This.

This handsome fella' is very protective over his 2 humans, and everyone is a foe. His humans are both much softer in energy, while he's got a much stronger energy (although sensitive and also quite insecure). This combination has created a massive gap between the two ends of the leash, and is acting out in the most unsavory (and risky) ways.

Learning how to both agree and disagree *effectively* with choices, states of mind, and behavior is something one would think would be quite easy, but is actually difficult for a lot of people; as - with dogs- this involves timing, appropriate type of pressure for the situation (spatial, leash, etc), body language, vocal pitch, inflection, and tone, energy, etc. All must work in concert together, be "short n' sweet" (not repetitive and constant) in delivery, and be in complete alignment for canine clarity and understanding. This, and most people are taught not to disagree with anything dogs do.... only tolerate, isolate, distract, or medicate.

Although there are other ingredients in play here, I'm really zeroing in on the human's level of confidence. There's also a cultural and familial (how they were raised) component to this, as there's some deeply ingrained "thou shalt not..." stuff in play. Stuff like, "thou shalt not be too loud"..."too vocal"... too this or too that. This has impacted how they show up, step up, dialogue, what is tolerated, how they respond, etc. Their approach.

Imagine a scale between 0 and 10. This represents state of mind (excitement, arousal- which can be "good" and also "not so good"; even "aggression" is a overly escalated, overly aroused, overly excited state of mind- it's just a not-so-good shade of it). 0 being the lowest intensity, 10 being the highest intensity. This guy hits a 9/ 10 quickly (even faster if with the woman). If the dog is at a level 8 or 9 intensity, and the human is trying to communicate with the dog and has an approach coming from a level 2 or 3 intensity.... you see there's a massive gap there. Any communication will be unheard, un-impactful, and totally ineffective. I'm not talking about loudness here... I'm talking about *intensity*. Big difference. Firm vs. soft and permissive. Marking what's not-okay and what's okay in the most appropriate manner. This is Parenting 101.

I always use the example of flipping the script and exchanging the dog for a child. If we were out with our child in public, and he was flipping people off, yelling obscenities at them, calling them names, trying to throw punches at everyone who walked by, etc.... how would we address it? Would we just stand there and allow it to happen? Would we try to "distract" him and redirect his focus onto a cookie? Would we hug him and tell him "sshhh... it's okay... ". NO. Dogs are not humans, but are a social species of animal and - like humans- learn through consequence. This does NOT mean harming, abusing, beating, etc. an animal. What this does mean is creating a level of discomfort that's meaningful enough to the individual to make them change their course. That's it. What's comfortable and what's not. Heck, we do this with our children to help them understand the difference between "okay" and "not okay", and we also need to do this with our dogs. Like humans, dogs do not come to us pre-programmed; especially with the understanding of what "we consider to be" polite, appropriate, respectful, etc. behavior... "acceptable" vs. "unacceptable behavior" (and this will vary from household to household). This, and humans don't come to the table understanding how to communicate with dogs (we can't teach them anything without understanding how to communicate in a way they can comprehend... and this goes way above and beyond anything verbal).

Anyways, I've lived this exact story years ago with my Lobo (https://www.packfit.net/lobos-story), so I deeply resonate with the situation here. Behavior is so very complex, and there are a number of contributing ingredients to address; so I look forward to helping them along their journey together

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