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Does it seem like religious people are less animal friendly?
(sh.itjust.works)
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this post was submitted on 17 Sep 2026
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Oh I'd say this is definitely just anecdotal to you personally. Lots of animal shelters are owned, operated and funded by religious organizations.
that also seems anecdotal... I personally never heard of a single one (oh, anecdotal too) and in all cities I've lived I knew of shelters and rescuers because I'm one (and I currently take care of 34 cats and 4 dogs), and I must agree with OP, I know a lot of rescuers that have a religion (like, that vague belief in the god their parents talked about) but none that are overtly religious (wear symbols, attend temples, etc)
edit: Homeless shelters and nursing homes though, plenty of religious institutions behind them.
Ton are a google search away. Dalo Acres Animal Sanctuary UT, St. Francis Animal Sanctuary MI, Keeping the Faith Animal Shelter PA. There's a ton of em.
The question isn't whether they are not animal friendly, but whether they are less animal friendly. There may be a ton of them but if there are six tons of non-religious shelters, there's a difference.
What metric would you want to see?
Self-reported religiosity and affection for animals would be a start.
So the shelters and sanctuaries I listed as brief examples?
No, the logic doesn't hold. There being shelters run by religious people does not say anything about whether they are more or less caring for animals than normal.
So you would need X amount of religious people to make a post like "hey I'm x religion and I love animals" what's the number you'd need? Would it need to correlate proportionally to secular animal lovers?
You'd want to show a significant negative correlation between religiosity and friendliness toward animals. 'Secular' would just be one end of the religiosity dimension.
Secular just means not religious, we are comparing the religious with the not religious. How religious an individual is, is way way too subjective to hold any weight at all. Comparing different religions/sects could bring interesting results.
Yes, the religiosity dimension has secular at one end and religious at the other. You want to establish whether that dimension is aligned with friendliness to animals. How religious people are is measured all the time, but of course methods can be questioned. I agree that would be interesting; surely a religion's views on animals would have some affect on its adherents.
This thread is basically about Dominionism vs Stewardship. A debate as old as many religions especially in the Abrahamic family
Yeah, but how do they treat them? Is it just a new way for them to make money?
Are you under the impression animal shelters are churning out big bucks?
Anything connected with churches can make good money from donations and shady financials.
While true, lets not be those jerks who associate literally every bad thing to ever happen with churches. Believe it or not there are churches with good people feeding the homeless etc. It's probably .000000001%, but they're out there (and it sure as hell ain't megachurches or any church that preaches maga)
I had food and home heating oil for 3 winters when I was a kid. From a church we didn't even go to. Parents were social workers, a unbelievably poorly compensated profession. Its why I became an engineer instead of following their path. Its much bigger than that percentage but I agree its never the mega churches. They are organizations run by people. Some good, some bad.
I agree, I have even helped my friends church with IT stuff and when I moved to a new town as a kid a church gave us food as we were the poorest family according to my school. That same church said I was going to hell a couple years later when everyone thought I was gay when a gay kid said I was cute and I thanked him.
Had me in the first half....
Damn. Thats shitty. Sorry they were assholes to you.
That is true of any charity organization, regardless of affiliation.
Yeah but it's easier to do when you think you are righteous and have the will of your God behind you.
If you're actively scamming the system intentionally, you don't think that. You know you're being shitty and you've consciencely chosen that over being a righteous godly person.
I didn't take organizations into account,
They are run by people. I think if you have a generally negative perception of a certain type of person, you'll start attributing negative behaviors to all of them, even if its only been your limited experience.