Laws of Human Behavior

Hugo Martin wrote about dogs off leash in the LA Times and, like many such articles, painted a sensible, well-written, wrong-headed picture that completely missed the point about people and dogs in public spaces. Nowadays, people do not love their dogs as they love their cars or even homes. The behavior of humans with their possessions is receptive to collective rule making and responsive to group pressure on behavior.

Nowadays, people love their dogs as they love their children. A dog becomes an ally who can be depended on in a very messy and confusing world. Dog people break the law because they experience a bond being in nature with their dog that their moral center tells them must be good and all the park rangers and dog experts in the world will not convince them otherwise. Seemingly wise pronouncements on rules for training to some sound like so much "spare the rod and spoil the child" dogmatism to such people and they will ignore it. Laws that groups of people agree are unjust simply will not be followed, and strict enforcement only will raise anger on both sides.

Thirty-nine percent of homes in America have dogs People need activities where they can enjoy the company of their dogs as equal companions, and that means no leash. A dog off-leash is a different creature than a dog on a leash. Fenced off-leash parks are okay, but only the dogs get exercise. For the humans, it feels like a daily visit to the prison yard. Runyon Canyon is the only local off-leash hiking area where both and it is overburdened in the extreme. Huntington Beach is another, but it is a long haul. Not something that can be done every day. The only solution is to have many, many more places such as these. Enough areas for people to hike and play alongside their dogs in the mountains and beaches, so that the scofflaws can both serve the demands of their hearts and obey the law.

Room needs to be made for everyone at the table, yet more room is made for people and their off-road bikes and dune buggies than is made for people and their dogs. Does this seem right or fair. Do dogs do more damage than dirt bikes?

We need to figure out how to integrate dogs more safely rather than figure out how the scofflaws are wrong. When such a large segment of the otherwise law-abiding population tosses all respect for a law aside, that usually indicates an obsolescent worldview that requires revisting by the community as a whole if the community truly wishes to solve the issue.

The Good Manners Instinct

Pickle came to see me this morning wagging her tail. She had gone on a road trip with one of her people, and she came through our shared yard and into my house to find me. She wagged her tail and made a general fuss over seeing me which she does not normally do. In fact, she rarely comes inside my house, and never past the kitchen. But this morning, after being gone for a week, she danced into my office as if to say, "I'm back! Are you still here? Oh, good. I'm glad. I'm so happy to see you again! " and was fully expecting the happy "hello" she got from me in return. It was a moment of delight shared.

I got to thinking how when I go away, I rarely bother to call people to say, "I'm back!" My human reason tells me it will seem self-centered. If nothing else, the idea sounds old-fashioned and stuffy. Bygone manners. The claustrophobic feeling of being locked into social forms. But I suspect good manners did not originate with Emily Post and the mavens of social forms. Good manners are found in the basic impulses of animals who value their group. And as creatures who value their group with deep affectionate loyalty, dogs are great teachers of group good manners.

Barking Dogs and Cable News

Have you ever noticed how happy dogs are when they are barking at the window when the mailman or another dog goes by. The mailman, he comes every single day, and yet the dog goes into a barking fugue and cannot be silenced. You yell. You punish. The dog may quiet down with serious intervention, but by then the intruder is usually in retreat, and the dog is wearing an expression of supreme satisfaction.

In a household with many dogs, all it takes is one dog to start and then the others throw themselves into the fray with a murderous abandon. It's so...animal in its intensity and one doesn't want that in one's house.

Until one turns on the TV and starts watching cable news. It seems that the popularity of cable news is that it provides the thrill of the pack attack. It doesn't have to be any more real than the threat posed to the dogs by the mailman. It's just so much fun to be going at it in faux tooth and nail. Life has meaning. I am SAVING THE WORLD. Gosh it feels good.

People put up with the barking dogs because households with dogs are much less likely to be robbed. A dog barking is not always a false response. Sometimes it can save property or lives. So, to continue the analogy, I do not want to say all fighting for justice and against evil is a substitute for facing reality. Sometimes it is all too real.

But when you have these well-to-do commentators on TV acting and speaking with righteous anger way out of proportion to the threat, whipping up frenzy over every real or imagined attack, it is false and does a disservice to the human spirit. It calls up our animal response and throws us into irrational rages that are never allowed to die quietly for the "mailman" never goes away. As he's leaving the porch, the UPS man is arriving, and then the FEDEX guy, and our barking is encouraged 24-7 until we have been driven mad with phantoms. If a real burglar did come along, our ability to recognize him would be compromised and we'd be too worn out to do much in the way of defense.

Inside and Outside Love

Inside is the person, so inside we sit. But outside is out where the dog would rather be. Without love, it would be a power struggle, a war for the right way to live. But there is love and so we go out in the hot and in the rain. We sit inside when the sky is blue.

My Dog, the Camel

If your dog sleeps with you, chances are you've noticed that while you sleep, the dog has drifted from his or her appointed corner. If you are a sound sleeper like I am, you wake up to find yourself perched precariously at the edge of the mattress, one half-roll from falling to the floor. The dog slumbers blissfully smack dab in the center.

I am reminded of the story of the camel who begs to warm its nose in its master's tent. Bit by bit, the camel wheedles its way inside the warm tent until it fills the tent completely and the camel driver has been pushed out into the cold night air. Camels. Dogs

Some folks say you should never let the dog sleep on the bed. The dog will forget who its master is, have behavior problems, make itself a nuisance. They say dogs are not people and shouldn't be treated as such.

Sure, dogs are not humans. I cannot stay at home while my dog goes out and earns a living or decorates the house or, god forbid, does the gardening. And taking over the 'tent' to sleep in the middle of the bed is certainly a nuisance. But this traditional idea of dogs also reveals a world-view of its proponents. This view deeply believes in hierarchy, in natural masters and slaves, in authority exercised in bright lines that punishes swiftly and demands absolute obedience. Households are like ships and need a captain who is the law in himself.

Me, I don't buy it. The price of the master/slave authoritarian dynamic is too high. My dogs are not my slaves. We are a team. They all agree that I am the leader, not because I hit them, but because I bring theme food, I provide them with shelter and I educate them in the ways of the world. I am top dog not because I hit and yell ( I don't) but because I serve and protect them. In exchange for that, they give me the same. They serve and protect me in their way. The image I prefer is captain of the team rather than captain of the ship. A ship is a hierarchy designed for war, where one side wins and the other loses. The team that is our household is designed for life, where even the idea of sides makes not sense.

If my dog pushed me so far that I went to sleep on the couch, the dog would leave the comfort of the bed and make do with the living room floor, preferring company to comfort. So I forgive the encroachment, give a solid bump with my hips to reclaim, if not the center, then one half of the bed, and go back to sleep.

Black and White

Dogs don't see colors. Everything is black and white or shades of gray. I learned this from my mother when I was ten, and at the time, I was sad for my dog. Now I know my dog does not know what she's missing. If she were writing this, she would probably say that she felt sad for humans who could not smell 'colors.' (there is no equivalent word because genius of smell is a dog talent and not a human one.)

The feeling of pity is not just anthropomorphizing. It is also metaphorical. We talk about people whose understanding only allows them to cast issues in black and white. Seeing shades of gray is weak to them because they see everything that is neither black nor white as blurring the lines, tainting the pure, and creating a shapeless, muddly mess of the world. But what they see as shades of gray is actually color to a complex mind. Yellow is not just a darker white, it has a personality distinct from a similar tone of blue or pink. All three colors could be photographed to look exactly the same gray on black and white film, but they are so completely different to the human eye that a child would not confuse them. I still remember the amazement I felt on seeing my first big box of 64 Crayola Crayons. Just looking at them was a joy.

People who scoff at middle-of-the road ethics, who mock social or educational initiatives, who defend authority and despise rebellion are people who have formed a clear idea of right and wrong. Their own lives are shaped by lines in black and white. Creative vision, situational ethics, questioning authority: these introduce variables into that picture and mess it up with grays. Such people have no 'cones' to see the color. Or more aptly, since we are all human, their 'cones' have either atrophied from disuse, or the light is too dim for them to function. (Cones need a lot of light, which is why at night, all cats are gray.) It isn't just conformity or closed-mindedness that keeps these people resistant to complex ideas. Their mental 'senses' are presenting them with a clear message, and the evidence that is so glaring to the reformers is as invisible to them as yellow to my dog.

Humans are disgusted when a dog smells shit. We laugh uncomfortably and pull away. We cannot accept that the dog loves the smell of rot or decay because our senses tell us shit is bad. No amount of logical argument will make us encourage shit-sniffing. Between species, there can be no reconciliation. Between humans, the organs of understanding are not missing. They are undeveloped. Framing what you can in black and white reduces complexity and does not solve the problem. It just causes more atrophying. Light, more light is needed, until the 'cones' kick in and reveal the beauty of complexity that makes it worth the price.

Christmas Dog

My sister tells me how excited even the baby Julian got over Christmas, that somehow he knew that the gifts were for him and he had to tear the wrapper away to open them. I notice how Blanche was the same - all giddy over all the toys, running around to play with them all all at once, like a kid in Christmas overload. Breaking not a few of them either.

How to Lie While Telling the Truth

Read the following opening paragraph of a Letter to the Editor of the Ocean Park Gazette in Southern California a while back. Note your reaction to the content. You will have a fundamental misapprehension of the situation without a lie actually having been told.


"Other Species May Pay Price for Dog Beach

"May 11 - Small vocal groups are pushing for unleashed, unfenced dog beaches in Santa Monica and Dockweiler (in El Segundo). Both of these locations include areas designated by the U.S. Government as protected for the snowy plover, a small bird that nests on the sands of certain west coast beaches. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service classifies the bird as "threatened" and the California Department of Fish and Game classifies the bird as a "species of special concern." "


Okay. Forget the "small vocal groups" dismissal of the proponents of the dog beach. (Note: Over 36% of American households include dogs. Not small and to my mind not vocal enough.) It's the second sentence I'm interested in.

The author says both of "these" places have snowy plovers. This is a true statement. But which places are 'these?" The proposed dog beach areas? Or the miles and miles of beach with the official names "Santa Monica Beach" and "Dockweiler Beach" See? Both Beaches-with-a-capital-"B" have snowy plovers on parts of them, not all over them, and not at all on the same part of the park as the beaches-with-a-small-"b."

This is a lie that is 100% true. Because English allows for pronouns like "these" without anybody but a composition teacher caring that 2 antecedents exist that could be confused and therefore require "the former" and "the latter" to clarify which is meant. So people reading this letter figure that selfish, thoughtless dog lovers are planning their doggy playground right in the middle of the habitat for a threatened species.

Innuendo is much more powerful than logic because it invites the collusion of the hearer's or reader's imagination. But it is a cheap shot by a small vocal group of selfish, thoughless dog haters who think a pluralistic society means making themselves into the royal "we."

Let me just say, representing 36% of the households, that we are not amused.