Visualise the scene with me…

The grown-up holds the ~five foot lead…the dog at its very end…two small humans kick a ball and grown-up pursues…dog is moved along, jerked from left to right…

Indulge me again, if you will…

Picture any weekend market pretty much anywhere and you will see it…dogs on lead, scanning & surveying, tight mouths panting…
Humans moving them by their lead, pressing on their back ends to keep them sitting, restraining them from moving freely amongst so much mouth-watering food, allowing them directly approach others regardless of comfort, exerting enormous social pressure on them…

Surely, our dogs are enjoying just being there. Just being with us. Basking in our presence. Being our spare parts while we enjoy ourselves.

Dogs have fulfilled lots and lots of roles throughout their history alongside humans. As our communities evolve, so too do our relationships with our canine companions. For the most part, dogs are exceptionally adaptive but their abilities to cope with busy human-centric environments and lifestyles is only half the battle.

Dog (Un)friendly

Expansions of human-centric environments to incorporate dogs, while trendy and popular on social media, is big business. Allowing clientele bring their dog is all the rage and I can see the appeal.
As society, in general, becomes less tolerant of dogs and guardians, we want to show ’em that our dogs are special, and loved family members.

But, are we stopping long enough to ask, what our dogs might want and need?

Ignorance is bliss

Being oblivious to the experiences of dogs is something I envy often, particularly when I’m out in public where there are dogs. I would love not be aware of dogs’ discomfort or of them being put in inappropriate situations. I would love not to have the gift of foresight for where this will land in three months, six months, two years time.

Becoming aware of our dogs’ experiences can be both enlightening and heart breaking all at once.

Humans Humans Humans

We tend to take an anthropocentric view of dogs, discussing our relationships with them in terms of how they benefit us. We get dogs for companionship, to get us out walking, to help us connect with our communities, to help us, us us us.

Getting a dog isn’t some convenience, getting a dog isn’t to complete your family, getting a dog is not for practicing parenting or teaching kids life-lessons.

Dogs are not auxiliaries to the brunch or the picnic or the cafe lifestyles. Dogs aren’t tools. They aren’t spare parts.

Our dogs have needs and individual requirements that can only be established by us because we control everything. That’s the human-centric part…the buck stops with us…

What about “working dogs”?

We have spent a long time and much effort developing types of dogs that fulfill pretty specific roles. These dogs come with innate tendencies, built-in and requiring refinement to do their job.

Looking at traditional working dog histories it can be easier to see where notions of “dogs wanting to please us” came from; dogs were tasked with doing behaviours innately reinforcing for them because we had selected for that. And even then, we make it all about us.

Modern jobs for dogs have taken existing types and have continued to attempt to develop their tendencies, often trying to squeeze square pegs into round holes. Rather than choosing traits, we attempt to select against and suppress unwanted characteristics.

The promotion of dogs in every heroic role, particularly via social media, leads to raised and unrealistic expectations for all dogs. Dogs are amazing but their awesomeness is independent of their service to us.

It’s not a quid pro quo, ya know?!

Dogs don’t owe us anything.

Our dogs don’t owe us “good” behaviour just because we took them home and feed them.

Our dogs are not beholden to us and our expectations of them.

Dogs as spare parts

If one wants dogs to fit in in this way, that’s fine; I don’t run anyone else’s life. But expectations will need to change. That’s the bottom line.

And while expectations might change…what about the welfare experience of dogs? That doesn’t change, regardless of our whims, intentions or wants.

Are we really “rescuing” dogs, when we warehouse them, sometimes, for years?

Are we really considering the actual welfare of assistance dogs, therapy dogs, dogs as tools to serve human well-being?

Are we really meeting dogs’ needs with agility, food toys & human-directed detection sports…or whatever the activity du jour?

Is the “pet-life” really a good life? Is it good enough?

To me, the biggest threats to canine welfare are not shock collars or “balanced trainers”, it’s our blindness to dogs’ experiences and our apparent unwillingness to recognise their needs as important and distinct from our own.

This all turned out to be far more ranty than initially intended but there are important thought-experiments to consider. There are actions we can take proactively and we should focus on moving forward with our concerns in mind.