What do you call a person who hates dog?

Peeves, Hates, and Aversions

Last October, a member of the Aspies for Freedom web forum began a thread called «Post One Pet Hate Every Day.» Other members began posting entries such as «Ignorant people,» «one-button mouses,» and «humans.» Two weeks later, a member who hadn’t contributed finally chimed in:

I avoided this thread for awhile because I thought it would be about hating pets. lol until I realized it was about pet peeves.

A few years earlier, in a forum for conspiracy theory enthusiasts, someone else asked fellow members, «What is your number 1 pet hate?» After «Elites secretly controlling the world» and «People who guarantee they know the truth and refuse to think they could indeed be wrong,» there came this response:

Are we talking like Pet, as in Animal pets, hate?
If so, I hate that my dog chews everything and wants to kill small animals.
If we are talking about Pet Peeve «hate» then … I hate people who don’t care about what’s going on around them

Both posters had to translate pet hate into pet peeve before they could get the intended meaning.

Sometimes this is taken to be a distinction between British English and American English. For example, a commenter on an online golf forum vented his «pet hate,» and got the response, «Pet hate? In the US, we call it pet peeve.» In its definition for the adjective pet, the Longman Dictionary Online has a single entry for pet hate and pet peeve, specifically labeling the former British English and the latter American. The truth, though, is a bit more complicated.

Let’s start with the etymology of peeve itself. The Oxford English Dictionary has peeve the noun deriving from peeve the verb sometime around 1909, and peeve the verb arising via backformation from the adjective peevish, sometime near 1900. As for peevish, the OED speculates that it might ultimately derive from the Latin perversus, though there are gaps in the story.

It didn’t take long for ordinary peeves to become pet peeves. Also according to the OED, the noun pet came from the Scottish Gaelic peata, meaning a tame animal. Its adjectival meaning of «cherished» or «favorite» is attested from 1819, in a quotation from Samuel Taylor Coleridge in a letter. The ironic extension of this meaning to encompass things that are especially disliked has its own subentry.

As for the difference between American and British English when it comes to pet peeves and pet hates, the new search tools on the Google Ngram Viewer allows us to run a comparison:

Looking at the blue and yellow lines, we can see that Americans do use pet peeve a lot more than they use pet hate. Looking at the green and red lines, we can also confirm that British speakers use pet hate more than they use pet peeve—but not by that much; it’s about a 3-to-2 ratio. Furthermore, until the 1940s, pet hate was almost as popular as pet peeve in American English. There was even a song copyrighted in 1934 with the title «Pet Hate.»

It also turns out that the earliest attestations so far for both pet peeve and pet hate are from American English. The OED has pet peeve from 1919, in a definition in a book of jargon: «Pet peeve, the thing that provokes you the most.» That fact alone tells us that the origin goes back further, and Google Books yields a couple of slightly earlier examples, both from 1917, both from American publications.

One comes in the April issue of The Illinois Chemist, a publication of the University of Illinois’s chemistry department. A margin-filling joke (like the kind you can still find in Reader’s Digest) at the bottom of page 24 says, «Our pet peeve: ‘Yes, and he talked about the paraffin series, methane, ethane, and profane.'» Get it? Propane? Profane? Those organic chemistry newbies are too much!

The other one comes from the September issue of Illustrated World, in an article by one Ray Goldman, explaining to prospective car buyers that a car costing less than $500 might not be such a bargain, because some conveniences you might think come standard don’t—such as a speedometer and shock absorbers. Page three of the article states:

Now we come to the pet peeve of the small car owner. Very frequently when the machine has stopped because of traffic conditions and the policemen on guard, the car becomes stalled because it lacks a flexible motor. This compels the driver to step out and crank up the machine on a crowded thoroughfare, and you may be sure he doesn’t like to do this any oftener than he has to.

The OED‘s first citation for pet hate comes in 1939, from the Baltimore Sun. This is about twenty years after the appearance of pet peeve, but again Google Books pushes the date further back. In fact, it takes it back to before the earliest attestation of pet peeve, all the way to 1902, again from an American publication. The novel Life of a Woman, by Richard Voorhees Risley, describes the elderly Miss Walsingham like this:

She had a huge sense of whimsicality and «intellectual fools,» as she called them, were a pet hate of hers.

There’s still more to the story. In addition to its citations for pet peeve and pet hate, the OED also has this 1880 quotation from Mark Twain’s Tramp Abroad:

For years my pet aversion had been the cuckoo clock.

Once more, Google Books has an even earlier attestation, and this time it’s from British English; specifically, the story «The Two Dolls» in Mary Russell Mitford’s Our Village, published in parts between 1824 and 1832. The story concerns a little girl named Fanny Elvington, who had a «foolish and wicked prejudice»:

But her favourite fear, her pet aversion, was a negro; especially a little black footboy who lived next door, and whom she never saw without shrinking and shuddering and turning pale.

Luckily, she sees the error of her ways by the end of the story.

Putting pet aversion into the Ngram mix with pet peeve and pet hate results in a surprising picture:

The peak for the red pet aversion line is more than twice as high as the 1945 peak for pet peeve, and almost twice as high as the current reading for pet peeve. It’s only around 1950 that the frequency of pet peeve and pet hate combined approaches that of pet aversion, which by then has been in decline for more than twenty years.

And in while we’re in the pursuit of bigger pictures, what did people call pet peeves, hates, and aversions before pet gained its ironic meaning? They called them bête noires and bugbears. Putting bête noire into the Ngram mix…

… it looks like they still do. Bugbear, it turns out, leaves all these synonyms in the dust, flattening the peaks for bête noire and every kind of pet dislike:

And finally, to close with the ultimate in closely nursed things that make your skin crawl, it turns out that there are even pet bête noires and pet bugbears!

Neal Whitman blogs at Literal-Minded, where he writes about linguistics in everyday life from the point of view of a husband and father. He taught English as a second language while earning his degree at Ohio State University; has published articles in Language, Journal of Linguistics, and other publications; and writes occasional scripts for the podcast «Grammar Girl’s Quick and Dirty Tips for Better Writing.»

What to Do if Your Dog Hates You

If you share your daily life with a dog, you will notice its tremendous behavioral and cognitive complexity, as well as its ability to feel and express a wide range of emotions. Many people anthropomorphize and misinterpret their dogs’ behavior, leading them to conclude that their animals hate them, but the truth is that dogs do not «hate» others, at least not in the same way we do. The level of affection that dogs show to their owners depends on the relationship that they establish, as well as the experiences that the dog has had before. So, if you suspect that your dog «hates» you, it is very likely that there is something wrong with his upbringing or the way you communicate with your dog.

In this AnimalWised article, we will analyze different aspects that could be disturbing or affecting your relationship with your dog. We will give you some tips on how to improve your relationship and how to find out where the problem lies in order to fix it.

You may also be interested in: What to Do if you Find a Lost Dog
Contents

1. Your dog rejects you and avoids physical contact due to a lack of socialization
2. Your dog hides from you or treats you differently due to traumatic experiences
3. 3. Your dog ignores you or attacks you due to inconsistent rules or punishment-based training
4. Your dog growls at you or shows his teeth due to anxiety
5. Your dog is nervous due to a lack of stimulation

1. Your dog rejects you and avoids physical contact due to a lack of socialization

The period between three weeks and three months in a puppy’s life is called the sensitive phase of the puppy’s socialization. It corresponds to a period when their nervous system is best prepared to absorb, process and adapt to new information. As the puppy grows, they need to explore the world around it to learn how to cope with and adapt to the stimuli in its environment.

If puppies are separated from their mothers too early (before the age of eight weeks), are socially isolated during the socialization period, or have numerous negative experiences at a young age, they are likely to develop anxiety-related behavioral disorders. Many of the dogs in shelters have experienced one or more of these scenarios and therefore are very fearful.

If you adopt a dog and you notice him rejecting you, avoiding physical contact, or showing signs of threat, this could be the cause. In his sensitive phase, your dog may have never had a healthy relationship with a human and is therefore very anxious. In this case, you should consult a dog ethologist or an educator who works with positive reinforcement to find out how best to interact with the dog so that they gradually learn to trust you.

If you are wondering what to do in case you find an abandoned or lost dog in the street, keep reading this article on what to do if you find a lost dog.

2. Your dog hides from you or treats you differently due to traumatic experiences

It is undoubtedly traumatic for a puppy to be isolated or prematurely separated from its mother during the socialization period, but these experiences are not the only ones that can cause behavioral problems. If a dog experiences physical or psychological abuse from a human, they may develop a pathological fear of people in general, regardless of their age or stage of development. They may also show this reaction towards people similar to those who abused him.

There are many animals in shelters and kennels that have been mistreated, and it can take a long time for them to trust people. Again, we must emphasize that their behavior, even their aggressiveness, is based on fear, not resentment or hatred. Therefore, it is ideal to work with a professional who can give us clear guidelines on how to deal with this situation.

If you want to know why is a good thing to adopt a stray dog and why they can make wonderful partners, keep reading this article on 10 reasons to adopt a stray dog.

3. Your dog ignores you or attacks you due to inconsistent rules or punishment-based training

The dog owner’s parenting strategy is often one of the reasons for a bad relationship. Every home should have a set of rules that must be clear, consistent and communicated in a way that takes into account the feelings of the animal. Instead, if it is sometimes accepted on the sofa and other times scolded, or if each family member makes their own rules, the animal is in an unpredictable environment. This situation can cause anxiety and confusion and eventually lead to behavior problems.

In addition, the use of physical punishment such as choke, prong, or electric collars, as well as intimidation as a training method, seriously affects the dog’s well-being and causes fear and reactions that can easily be misinterpreted as hatred.

If you want to learn how to educate your dog, don’t miss this article on basic dogs commands.

4. Your dog growls at you or shows his teeth due to anxiety

The language of a dog is extremely comprehensive and complex. Through facial expressions, body posture, and vocalizations, dogs communicate a wide range of intentions and emotions, both with humans and with other animals. When we adopt a dog, it is important to train and understand these signs, because communication is at the heart of any relationship, even between different species of animals.

Since dogs watch us closely every day, they quickly learn the meaning of our gestures, words and facial expressions. We, on the other hand, usually take longer to understand them. For example, we assume that a dog wagging its tail is happy, when in reality this can be interpreted in different ways depending on context and movement.

To know if our dog is uncomfortable or needs space, we need to understand the «calm» signals (yawning, licking, turning face, etc.) and the «threatening» signals (growling, showing teeth, marking, etc.). If we pay attention to these signals and avoid forcing our dog into uncomfortable situations, their trust in us will grow.

If you want to help your dog to socialize with other dogs, keep reading this article on how to introduce your dog to a new dog.

5. Your dog is nervous due to a lack of stimulation

For our dog’s well-being and to build a lasting bond with them, we need to spend a lot of time with them and stimulate them physically and mentally. A lack of stimulation can cause a dog to exhibit negative behaviors such as nervousness, excessive barking, etc. Stress and anxiety are often the result of not being able to channel their energy or stimulate their mind.

Living with a dog means spending time together, doing enjoyable activities and having positive experiences. Dogs are sociable creatures, they need interaction with other people. The dog needs walks, training sessions, playtime and of course moments of relaxation and cuddling to build a secure and healthy bond with us and develop a stronger sense of affection.

The same goes for activities and challenges that encourage their decision making, make them think and stimulate them on a cognitive level. Methods we can use include skill training with positive reinforcement or using interactive toys and puzzles that can be solved alone or with our help. By doing this and providing them with the physical exercise they need based on age, size, breed and health status, the dog will flourish and their relationship with their caretaker will improve.

So if you notice that your dog is barking at you, showing their teeth, hiding from you or refusing to be petted, it does not mean that they hate you, it simply means that something is wrong and this is their way of telling you. Therefore, you must determine what is causing their behavior and treat it in order to improve your relationship with them.

If you want to know more about how to keep your dog stimulated at home, keep reading this article on 6 games to play with your dog indoors.

If you want to read similar articles to What to Do if Your Dog Hates You, we recommend you visit our Basic care category.