Read on Twitter
hello. this incident comes back up every few months, and because of that i don’t think i did the best job of addressing it initially. i know if you’re seeing this for the first time it’s probably disappointing, so let me explain https://twitter.com/baseddrworm/status/1315953241960701952
i used to treat every post as a blank canvas to tell a story. i would make up a name for the dog, a ridiculous breed name, and often a totally nonsensical narrative for them. it was fun to write this way
and because everything we post is user submitted, i always got the owner’s consent if we changed things. Kanan’s human Danny, @CaponeKnows, was aware of the switch before we posted
since we directly credit the owner of the dog in each post, (unless they don’t want to be tagged) somebody went to Danny’s account and saw that the dog’s name was originally Kanan. when they made a post about it, i was confused and my first reaction was to be super defensive
i didn’t really know what “whitewashing” meant, let alone the impact of participating in it. after taking more time to read the replies on the post calling me out and educating myself, Kanan’s post was deleted and we haven’t changed a dog’s name since
i’m ashamed that this is part of @dog_rates story, but it is. once again, i am sorry to those hurt by this, that is the furthest thing from the intent of my accounts. thank you for hearing me out
OH and i’ve stayed in touch with Danny and Kanan over the years and i’m happy to report that Kanan is a big boy now
