positive, non violent training methods in rescue.

give him enough rope and he will hang himself.

this is so true...at least in rescue.

honestly...i watch more people in rescue hang themselves because for some reason we think certain things give us the right to cast off all civilized bonds and act like total barbaric fools.

well the fact of the matter is...no reasonable person is altogether trusting of any kind of freak out...a lack of self control and bad behavior for any reason raises red flags for most of us. i wasn't happy to read of rescues stalking and confronting the plaintif of the brookside dogs deaths outside of the courtroom..really? feeling angry upset over those poor dogs unnecessary deaths gives us the right to behave anyway that we want? whatever emma paulson did or did not do has NOTHING to do with how we decide to behave. and nothing we shout out in rage will bring those dogs back. however..by talking about what happened in a reasonable and rational fashion...we can educate. and it is those open and honest but civilized discussions that will save other dogs lives in the future.

did anyone watch the pack behaviors that occurred during the last vancouver hockey night riot? give some thought to how that unhappy night did escalate...a few angry and badly behaved folks whipped up a frenzy of destruction that night....and for what?

just recently an animal abuser pretty much got off with a slap on the wrist because of the horrible things that were being posted about him on facebook pages...the verbal violence of it angered the judge and he sited those verbally violent posts as part of the reason for his leniency. now how did any of that help that poor dog?

the same thing happens in the ongoing internet battles between out of country animal importers and rescue from homers...the screaming gets so loud and foul that the importers actually score points when they respond respectfully when confronted by some really ignorant and insulting remarks.

the second that issues become personal the battle is all but lost.

if we want to shut down a conversation, all we have to do is start yelling and freaking out and at that point people just naturally dial the volume down to zero and turn and walk out or..they start listening a little bit more to the side that sounds more intelligent and reasonable. most folks become skeptical and uncomfortable with confrontational rudeness or verbal violence.

we can talk about issues in a reasonable and rational manner. just because we are passionate about something we believe in does not mean we need to froth at the mouth.
and i am finally learning that if yelling, hitting, using prong and shock collars do not work well on dogs, they will not work all that great on people either.

i love the selfless act of rescue and i value each and every person who goes to the wall to help an animal in distress...but sometimes the beauty of our rescue passion is obstructed by the human bodies hanging from trees. we did not know to control the amount of rope we were letting loose and so passionately swinging.
we need to keep our own ropes short and a little bit slack while keeping relaxed control just like we do with our dog training leashes...that is how we will encourage others to walk with us thru rescues door. we do not need to beat and boot them in..we can be respectful and informative and let them choose when to come in.