well.
One of these days, you’re going to post a comment that doesn’t invoke chaos theory, at which point I will be left with nothing to say.
Today is not that day.
I’m gonna claim my girlfriend is my emotional support human. Free flights for her.
Checkmate, atheists!
Be careful how you pet her on the plane. She might bite.
Mine is a combination of those mentioned by Weebs and Jim Tyre. We drink martinis and have small talk, the latter being that I use really small words. It helps and it works, but the tassels are sometimes distracting.
Tassels never added anything to my peace of mind.
Oh really?
tassels
Funny how the same physical item can be put to different uses.
When you posted about a snake as an emotionally therapeutic animal, I had hoped the video would be of Samuel L. Jackson’s complaint from Snakes on a Plane: “I HAVE HAD IT WITH THESE MOTHERFUCKING SNAKES ON THIS MOTHERFUCKING PLANE!”
Already did the snakes on a plane post.
Before I moved out, my ex turned the house into a menagerie and turned my kennels into an aviary.
The peacock escaped.
For the next year there were peacock sightings throughout the land as it terrorized the community, each time with fewer tail feathers. No one saw it after the next hunting season.
If I saw a peacock on a plane, I’d insist the airline accommodate my peacock-triggered PTSD.
I went around my car once, only to be confronted by a peacock. Scared the living daylights out of me. I’m with you.
Over 10 years ago, I was on an oversold flight with an emotional support (owner told me she was avoiding the airline kennel fee) 60lb dog. The dog was very sweet, as was the woman who owned it, but said dog was spread out on floor into my foot space. (I had to take my shoes off and rest my feet on the dog.) Flight attendant demanded I plane check my carry-on because the dog was using the space under the seat in front of me. Delta lost that bag for over 10 days. It contained medication and valuable documents and jewelry. Needless to say, my anxiety was intense. I researched terms of carriage, etc., and asked a lawyer friend to send Delta a letter–apparently if you buy a ticket you own the space in front of your seat, including under the seat in front of you. Delta refunded me the cost of the ticket and gave me 100K medallion points. They found the bag–it had been put into the flight attendant’ baggage storage area; she never checked it. (This article is not about bully flight attendants so I won’t go there.)
I usually don’t post war stories, but since the post has some age, and you’ve got a good story, why not?
Yes to the war story! I have been holding on to this “emotional support” story for 10 years. (Not really, but your post “triggered” me.) Just wanted to point out that if you find you are a passenger next to an emotional support animal, you also have “rights”. I did not know that until it happened to me!
Ten years ago, after the flight, I read the FAA rules: airlines can not ask a passenger what their disability is. It is exactly as your post says. I was returning home after a grueling court hearing to have my father declared incapacitated due to Alzheimer’s. Too bad for me I didn’t have an emotional support dog. : (
Hence, the court papers and doctor’s statements in the carry-on.
The flight attendant was adamant there was no space on the plane–it was a 777 so it made no sense. The whole experience was surreal. Flight attendant would not allow me to hold the bag in my lap. (But taking off my shoes to placate the dog was ok?) She was high on being a militant rules enforcer, and not a problem solver. She threatened to throw me off of the flight if I did not acquiesce. (I had kids and a job to get back to.) She did this on the plane intercom, causing me embarrassment. My lawyer friend astutely pointed this out to Delta management. I’m sure had I pursued it they would have paid more–supposedly the FA was reprimanded–but money wasn’t my point. And at that time; anything court related was not appealing. Thanks SHG, I know you don’t “give space” to War Stories lightly.
I doubt I would have been nearly as accommodating as you. Thanks for the story.