Pet owners or pet parents?

[Catherine]

The question of whether we are pet owners or pet parents is up for debate. Some people feel very strongly that they own their pets. Others see them as their children.  I don't know if that effects how they feel about the pets, but it does reflect an attitude of the part of the human involved. Increasingly people are seeing pets as the children in their lives. Some pets are like children.

http://news.google.ca/news/url?sr=1&ct2=...t=2&at=dt0

Thinking over my relationship to my pets, I don't like the term owner.  I am more of a guardian. I don't think of them as children, except for babies I am raising. Most of my pets don't see themselves as "children" either. They have a sense of being adults.
Maybe I feel a bit like a mother to Barrie, but a 3 ft lizard is a special case.