Driving through Wyoming on Interstate 25 a few years ago, my friends and I passed a flatbed pickup truck. Standing on the back, watching us pass, was a well-traveled dog. He nonchalantly wandered around the bed. He walked over to the edge and peered over. He strolled up toward the cab and craned his neck so he could see around the front of the truck. The truck was doing about 80 mph.
Somehow, the dog seemed fine.
Just this past week, the Larimer County Commissioners voted against a Humane Society request that would have made it illegal to transport a dog in the back of a pickup truck (let alone a flatbed pickup truck).
As Commissioner Steve Johnson put it, “It's not the job of government to keep people from being stupid.” He added: “That's how we ended up with books of laws that are impossible to enforce.”
Commissioner Tom Donnelly noted that such a law would “risk making every cowboy in Larimer County a criminal.”
Of course, there are those who would argue that if we truly cared about the welfare of our pets, we'd want to do everything possible to protect them. Riding in the backs of pickup trucks is unsafe. So let's pass a simple law and protect those dogs.
Or, to put it differently, how many dogs must die before we act? How many must be crippled or maimed? Don't you care about dogs? Are you heartless? If just one dog's life is saved by passing a law against riding in the backs of pickup trucks, isn't that worth it?
But what kind of person would allow all of those dogs to just ride around unsecured inside cars and trucks? (What do you have against dogs, anyway?) What if there's a collision? That dog's going through the windshield — and will probably maim some of the other passengers in the car on their way out. So if we truly care about dogs, we need to get in touch with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration and get them to create a dog-shaped crash test dummy. We'll have the safety agency put that dummy through a series of crash tests (front- and side-impact at various speeds, just so we have our bases covered). Let's see how the unsecured dummy dog fares. Unsafe at any speed, indeed. And I doubt that the discriminatory human-centric safety belts in the average car are going to be much help.
So, if we truly want to end the mindless carnage of dogs flying out of the beds of pickup trucks or through the windshields of cars, we need to pass a law mandating doggy seats. (And I'm sure the local fire department will help you make sure they're properly installed).
You can probably see where I'm going with this. (And no, I'm not advocating against child-safety seats.)
The canine version of “unsafe at any speed” is a good example of the absurdity of the “if it's dangerous, there should be a law against it” mindset. Look, life is unsafe, for dogs and humans alike. The dangers of life teach responsibility and caution. Yet as government passes more and more laws, treating us like children and nannying us into submission, we become less and less free.
It's hard to stand up against the rhetoric of the nannies. (What are you, heartless?) It's useful to have the absurd example of the unsecured dogs to make the point. Obviously, the commissioners were right to vote against the proposed law.
(In the interest of full disclaimer: I did own a dog as a kid, a golden retriever which was, inexplicably, deathly afraid of the water. He did, indeed, ride in the back of the pickup truck from time to time. Then again, so did all of the kids.)
