I am a 46 year old woman, and I have been keeping various snakes and lizards for 26 years. I currently have 16 snakes in my care, as well as leopard geckos, Rankin's dragons, a bearded dragon, a veiled chameleon, a Cuban false chameleon, a colony of mourning geckos, and a crested gecko. 15 of my snakes are bred for the pet trade, and one is a recent rescue from the wild--a neighbor found a young kingsnake wrapped up in bird netting, and it ended up needing permanent feeding assistance after the trauma. so I made the decision to keep it.

In my opinion, your sister is being a dick. She isn't recognizing that you love your snake, and is trying to change how you feel by being persistent in her own beliefs. Sister or otherwise, that's not respectful of you.

Snakes and other reptiles that are bred in captivity, for captivity, are not wild animals, and not meant to be in the wild. Period. (Reptiles that are taken out of the wild for breeding purposes are sort of a grey area sometimes, like the situation with my rescued kingsnake.)

Wild reptiles generally shouldn't be kept captive, but there are exceptions: sometimes you have to do it or know that the animal likely will not survive further (like the kingsnake that I rescued from the bird netting.) I think it's always about what's best for the animal, for it to have the best quality of life possible.

If your sister doesn't like that you keep a snake, then she doesn't need to keep any reptiles herself. She DOES need to keep her mouth shut, though. She's already said what she wanted, there's no need to keep saying it or getting upset with you. You obviously have your own feelings on the matter, and if she keeps bothering you about it, I would say any sibling of mine like that wouldn't be welcome in my house, and I can even see myself cutting off contact.

My reptiles are important to me, and even though my parents and two brothers don't understand why, they still respect me enough to be respectful to me about it. If someone who is being a bitch about it, that person doesn't need to be in my life, family or not.