Kelly is right when saying, that before trying that trainer could not know how the dog would react and if he would be able to swim on that side with streaming water. She is right, that everyone makes mistakes.

But for me in this case this is not the point. We all make mistakes, yes, but not with INTENTION. We don't need to be a trainer to see and feel that this dog didn't want to be thrown into that water. Even a complete beginner could see how the dog resisted and struggled in panic against being thrown into the pool.

This trainer didn't care about this in the least. Such a dominant behavior isn't a mistake which can happen to anyone. No matter what happened before or after. We cannot know. But we have eyes and can see the fact of the very moment of that clip. FORCE
. Maybe that man is a good trainer in other situations. Means, he must have had a certain motivation for acting against his own better knowing.

No simple mistake, but an awful ATTITUDE to force an animal who is in such a fear.

I do apologize for having called that trainer a swine. But no misunderstanding please: I don't apologize to him, I apologize to the swines for having compared them with him.

 Quote: Christina Stockinger

Such a dominant behavior isn't a mistake which can happen to anyone. No matter what happened before or after. We cannot know. But we have eyes and can see the fact of the very moment of that clip. FORCE
. Maybe that man is a good trainer in other situations. Means, he must have had a certain motivation for acting against his own better knowing.

Social pressure can be a hard thing to over come for a human being. The same way people can be pressured to act differently than they normally would based on the "crowd" they're involved in. This trainer could very likely have been under tremendous pressure from the production crew to have his dog perform what they wanted in a timely manner and felt like he didn't have time or the freedom to go at his dog's pace. Not saying it was the right thing to do, I'm just saying that in the moment, confronting social pressure is a hard thing for most of us to do, especially in a group of people who are all just waiting on you. After the fact we usually look back and say "I wish I had just spoken up and done it differently."

Years ago I went to see a seminar taught by Dr. Ian Dunbar, and he told us about his experience on his dog training television show in the UK. He said that there were times when, due to time constraints, he used training methods that were inconsistent with his training philosophy (he is a "force-free" trainer) and that if he could go back and apologize to those dogs he would. He felt that it wasn't the best way to train a dog, but he did what he felt he had to do at the time, because of the social pressures that he had to deal with. I believe that this situation is much the same. This man may well have known that this wasn't the best way, but he did what he felt he had to do at the time.

It was not a nice thing to do, and he probably regrets it now after the fact. Regardless of whether it was an accidental mistake or an intentional mistake, that kind of thing could happen to almost anyone depending on the situation, which was my point in mentioning the bit about Dr. Dunbar.

Ian Dunbar! Wow! That goes back a bit. I think I still have some of the booklets he had at his seminars.

Thanks, Allie, I must admit you're right. Under the pressure of production it would need a lot of effort, strength of character and personal conviction to say NO! I cannot know how I would react, as I've never experienced such a situation and never will. So I can see, I must mitigate some of my critic. I simply cannot bear to see a dog being forced like this.

I also do think that for producing a movie, they would check out what they can do and what not. Or do you think they have filmed directly, instead of clearing up things before? I would not accept this, I'd want to know before what is waiting for my dog and me.

The dog had rehearsed this, but entering from a different angle. He refused because the actual set had him entering the water from a different mark. It happens with dogs. Although he had to be forced to enter, he performed the rest of the shoot as rehearsed and they got the shots in the water.

Our TD wrangles for movies. Sometimes you get unexpected performances. Sometimes they work out for the better, the director loves the dog, and you get more shots than you originally contracted for. Sometimes a dog that has sat a thousand times will get confused and hesitate to sit on cue, costing you the one shot you were contracted for, You still get paid for the shoot, but you don't get called back.

With the first part you write I agree. Giving a dog a command in situation he's not used to, he can seem to have forgotten how to perform an exercise or he may not understand, what you want from him. This would mean, the exercise was not enough generalized. This part I would understand fully, because it happened and still happpens with my dogs various time. Then I have to go on training this on other spots and also with more and new distractions etc. Though I certainly wouldn't force him to do it if this exercise under the new circumstances would trigger so much fear. No reasonable trainer would do this neither a simple pet owner who loves his dog.

Your other part : "He performed the rest of the shoot as rehearsed" I don't understand at all. Have we watched two different clips?

The dog was not able to swim any more. His whole body was hanging in an almost vertical position in the water. His head was even sometimes under water. They had to save him, if not he would have drowned. This must have been an extremely horrifying experience for him. I am totally against such a procedure. Just because it is done for a movie doesn't make it better. It is not justifiable no matter what the motivation of the trainer and the director might have been.

According to this article and others, the shoot was completed, this one clip is from one take, and as has been noted in other forums and media, this clip does not represent the entirety of the circumstance.

I think you are trying to apply what is practical to pet owners and most trainers to an unrelated situation. In the sport and training that you mention, you have unlimited time to perfect any given behavior. In the life of this dog, he has to practice this and get it right within a very limited window, then he moves on to the next task and he may never have to perform this task again. It is not possible or practical to generalize every task that a dog may have to perform on a movie set.

Also, you have to consider the consequences of walking off a set. For a novice such as yourself, it is easy and seems noble to refuse to do something and walk away. However, if you wrangled on movie sets for a living and you walked off because of an unforeseen action by your animal, the days' shooting would be lost and you would not be called back. You would eventually lose your livelihood.

I find different views on "force" to be interesting. Many people object to seeing the dog forced into the water, but many of the same people would use an ecollar for escape/avoidance training, or use corrections during OB. Ethically, I can't make that distinction. If the dog had practiced this before, I was sure that he would not drown, and I had thousands of dollars at stake, I can't say that I wouldn't get him in the water any way I could.

For me, Duane, it is not at all justified to teach a behavior within a limited time. If someone makes a living out of this, he is chosing the wrong way. He'd better make a living out of something else. I think what those movie makers are doing as well as the trainers participation is terribly wrong, it is animal cruelty.
Although this clip does not represent the entirety of the cicumstances it shows the part of cruelty the dog had to bear.

About force: I don't think the use of an ecollar is force if done correctly. It never should be used as avoidance training. It is of no use to make a dog obey with such a method. Such trainers then will probably reach what they want from the dog, but at the same time they will never be able to build a good relationship with him (unless they stop this manner of training). Such a method goes near to cruelty or already is, Though I guess in a weaker way than making him nearly drown. The dog does is in a mode fear or discomfort if he only obeys in order to escape the consequences of an undesired behavior. Avoidance training is old school training. This should have been overcome long ago.

For me Christina I would have done some things differently. However, when training dogs to work, you often have to react in a limited time. What bothers me most about the uproar that this clip has caused is that the most vocal critics seem to have zero experience with animals in the movie industry, yet they are roasting these people on the world wide web.

 Quote: Christina Stockinger

About force: I don't think the use of an ecollar is force if done correctly. It never should be used as avoidance training. It is of no use to make a dog obey with such a method. Such trainers then will probably reach what they want from the dog, but at the same time they will never be able to build a good relationship with him (unless they stop this manner of training). Such a method goes near to cruelty or already is, Though I guess in a weaker way than making him nearly drown. The dog does is in a mode fear or discomfort if he only obeys in order to escape the consequences of an undesired behavior. Avoidance training is old school training. This should have been overcome long ago.

I find this statement odd. First, the very trainers that you lawd here daily, (ME and his instructors, to be specific) use ecollars in escape/avoidance training. It is more common than you seem to realize. Stemming the dog until he performs a behavior to "turn off the pressure" is absolutely forcing the dog to comply.

http://www.vulture.com/2017/02/a-dogs-purpose-animal-abuse-video-found-to-be-fake.html

http://www.etalk.ca/news/2017/february/american-human-a-dogs-purpose-video-leak-faked?platform=hootsuite