What is wrong with Cesar Millan, and what is wrong with us?
This is an interesting read:
"What is wrong with Cesar Millan, and what is wrong with us?"
URL: http://beyondcesarmillan.weebly.com/alexandra-semyonova.html
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"What is wrong with Cesar Millan, and what is wrong with us?"
URL: http://beyondcesarmillan.weebly.com/alexandra-semyonova.html
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Comments
Comparing dogs to wolves and saying "that's like comparing people to chimpanzees" is the most emotionally politically loaded way to come at it. Can we compare other domestic animals to their wild relatives instead and be more objective and less sensational? Maybe comparing dogs to wolves is like comparing quarter horses to wild mustangs, or rhode Island reds to those endangered prairie hens, or rats to capybaras, dutch dwarf rabbits to arctic hares? NOW we can talk. Its not are they or arent they, its in what ways are they and it what ways arent they?
I thought the Coppinger's book (Dogs: a new understanding) was really well done on so very many levels and topics. So maybe dogs are really descended from dumpster divers- that's okay, I still love them if they are deemed "ratlike" or "parasites" (the Coppiingers go to great lengths to describe the differences between true parasitism and mutualism and other isms that aren't EXACTLY parasites). Rats are less noble seeming to us than the wild wolves we kindof hope our dogs are. (Though I am told rats get a very bad rap and are actually good mothers and intelligent, clean pets.) Rats are opportunistic and adaptable, and so are domestic canines, feral and wild canids. but not all: Coyotes are all over the eastern states now because they are adaptable and wolves are not because they are a niche animal. Both are canines, but in adaptability our dogs may be more like coyotes. But examine what conclusions we draw based on the wolf image vs the rat/dump image- and I am not at all excusing myself from these leanings- at all.
- we buy the bag of dog food with the wolf on it, or the name that sounds wild and primitive. "Orijen" "Wolf King" "Taste of the Wild" "Acana" for example. We LIKE to think of our dogs as wolves, theres no getting around the attraction. We dont like thinking of them as giant rats, eating garbage. Some of us feed prey model raw because we believe it is best and most natural. We like the wolf image here. I love feeding my dogs raw, tripe, bones, and get all excited to find proteins like venison, rather than standard old "beef" and I dont want to feed them "by products" and wheat and corn and sugar.
- We LIKE (especially on this forum) to talk about how primitive/unrefined our favorite breeds are, or certain individuals are. We are excited when our dogs show competence at survival behaviors like Reilly digging out a nest of meadow voles and pouncing on and eating 4 of them. We talk about not breeding away that natural hunting drive. We like to think our dogs can hunt like wild canine hunters, not like wild canine trash pickers. I have not come on the board to tell the story of Reilly's big Day when she was down at the neighbor's compost heap and scored some old half eaten burritos, but to her that was at least as big a victory and wonderfully naturally reinforcing. Both are natural behaviors for dogs, one is athletic and dramatic, the other is dirty and unathletic and we dont want to talk about it.
- We read about Natural Dog training and "Be The Moose" to your dog. That's Wolf-model, not dumpster model. It's not "Be the Burrito." Its nice to think that we can keep our wolf image here, but lose the "Alpha dictator" Millan model discredited among modern dognoscenti as below:
- We dismiss the old "dominance is natural" wolf research for one of two reasons: 1- that dogs aren't wolves, and form different loose. fluid social structures (dumpster divers). OR 2- that that old research was done on captive, unrelated adult wolves and ACTUALLY wild wolves dont behave that way because they live in families with parents, not alphas. A better logician will correct me here but I would counter that if we like argument #1, that we can;t have it both ways- either our dogs are wolves like the 3 points above that we love so much, or they aren't and if not wolf social structure doesnt apply anyway. And that #2 doesnt logically discount "dominance" either because even though it is true that wolves form families, our OWN pet dogs are in the vast majority of cases...captive, unrelated adults.
Whether dogs are wolves or not is moot. We pick and choose anyway when we want them to be wolves and when we dont. The only valid reasons to reject "dominance model" training is because it doesnt WORK well, and you dont want that kind of relationship with your dog, you arent going to be that kind of person and your dog isnt that kind of person either.
I too am a big fan of the Coppinger's book, and I agree with you that it's less a "they are, or they aren't" thing, and more a collection of traits dog share with wolves and a collection of traits they don't.
Also, I am not really bother by thinking of dogs as dumpster divers, and it really doesn't suggest a dog is any more, or less, a wolf. I mean, we should keep in mind, wolves and coyote scavenge as well.
I often refer to a dog or a breed as "less refined" or "primitive", but to me (IMHO), the primitive, or less-refined, extreme doesn't equal a wolf. When I use the term "refined" I am referring to the distance a breed (or dog) is from their original purpose as a breed. So, for example, IMHO, the Shikoku is a less-refined dog breed when compared to, lets say, the Great Dane; the Shikoku is still used for hunting, and still retains a great deal of its hunting abilities - almost any Shikoku you see these days has most of its original hunting instincts intact, while the Great Dane is a breed that is now rarely used for it intended purpose. So, to me, a less-refined breed/dog is one that is less-removed from its intended purpose as a breed and it doesn't mean, at all, that I feel the dog/breed is more similar to a wolf.
What bothers me with blindly assuming dogs are like wolves, and therefore should be treated like wolves, is it ignores the 10K+ years of domestication and evolution the dog has gone through - which was one of the main points of Coppinger's book.
If you look at a dog like Blue, and then at a wolf, there has clearly been some rather huge alterations done by man, and so it is silly (IMHO) to treat Blue like a wolf and pretend that he is unchanged from the wolf. Sure, from time to time, you get a glimpse of "wolfness" in Blue - but that short glimpse should not be the dictating factor of how you treat and classify Blue, should it?
To me, that is like saying you should treat/classify a gun the same way you would treat/classify a rock. The rock was used as a weapon since the time when man first started to use tools, but the fact that a gun and a rock have both been used as weapons is the only connection between the 2 - no one would argue that a gun is as primitive a tool as the rock (when used as a weapon). Man put years and years of thought in to weapons in order to come up with the gun, so it is somewhat insulting (IMHO) to imply a gun is not different from a rock as far as tools go.
Actually, that is another point I took away from the Coppinger's book - it is somewhat insulting to call a dog a wolf, or to imply breeding a dog with a wolf would improve the dog/breed, as they have both gone through a LOT of selection and/or evolution to become 2 very different beasts. With that said, I also find it is insulting to dogs (and the humans who selectively bred them) to say "dogs are just dogs" and pretend there is no difference between the breeds (which is something Cesar loves to do). Anyone who has been in dogs for a long time, and has lived with different breeds, can tell you there are very distinct differences between breeds, and even more distinct differences from dog-to-dog.
So, to your points, I agree - and have always pointed out - the "alpha dominance theories" may be incorrect and therefore not appropriate for the foundation of training methods, but the real reason one shouldn't use those methods (IMHO) has more to do with treating animals with the respect they deserve than any canine social structure theories. I have always said: if the end result is the same (a dog gets trained) why would anyone choose a hurtful, relationship ruining, training method when they could achieve the same result using treats and fun?
Then there is just simply my experience. My wife and I have 15 dogs, from different breed, who all "run together" and get along. There is no one dog here that cannot be with another dog, they can all be with each other and get along fine. In the same way it is hard to tell someone why a movie was good, but it is easy to tell someone why a movie was not good; it is hard for me to tell you what we do right... however, I can tell you what we don't do: We don't assume all our dogs are "just dogs", and we don't expect every one of our dogs to learn in the same way. We also don't disrespect our dogs by bullying them, or abusing them. We don't treat them like people either.
In the years I have lived with our dogs, and as our family has grown, I have never seen anything that resembles a rigid social structure. There is no one "leader", and there is no one "beta". Each of our dogs are an individual and each one learns and behaves in their own special way.
So, for me, "the proof is in the pudding".
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