What's in a name?

I've been thinking over the last couple of weeks with reference to the recent spate of bad publicity about dog attacks on people. These have been a godsend to the anti-dog lobby. When I looked back over the many years that I've been involved in both dogs and law enforcement I realised that there was, in many cases, a common thread running through dogs involved in violent incidents.

That common factor was not as you might think breed but name. So many of these dogs have aggressive names given to them by their owners. Tyson, Killer, Fang, Rooney, Ripper, Storm. I even knew a particularly unpleasant character who had two large dogs called Ronnie and Reggie after the Kray twins.

You have to ask, do the owners give their dogs macho names because they want a dog that is looking for trouble because they are themselves are rather inadequate? I recently had a client who was concerned following the Leicester Rottweiler attack. She had a Rottweiler/Japanese Akita X. She just wanted as a responsible dog owner to ensure that she was doing the right thing. Both by her dog and any humans she interacted with. It is easy to make presumptions before meeting a dog and if I'd just said that with that mix of breeds there would be aggression issues it would have been a wholly wrong assessment. When I asked the dogs name and was told 'Wilma' I just knew that these owners were not the type to have a land shark. I did the consultation, there were as always, issues to be addressed but the family were delightful and Wilma was a real sweetie. When have you ever heard of someone being savaged by a dog called Cecil?

All of my Police Dogs would go into any situation and take the world on if that was what was required but would far rather chill out at home or on a nice country walk. They didn't have to prove anything to themselves or anyone else. They had really butch names such as Ben, Acco, Gaspode (named after a scruffy talking dog in 'Moving Pictures' by Terry Pratchett), Cocoa, Jack and Bramble.

It just goes to support my long held view that it's not dogs who need a licence but the prospective owners. They should be assessed for suitability before being allowed to take on a dog but the I suppose that would infringe their 'Human Rights'. Never mind the rights of the poor old dog who is often discarded when he is no longer 'Hard Enough' or a new breed becomes fashionable within certain groups in society.

It is not only dog owners who stereotype by name. There was the time in the course of my Police service when I had cause to speak to woman living one of the rougher areas of my patch. She had eight sons and when I asked their names replied "Duane" When I asked what the others were called she replied "Duane, they're all called Duane. It makes it easier you see." I then asked the obvious question "What do you do if you want to speak to a particular Duane?" "Oh that's easy" She replied. "I just call his surname!"