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Anonymous
Here's your essay.
Address the biggest misconceptions: Rats are naturally clean. They groom like cats.(1) They're not vicious in the least. As a prey animal, they fear anything larger than them. Domestic/captive/socialized rats are extremely friendly and docile. Their docility is part of their popularity in labs.(2)
Rats share a shockingly similar biology to humans: More closely related to humans than all animals of Carnivora (canines, felines, bears, weasels)(3) Share a close genetic relationship to humans and have similar nutritional requirements.(4)(5)
Smart as fuck: Capable of metacognition.(6) Most trainable animal in the world after dogs and pigs. Can recognize causal relationships.(7) Can be trained to recognize difference between spoken Dutch and Japanese.(8)
Social, Loving animals: Rats laugh.(9) They love to wrestle.(10) Rats restrain their behavior when they see that it makes another rat uncomfortable.(10) Rats release the same pleasure hormone as humans when they play with friends or search out and eat exotic foods.(10) Mother rats often combine their litters to raise children together.(11) Rats grieve the loss of friends.(12)
>>324517 Rodent diseases kill about as many people as lightning in the U.S. (go to CDC.gov and add the deaths by hantavirus, leptospirosis, etc. and compare) Their association with disease is overstated way out of proportion, don't dwell on it. Besides, toxoplasmosis seems to have little to do with rats: >Toxoplasmosis is a parasitic disease... the primary host is the felid (cat) family. ^Wikipedia
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