The Instagrams of Kennady Pine's cats Norman and Oatmeal.
The Instagrams of Kennady Pine’s cats Oatmeal and Norman. Kennady argues that Instagrams for pets are a good thing, though some might not agree.

As I check my social media, a soft orange glow illuminating from my crystal salt lamp, both of my cats curled up oh so picturesquely on my lap, I ponder an age old question. 

Should Instagrams for pets be a thing?

For years, I was adamantly against the idea. I can recall scrolling through my Instagram feed, harmlessly double-tapping slime videos, only to grimace at a first-person narrated photo of a mediocre dog.

I was confused—distraught, even. What kind of psychotic individual would create a social media account for their pet?

Then something incredible happened. I adopted two cats from the animal shelter—Norman and Oatmeal—and I immediately had this unrelenting urge to create Instagram accounts for each of them to share their antics with the world.

The cat Instagram obsession had begun and I was all in.

Fast forward to today, I can without a doubt say that I am a fan of pet Instagrams. I will scream it from the rooftops. A rush of adrenaline or surge of heroin pumping through your veins is truly lackluster in comparison to the euphoric feeling of uploading a silly video of a kitten.

However, where do we draw the line? Where do pet social media accounts cross the border of cute and psychotic?

I have the answer for you, pet-loving readers.

The moment you become crazy is when you start writing your captions through your pet’s perspective. This is a fact. No one in their right mind should be articulating what their pet is— but probably isn’t—thinking. I’m sure your cat loves you, but do you really need to prove to your audience that they do through your own self-praising cat mom caption? 

It gets even weirder when people make purposeful typing errors as if their pet is terrible at grammar. Who are you to assume that if your pet was able to articulate their thoughts into coherent sentences on social media, they would be consistently grammatically incorrect?

I don’t mean to be judgemental, but come on guys. Hop on your IG and post about your pet’s quirky antics or how their vet appointment went.

That being said, most people do truly love pet content on their social media accounts.

I took it upon myself to do a bit of research regarding the controversial pet instagram debate. I posted a poll on Instagram asking my followers whether they thought accounts for pets were weird or cute. The results came back 88 percent cute and 12 percent weird.

I think the results speak for themselves. 

The truth is, I find so much joy in posting photos of my cats for the entire interweb to see. There’s no greater feeling than pushing thirty likes on a photo of Norman and Oatmeal sitting in a silly position or playing with a piece of string.

The creators of the Instagrams love posting, the followers love the content, and the pets love the attention. It’s a win-win for everyone involved. 

Kennady Pine can be reached by email at kpine.sagebrush@unr.edu or on Twitter @NevadaSagebrush. Oatmeal and Norman can be reached on Instagram @glutenfreeoatmeal and @norman_sucks.