28 JanWould you put a shock collar on a human you love?

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Shock collars for dog training have been around for decades. When they began to gain in popularity in the 1970s, there were FDA attempts to recall them. Recently, there’s been a movement to ban them in Canada. In the states, there are occasional animal cruelty cases brought upon those who use them; a few years ago woman in Mahopac, NY, was charged after it was found that her pitbull’s shock collar had become permanently embedded in his neck. In 2011, they were outlawed in Wales.

As so called “positive reinforcement” dog trainers, we never use shock collars. The short answer as to why is not because they're inhumane (they are) or painful (that, too). It's because they can do more damage than good. Dogs are constantly making associations (this is what learning is, really) can easily associate the shock with the wrong thing: You think they think they were shocked for barking, while they think they got shocked for going to the door to greet your grandpa. Now, all old men are bad. You think they understand that passing the boundary of an electric fence will cause a shock, while they think running towards the approaching UPS man caused the shock. Now you have a dog who barks at the UPS man and hates old men and is needlessly getting jolted by electricity by people who he thought loved him.

However, as much as I love dogs, I think there are many unfair things we do to animals, and shock collars are pretty far down on that list. As a non-vegetarian making a case for animal rights, I would go so far as to label myself a hypocrite. Here I am treating my little poodle mix like a baby doll while I pick at a plate of fried bacon.

So, I’d like to abandon any kind of animal rights argument in favor of this one: Shock collars can be dangerous to people. A common retort that people often have to shock collars is: Would you treat your child that way? Yes, apparently some people would. YouTube hosts literally hundreds of people shocking themselves (and sometimes their children) with electric collars made for dogs.