I can think of at least a couple stories from the last year where some guys lost all their money , their jobs , and straight up murdersuicided their entire family . The reasons and details are different , but fucked up people aren ' t limited to either gender . <| sep |> Please see my comment in reply to your recently deleted comment . It clarifies my stance on the baby argument . Babies are not adults and are not aware . Dogs are aware as adults . I ' ve reiterated this many times . If you genuinely feel your dogs are not competent enough to survive , thenA You underestimate your dogs . People do this all the time for things they care about and for . What parent isn ' t wracked with fear sending their kids off to college for the first time ? It ' s normal to worry . But it doesn ' t mean that the dogs are incompetent . B You have not imparted good life skills to your dogs as a pack leader . Your dogs are spoiled as they should be because they ' re probably very good doggos . This isn ' t an insult . I wouldn ' t expect most people to raise dogs with that kind of selfsufficient mentality . It ' s not why people keep dogs . You take a male human who ' s live with his parents until he ' s 40 and had every minutia of his life controlled by them and put him out in the real world with no support , he won ' t fare well either . But what if it was his choice to try anyway , is the question I am trying to get across . C Your dogs simply may not be intelligent enough in that regard . This would likely be caused by genetics . We all know that some breeds are better problem solvers than others . Also , breeds aren ' t a real thing , they ' re a bastardization of mutts , despite what most people believe . They ' re a set of traits that are controlled by a very narrow set of genetics . These genetics are narrows because every breed invariably had heavy inbreeding in its lineage . It ' s unavoidable , you can ' t turn wild dogs or wolves , or foxes , or whatever biologists are saying they came from these days into the little brachycephalic fuzzballs we have today without inbreeding . This inbreeding inevitably leads to reduced favorable survival traits . they have been removed from the natural order and manipulated by humans to be basically novelty items this is another discussion in and of itself . Basically what I ' m saying , it ' s it ' s possible for certain dogs to just be bred for failure if the don ' t have human help . Likewise , just as two siblings can have two different intellects , so too can dogs within breeds have different intellects There are indeed mentally challenged border collies . The same thing happens with humans , too . Not many are going to send their mentally handicapped family members out into the wild This isn ' t Sparta so they probably shouldn ' t send their mentally handicapped dogs out there either . Or it could be something else . Obviously I don ' t know you or your dogs . If you choose not to read anything else I ' ve written thoroughly , please at least consider reading the following carefullyI ' m not making any claims here , just trying to open minds . My intention isn ' t to advocate for everyone to open their doors and let their dogs run free . I ' m simply trying to pose whether or not we should view dogs as individuals or objects . I am positioning myself on the stance that dogs are individuals and are capable of obtaining free will . This does not mean I believe this . I don ' t believe anything There is only what I know and what I don ' t . Nor , again , does this mean that I think all dogs should be allowed to roam freely . I was hoping it would help people really think about their relationship with their dogs . And then I hoped they could offer intelligent responses that could enlighten me in some way , even if it was counter to what I had initially expressed . I am NOT telling anyone how to care for their pets . You can stop reading carefully now if you do choose . I know I can be wordy . The idea aligns with the saying , If you love someone , let them go . A dog may genuinely be unhappy with a family , despite how the family may feel . I had a powerful and related anecdote on the idea about a dog that ran away and his previous owner just let him go . It ' s an avant guarde idea , but that doesn ' t mean it ' s wrong nor does it mean it ' s right . But the older I get and the more I interact with all animals , I feel like they have feelings , motivations , and intellectual concepts that go beyond simply instinct . It seems to me that what we call emotions in humans is what we call instinct in animals . And I ponder what rights animals truly deserve .