The Cesar Millan Phenomenon
One of the most-asked questions we get around here is: “What do you think of Cesar Millan?”
HE'S EVERYWHERE! Love him or hate him, he’s hard to ignore. First seen in 2004 as The Dog Whisperer on the National Geographic Channel, he’s been on Oprah, written bestsellers, and now gives lectures as a dog psychologist. He may be best known for roller skating at high speed on the beach behind a pack of big, feisty dogs. No small feat.
CESAR BASICS: Cesar believes that every dog owner must become a calm-assertive pack leader. He bases this approach on twenty years of growing up on a farm in Mexico and observing wild dogs there. He believes the pack leader is dominant over the pack members and that the calm presence of this leader keeps the submissive members of the pack in order and eliminates unstable behavior.
THE BEST OF CESAR: Cesar Millan’s formula for living with a dog is: Exercise first, discipline second, and affection last. He believes that dog owners in America basically have it backwards. Many spoiled and unruly dogs are created by dog owners who freely give affection first, discipline second, and exercise last. This is often the result of well-meaning families treating the dog more like a human child than... well, than like a dog. Dogs need to be understood and treated as canines first, and family members second.
THE WORST OF CESAR: So why is there so much controversy surrounding this wise and successful individual? First, ‘dominance theory’ has come under heavy fire in recent years. There is a growing contingent of research that suggests our knowledge of how a dog pack behaves is primarily based on flawed studies from the 1940’s. These studies focused on captive wolf populations, rather than wild wolves, and are not thought to truly represent either natural dog or wolf behavior. Second, Cesar utilizes very little food or reward-based training in his program, which infuriates the all-positive, anti-correction crowd. This also troubles us to a large degree.
OUR TAKE ON CESAR: The best thing to come from Cesar Millan is that he’s got people excited about training their dogs. We love his formula of Exercise/Discipline/Affection, his insistence that dogs are dogs (not children), and his belief that dogs should have jobs and live within structure. As far as pack theory, we model our own program loosely after it, like Cesar. (Whether or not it is scientifically provable isn’t a priority for us – it’s a structure that’s understandable and one which people can implement, which is why it works so well.) We usually disagree with the equipment he uses and his approach to aggressive behavior; we believe reward-based training is a better, safer, strategy. But exercise, training and giving a dog a job and a warm place in the family pack…we’re all for that!
