Petitions, boycotts, and dog-abuse defenders: An Instagram Live with Zak George

Today I caught up with Zak George to hear the latest about his public feud with Dog Daddy.

See Dog Daddy's petition against Zak George atchange.org

Dog Daddy, Part 1: The face of modern "bad" dog training

Dog Daddy, Part 2: Zak George calls out animal abuse masquerading as dog training

Annie sees Dog Daddy live. Also: Get to know Erin Whelan (2020 episode rebroadcast)

Transcript

This transcript was made automatically from the audio, so it may contain small errors.

Hey there, can you hear me okay? Yeah, I can hear you. How are you doing? Awesome. That's awesome.

It's great to see you again, Annie. You too. Oh my gosh, so much. Oh yes. I'm, um, hold on.

All that happens. I know, and I just wanted to, uh, I just really wanted to touch base and kind of check in on this saga. It's really a saga. It's really like, there should be a Netflix show. Yeah, yeah.

I mean, there is that obvious component to it, but it also is a very dynamic example of why we have to get regulation in this industry, I think, too. And I know you are quite passionate about it, and I'm so glad to be able to talk to you again about it, because without dog professionals standing up, Right? We're not going to get anywhere. It's up to the people in the industry to keep their house clean. And that's what we're trying to do.

We're trying to clean some house. Yeah. I mean, I also think even more urgent than regulation, although I do think regulation is urgent, is just like more like a better understanding from everybody about like what good dog training should look like. I agree completely. Like, it should be obvious.

And I think that, you know, when I went to the Ringwood event, whenever that was 10 days ago, I was just shocked by how I was the only one in the room who seemed to think that this was problematic. Yeah. And if everybody, you know, people seem to generally be in agreement that like it's not a, of course we have regulation about like not hitting your children, like not abusing your children. There's regulation about that, but there's also a degree of like common understanding and common sense about like how we should treat children that like... Doesn't seem to exist.

So for anyone who's here, I am recording this for my podcast. It's called How to Train Your Dog with Love and Science. And I've done a couple episodes now about Dog Daddy, a.k.a. Augusta de Oliveira. One was kind of like a deep dive into like who he is and how we got there.

And then you were kind enough to do an episode with me where we kind of talked about your involvement and That was a few weeks ago and since then, I mean, a couple things have happened. I went to a Dog Daddy event and I also talked a little bit about it on the podcast, although I'm happy to talk more about that now. But I also wanted to talk about this petition and some of the craziness that's happened. So because I'm recording this for the podcast and not everyone might be familiar, if it's okay with you, I just wanted to read through this petition. And then maybe we can talk about some of these points.

So this was posted in the last, this was posted five days ago on change.org by Augusto de Oliveira. And he writes, we the undersigned expressed our deep concern regarding Zak George's dissemination of misinformation on dog training techniques. We urge for an end to the spread. of inaccurate information that puts the well-being of dogs at risk, especially the potential consequences for aggressive dogs facing euthanasia. So I want to come back to this point, but let me read through the rest.

One, spread of dangerous information. Zak George, and by the way, like they cannot figure out how to spell your name in this petition. Zak George has unfairly targeted effective... Tools and techniques crucial for rehabilitating aggressive dogs often based on out of context viral videos lacking proper validation. Lack of credibility.

The trainer lacks credibility in supporting his claims, relying on questionable sources and lacking a comprehensive understanding of the context surrounding the techniques he criticizes. Three, unfair targeting of other dog trainers. Zak George has unfairly attacked fellow professionals questioning their moral standing without substantial evidence creating a hostile environment within the dog training community. Four, misunderstanding of boycott with petty consequences. Zak George's misunderstanding of a boycott has led to unjustified online attacks on small businesses that associate with other trainers, causing substantial harm and portraying a petty and disproportionate response.

Call to action. We call upon Zak George to cease the spread of misinformation, acknowledge the potential life-threatening consequences for aggressive dogs, and engage in open and informed discussions. Your support in signing this petition is crucial in promoting responsible and effective dog training practices and safeguarding the lives of these animals. Five, effective boycott on sponsors. We propose a true boycott by expressing our concerns to Zak George's sponsors, applying temporary pressure to encourage resolution.

This approach aims for a constructive dialogue. While emphasizing the impact on his support network until a satisfactory resolution is reached. We're currently focusing on BarkBox. And here is the contact information. And this, that's the sum of it.

And it has over 2,500 supporters who have signed this. And with comments galore that have kind of made me want to reach, tear my hair out. Tell me about how you discovered this petition and what it's meant for you so far. Okay, I first want to acknowledge I know the connection here is a little choppy for some people here, and we are recording this podcast. I've got a feed here that I'm recording separately so that we can help the audio later for those of you in the comments talking about it.

I am going to respond to that, though. Yes, I have to tell you, it is my first petition ever. No one's ever made a petition against me before, so that's interesting. And with a whopping 2,400 signatures or 2,500, whatever you said, you know, the thing is, I don't think that I'm going to be able to compete.

of thousands worldwide. So it's humorous to me in a way. I am more entertained than anything from it. However, as far as the other stuff goes, what's funny is he tried to initiate a boycott against my sponsors and we've just seen our sponsor sales surge since then. Which is, you know, it's good to know people have our back on this.

So, I mean, you know, it's not having the intended effect. And what else? Well, yeah, yeah, Bree is over here reminding me that we only work with sponsors that support ethical dog training. I mean, people, that's, you know, a good reason that most of my sponsors even come on board in the first place is to send a message that they stand for modern training methods. You know, what else is there to respond to?

I mean, it's someone who's flailing, who's desperate, who's taking people down everywhere he goes. You know, if he's going to be partnering, especially with dog-related businesses, we're not going to let them off the hook for platforming him either as a movement. I mean, this is, it takes two for these workshops to go on. You went to the... Ringwood, New Jersey location, which is a dog training facility.

And you have to be out of your mind as a dog training facility to be platforming someone like Augusto de Oliveira at your facility for innocent members and civilians, essentially, of the New Jersey area. We're not going to let that slide. We're going to voice public discourse over that. Now, look, as far as I know, they can do it, but we're allowed to... Be upset about it.

We're allowed to leave reviews. We're allowed to say we don't think that was a very smart move, especially given the condemnation of the American College of Veterinary Behaviorists and the AVMA against these methods. And I could go on and on. So, yeah, that's where we are. Yeah, yeah.

I mean, I think what what I guess you could say shocked me about this petition was it just seems like topsy-turvy day or like opposite day because it's like pretty much every single thing he's saying here seems like... I'm rubber in your glue. Like, point by point. He has unfairly targeted effective tools and techniques crucial for rehabilitating aggressive dogs, often based on out-of-context viral videos lacking proper validation. Okay, the out-of-context viral videos, I don't believe having seen this stuff now happening totally, you know.

In context. But this calling of these targeted, effective tools. I mean, like, what are his tools? Like... Yeah, I assume he's really trying to rally the people who are very pro-pronged, shock and choke chain in training.

And again, I've been very clear in the past, I don't hold individuals to the same standard that I do professionals on this issue. So he's really banking on that. The fact is, when you look at the video clips we show with him, it's not like we are CGI-ing them. It's not like they're only four second or half second clips or something. Yeah, he...

He doesn't, he really, he doesn't know much and I'm increasingly just like heartbroken by all of the attention and how even I think, like when I went to this event, even before he touched any of these dogs, he wasn't doing them any favors because they were all crazy stressed out. You know, there was like, there were like, what, 15 dogs in the room. Like, they seemed like a lot of them were having panic attacks before he ever approached them. And actually, I was watching the video that he posted from... From the event that he just posted, like his point of view of how this event went.

And he starts out going up to each dog and owner and being like, we're going to start in a second. We're going to start in a second. And... I just I just was like hitting my head and being like, the training is already happening. Like these dogs are already learning.

It's not like it's not like this is we're going to start training when when you start like hanging the dog by his neck or like forcing the muzzle on the dog. That's like losing its shit. You know what I mean? Right. Yeah.

I'm wondering about your safety. Have you been worried about your safety? Have you received any threats or anything that you're worried about? I think we're having some significant issues on the audio. I was only able to make out about 10% of that, unfortunately, so I don't know if it's on my end or not.

If you want to try again to ask me the question, I'll try to answer. If anyone in the comments can tell us which, if it's both of us that are chopping up, I can't tell. Sorry about it. I was asking if you're worried about your safety because the craziness of all of this makes me a little worried for you.

Am I worried about my safety? No, not, not. I mean, you always have the possibility that, you know, I mean, I've been a public figure now for 18 years and I've been controversial, which it shouldn't be controversial, but I've been talking about this for some time. So this isn't new. No, I'm not worried for my safety.

I'm really not. You just have to live life. And because what's the alternative? The alternative is, OK, I've got a platform of three million subscribers on YouTube, half million on Instagram.

That's the alternative. People with platforms, I've always believed, have a responsibility to speak up for what's right. And that's just what I'm trying to do right now. That's also, yeah, I'm not worried in the slightest because I know we're right. And any movement since we spoke last about anything that we can do to actually stop him?

This morning I just posted a link in my bio where people can put in their address and they can contact their local representatives, making them aware of the need for regulation. And like you said, I would much rather would prefer there not to be regulation, but there is a clear need for it because it's not like so-called dog trainers. We're going to just be on their good behavior. We must have recourse when people treat dogs in this manner in the name of dog training. And so that's some area, you know, we are continuing our boycott against Westbrook Pet Resort in Ringwood, New Jersey as well.

We, you know, they seem to have doubled down and said, we support this guy. We support these methods. And if they're going to support that while catering to the public in spite of the condemnation by international organizations worldwide about not only abusive and aversive methods, but Augusto de Oliveira personally, we don't have choice but to call them out and say, this is a bad apple right here. This is a bad apple of an establishment if they are going to have this attitude about this issue. It seems to me like a lot of his ire was stoked by you going after the Westbrook facility.

Probably. Yeah. It takes two for these to go on. And, you know, we're going to make it clear. If you platform this guy after you've been made aware of this and you continue to enable it or whatever, this is what civil discourse looks like.

This is what we do when we don't feel heard. We hold people accountable. And it's up to professionals who definitely know better to do this. And that is what we Sadly, though, you know, dogs are considered property and they really are sort of treated as such. I think that's part of what's at the heart of this is it's like my dog, my choice, as opposed to seeing it as like a sentient being that is affected by the laws of learning, which are not species specific.

Yeah, I mean, I had taken exception to a post he had.

Mostly a couple of them in the 90s.

And so essentially I posted, I made a post saying, look, in order to believe what he is saying, everybody, and the supplies to Augusto as well, you need to assume that the College of Veterinary Behaviorists, the AVMA, and all of the respective organizations in every nation on earth are wrong. And Ivan and people like Augusto, Gusto are correct. Anyway, his fans didn't like that, and whatever, people can feel what they want, but I didn't go on his podcast because I don't platform aversive dog trainers. I mean, that's, you know, it's essentially like, it is no different than platforming a flat earther, and it just is true. There's a mountain of evidence, and this is a scientific profession, and I'm not going to entertain the idea of That the earth is flat.

And that's essentially, you know, what I'm being asked to do by going on his podcast. I did listen to, I have listened to most of Dog Daddy on his podcast and I was just... I mean, this guy does, I mean, not Ivan, but Dog Daddy, like, he doesn't stop talking, and I was shocked about this when I went to his event, too. He just, uh, I'm sorry, somebody's saying about something, considering how he treated Susan Garrett, he would have tried to set you up to look bad. Well, I'm interested now in, like...

Checking out more of his work because I wasn't familiar with him. You know, it's hard to open your eyes when you're so passionate about good dog training. Not open your eyes. It's hard to, like, decide to sit down and watch bad dog training. You know what I mean?

It's hard to, like, it's like pulling up, you know, I want to see child abuse on my screen or whatever. Anyway, the guy doesn't stop talking and I really feel like, I felt like when I was watching him, this is somebody who is a complete charlatan, a complete showman and is making up for the fact that he doesn't know anything about this subject. I mean, I don't think he could talk about it even enough to like explain the problems with punishment. Or even argue what the benefits could be. He didn't stop talking the whole time, and you could hear that on this podcast, too.

He talks for nearly three hours straight without cease. One interesting thing, and I'm wondering if you've found this as well, is it does seem like there is some sort of... Hand-holding going on between so-called balance trainers and so-called positive reinforcement trainers who are like, we have different values, right? I think good balance trainers understand the science, but a hot dog trainer says, you are the hacks, snake oil. Okay.

These kinds of comments, what do you even say? I've noticed that they're faking now.

Well, Hot Dog Trainer, if you are there and you really want to write in some clarity about what it is about Dog Daddy that is so appealing to you, I would love to know. I would really love to have some people on the podcast who can speak to what it is that he's brought to their lives and how he's helped their dogs. Anyway, what was I saying? I was saying that he... I lost my train of thought.

I was saying that he's brought together these two worlds because it's like the balance trainers are like, this is not dog training. And the positive reinforcement trainers are like, this is punishment training, but it's not even like, I mean, if you're going to use punishment, like there's effective ways of using punishment to reduce potential fallout. And the best balance trainers, I think, are like really thoughtful about that kind of thing. But you can't look at this as even balanced training. I mean, would you call this balanced training?

You know, no, but I don't, you know, I think I made it clear last time that I'm just not a fan of the term balanced training. I think it's a term for branding. It doesn't make sense to me. It doesn't make sense to me either, yeah. Anyway, it points to the problem because Augusto will call himself a balanced trainer.

That's what he refers to himself. And then other so-called balanced trainers are like, that's not balanced training. And so it doesn't help the term. I think we need to call it what it is. It's aversive training.

And if you're using aversives in your training, you need to be very clear about that to the public. Because the reason that if you are a so-called balanced trainer and you are using aversives even 5% to 10% of the time as a prescribed method of your training, then you are running counter to the most credible, credentialed animal behavior organizations in the world. It doesn't make sense to use positive reinforcement even 95% of the time if you're going to go and wreck your work. Yeah. Two things I was thinking when I was at his event...

One is that I don't, I can't imagine like a good dog trainer kind of holding an event like this to, you know, supposedly cure reactive dogs. And by the way, I thought a lot of the dogs there didn't actually seem that reactive. Like they seemed like, you know, stressed out, but like they seem like worse after dealing with the guy than before. But part of the reason is that like... It would be a little bit like watching paint dry.

Like if you're really trying to deal with helping a dog who has severe issues, it's like a longitudinal project. It's not something that you can walk around the room and do five minutes of and like fix the dog. And it also occurred to me while I was there how interesting it is that he like goes to different cities for a few hours and then leaves. Yeah. Because, like, that's just, like, that's totally, like, the charlatan traveling salesman move, right?

Like, come in, sell everybody on something, and then leave before the shit hits the fan. Because every one of those dogs, every one of those dogs left more damaged than they came in. And, but, you know, by the time, like, the shit hits the fan, the guy's, you know, in some other city peddling this stuff to someone new. Well, that's true, and that's one of the things that we are, if I can comment on that just really briefly, that's what, over the last 10 days, we've made it very clear to him publicly that just because you're gone doesn't mean we're not going to hold those people accountable who platformed you. You are responsible for a flood of public criticism coming to those establishments' ways, and, well, you know, I mean, I don't know if that will affect him or not, but we will use our civil discourse to make it clear that we're not going to forget.

We will remember where he's been. Right, right.

But they invited him back for next year, right? As of now, if they're still in business in April, we'll have to see. I have to say, I mean, all other things aside, as someone who, like, herself runs a dog training facility, and I'm, like, maniacal about trying to, like, You know, I mean, keep it clean. Just there, just there. Keep it clean.

Like the place was so filthy, filthy. Like my daughter, my daughter was came inside just for a minute. Like I didn't want her to see this stuff. And like she wouldn't, she's four, like she wouldn't sit on the toilet. She was like, this is really dirty.

I don't, and there was like no toilet paper in the bathroom. Like on the one hand, it really doesn't matter if the place is clean or not. On the other hand, like I think as a business owner, like I want every experience that my clients have to be good. Like I want to do everything I can to make every experience good. There was no chairs.

It just, it was, I did not have a good feeling about the place for what it's worth. So that's my... That's my Yelp review having nothing to do with, like, who they're hosting. Yeah, good feedback. Yeah.

All right. Well, thanks again for your time. I was glad to get to hear what's happened since we last talked. Anything else? Any other high points or low points in the last few weeks on this matter?

Yeah, we're focused on Tampa right now. In addition, we haven't forgotten about Westbrook. We still have plans for civil discourse there, which will come to light later. However, in Tampa, we are focused, if he does intend, you know, I mean, hopefully he will announce that he's taking a step back to reevaluate some things and cancel the Tampa events. If not, then we intend to, you know, continue to apply the pressure to those who give him a platform.

So Tampa is happening this Saturday. November 25th, if anyone is interested in joining us in civil discourse around this and public education so that we can help people understand the right ways and more modern ways that

All right. Thank you very much. I'm glad you guys are speaking out against this training. I'm offended that he calls himself a dog trainer, and it makes me actually think that maybe it's time for all of us to rebrand ourselves since anyone can call themselves a dog trainer. In the end, what we're doing is teaching.

We're teaching people and we're teaching dogs. Dog trainers like to say how we're unusual teachers and that we're teaching two species at once. So maybe we can brainstorm on some other way to refer to ourselves so that he can stay a dog trainer and we can be, I don't know, interspecies educators or something like that. It's certainly something to think about. All right.

Well, happy Thanksgiving, Zak. And stay safe and keep up your good work. And thanks for chatting. I appreciate it. Yeah.

And if anyone's here and you want to check out my podcast, it's called How to Train Your Dog with Love and Science. And I will post this. I'm going to hope to post this today.