Something I've Noticed....

[Jenn&Ziggy]

This weekend my boyfriend and I went to the lake with one of his co-workers and took Ziggy along. All of the people we were with had labs. Well they were all smacking their dogs for the stupidest things and couldn't understand why we never smacked Ziggy. It drove me nuts! It seemed like every 5 seconds someone was smacking their dog.

Some of the things that were said to me include:

"All dogs need a good beating once in a while."

"If your dog growls at me one more time I'm going to hold him under water." *I almost went off on the person that said this* (Ziggy was sleeping in the boat and was sick of being wet; he just wanted to take a nap and nobody would respect him and leave him alone "because he's just a dog".

I made a comment to one of the men there about how I hope he never treats his child the way he treats his dog (his wife is pregnant); and both him and his wife replied "oh no, we would never treat a child like we treat our dog". *I wanted to scream! Your dog should be treated like your child...*

Ziggy has never swam before so my boyfriend and I were walking Ziggy to the deeper part of the lake and helping him learn to swim and we kept getting told to just throw him in the water and make him figure it out... He did know how to swim, but he was very uneasy about it and having us there to hold him when he got freaked out helped to build his confidence. Well nobody could understand why we "babied him". *sigh* You don't just throw your child into the deep end of a pool!!!

Needless to say, it was a very long 7 hours on the sand bar. I barely knew any of these people and was stuck there with them so I kept my mouth shut as long as they didn't touch Ziggy; thank god they didn't, they would have regretted it instantly!

I suppose the point of this post is to ask you guys if you've noticed people who have labs displaying the "its just a dog" attitude or if I just happened to stumble into a sad excuse of human life.

The poor dogs were getting smacked left and right for all sorts of things. I went home quite upset.

[valkyries]

i find alot of people say it's just a dog it just us crazy husky owners who treat our's like our kids xxxx

[tracey8]

Iv'e lost a few friends and even family over my babies,they just don't get it.

[Rosemary]

Unfortunately I don't think it is just lab owners. My husband has a friend who will hit his dog for any small infraction. I refuse to go to his house, as I may say something - not that I will regret it, but my husband works with him - idiot The sad thing is that the last time I was there, his child (3 years old) smacked the dog for licking his hand we left immediately after that.

[Osinn11]

My wife and I were just talking about this very thing 10 minutes ago. We wonder where all the Husky owners are that actually understand!

[Jenn&Ziggy]

i find alot of people say it's just a dog it just us crazy husky owners who treat our's like our kids xxxx

Poor doggies That's just not fair to them at all. Dogs can relate to humans a lot more than people realize. The poor things have feelings too!

Iv'e lost a few friends and even family over my babies,they just don't get it.

Oh jeez! That's crazy! My family teases that Ziggy is spoiled, but they wouldn't stop talking to me over it!

[tracey8]

i know they don't get how i can give my life to them i have 8 furbabies and they take up all of my time and they just don't like it stupid i know

[Jenn&Ziggy]

Unfortunately I don't think it is just lab owners. My husband has a friend who will hit his dog for any small infraction. I refuse to go to his house, as I may say something - not that I will regret it, but my husband works with him - idiot The sad thing is that the last time I was there, his child (3 years old) smacked the dog for licking his hand we left immediately after that.

That's horrible!!!! I wouldn't be able to be there either. The child is going to grow up abusing their poor dog I hate how rude humans can be. I'm going to steer clear of humans and just get more dogs haha!

i know they don't get how i can give my life to them i have 8 furbabies and they take up all of my time and they just don't like it stupid i know

That's so sad and rude of people! Dogs enhance our lives more than anything ever could; we should repay their never ending love with being considerate of them in our every move; and loving them of course I suppose all you can do is feel sorry for those people that will never learn the unbreakable bond and love of a dog that loves their parents.

[Povodny]

Actually there is a difference between a dog and a child. So when he said he'd never treat a child like a dog that's quite appropriate.

I've had children and I have dogs. Children continually grow and develop into adults who, supposedly, are capable of caring for themselves. Dogs develop To the mental age of three, sometimes five and then you have to care for them indefinitely lol

Theyre a load of plonkers. You don't necessarily have to spend any time with them again. People are idiots. Just accept it and move on plus you a much better person lol

[joshmp5]

i'll pop at storm just to get his attention. usually just poke him to get him to look at me (and away from say, the couch cushion lol) but god help me around those people....years ago i watched a guy hit his dog. to make a long story short. he'd hit his dog so i hit him, hard. i asked him why he hit his dog. "he did something i didn't want him to do" and "why did you hit me?" were his replies. i smiled and said, "you did something i didn't want you to do" I'm pretty sure he got the point.

[Kells xx]

that makes me angry when people hit their dogs...

and id never throw my dog into a lake to make it swim......thats really cruel!!!

no wonder you werent happy there and no one here would judge you for not wanting to spend time with them again,

i couldnt have held my tongue as much as you though...

id much rather baby my dogs than cause them unnecessary stress...

hugs for having to deal with those idiots xxx

[Paranormal Wolf]

Sadly it's not just lab owners who do these kind of things and have the mentality of "its just a dog"

On the plus side its not just husky owners who love their dogs an treat them well and love them. I owned many breeds before owning a husky and none of my dogs ever were or ever will be "just a dog". They are so much more than that!

[Emma]

God, you really drew the short straw that day, what a horrible situation. Sounds like a bunch of control freaks who can't train their dogs properly so have to resort to violence. If they're struggling with their labradors which are fairly easy to train, I'd hate to see them cope with a husky.

[Jenn&Ziggy]

Actually there is a difference between a dog and a child. So when he said he'd never treat a child like a dog that's quite appropriate.

I've had children and I have dogs. Children continually grow and develop into adults who, supposedly, are capable of caring for themselves. Dogs develop To the mental age of three, sometimes five and then you have to care for them indefinitely lol

Theyre a load of plonkers. You don't necessarily have to spend any time with them again. People are idiots. Just accept it and move on plus you a much better person lol

Of course there are actual differences between a child and a dog. They could never be fully equivalent; I just wish people would realize that dogs have feelings too and should not be abused because 'it will forget in 30 seconds'. Yeah I probably will not go out with them again. Haha, thanks!

i'll pop at storm just to get his attention. usually just poke him to get him to look at me (and away from say, the couch cushion lol) but god help me around those people....years ago i watched a guy hit his dog. to make a long story short. he'd hit his dog so i hit him, hard. i asked him why he hit his dog. "he did something i didn't want him to do" and "why did you hit me?" were his replies. i smiled and said, "you did something i didn't want you to do" I'm pretty sure he got the point.

Oh yeah, I poke Ziggy or tap him on the nose messing around and whatnot all the time. These people were hitting their dogs pretty dang hard. Enough to where they ran away with their tail in-between their legs whimpering . There were loads of other things they were doing that upset me too. One of the couples had kids and they were getting wasted (while their kids were swimming in a lake) and talking about getting rid of the kids right in front of their kids. Plus the parents had to drive the boat back and drive a car and did not seem like they were going to be waiting to sober up. They were a danger to everyone. Stupid people.

That's an awesome story!!

that makes me angry when people hit their dogs...

and id never throw my dog into a lake to make it swim......thats really cruel!!!

no wonder you werent happy there and no one here would judge you for not wanting to spend time with them again,

i couldnt have held my tongue as much as you though...

id much rather baby my dogs than cause them unnecessary stress...

hugs for having to deal with those idiots xxx

Ziggy was noticeably uneasy about swimming too; I would never just throw him into the lake. I'd rather baby them too! Ziggy is very independent, but I still do not want anything to happen to him and like to be near him at all times (especially since huskies wander!) Thank you!

Sadly it's not just lab owners who do these kind of things and have the mentality of "its just a dog"

On the plus side its not just husky owners who love their dogs an treat them well and love them. I owned many breeds before owning a husky and none of my dogs ever were or ever will be "just a dog". They are so much more than that!

I'm sure there's all kinds of dog owners that have that horrible mentality. It just became prominent when every lab owner at the lake treated their dogs like crap. I agree! I had English springer spaniels growing up and they were always very very loved. Dogs should be a part of the family. Not your 'bitch' (excuse my language ) or just a dog. They deserve to be loved and well taken care of.

God, you really drew the short straw that day, what a horrible situation. Sounds like a bunch of control freaks who can't train their dogs properly so have to resort to violence. If they're struggling with their labradors which are fairly easy to train, I'd hate to see them cope with a husky.

Right?! Ziggy has been trained 100% on positive reinforcement and we ALWAYS get compliments on how well behaved he is. I'd absolutely LOVE to see them try to train a husky. I don't think they would succeed! However, I'm glad they do not have a husky because they almost definitely would not treat the poor baby well.

[mydiamond]

omg I'd say you shouldn't hang out with those kind of peeps ever again

It's not just lab owners (echoing the others here) =\ my maid once told me that she saw a little girl smacking her Pomeranian oh gosh the fact that a little, LITTLE child did this shocked me a lot =\ there's also this boy that chased after his puppy (it has been a long time ago) and when the puppy won't come when called he threw his shoes to the poor little pup

a conversation I once had with a neighbor (I'm famous for being 'the girl that walked her dog too much' LOL)

Man: walking your dog AGAIN??

Me: *laughs* yes! This boy is an energetic one. I'm simply meeting his exercise needs.

Man: What would happen if you don't?

Me: Well he would become destructive.. But before that he'd howl and remind me that it's walking time LOL

Man: Hey you could always beat him up

Me: :eek:

[BingBlaze n Skyla]

ive seen people like that with collies too

poor dogs

[jmscott]

I think the people who do this tend to have Labradors because the breed is very forgiving, biddable, and needful of human attention. On the other hand, if our breed were to be hit like that, they would completely disregard us as humans worth listening to. Siberians are too independent to continue to respect and adore their abusers, in most cases.

[persephona]

This weekend my boyfriend and I went to the lake with one of his co-workers and took Ziggy along. All of the people we were with had labs. Well they were all smacking their dogs for the stupidest things and couldn't understand why we never smacked Ziggy. It drove me nuts! It seemed like every 5 seconds someone was smacking their dog.

Some of the things that were said to me include:

"All dogs need a good beating once in a while."

"If your dog growls at me one more time I'm going to hold him under water." *I almost went off on the person that said this* (Ziggy was sleeping in the boat and was sick of being wet; he just wanted to take a nap and nobody would respect him and leave him alone "because he's just a dog".

I made a comment to one of the men there about how I hope he never treats his child the way he treats his dog (his wife is pregnant); and both him and his wife replied "oh no, we would never treat a child like we treat our dog". *I wanted to scream! Your dog should be treated like your child...*

Ziggy has never swam before so my boyfriend and I were walking Ziggy to the deeper part of the lake and helping him learn to swim and we kept getting told to just throw him in the water and make him figure it out... He did know how to swim, but he was very uneasy about it and having us there to hold him when he got freaked out helped to build his confidence. Well nobody could understand why we "babied him". *sigh* You don't just throw your child into the deep end of a pool!!!

Needless to say, it was a very long 7 hours on the sand bar. I barely knew any of these people and was stuck there with them so I kept my mouth shut as long as they didn't touch Ziggy; thank god they didn't, they would have regretted it instantly!

I suppose the point of this post is to ask you guys if you've noticed people who have labs displaying the "its just a dog" attitude or if I just happened to stumble into a sad excuse of human life.

The poor dogs were getting smacked left and right for all sorts of things. I went home quite upset.

Not sure if it's just people with labs... most dog owners seem to be relatively ignorant. When K was a pup, we kept getting told to smack him with a rolled newspaper and to shove his nose in his urine if he peed in the house... incidentally, a friend who owns a black lab said he did the same to potty train him. St00pid

As for swimming, all dogs know how to swim innately so he wouldn't drown, but I think it's stupid to suggest throwing him in the water like that, he'd probably be way too scared of water to ever go in on his own again!

It's too bad there's not much you can do to change these people's mentality.

I've learned to just smile and ignore such "useful" advice from random people... kudos to you for being able to last that long!

[PoBD]

I'll give my fur kids a "snap out of it" tug on the lead but I don't just smack them for every little thing. I used a rolled up magazine when they are inside and smack my hand because they don't like the noise...but 98% (1% lead tug, 1% smack my hand with the magazine) of the time I can just say very seriously (like I'm really mad lol) "what did you do!!??" and they fall over in guilt LOL. This morning Moro got a hold of an empty caulking tube and I said "Moro, what do you have, lemme see buddy" and he came hopping over and placed it in my hand & I praised him for bringing it to me....if he has something he's not supposed to I trick him and ask him to share it with me and he does and he's rewarded with hugs for doing what I asked... it's quite funny and it works perfectly, never have to fuss at him about those things. Have to be pretty stern about him messing with the kitty cat but other than that, soft/serious words or a tug on the lead works.

On Sept 8th there is a River Dog Festival here in our town, where everyone can bring their dogs to the river for fun. The Alabama Siberian Husky Rescue (LOVE THEM!) is putting it on and I want Moro there to be an example to potential adopters (so maybe we can help the other fur babies get the RIGHT home). I want them to know yes a husky is hard work but they are SO WORTH IT! I am afraid however of the ignorant people who do not know how huskies (or german shepherds) are...I'm afraid they will mistake his talking for aggression etc and complain then we'd have to leave I'm also afraid that our GSD will try to warn us of strangers etc and people will take offense to that too because we will be camping there. I hate stupid people...and I have a huge problem with people who assume because a dog is barking/jumping etc that they are aggressive...Moro doesn't have an aggressive bone in his body....there will be a TON of people and their dogs there, I'm sure there will be a lot of them off lead but my dogs will NOT be off lead...I don't trust the OTHER DOGS AND PEOPLE! We're going to help the other huskies and play in the river then camp as a little family. I want to go into calm (like Caesar says to lol) so Moro & Juno will be calm....but I'm still afraid of the idiots....wish me luck with that please.

I can totally relate to you about babying the dogs. Moro nor Juno have had a chance to really SWIM, they've played in shallow water but have not been swimming and we want them to, so I will do the same thing and help my babies learn without them freaking out. If others don't like it I will politely ask them to piss off or my hubby (the MARINE) will ask them not so nicely LOL.

[Removed #5]

I've had labs, and bar none one of them was my "bestest friend" - shes been gone many years now but she the standard to which all my other friends strive! (( unfair, I realize but that's the way it works ))

Avalanche doesn't understand getting hit, to him it's just play and he comes back for more - hitting him as a correction just wouldn't work! He's going to be a puppy til the day he dies, I think and even though he sometimes overdoes it, I love that about him (( most of the time ))

Sasha has been hit one time and that was when she bit me the second time! But we're getting on better, she's still overly protective about her food but at least I can now pick up her bowl without losing a hand - I don't have any idea what happened to her as a pup but it's been longish haul with her to get that trust.

It took misty forever to accept bodies of water ... the first few times we went to the beach ( gulf of Mexico ) she'd just sidle along the beach looking at the waves. Eventually she got bolder and then there was no stopping her "Water!! Lemme go!!"

While I'm the one hand, often more physically corrective of my dogs I wouldn't think about just hitting or kicking them without some VERY serious cause; on the other I detet those who seem to think that the only correction a dog understands is a beating!