Rego: Emotional support animals deserve the same respect as service animals
February 21, 2017
This column is one half of a head-to-head. Read the opposing view here.
Emotional support animals should be considered service dogs with all the same benefits. Service animals are companions which help their owner to perform daily tasks that they could not otherwise perform. An emotional support animal is more than just a pet, it is an aiding mechanism that helps a person be the best version of them self. However, laws regarding the two vary tremendously and restrict where one can bring an emotional support animal.
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By definition, a service animal is any dog or other common domestic animal individually trained to do work or perform tasks for the benefit of an individual with a disability. An emotional support animal is a companion that a medical professional has determined provides benefit for an individual with a disability. Both definitions mention a disability, but no limitation to the type of disability. Disabilities can be anything physical or mental which limits a person’s movement, senses or abilities. Most people commonly think of service animals performing tasks for the physically disabled, such as the deaf. Service animals also perform tasks for a person diagnosed with PTSD. PTSD, post-traumatic stress disorder, is a condition characterized by mental and emotional distress after experiencing a terrifying event and is a mental disorder much like anxiety or depression. However, emotional support animals are given for people who have mental disorders. To discriminate one mental disorder against another is unjust. If a service animal can be administered for one type of mental disorder, than a service animal should be able to be administered to all.
By law, service animals are allowed to go anywhere the public is normally allowed. When inquiring about a service animal, only two questions may be asked: is this a service animal, and what task(s) was it trained to perform? On the other hand, emotional support animals are not allowed everywhere their owner is, and in most cases, are treated like any other dog. While it is true that the animals’ amount of training differs greatly, that is perhaps something that the government should change since emotional support animals seem to affect their owners just as greatly as a service dog.
The biggest issue people have with this argument is that obtaining an emotional support animal is so easy and a power so abused it’s almost a complete joke. After taking a stratified survey, only one in four dogs on campus provided legitimate service to their owner, yet the other three dogs still wore service vests. This may only be a sample size, but it is a very good example of the dogs that wear service vests on school which are not actually service animals by definition. Yes, there are admittedly people simply buying a vest online to put on their dog as an excuse to bring it to campus. That is ethically and morally wrong, no argument against that. There have also been many instances where people have obtained emotional support animal verification to simply be able to bring their dog on a plane. The list of immoral and irresponsible acts related to this abuse in power goes on and on. These are perfect examples of the few ruining it for the many who could potentially benefit from an emotional support animal being with them everywhere.
Service animals are trained to perform specific tasks as to mitigate a person’s disability. In the instance of a blind person, the animal assist in directing its person. Emotional support animals can help calm someone in social situations and overcome fears that they could not otherwise handle on their own, thus allowing them to live a healthy and normal lifestyle. If a person with terrible anxiety were invited to a concert, that person might normally say no because of large crowds of unknown people. But if they had an emotional support animal, they might feel more inclined to say yes and be able to live their life as full as possible without anything holding them back. While there may be differences between the extremes in types of disabilities and their need for aid, it does not mean that one disability is more deserving than the other. People can experience such crippling depression that they can’t leave their house, and that is by no means living a normal life.
While the power of obtaining an emotional support animal is commonly abused, it is simply because of the lack of regulation and requirements for having one. If laws were changed to have requirements similar to that of a service animals, then emotional support animals would only be administered to those who genuinely need them to live life. Emotional support animals should also be required to undergo special training just as service animals do. Both emotional support animal and service animal laws could be more constricted. For instance, service dog vests should be available only through doctors administering the animal. Or people should have some simple form of ID proving the requirement for a service animal. No matter how the system decides to work through it, emotional support animals and service animals should be classified equally.
Kathleen Ivy • Feb 22, 2017 at 8:06 am
Rego, I suggest that you do better research before writing an article on a subject. I hope you read the comments. They contain some good information. What an embarrassment this misinformation is.
Shay Rego • Feb 28, 2017 at 2:56 pm
you’re rude, calling my first article an embarrassment. i did do my research, and my definitions were not incorrect..
Kathleen Ivy • Feb 28, 2017 at 3:56 pm
You are mistaken.
Bruce Catlin • Feb 22, 2017 at 2:23 am
The A.D.A was not written to give disabled persons more rights than another person, it was written to give them the same rights. I, disabled or not should not expect to be able to bring my pet, in the case of emotional support animals this can be dog, cat , rabbit, gerbil ( list goes on and on ) where pets are not allowed. You do not get to infringe upon the rights of others be having a untrained or undertrained animal with you where ever you go. Real service dogs go through a year and a half to two years of training, hundreds of hours, thousands of dollars worth of training. They are specifically trained to mitigate portions of a persons disability, but a large part of their training is on public access, manners, obedience. A disability does not make a service dog, training does. You and many others seem to blur the lines between service dogs and emotional support animals. The line is very clear, if you are legally disabled you ether have a well trained piece of medical equipment ( service dog ) or its a pet (emotional support animal ). That’s the way they are defined by law.
Camaro • Feb 21, 2017 at 6:32 pm
Your whole premise is based off of incorrect information. First your definition of service animal is outdated. “By definition, a service animal is any dog or other common domestic animal individually trained to do work or perform tasks for the benefit of an individual with a disability.” In 2010 the DoJ revised the definition to only dogs, with a special provision for miniature horses.
The difference between an ESA and a Service Animal is the training, the disability does not matter. If a person with PTSD has a dog and a medical professional attests to the presence of the dog in some way mitigating the person’s disability then it would be an ESA. If the dog is then trained to perform a task such as grounding, blocking, etc, it would then be a service animal.
ESAs are allowed in most no-pet housing and in commercial air travel by the Fair Housing Act and Air Carrier’s Access Act respectively. In both cases they can be required to provide specific documentation from a treating licensed medical professional. The ID’s, registries, certifications, and vests all mean nothing, if they are accepted it is due to ignorance or apathy.
ESAs are not covered under the ADA and should not be treated different then pets aside from the two places protected by federal law because they do not having the training that service animals do. If they did they wouldn’t be ESAs they would be service animals.