It is universally agreed that we as humans are better off than dogs in America, in intelligence, dignity, health, etc. Two crucial facts contradict this notion. So, let’s get to these facts:

FACT ONE: New York’s rich hotel heiress Leona Hemsley, famously mean and ruthless with her hotel employees, left $12 million upon her death to her Maltese dog named Trouble. According to her instructions, $300,000, enough for 10 low-income families in America to live on for a year annually, was set aside for the dog’s care! With this inheritance from his benefactor, the Maltese enjoyed his upscale life, served by human caretakers, and died four years later. The “millionaire dog” was also called the “most hated Maltese” while alive, perhaps more in spirit of humor, not real hate. Still, some of the humor was understandably bitter because, under the ironic circumstances, human beings had to work under the command of an employer-dog. (Did the Maltese sign his employees’ timesheets with his paws or with simple barks?)

Enjoying “The American Dream,” the fortunate dog lived and died in peace. It is feasible that many of Trouble’s employees wished they had been born as Hemsley’s dog, instead of minimum-wage human citizens. At least in capitalist America, dogs can and do inherit money like humans. In some countries dogs are eaten as food, but only in America, by contrast, can a human being actually be “lower” than a dog in legal status and socio-economic hierarchy.

FACT TWO: Americans are known to be increasingly obese, and many health woes are commonly attributed to our bad eating. The food industry, on its part, pushes more fat, sugar and salt into our ultra-processed food, reaching the level of what the industry calls “the bliss point” of maximum tolerance for sugar, salt and fat in what we eat, that makes it much tastier but worse for our health.

But, strangely, such inanity is pronounced only when we manage our own food, not when we decide what to feed our dogs, whereby our intelligence level jumps to a very high bar.

First, look at the commercials put out by McDonald’s for its hamburgers: Nothing but deception, eye-catching, visual tricks, all full of fat, sugar and salt. Not just McDonald’s, it’s all human food advertisements, typically at ballgames, all quite salivatory and stomach-churning. All human food ads are designed to tempt you to run to the nearest restaurant. (How many times do we call for pizza after seeing an irresistible advertisement on TV?) There is no mention of health or nutrition in food ads.

Then, in radical contrast to human food advertisement, look at the dog food commercials, which reflect most owners’ concern for dogs’ health and nutrition: Whether on television or in printed media, the ads all uniformly emphasize health, balanced nutrition, energy — all very smart and intelligent choices. A typical dog food ad (quoted from www.dogfeast.com) says: “100% nutritionally guaranteed! The highest standard of excellence for product quality, taste and customer satisfaction. ALL NATURAL, these high-quality dog foods use only the finest ingredients that meet or exceed the nutritional standards. NO CORN. NO BY-PRODUCTS.”

In contrast, human food commercials, designed by the best visual tricksters, are mercilessly seductive in selling junk food: every morsel dripping with fat, sugar and salt, as impossible for us to resist as the blood-sucking Sirens were for Ulysses’ sailors. All human food commercials rely on what your eyes see, in which we are most gullible. (Reminder: Americans live shorter and fatter than all OECD nations).

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On the other hand, God protects dogs with immunity to deceptive advertisements concocted by the devious two-legged animals who can trick only their fellow humans. Dog owners seem to be much more alert about their dogs’ vaccinations and other regular health checkups than they are about their own children’s. I reckon that many American parents, completely fooled by their FDA and food corporations in cahoots, unconsciously feed their children the poisonous junk food that they would not feed their dogs. Even the Farmer’s Dog is sympathetic when its mainline mantra says, “Eating healthy is hard, unless you are a dog.” How hard? We need the knowledge of a Ph.D. in nutrition science and the discipline of a repentant monk to eat healthy every day until we die.

A disturbing question: Do we love our dogs more than we love our children? In answering this question, we notice that perhaps dogs have a slight advantage for our affection because of the different ways in which we end up with dogs and children: We normally get our dogs as a deliberate decision of love and affection; but the way we get our children is actually quite casual, mostly as by-products of accidental and even careless passion. Unlike dogs that are welcomed wholeheartedly into our family, children come to us often with prenatal and post-natal depression. Few children arrive with such love and excitement as our dogs.

Given such differences in their origins, we shouldn’t be surprised that we tend to treat dogs better than our human children. In consequence, American dogs look healthy and energetic, and live mostly to their maximum natural lifespan. But American children are groomed to become fat-sick-dying-early adults. Obviously, judged by food advertisement, we feed dogs with better food than we do our own children.

Shouldn’t we treat our children at least like dogs, so that they eat better, and live healthier, happier and longer — like our dogs?

Jon Huer, columnist for the Recorder and retired professor, lives in Greenfield.