The same sad comments about my snakes... (vent)

[BWB]

I get all of the same comments from my coworkers (mostly women) - "why do you have snakes?", then they cringe and squirm. I explain that they are not slimy, scary, etc. They won't get out at night and hunt me down (although I do fear them getting out but only because God knows where they would end up and I don't want to lose them, in any way). My best answer is that they are so darned interesting and I am learning something that, mostly does not frustrate me. I can't handle dumb pets (some dogs and cats are just plain dumb or stubborn or both) and don't like spending all my time trying to teach an animal where to go to the bathroom, to come, heel, etc. I love taking out my snakes and looking them over, letting them crawl over my shoulders, and head, on the computer and keyboard and all kinds of crazy places. I find it very relaxing and when it's time to put them back I am the one who is hesitant so if they turn to come out or stick up their head, I'm taking them back out again. I am trying to educate other people and I am not the stereotypical snake owner (at least not to my coworkers). I am an old fart, getting ready to retire and I envision that taking care of snakes and possibly breeding will be a big part of my retirement. I have shown the snakes to kids in the neighborhood and tried to show them how to handle snakes, etc. - the kids do a lot better than the parents!

[angllady2]

Theresa has some good points.

The best way to adapt is to come up with good answers to comments/questions. For example:

"Why on earth would you own A SNAKE?"
"They are quiet, docile, don't take up much room, don't make noise, are hypo-allergenic, don't make big messes, never need to be walked or have a litter box, and best of all, they only eat once a week! What's NOT to love about owning a snake?"

"Aren't you afraid it will eat your child, dog, cat, etc?"
"in the first place, my snakes don't get big enough to eat anything bigger than a rat/mouse. In the second place, do you believe everything you see on TV? Almost no snake gets big enough to eat a dog or cat, and NONE get big enough to eat a person."

"Why would you want to own the Devil/Satan?!?"
"Satan, seriously? So let me get this straight, you think Jesus was a sheep? If calling the son of god a lamb was a metaphor, why would you think the devil being a snake was any different?"

"Don't they bite?"
"Anything that has a mouth can bite. Ever had a teething baby latch onto your finger? While bites sometimes do happen, a kitten does more damage than one of my snakes. If you aren't afraid of a kitten, there is no reason to be afraid of my snakes."

"Aren't they slimy and gross?"
"Actually no, snakes are warm and very soft, like leather. And they can come in some pretty awesome paintjobs! ( morphs )"

"Aren't you afraid it will strangle/constrict you?"
"not at all. My little snakes couldn't hurt me if they tried, and even my biggest female, if she gets carried away, is as easy to remove as unwrapping a scarf."

Things like these will curb a lot of the ignorance.

Gale

[Tash]

Re-education is key! Although it's hard to get most people to listen. People often the fear what they don't understand and are uninterested in changing what they think they know about such things.

I think my best comments were,

"Why can't you just get a REAL pet like a cat or dog?" - ex boyfriend

"Why would you keep such a dangerous animal? Arn't all snakes venous? "
- Aunt

"...that isn't a kitten."
-friend

"Remind me to never stay at your house, I'd hate to wake up to a snake strangling me in my sleep." - Grandma

"Don't be thinking you can bring that thing over whenever you want. That snake isn't allowed to just roam around my house... you don't have it on you do you?" -Dad

"I'm just worried that one day your roommate is going to call me and tell me your dead because you insist on keeping bloodthirsty killers as pets."
-mom

As you may have noticed I don't get my love of snakes/reptiles from my family. I deal with it all the time and love the chance to tell them what owning snakes is REALLY like. It takes a while but slowly they are beginning to listen.

Luckily I have an uncle that shares my passion for reptiles, and the rest of our family looks at us like we have three heads at family get togethers when we start talking about them.

[distaff]

A thick skin helps.
I mostly just shrug people off, and I don't share my personal life with jerks anyway.

I'm surprised that more people aren't won over by the sheer beauty of your photos of them, esp. Cake, but... it is what it is.

[distaff]

Personal theory:

I think many people have a morbid fascination with danger, and they see the snake as an easy stand-in. The phallic shape doesn't help matters either. Most can't get their minds out of the gutter, and for those who are too polite to mention such a hang-up, they just end up in an unreachable state of cognitive dissonance; viewing the women snake keepers as trashy deviants, and the men as dirty. A certain young rapper posing with her behind in a thong hasn't helped matters in that regard.

IMHO, morphs are probably the best thing to happen to snakes. A pearly lavender and yellow snake changes all the associations.

[DVirginiana]

I've literally been asked "What is your obsession with animals that want to eat your face off?" and told to have the hospital on speed-dial (I keep some tarantulas and scorpions too, though none that would be able to do any serious harm). Usually these are meant jokingly, as everyone who knows me knows they'll get an hour-long biology lesson if they insist something stupid is true. I don't get a lot of seriously negative comments about my herps.

Ugh, the worst is that I recently ended up with an accidental pet mouse (Little guy turned around to confront my BP whenever she was about to strike and eventually freaked her out enough that she gave up... Impressed me enough that I decided to adopt him) and people act seriously suspicious that I'm suddenly going to kill him by giving him to my python. That ticks me off in a way that stupid comments about my reptiles don't, because they're implying that I'd suddenly kill off an animal I made the commitment to keep, and also that because I have snakes I must be some sort of animal-torturing psychopath... I usually say something like "Just because I have snakes doesn't mean I hate mice. Just like you can eat a hamburger without me assuming that you run around clubbing baby cows to death."

[Tash]

I had a male coworker tell me once that he thought me feeding rats to my snakes was just plain sick and twisted and I was basically in the making of becoming a serial killer. It makes me wonder what he things his dog food/treats are made out of?

[redshepherd]

Oddly enough, because I do educate calmly (in public at least), explain that ball pythons and dumeril's in particular are the most docile snake, how they just hide in a hole all day and sleep until they come out to eat a mouse, they aren't even remotely strong enough to strangle a person, my flimsy arms are much stronger than they are, ball pythons tend to imprint on a type of prey, the bites themselves are tiny and hardly hurt at all, etc.

But the same people who I "educate" continue to not believe me/continue to make such comments/think I'm just playing the devil's advocate/am just a misinformed child who naively thinks all animals are gentle. LOL.

Yeah, I definitely don't have a particularly thick skin- I'd say I'm just an average person when it comes to that, so the endless repeating comments are making me quite fed up with these people who won't sit and listen, and instead would rather believe the myths and Hollywood stereotypes they've heard before.

Theresa has some good points.

The best way to adapt is to come up with good answers to comments/questions. For example:

"Why on earth would you own A SNAKE?"
"They are quiet, docile, don't take up much room, don't make noise, are hypo-allergenic, don't make big messes, never need to be walked or have a litter box, and best of all, they only eat once a week! What's NOT to love about owning a snake?"

"Aren't you afraid it will eat your child, dog, cat, etc?"
"in the first place, my snakes don't get big enough to eat anything bigger than a rat/mouse. In the second place, do you believe everything you see on TV? Almost no snake gets big enough to eat a dog or cat, and NONE get big enough to eat a person."

"Why would you want to own the Devil/Satan?!?"
"Satan, seriously? So let me get this straight, you think Jesus was a sheep? If calling the son of god a lamb was a metaphor, why would you think the devil being a snake was any different?"

"Don't they bite?"
"Anything that has a mouth can bite. Ever had a teething baby latch onto your finger? While bites sometimes do happen, a kitten does more damage than one of my snakes. If you aren't afraid of a kitten, there is no reason to be afraid of my snakes."

"Aren't they slimy and gross?"
"Actually no, snakes are warm and very soft, like leather. And they can come in some pretty awesome paintjobs! ( morphs )"

"Aren't you afraid it will strangle/constrict you?"
"not at all. My little snakes couldn't hurt me if they tried, and even my biggest female, if she gets carried away, is as easy to remove as unwrapping a scarf."

Things like these will curb a lot of the ignorance.

Gale

I've actually gotten all of these comments/questions before already, and responded in a similar way to you. About 50% of the people I tell don't seem to believe me- look at me like I'm just a naive kid who does not understand the ~danger of the snakes I own~. The best we can do, I guess!

[redshepherd]

Some good responses I've used..
"Ewww, I hate snakes!"
"Oh, I love ALL animals!"

"Won't it bite you?" "Has it ever bitten you?"
"Oh, the worst it can do is like a papercut. I've been mauled by a pomeranian once, that was scary! And kicked by horses, boy does that hurt. The snakes are harmless."

"I'd NEVER own a snake!"
"That's fine, I love them enough to more than make up for you not owning any. I'll take your share of the snakes and you can have my share of the budgies! Those little birds bite so hard!"

Nice ones- I actually answered these in the EXACT same way as you, particularly the loving animals and papercuts part.
I do wish I was more thick-skinned for this, but it is what it is. Starting to get annoyed finally after a couple months of, "Did your snakes go after your dogs yet?" and I solemnly reply, "Dogs and cats can bite my snakes in half without a second though." :|

[The Golem]

After showing a photo of my snake to some women at work one of them said "That would make a nice purse".


But even though the questions can be ridiculous it's really best to pause for a moment and use the opportunity to educate. Many people have never held or even been close to a snake so they really don't know more than what they've seen in movies and newspaper headlines.