WIBTA for potentially getting my friend’s dogs taken away?
Throwaway given the question!
I (30F) have a friend, “Emma” (28F), who I’ve known for a long time. Emma absolutely loves dogs and being a “dog person” is a huge part of her identity, but over the last few years I’ve become increasingly uncomfortable with how she actually treats and manages her pets.
She has a dog she’s had for about 3 years. The dog has become increasingly aggressive over time, but whenever there’s an issue, Emma always blames other people, other dogs, bad circumstances, etc. She never really seems willing to acknowledge that her handling of the dog might be part of the problem.
Some examples:
- She routinely leaves the dog alone for 8–12 hours a day.
- Sometimes she is crated for long stretches.
- When she goes on vacation, she doesn’t arrange for anyone to really care for or walk her because she says the dog is “too aggressive.” Instead, she has people stop by couple times a day just to let her into the yard.
- She lives in a small studio apartment with the original dog and cats.
A few weeks ago, she found an abandoned dog in our city. At first, she told my husband and me that she was just temporarily taking care of him until she could find him a better home. We actually felt relieved because we already had concerns about her current situation.
But now she’s decided to keep the dog permanently.
When we visited recently, the new dog honestly seemed noticeably more aggressive and stressed than when we first met him after he’d been rescued. The whole environment felt tense, chaotic, and under-controlled. Since she adopted this second dog, our concerns about the animals’ wellbeing have gotten much worse.
The problem is that anytime we’ve tried to gently bring up concerns about her dogs in the past, conversations go completely off the rails. She gets extremely defensive and refuses to even entertain the possibility that something is wrong.
So now I’m conflicted about whether I would be the asshole if I reported the situation to animal control or animal welfare services.
Part of me feels like I’d be betraying a friend of 15+ years but more IMPORTANTLY I also worry that if the dogs were removed, shelter life could actually be worse for them. Or they might be in worse conditions.
But another part of me feels like these animals are living in an unhealthy situation already, and adding a second aggressive dog into a tiny apartment with minimal exercise and long isolation periods feels irresponsible.
WIBTA if I reported her?