Culture Clash

Skimming through The Bark, I found an article that  suggested reading, "The Culture Clash," which I ordered from half.com. It offers yet another view of why dogs behave like they do. To author Jean Donaldson, it all boils down to  B.F. Skinner's theory of operant conditioning–you put a rat in a maize and he'll figure out how to find the cheese in the center. Dogs are just like big, furry rats that way.   They aren't trying to please, anger or embarrass us, they merely respond to positive or negative reinforcement.

Ms. Donaldson is not real big on tolerance and acceptance of alternate training philosophies. In fact, she has a rather major 'tude about anybody else's but her own. The author thinks the whole dominance/pack theory is a bunch of hooey, treats are a must for training and for God's sake, quit treating dogs like Lassie. They really don't know--or care, for that matter-- that Timmy's trapped in the mine.



Jean Donaldson offers some good ideas about how to make our dogs act like we want them to. But then, so do the Monks of New Skete, The Dog Whisperer, and dominatrix/trainer Victoria Stilwell. Ten or 20 years from now these competing theories will probably be as obsolete as teaching your dog not to pee in the house by rubbing its nose in it. It's sort of like child rearing; In the early 20th century, mothers were instructed to not pick up their babies when they cried. By the mid-20th century,  Dr. Spock was instructing to pick up their screaming babies and comfort them. It's easy to come up with different points of view regarding  the right way and the wrong way– neither dogs nor babies can tell us.





The "My way is the only way" thread (more like anchor rope) that runs through "The Culture Clash" sounds a lot like the potholes that slow our journey towards finding Jesus, Allah, nirvana, enlightenment; whatever that Big Purpose is we continue to search for. As a timely bumper sticker reminds us: "God Wants Spiritual Fruits, not Religious Nuts."