Yeah aside from having cats that would appreciate the fun new things to murder, I don't get birds because I would feel bad about having them locked up in cages but birds literally just shit and piss at random as far as I know so letting them roam the place at their discretion isn't going to work either.
Birds don't pee, and they don't just poop everywhere, theyre not gonna not make little poops, but depending on training they tend to poop around their cages.
Keeping birds in a cage isn't good for their mental well-being. It's true for all birds, but with larger ones like cockatoos they'll get bored and pluck out their own feathers if they don't have mental stimulation or enrichment. Birds are social, especially parrots, they need to be around other birds or have lots of interaction with people/toys to avoid boredom and depression.
This also comes in to clipping flight wings. Flight is physically healthy for the bird and it's extremely mentally stimulating. Clipping wings is only done for human convenience, train the bird and don't give it opprotunity to escape and the bird isn't gonna fly away. They'll get into annoying places but they're mischevious, especially as "teenagers." It's just important to have a good relationship with them. They should wanna come down for their cage eventually, and hopefully the house is birdproofed.
Cages also aren't bird prisons given they're raised correctly. Birds also value privacy and quiet comfort, that's why you can't keep more than one large bird in a cage and why a bird owner might have to show the bird their old cage is being destroyed when getting a new one.
Birds make great companions, but they're a handful and most people don't have an idea of the pros and cons of them, or just how different they are from dogs, or even how smart and clean they are. (they love to bathe in water and preen their feathers, some sandbathe, either way their wet pants are cute.)
