Most pet news is accompanied by a chorus of “aww” and “can I come over?”, but if you tell people you just bought a ball python, the mood in the room changes faster than a jump scare in a horror movie. When I first told my mom that I wanted a snake, she looked at me like she thought I belonged in an asylum. Now, after having Helios my snake for a few months, she likes him better than me.
Classmates think that I’m no longer just a regular teen; I’m now a mysterious figure who probably lives in a basement and casts spells, even though all I wanted to do was show off Helios’s favorite spot to bask. This is the ultimate double standard in the pet world. We’ve been conditioned to think that owning a reptile makes you the villain in a low-budget movie, but the truth is a lot less exciting.
Snakes have the longest-running PR crisis in history. From ancient myths to movies like “Anaconda” or “Raiders of the Lost Ark” where a CGI anaconda tries to eat a helicopter, they’ve been saddled with the “bad guy” reputation for centuries. Because of this, we treat these goofy blobs like they have a malicious master plan to take over the living room. The thing is, a pet snake’s biggest dream is to find a slightly warmer spot under its heat lamp. I also know that Helios won’t judge me for my lack of attention or bark at a delivery driver at three in the morning. They’re literally just the quiet introverts of the animal kingdom — misunderstood, chill, and just trying to stay cozy.
The logic behind fearing them is pretty shaky when you look at the stats. People who scream at the sight of a six-inch-long garter snake are usually the same ones who would let a ninja with retractable switchblades on its paws sleep on their face. We’ve accepted “dangerous” animals as cute because they have fur, while we’ve branded “harmless” ones as monsters because they have scales. This is a completely vibe-based judgement.
Think about it: a snake has no arms, no legs, and can be defeated by a sturdy Tupperware lid. Your “safe” family dog weighs 80 pounds, runs at 20 mph, and can turn your TV remote into confetti in under ten seconds. One of these is a physical threat, the other is a sentient noodle that’s scared of a loud sneeze.
At the end of the day, hating snakes is kind of a cliché. It’s a fear that we’ve inherited from watching too many movies and not enough biology. Once you get beyond the “creepy” moniker, you can see that snakes aren’t slimy or evil, but rather just quiet (and usually small) roommates who just so happen to be, you know, tube-shaped and limbless. Choosing to see past the stigma makes you someone who’s willing to see beyond a movie script. Having a snake also means I’m living the dream while the rest of the world is hard at work extracting dog hair from their sweaters or being awakened at 4 a.m. by a cat. If being a “snake person” means that I get to have a pet that is as chill as I am, then I’ll take the bad guy designation any day of the week. At least all my favorite, expensive items will be safe from ever becoming a glorified chew toy.
