But even if I was to agree with you, and label my dogs aggressive what would that get me? All trial premiums list no aggressive dogs, so no showing. No insurance, and oh my if my dog ever bit someone and it went to court and I said I knowingly had an aggressive dog . I get what you are saying, but I think that is a dangerous route to go, lumping a lot of behaviours under such a 'dangerous' label.
This is politics, not science. Of course you want to put the right spin on it for the general public and the AKC (who have a history of keeping their head in the sand about real dog temperament). And your insurance company. Of course you cannot enter a trial with a dog that may bite a person or a dog while there. But I don't think the AKC makes you declare him completely non-aggressive, they just punish the heck out of you if there is an incident. This seems right and fair to me. It is not the dogs that are dangerous, so much as the handlers who let them get into situations they shouldn't.
But, if we're going to help people handle these dogs properly, I think it would help a lot if we were honest and unafraid of the behavior. The dog isn't bad or abnormal, it's aggressive and that is normal. But, it's not acceptable for most people and the behavior needs to be changed. The reactions need to be changed and the management/control needs to improve. Check out this crazy story:
Some people here in Phoenix bought a malinois puppy from a police breeder as a pet. :yikes: They are really smart, nice people and realized pretty quickly that they could have taken more time to make a better purchase decision. But, like most Americans, they just didn't notice the connection between biting and breeding. Of course, the dog started showing some aggression as soon as they brought her home. They sought me out and hired me to help train her.
The other day they arrived at the park for the fourth lesson and Hazel came out of the car loaded for bear- hackles up, ears forward, growling and straining towards me. Every sign said this dog is aggressive and will bite. When I told the people she scared me and I thought that she might bite me if I tried to pet her in that moment, they were shocked. They said, "you don't really think she would bite someone, do you?" This is a malinois whose parents or grandparents are police dogs. They called me for training bc Hazel was growling and snapping at them at 11 weeks old. I told them on multiple occasions that this dog will almost certainly be willing to bite someone as an adult dog. But they still didn't think Hazel would bite someone.
This is the reason people's dogs bite other people. People do not want to believe that their dog is aggressive bc they equate aggressive with bad. They love their dog and know she can't possibly be bad. So they bury their heads in the sand and ignore all the signals that say their dog might bite someone. They need a wake-up call. THE DOG IS AGGRESSIVE. Now let's fix it. But as long as you sugar coat it, nice people everywhere will act like it's not really happening. They will not be careful and they will not seriously address the problem. Until the dog bites. Then they hire the trainer. But that is really way to late. You need to intervene before the dog has enough experience to get confident about biting. Fixing a dog that is already biting people is generally not all that effective. You need to develop new, acceptable responses to stress when the pup is young.
This is why I am fighting on this issue. I saw all the dogs that were euthanized for aggression when I was working full time as a dog trainer. The pain and heartache it caused was terrible. One of the worst things in the world is to go to a couple's house for an evaluation and see their aggressive dog problem and then hear them say they want to have kids soon. In most cases the dogs are already so far along in their aggression that a complete resolution is not possible. I sat in peoples' living rooms and cried with them while they decided to euthanize their pet, who they loved but was biting people and might be a serious menace to their children. And I think in most cases these problems would have been avoided if the people had called the trainer the first time the dog growled or snapped at someone. But they almost never do. They wait for the bites. And then they call. And by then the dog had had dozens if not hundreds of experiences using their aggression to get what they want. How do you undo that? And how do you tell them to choose the dog over the kids? I personally don't think "he probably won't maul your kids after the training" is an acceptable guarantee.
But I still think you are interpreting "aggressive" to mean bad. To me, aggression is a necessary part of a dog. I love pits, JRT, mals, etc. bc they are aggressive. A non-aggressive JRT would not be a JRT in my book, he would be a cull. Who would breed non-aggressive terriers or protection dogs? Did anyone see the recent link I posted about the great little staffy who saved his owner's kid by killing the snake that tried to bite her:
