Dealing with insensitive non-bunny people: annoyed rant ahead!

[Kate Monster]

When I go back home to visit my parents, I tend to get a lot of rather unintentionally cruel comments about my bunnies.  Basically a lot “Yum, rabbit stew!” type of jokes from my dad, my boyfriend’s family, friends of the family, etc.  I imagine that I’m not the only person who has this problem but it definitely seems specific to a certain type of somewhat macho culture that involves lots of guns, hunting, and refusing to see any pet other than large hunting dogs as ‘real pets’. (not that I don’t love hunting dogs, some of my best friends are labradors!)  They aren’t serious, and they aren’t trying to be mean, but it’s hurtful and the attitude bothers me.  I just never really know what to say, I mean it would never occur to me, or really anyone I know, to meet someone’s golden retriever and say, ‘wow, she’d make an awesome burger!’ because that would just be a terrible thing to say, so why would anyone say that about my bunnies?! I even tried making that point to my dad by saying pretty much that, “You wouldn’t think it particularly funny if I joked about eating your dogs, why would you think I’d find it funny if you said that about my bunnies?” He just shrugged and made a similar joke about how yummy the dogs would think my bunnies are a couple days later. Ugh. I got similar jokes when my dad’s friends came to visit and when my boyfriend’s parents came, they even managed to include jokes about eating our tortoise too! I really don’t have the energy to lecture everyone about how my boyfriend and I really do love and value our bunnies (and our tortoise) as much as they love and value their dogs and it’s hurtful to joke about killing them. Has anyone else had this problem and have you developed any awesome, sharp, one liners to say to make a point and shut people up? I try to ignore it, but I feel pretty strongly that people need to change their attitudes towards slightly less conventional pets and not see them as somehow ‘less worthy’ than dogs and cats (although a lot of the people I grew up around devalue cats a bit too). Any tips others have had would be awesome or feel free to join me in venting.

[LBJ10]

Hmm, I don’t think anyone has joked about eating our rabbits. I do sometimes call Leopold my little bunny slipper though. Hehe! I don’t say it because I want to kill him and make him into a slipper though. He just looks like a little bunny slipper sitting on the floor sometimes. I do know what you mean though about people saying things that they think is funny, but in truth it is downright hurtful. I remember one year at Christmas, my mom was asking me about blood types. I started to explain the genetics of it to her and then somehow homozygous turned into homosexual and she could not stop laughing. I’m talking rolling all over the floor in a hysteric fit. I have friends who are gay and I didn’t find it particularly funny. Especially since I was trying to explain something to her that I actually knew something about and she wasn’t even taking me seriously.

[peppypoo]

Ugh yes. My family was heartbroken after losing our dear Tammo this past summer, and somebody I know even had the nerve to comment that we would have a free meal that night. A few months ago, one of the members here (I can’t remember who!!) posted a great comeback on one of the threads here… 

“So are you going to eat your rabbit?”
“Maybe after I eat your dog!”

A little confrontational, maybe, but perhaps some people will get the message if you fire it off with the right attitude .

[highway234]

i just had a complete stranger tell me she wanted to turn my rabbit into soup when i put up her new pictures on facebook. it IS odd how people feel comfortable doing that. she said “time for soup” and i said, “no, it’s time for me to kill and eat your dog.” hope that didn’t come across as too arch. lol. when i first mentioned getting banjo, a couple of my friends (and yup, it was the more macho ones) joked about the rabbit scenes from fatal attraction. har har. i knew them so i shrugged it off but i didn’t really care for it. i think just mentioning the double standard that you’d never say such a thing about someone’s dog or cat is probably enough to shame anyone into silence unless they’re just a complete jerk.

[highway234]

Posted By peppypoo on 02/09/2011 08:31 AM
Ugh yes. My family was heartbroken after losing our dear Tammo this past summer, and somebody I know even had the nerve to comment that we would have a free meal that night.

That is just AMAZING to me. so insensitive!

 

[LoveChaCha]

Highway, I would have said the same thing.

I’ve never heard my dad make a joke about my bunny. He knows I would be angry lol.

“Can I eat your kid?”

Also, my friend’s rabbit passed away last December and I went to get a rose from a store for him. She had buried him in her backyard. The person that helped me asked why I am buying a rose so I told him. He said “Oh, she can eat him now!”

 

I gave him the death glare

[highway234]

i have a feeling with rabbits becoming more and more popular as pets/companions it’s going to be less and less socially acceptable to make such comments in the near future. one can only hope. i’m actually a lot more militant on it now, just from having read this thread.

[LoveChaCha]

I agree Highway.

Yesterday, as i was taking out the trash at my apartment, I was about to walk down the stairs when I saw a bale of hay sitting at the front of my neighbors door.

First thought?

Rabbit.

[Dextervonbon]

I get the same comments all the time on FB and in real life and it’s really getting to me now. I even had a cashier at Petsmart ask what kind of pet I had when I was buying hay, I told her I had a bunny and she was like “oh my snakes eat bunnies”. I think of Dexter and all my pets as my children and when someone says something like that, it does make me feel like they want to harm my “kids” more then just a bunny.

[highway234]

har, yeah, there was a little strand of hay sticking out under my apartment door for a couple days that i just noticed, and i remember thinking, everyone’s gonna know i have a rabbit! lol. could be a guinea pig, too, i suppose.

actually, i’ve got a related gripe. i posted on facebook that i’d bought a book about rabbits and one of my friends from high school is all, dude, like, dude, you’re becoming like a crazy cat lady. i only have one rabbit! then i mention i’m thinking about starting a meetup group for rabbit owners in my area, and another one of my friends is sorta taking the same tack. no one would look askance at starting a meetup group for dog or cat owners, but a meetup for rabbit owners, suddenly people are looking down their nose at me. there’s this stereotype that rabbits aren’t real pets the way dogs and cats are, i think, maybe because they were historically thought of as being kinda toy pets or the sort of pet you get a child to raise him- or herself, etc. i’ve never owned a cat but banjo’s got at least as much personality as any of the cats my parents have owned. dag!

we need a rabbit revolution!

[peppypoo]

Dexter, you should have said “oh that’s funny, my bunny eats snakes!”

Kidding aside, I think when such incidents happen, it’s important to say something back to the perpetrators. Of course, it doesn’t have to be snarky or confrontational…maybe something as simple as letting them know their comments aren’t funny or appreciated. As highway/Brittany have mentioned, part of the problem is with lack of awareness…every time you don’t speak up for your buns, that’s one more missed education opportunity!

[LoveChaCha]

The owners at my work have a book that you can flip and put back onto the store front that says “Your server is… and info bout that person.”

I put ‘I like to read, and hang out with my pet rabbit.”

 

Yep, I did go there

Everytime a person at my old job bought pet toys, I’d ask about their pet and I would tell them about my rabbit. I don’t mean to brag, but I use it as an opportunity to educate people that rabbits aren’t smelly and that they require as much (or more) care as a dog or cat does.

I took a pic yesterday and posted it on my FB. So here it is!

See the plastic bag? I was taking Chacha’s poo out to the dumpster at the time lol.

I am so tempted to knock on the neighbors door and ask.. but I’m not going to

[Monkeybun]

I liek the “How about I eat YOUR kid” response. But then… I tend to spaz on people that joke about eating my 3 furbabies. People that do, and do not stop, find themselves not seeing me much… heh. I avoid them and de-friend them on facebook if they don’t quit being asses.

[MayaConsuelo]

I have very few problems like this, people know I’m psycho about my rabbit and Mr. Bun-Bun has a big fan club as well (absolutely everyone who meets him just loves him.) 

One of my friends recently said something about eating rabbit for good luck in the Year of the Rabbit on twitter. He’s not on FB and very rarely comes over to my house. Then I posted something about giving rabbits kisses and cuddles for good luck instead. Well, he came over to my house the other night and SOMEHOW didn’t know I even had a rabbit? Strange. So he didn’t post that to aggravate me and probably wouldn’t have if he had known. AND he’s an expert gardener and was excited to see Mr. Bun-Bun because rabbit poo is the best fertilizer. Now I’m collecting Bun-Bun’s poo in a giant bucket for him to use in his gardening. Ha ha!

For the people who are being constantly pestered by people “joking” about eating their pets, I don’t know what to tell you. I’m extremely laid-back and happy, but when I get mad I get HULK SMASH MAD and people back off really fast. So nobody’s made a joke like that around me more than once!!

[Lintini]

It’s gotten so old, everytime I post a photo of my rabbits and put it on facebook….someone always has to put up a “eating rabbit joke” on their pictures. I delete it. I’ve threatened to unfriend them. lol.

I’ve pretty much become immune to the jokes, and I’ll say something snappy back at times but for the most part it just goes in one ear and out the other at this point.

[anneNjoerule]

I have luckily never had any of these comments about my bunnies. I did however, raise rats for 7 years and I got a lot of crap about them. Lots of, “they should be in the sewers”, and “they’re so ugly!,” and “aren’t you scared of getting the plague?,” and the most popular: “I’m gonna feed them to my snake!” So I understand completely, sometimes I would get so upset I would start crying with rage, but than I’ve always been super protective of my fur babies. I can’t understand why anyone would say that. I get people who think that rodents and legamorphs are silly pet choices, that’s their opinion. What I don’t get is why people would feel the need to talk about killing and eating them or feeding them to their snakes. Like, “do you have no respect for me?” “Do you not see how much I love them?” Yeah, it makes no sense.

[peppypoo]

Sigh. Visiting my boyfriend this weekend. Bf’s roommate came up to me and was like

Him: Oh hey I saw a really cute picture of a bunny the other day! It was skinned and headless, ready to be cooked. Maybe you can try it sometime!
Me: I’m sure it would work better with your dog.
Him: Nah my dog is too small.
Me: And my bunny is bigger? Riiiight.

Ugh, he’s such a jerk.

[highway234]

boo hiss. it would be even worse if the “fine, i’ll just kill your dog” retort doesn’t work, as it sounds like it didn’t in the case of this guy, because i really would be out of clever things to say at that point.

[highway234]

boo hiss. it would be even worse if the “fine, i’ll just kill your dog” retort doesn’t work, as it sounds like it didn’t in the case of this guy, because i really would be out of clever things to say at that point.

[highway234]

sorry, dupe post again. i’m such a rookie.

[MayaConsuelo]

Peppypoo how often do you have to deal with this psychopathic roommate of your boyfriend? If asking him respectfully doesn’t make him stop, try telling him you’re going to skin him and boil his head in a pot… or maybe have a screaming/crying fit if you’re a good actress, so he’s scared of you and will leave you alone. Sorry these are the only ideas I have.

I do occasionally deal with the offhanded FB comment which I immediately delete, depending on my mood I unfriend the person or lecture them.

I’m pretty lucky that everyone around me loooooves Mr. Bun-Bun. Most of my friends love animals, I can’t really imagine being friends with somebody who didn’t love animals.

[Kate Monster]

While it’s nice not to be alone in your problems, frankly I rather wish I were the only person that had this problem for the sake of the bunnies! None of my friends say anything, it’s mostly family and friends of family. I guess it comes down to be able to pick your friends but not the people that you’re related to (or the random people you run into, I had a cab driver tell me the most horrible story about his dad and some rabbits, I won’t share that though because frankly I wish I hadn’t heard it!).
It’s hard for me to retort that maybe I should eat my dad’s dogs, because well I grew up with them and they’re my dogs too. So I suppose maybe I’m going to just go for icey silence.
My poor tortoise got a few ‘soup’ jokes as well and lots of ‘ewwwww, he’s so ugly!’ comments. I know that certain pets aren’t for everybody. Not everyone is going to really appreciate or enjoy bunnies and plenty of people have an aversion to reptiles and frankly, that’s ok, they’re entitled to their preferences. Some people are afraid of dogs and some people really don’t like cats, to each their own. But it’s not that hard to be polite and it’s easier to not say anything than it is to make mean comments.
The fact that someone said their snake eats bunnies it more than a little horrible as was the skinned and headless bunny joke. What on earth is wrong with some people?
I say viva la bunny revolucion! I welcome our new twitchy nosed overlords.

[bunnytowne]

A good shame on you    has worked  and haven’t heard it again from the people who got a shame on you from me. 

My husband likes to eat rabbits but he has  never said a word about my pets.    Haven’t had rabbits but once for food since I got Cotton.   He doesn’t talk about it or make jokes about my buns. In fact he collects grasses n clover for them.    I have maybe heard him say something 2x about eating rabbits someone has raised for food.   I did mention I don’t think I can eat a rabbit for food anymore.  So he never mentions it.  

I can understand since I grew up raising rabbits for this purpose as a child and for show. I had a special pet rabbit that was never going to be eaten.   I could compartmentalize it when I was a child

No longer can I compartmentalize it as an adult  nor do I  care to.  

Having grown up with people raising their own food n gardening I can understand where they are coming from but to say these ugly things to people who have rabbits as pets and about their pet rabbit in particular no excuse.  Absolutely no excuse.

I mean there are chickens n goats n sheep out there some people have as pets n some as food or both.   Bunnies seem more delicate and endearing to us to have to listen to ugly things people say. 

Seems easier to be a vegetarian than pick which animal is food and which a pet sometimes.   I think if all  people/families had to butcher or slaughter animals themselves to eat that the world would be a better place.   We would place more value on life.  Human and animal. 

[MimzMum]

Posted By peppypoo on 02/11/2011 08:00 PM

Me: I’m sure it would work better with your dog.
Him: Nah my dog is too small.

Next time he says that tell him: Not as small as your…brain.

At the risk of offending folks who prefer vegetarianism (I was one for awhile), order him a plate of rocky mountain oysters and tell him it’s rabbit. Then reveal the truth after he’s eaten a few. Make sure the path to the loo is wide open. Unless he’s just too thick to be grossed out by it.

lolz…Pardon my irreverent humor, but I have no use for people like this guy.

Anyway, I’ve been trying to post these pix to this thread for a week. ^_^ First the one that reminded me of the bunny slipper comment:

And this one, that tells me that the bunny truly has the heart of the wolf…for breakfast.

 

[LoveChaCha]

Oh bunnytowne, you are so strong I admire you and your words to your husband. It can sometimes be hard to stand up for what we believe in. I haven’t gotten a ‘eat your rabbit’ joke in a while, but I do hear of people that used to own rabbits as a child.

Mimz, .. LOL! so silly I love the pictures!

[peppypoo]

At the risk of offending folks who prefer vegetarianism (I was one for awhile), order him a plate of rocky mountain oysters and tell him it’s rabbit. Then reveal the truth after he’s eaten a few. Make sure the path to the loo is wide open. Unless he’s just too thick to be grossed out by it.

lol MimzMum, that would potentially sound like a good idea…except we’re Asian and are used to eating just about any animal part. Never tried “rocky mountain oysters” before, but I’ve had the chicken analog 
 

The bf’s room-mate is just one of those guys who makes “clever” irreverant jokes regarding just about every politically incorrect topic you can think of.  He only does it to people he’s familiar with (thank goodness, I know another very awkward guy who doesn’t quite have this boundary…) and it’s something I’ve just learned to live with.  I pretty much har-har-har and blow it off, as I know he doesn’t mean it seriously and I’m not one to be offended easily.  Ehh.

I have to admit, I’ve made a few jokes of my own regarding Peppy…I’ll say something along the lines of “OOO NAUGHTY BUNS FOR DINNER!!” and exaggeratedly OM NOM NOM her.  Lovingly, of course! I just feel like it’s different when I do it myself?

 

 

[LBJ10]

This still amazes me. It never occurred to me that people would joke about eating other people’s pet rabbits. I don’t think this has ever happened to me. And when we had our chinchillas, no one ever joked about turning them into coats. Everyone that I work with knows all about my ongoing zoo and they are usually asking how everyone is. One co-worker of mine loves talking to me about the rabbits because she used to have one. Her daughter got it as a pet and then left her behind when she went to college. My co-worker always said she got “stuck” with this rabbit, but I know she loved her. She bought more stuff for her than she did her own kids when they were growing up! Haha! As for my family, no one has said anything. My parents even got the rabbits a Christmas gift this last year, since they always get gifts for the other pets in the family (e.g. dogs, cats). My in-laws just found out about the rabbits and they were cooler about it than I thought they would be. But I guess they shouldn’t have been surprised! We just didn’t tell them right away since we were afraid they were going to say something about us not spending our money on the “right” things.

[LBJ10]

Oops, double post.

[MimzMum]

lolz…You mean chickens DO have nuggets? ^_^
That’s right, you translated the Rabbit Year cards for me. *forehead slap* I forgot! >.< Please forgive me, I'm getting everyone confused. 0_o;
Okay that won’t work then….lol.
Well I can remember having sweetbread a long time ago, which our (male) neighbor very graciously gave us without telling us what it was until after we’d chewed and swallowed. I guess he figured since both he and my husband were Alaskan-born,’burly-men’ he could take it, but I think my hub turned several shades of green while I just sat there, grabbed another one and munched away and said, ‘Hmmm….not bad.’ xD If I thought about it too long, I might feel a little queasy, but really it was very tasty stuff. Don’t know that I’d ever want it again though.

Well, that’s different when WE say stuff like that, because of course we don’t mean it in a literal sense. Not that I’ve ever said anything like that…nor nommed my bunnies, lovingly or otherwise. But I do give my Yorkie a good soft ear kronsche when I can get away with it. I think it feels more natural to me with the dog. (It’s how a lot of these little dogs play, after all.) The bunnies I just want to cuddle and protect. ^_^

I have a tendency to not have a clue when someone is kidding about something. I’m very gullible (perhaps just dense) in that way. So if someone said something like that to me I’d get pretty hot about it, no matter how they meant it. Them’s fightin’ words, hombre.
It’s good though that you can let it roll off. It would definitely get on my nerves if it was me.

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