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The WFFCW wascreated August 5, 2001
:: we're 17 YEARS OLD!
WFFCW
hits since April, 2003
"It's like a nightmare, isn't it?
It just keeps getting worse and worse."
.... Keith McCready, in "The Color of Money"
"The only vaccine powerful enough to inoculate you from lies is the truth." .... Al Franken, famous author
WFFCW Quote Of The Second
WHAT IS THIS WEBSITE ABOUT? Some of this is a personal website containing
REBUTTAL, REPLY, and COMMENT to (primarily) public statements and accusations made by various self proclaimed "internet dog training experts". The majority of the statements and accusations are
FALSE, and refer to me, personally.
The nucleus of this website is based on verbatim quotes of public messages, most of which are archived with their respective lists. Unless noted, nothing has been altered, other than formatting line length to screen width and changing the font style.
Other parts of this site contain
OPINIONS, HUMOR, PARODY, COMEDY, and SARCASM which reflect my own personal sense of humor and viewpoints. The First Amendment of the Constitution adequately, particularly, and specifically provides these rights. This site is for
educational and entertainment purposes. This is emphatically not a "hate" site. There
is no hate, and never was. Profanity is kept to a minimum, but it
does exist. If this website seems offensive to you, in any way, please leave now. Please do
not subject yourself to being offended.
TO THOSE IN FEAR OF THIS WEBSITE:
Websites can be terrifying places. If you're afraid,we'll never understand why, but what can WE do?You're
allowed
to be frightened of webpages, or anything else.This website contains
NOTHREATS of any nature - no direct, indirect, implied, supplied, or personified threats
- it never did and never will. There is a lot of SARCASM here.
If you're afraid, our heart goes out to you - we don't WANT you to be afraid.
We want you to get help. Dial 911, and scream for help. If you wind up in a straight jacket, that's your problem. If you don't, that's your problem, too.
First of all, I'd like to borrow an
(approximate) quote from Gene England:
"Dog training
is no more and no less than building consistent, reliable, repeatable habits
in a dog."
If you believe that, please continue reading.
If you don't believe it, this page probably isn't for you.
What if people started really thinking?
What if people thought of protection training in simpler terms, and purely as
a function which a dog performs on a specific command OR if certain events take
place to create suspicion and/or aggression?
What if we just threw out all this "drive" bullshit, and referred to
everything the dog does in protection training in a simpler way? For
example: turn on, or turn off. Just like a light. A simple
"yes" or a simple "no". "Fight Time" or "Not Fight Time".
Suppose there were no words like "prey drive", "defense drive", "fight
drive", "survival drive", "hunt drive", or "truck drive". We seem to be
able to discuss and do so many other facets of dog training work without a
pail full of different "drives" - what if we left out all these "drives" when we
think of protection training, too?
What if we forgot "prey drive" and just said the dog loves to chase a ball,
because he really likes playing with a ball and he enjoys it? What if we
just said the dog loves to bite a burlap rag because he likes to bite, it's fun
for him? Or he loves hot dogs, because he likes food? Is it
absolutely mandatory to assign a "drive name" to various behaviors of the dog?
What would happen if we didn't assign a "drive name"? Would the dog
suddenly stop doing things, because there wasn't a "drive name" attached to it?
You're probably using a computer right now if
you're reading this. A computer does require drive names.
Most of us would be lost without our C: drive! And how could we play music
without our CD drive? That makes sense to me.
How about if a dog is put in a position where a (skilled) helper in hiding
begins to sneak out, towards the dog, and the dog's suspicion causes the dog to
bark? What if we didn't call that ANY drive, but simply accepted
the fact that the dog barked because he saw a stranger behaving in an unusual
way? And what if the dog was immediately praised and rewarded by the
handler, when the helper ran for cover as an apparent result of the barking?
THEN - What if the helper walked out of the hiding place normally, approached the
dog as any person might, and praised and petted him, along with the handler?
How about if the handler and the helper even gave the dog a few chunks of hot
dog?
Again, I'd like to try and make a point.
"Fight" is not "play". A ball, a tug, or a toy are for "play". "Fight"
is a result of arousing the dog's suspicion and aggression.
If you agree with this, please keep
reading. If not, this page probably isn't for you.
In most areas of training, people accept the idea of "doing exercises".
Lots of people will teach a dog to sit, and the majority will go out and
repeat that specific "exercise" many, many times. Some people may notice
that the dog learns what "sit" means after enough repetitions. A few
people in the world might actually even correct the dog after he's
learned what sit means, but fails to do so, or breaks the sit when he decides he
wants to. Some people might even realize that training the dog to sit reliably may have actually taken thousands of repetitions, in dozens of
different locations.
Of course, there may be trainers that can teach a dog to sit reliably with
only one repetition. I've never met one of those trainers, but it's possible he/she
exists.
Getting back to protection training, what if there was an exercise called
"turn on-turn off", which is essentially (but very briefly) described above?
If that exercise was repeated enough times, is it sensible to think the dog
would eventually learn to "turn on" when a specific command was given - for
example "pass auf" or "watch him"?
What if this training pattern - a helper in hiding who
CAUSES
suspicion, always followed by the helper causing NO suspicion, was
repeated enough times for the dog to learn to recognize not only the behavior of
the helper, but the commands associated with the exercise? In this case,
"turn on" ("watch him" or "pass auf") and "turn off" (for example "aus" or
"leave it" or whatever). Would the dog learn to do this after enough
repetitions of the exercise?
What if a person was teaching a dog to sit? As the dog progressively
learned what was required, is it sensible to think that the handler might place
the dog in a sit, and walk a short distance away? During the learning
progression, it might even be possible that the handler would "test" the dog
regarding the sit exercise, and create attractions and/or distractions which could cause the dog to break the sit. Or would that be impossible?
If it took 3 days, or 3 weeks, or 3 months, could a dog learn to "turn on"
and "turn off" fairly reliably? What if part of the "turn on" was based on
the dog's strength? For example, if it was determined the dog was strong enough, what if the helper got close enough to the dog to present a
burlap rag for the dog to bite? What if the helper immediately ran
away if the dog did bite the burlap rag? And - as stated above -
what if the entire pattern was repeated, which always includes the
"turn off"?
This short page might give you some things to think about.
This link will
show some videos of biting dogs. If you watch the videos, you may notice we have no outing problems at all (with the exception
noted). Even with
beginning dogs, "aus" is a natural part of the progression. We don't need
or use force, balls, toys, food, a second sleeve, or anything ..... we simply tell the
dog "aus". In some videos, multiple "aus" commands are given -
what you're seeing are not "finished" dogs, and some dogs required more
training to release on one command. I think this is both reasonable and
expected. Training progresses one step at a time.
The reason this system works is because the
dog
believes the fight is really over. He's "clear", and has no conflict in his mind.
Anthropomorphosis is a process of turning a dog into a human, comparing what
a human thinks and does, and attributing that thinking process to a dog.
Unfortunately, this doesn't work. Dogs aren't humans and humans aren't
dogs, either. This may have been going on for a few million years, but
Walt Disney and the TV really helped.
I've been publicly accused of being a "guard dog trainer", "forcing dogs to
bite", "hanging them by their neck until they bite", "shocking them on their
testicles to get an out", and assorted other tidbits. It's not true.
I've also been accused of training every dog to be a protection dog.
This, too, is not true.
Every dog that has ever come to my school
for protection was temperament tested - for a fee. I didn't do free
temperament testing, although others might. If the dog showed the nerves and character
during the test, a conditional contract was signed, and the testing fee
was applied to the contract. For every 100 dogs
tested, 15-20 passed the temperament test. I am unable to give a
dog the nervous system which is required for protection training, but I am
able to test and determine if nerves and character exist. Even then, in the
majority of dogs, only conditionally. I have no idea how far a
dog's nerves will go, until we conduct many, many training sessions. Some
dogs can take far more pressure than others.
What I did do, was to go to school, and learn how to use a tool
called TOTO: "turn on-turn off". I discovered that one single tool
is the
foundation - the basis for training strong, reliable protection dogs. I
also discovered that, while I used and advocate table training, tables aren't
even remotely a requirement. "Turn on-turn off" can be done anywhere,
anytime. All that's really needed is a dog, a leash and collar, a
patient helper who understands the concepts, and is able to recognize what he's
looking at when he sees it.
In addition, I learned that "turn on-turn off" circumvented several problems
because they never were created in the first place. For example:
The dogs never became "sleeve freaks", chewing, ripping, and destroying an
object which they had bitten. When a sleeve was "slipped", the dogs ignored
it, and focused on the helper.
"Turn on-turn off" created extreme calmness in every dog, based on the fact
that the pattern conclusively proved to the dogs that the fight was
definitely over, and further suspicion or aggression was unnecessary.
My concept of "turn on-turn off" requires that the dogs are never "lied to"
- that is to say, "aus" is positively "aus" for everyone involved, with no
exception. Exactly like a professional boxing match, when the bell rings
the round is OVER.
The dog's self confidence in protection work increased dramatically, and
usually, very quickly. This was based on the above statement: the pattern
conclusively proved to the dogs that the fight was definitely over.
No leaking, whining, extraneous barking - nothing. Just calmness, yet
alert for the next (possible) "round".
This calmness allowed the dogs to accept far more pressure in bitework. Stick
hits for sport dogs, and, for police and personal dogs, a great deal more
pressure was applied during bites. I can't recall any dog coming off the
bite at any time. It should be perfectly clear that the increasing
pressure was applied gradually. One step at a time.
I believe that "turn on-turn off" additionally proved to the dogs that the
helper was not a genuine enemy, determined to kill them. Rather, the dogs
seemed to consider me a friend and a fighting partner, much like a boxing
partner might be.
In the early stages of training, as a helper, I gave
most dogs just as much physical praise and hotdogs as the dog's own handler did.
Over time, this stopped, especially with working police dogs.
After a certain point in training, I never again touched a dog I was
doing bite training with. Logic dictates that it was necessary to make
this transition.
"Outing" began from the very first day of "turn on-turn off". It was a
natural, integral part of the sequence, therefore, the multitude of problems
others experience in ending a bite were never created in the first place.
Through many, many experiences with dogs trained elsewhere, I've
solved outing problems in short order - WITH NO USE OF FORCE WHATSOEVER
- by using "turn on-turn off". If this took 2 weeks or 2 months - once a
week or five times a day - I never deviated from what I already know. The
pattern must conclusively prove to the dogs that the fight is definitely over, and no further suspicion or aggression are necessary.
I may add to this page in the future. Realistically, it would take four
days or more to clearly explain the details and ramifications of "turn on-turn
off", so this tiny introduction is no more than a mini appetizer.
But I did this on purpose. It's good to make
people THINK.
