The Divide in Dog Training and Why It’s Bad for the Industry as a Whole
The dog training world feels more divided than ever. Scroll social media for five minutes and you’ll see it. Positive reinforcement trainers on one side. Balanced trainers on the other. Both convinced they’re right, not just practically, but morally too. The conversations around tools, methods, and ethics have become louder, sharper, and far more public. And while training methods absolutely matter, the way this divide is playing out is starting to damage the industry as a whole. Because when everything becomes about conflict, the people stuck in the middle are dog owners, and the ones who pay the price are the dogs.
The methods matter
Let’s be clear, this isn’t about pretending all training approaches are equal. They’re not. Major veterinary and welfare organisations have been very clear on this. The American Veterinary Society of Animal Behavior advises against aversive training methods, highlighting risks to welfare and the human–animal bond, and recommends reward-based approaches (AVSAB Humane Dog Training Position Statement). Here in the UK, the British Veterinary Association and BSAVA have also opposed aversive tools like shock collars on welfare grounds (BVA policy on aversive training devices). The RSPCA takes the same position. And the research backs it up. A 2020 study by Vieira de Castro found that dogs trained using aversive methods showed more stress behaviours, higher cortisol levels, and more negative emotional states. A follow-up study in 2021 found that reward-based training was not only better for welfare, it was effective too (Vieira de Castro et al., 2020; 2021). So yes, where we stand on methods matters. A lot. But the bigger problem is what this divide has become. The conversation has drifted away from education and into identity. It’s no longer just about what works, what’s humane, and what’s fair. It’s about sides. Camps. Labels. Public call-outs. And from the outside? It looks like chaos. Dog owners aren’t stepping into a calm, professional space. They’re stepping into a battleground. One trainer says “correct the behaviour.” Another says “never correct.” One says “purely positive doesn’t work.” Another says “balanced training is just punishment rebranded.” To professionals, these are complex conversations around learning theory and welfare. To owners, it just sounds like noise. And noise doesn’t create confident owners, it creates overwhelmed ones.
The real impact on owners
Most people aren’t looking for a philosophy. They’re looking for help. They want their dog to walk nicely, come back when called, stop reacting, settle at home. They’re often tired, frustrated, and worried they’re getting it wrong. Then they land in an industry that contradicts itself loudly and publicly. So what happens? They pick the trainer who sounds the most certain. The most convincing. The quickest. Not necessarily the most ethical. Not the most evidence-based. Not the one thinking long-term. And that’s a problem, not just for individual dogs, but for the credibility of the whole industry. Social media has only made it louder. It’s made education more accessible, but it’s also made conflict more profitable. Nuance doesn’t perform well online. Outrage does. A 10-second “fix” gets more attention than an honest explanation of behaviour. A dramatic transformation gets more clicks than a realistic training process. So the loudest voices often aren’t the most informed, they’re the most engaging. The divide becomes content. The argument becomes branding. And owners are left trying to work out who to trust while professionals publicly tear strips off each other. That doesn’t build trust. It erodes it.
And the dogs?
And in all of this, the dogs get lost. They don’t benefit from ego.They don’t benefit from arguments.They don’t benefit from “winning.” They benefit from clarity, consistency, and humane training. They benefit from feeling safe enough to learn, not shut down enough to comply. They benefit from trainers who understand behaviour properly, who look beyond obedience and consider emotional state, and who don’t rely on fear or discomfort to get results. When the industry becomes more focused on fighting each other than teaching, dogs stop being the centre of the conversation. And that’s a problem.
Where do we go from here?
Now don’t get me wrong, disagreement isn’t the issue. A good industry should question itself. We should challenge methods. We should examine evidence. We should move forward. But there’s a difference between professional disagreement and performative hostility. Once conversations turn into mocking, shaming, and point-scoring, they stop being useful. Owners switch off. Good trainers get dragged into nonsense. Important welfare discussions get buried under noise. At that point, no one is learning and nothing is improving. You can be clear about your values without turning everything into a fight. You can advocate for reward-based, welfare-first training without building your entire identity around opposing others. You can call out harm and still focus on education. Because at the end of the day, owners don’t need more drama. They need clarity. They need to understand why something works.They need to know what’s fair.They need guidance they can trust. Not another argument to scroll past. I honestly believe this divide is damaging the industry’s credibility. From the outside, dog training already looks messy. It’s unregulated, inconsistent, and often driven by opinion instead of knowledge. And when professionals spend more time criticising each other than educating owners, it reinforces that perception. If we want to be taken seriously, we have to come together and act like a profession. That means valuing evidence, prioritising welfare, and communicating clearly. Because everything we put out publicly shapes how owners understand dog training. Our love of dogs is the reason so many of us started in this industry. We should be pushing forward by being better. Better informed, better at communicating, and better at keeping dogs at the centre of everything we do. The divide is real, and it matters. It confuses, it undermines trust, and it pulls us away from the very reason we started. But it’s the hostility that’s doing the real damage. It’s what keeps widening the gap. At Barkology, we strive to build a business and a community centred on welfare, education, and real-life training that works. And honestly, how much better would this industry be if more people were focused on helping rather than fighting? Just imagine how much more impact we could have.
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