I’ve recently taken up the conscious practice of avoiding the use of animals as representational embodiments of negative qualities in humans. From “cowed” to “eating like a pig” (and don’t even get me started on “dogging”…), we’ve long employed metaphors based on what we think we know about our fellow non-human animals that are, in fact, too often everything from partial misunderstandings to simply flat-out wrong. And of all the animals that figure prominently in our figurative language, sheep are among the most – if not actually the most – commonly used.
