[nagdu] Puppyraising for owner training

[The Pawpower Pack]

I think that to some degree, the guide dog schools put forth a "father  
knows best" attitude; making it clear that if it weren't for them and  
the program and the puppy raisers, that the blind handler wouldn't be  
able to have a dog or travel as independently.  Certainly not all  
trainers and staff do this but it happens enough and I'm pretty sure  
it happens or has happened at every program.  Many people who have  
obtained their dogs from programs are very loyal and they tend--  
especially as first-time guide dog users-- to accept whatever the  
trainers say as gospel.  Combine that with stories in the media about  
people who have owner trained service pigs or who's owner trained dogs  
engaged in a horrible or socially unacceptable behavior in a very  
public fashion; you get an image of incompetence.

Also the guide dog programs put out quite a bit of propaganda  
basically saying that without the guide dog programs, blind people  
would be home, in the dark, friendless with out the ability to travel  
independently at all.  Many times guide dog program literature  
presents guide dog use this way-- as a necessity-- a gift bestowed by  
the kindness of the sighted.  Not as a different, and equally  
respectable travel choice as that of white cane use.
The material focuses on what the program does *for* the blind person  
and leaves the impression that someone has to do *for * us.

Also owner trainers make up a small percentage of an already small  
minority.  People are curious about it, they have lots of questions,  
and usually their eagerness to have them answered can outweigh any   
other matters at hand such as the appropriateness of the time/location  
of asking such questions.

Guide dogs and their handlers are unusual, once people know I'm an  
owner trainer than I become something even more unusual amongst the  
already unusual and Americans, as a culture, seem to think that it is  
our "right to know" things about people if they are at all different.

These are just my experiences for what they are worth.

Rox and the "Kitchen Bitches:"
Bristol (retired), Mill'E SD. and Laveau Guide Dog, CGC.
"My goal in life is to become as wonderful as my dog thinks I am."
http://www.pawpowercreations.com/retreat.html
pawpower4me at gmail.com
AIM: Brissysgirl