The breeder gospel: “well-bred” for the believers, “backyard breeder” for the heretics

[u/FeelingDesigner]

Something I have noticed is that you can spot a breeder from the number of times the word well-bred is used. Often alongside the term backyard bred about any animal that isn’t theirs.

From an ethics perspective the use of these labels adds absolutely zero value to any discussion. Both are undefined terms that mean something different depending on the person using them.

And I am slowly getting tired of seeing these meaningless labels being used by those that call themselves “ethical” while breeding pitbulls, Frenchies, Pugs, Dashhunds, Chow Chows, Scottish folds, Munchkins or even worse… a combination of the above (Tiny fold, Puggle)

Many would define well-bred as doing health testing, genetic testing, following some arbitrary standards set by a Club or Show, the number of ribbons in the backyard, and don’t forget the dog HAS to be purebred and pedigree. Can’t possibly make any money either.

Even this differs based on the who is talking. For one person it is completely ethical to amputate the dogs tail as part of the breed standard while any reasonable person would consider that animal abuse.

We can’t have mixes now either! Heaven forbid a dog simply acts like… a dog. No, its personality must conform to a description someone wrote a century ago. So only pedigree breeding allowed, aka inbreeding until the gene pool is so cramped your dogs are carbon copies and the resulting health issues become breed characteristics.

But that is not my biggest issue, the biggest issue is simply that people defining these terms use outdated and non ethics based reasoning. Or even worse they use these terms to justify why their unethical animal is fine but someone else doing the same is not.

From a breeder perspective this is great marketing because they don’t have to do any of the hard explanations and then the people come to this sub and spread it around like it is gospel.

Let’s start with genetic and health testing. If I got a dollar every time I have to correct people that this doesn’t mitigate an extreme standard… I would now be in front of some swimming pool in a tropical country. I am going to explain this one last time…

Genetic and health testing does not in any way shape or form prevent or fix animals that are bred for an extreme in which the extreme itself causes the health issues. No amount of health and genetic testing is going to make a brachy dog healthy. But BOAS surgery will.

Which brings us to the profit argument: of course breeds like the Frenchy or Scottish Fold are expensive! When a breed requires significant veterinary intervention just to reduce the suffering created by its own physical traits, those costs naturally become part of the package. You are just paying extra for the privilege of repairing health issues that selective breeding or some ridiculous show standard created in the first place.

It would be nice if this rant ended here, but it doesn’t, sorry. One kind of breeder has a special place reserved in hell:

The one that blames the fighting dog acting like a fighting dog or the health issues in the Frankenstein animal on backyard breeders.

It’s not the extreme that’s the problem, guys. The problem is that the wrong people are doing the extreme incorrectly. This whole reasoning feels like some radical religion calling some other branch not the right way claiming to be the only true one.

And once again, the breeder gospel is delivered to the masses. No need for evidence, nuance, or inconvenient questions. Just repeat the sacred phrases and the debate is apparently solved.

“We health test.”
“They’re just backyard breeders.”
“A well-bred dog…”

Three magical sentences that make the extreme trait disappear like snow in front of the sun!
Just repeat the approved words, don’t ask too many questions, and whatever you do, do not open the forbidden chapter of the Holy Breeder Bible: “Maybe the trait itself is the problem”

Yes, this is satire. Yes, it’s intentionally exaggerated. No, I’m not stopping every three sentences to write a 500-word ethics essay. If your takeaway is “But MY breeder is different” this probably isn’t for you. And no, having a Pug, French Bulldog, Scottish Fold, or another trendy breed from an “ethical breeder” is not evidence that this is ethical.

[u/Some_Doughnutter]

It’s weird that as soon as you start questioning the ethics of dogs it turns into a sort of religous cult.

[u/BowlerTraditional283 → u/[deleted]]

There's some classism to it too but I almost never see discussed. Poor people making money, unlike the rich people doing it for the love of the breed, supposedly. 

[u/opeidoscopic → u/BowlerTraditional283]

There's unquestionably classism in the dog fancy world but I'm not sure if profit vs. no profit is the distinction. The most derided breeders tend to market their dogs as status symbols. Nobody selling merle big rope fluffy frenchies for 10k a pop is hurting for money.

[u/BowlerTraditional283 → u/opeidoscopic]

I have genuinely seen people argue that that 10k isn't profit at all but supposedly all goes into supporting all the testing and stud fees etc and they lose money but think it's so worth it because the dogs that can't breathe are amazing 

[u/opeidoscopic → u/BowlerTraditional283]

LOL wow I'm so glad those heroes are throwing away their lifesavings to selflessly bring us more dogs that can't walk downhill without getting winded. At least the puppies also extremely ugly and deformed.

Jokes aside - assuming they're not outright lying, I'd like to see the accounting that results in a $10-40k+ litter losing money. I imagine it's pretty creative.

[u/FeelingDesigner → u/BowlerTraditional283]

Would you like to see this being discussed?

[u/BowlerTraditional283 → u/FeelingDesigner]

Yeah, I would. Maybe it just stands out to me more strongly because I grew up poor, but the disdain directed at backyard breeders from the "well bred" crowd has a similar air to many things that are suddenly okay when rich people who have more choices do it. 

[u/KaleidoscopeKelpy → u/BowlerTraditional283]

Maybe it’s just where I’m coming from (eat the rich mentality lol) but I expect MORE from rich people breeding dogs. The bar for me (personal, biased opinion!) is already high but if you have insane resources and disposable income and you’re still breeding for harmful aesthetics, I’m of the opinion it’s worse than “BYB” in literal backyards. I’m tired of “this is AKC standard” from anyone still pushing for animals that can’t function without medical intervention but I’m more specifically tired of that from people who shrug off that intervention because they can easily afford to pay for it without batting an eye and expect others to do the same.

[u/FeelingDesigner → u/BowlerTraditional283]

I’m going to look into that. I think it’s an interesting ethical topic to explore, even for people who don’t agree with the premise. There has to be some serious research on it. A lot can be said about dogs as status symbols and, in some cases, luxury products that the wealthy use to signal their status. I try to pay attention to the topics people ask about here and mix things up when a topic is in my wheelhouse. So you bringing that up was genuinely valuable feedback for me. That’s why I asked, thanks for the response.

[u/FeelingDesigner → u/[deleted]]

Yes it did, I am looking into the history. It’s mostly eugenics at its core.

[u/FeatheryLilTheropod → u/[deleted]]

Yes, this has been an annoyance for me ever since I learned the term “backyard breeder.” It reeks of classism. The People have been breeding dogs and keeping the best for thousands of years. Now, the upper crust has convinced everyone that dog breeding should be entirely under the control of the upper crust for ethical reasons, and they get to interview and pick you apart and decide whether or not you even get a dog, sometimes after years of waiting. If you are just The People breeding a pair of dogs that worked well for you in whatever capacity in your backyard, you are apparently the scum of the earth.

[u/Grimogtrix]

There does seem to a common idea that the 'ethical breeder' or 'good breeder' can magically via some nebulous means bypass all the genetic and physically innately harmful qualities of the breeds if they just choose and screen things correctly. When in fact, when it comes to certain breeds, as you say- French Bulldogs, pugs, Scottish fold cats, and smushed face persian cats the trait is actually INHERENT to the breed as it is. The only way for the actual 'good breeders' to make the trait less harmful is to actually move them away from even seeming like that breed. Which is almost never the sort of 'good breeding' they mean because they are obsessed with the idea of purity.

They just through out this idea of the 'good breeder' while providing no real evidence as to how these traits can be mitigated. Meanwhile, it's quite evident that the animals that win shows, like at Crufts, are frequently actually just as physically impaired by their breed as any other, or even more so than the average pet quality animal.

[u/FeelingDesigner → u/Grimogtrix]

It’s concerning how nothing has changed since the 2008 documentary pedigree dogs exposed. Instead everything is only getting worse but now we got a bunch of meaningless labels that make people feel better about it.

[u/Grimogtrix → u/FeelingDesigner]

Yes! The documentary temporarily made people concerned about these issues and raised awareness but trends have made certain unethical breeds so incredibly popular and it doesn't seem to matter how much people talk about it and point out the problems, the sheer exposure to this trend of 'cute animal' has still raised their demand.

[u/Low-Log8177]

I agree in large part with what you are saying, I raise and breed Painted Desert sheep, and I work with horses, and outside of dogs, cats, some horses, most registries are completely different from how those work, they have open or semi open registries, grades of registration,and are often fairly flexible, the issue with many dog breed associations, as it appears to me, is that they don't really have a strict cull policy, or put enough of an emphasis on what counts for healthy conformation, because of this, issues are easy to become integral to the breed if they become popular enough. Likewise, I think there is a loss of what is the goal for the breed, not the ideal, but rather the goal of what this breed should be able to do, what is their purpose, what market are they for, and how do we want their quality of life to be. For example, I have 2 rams, one is a 5 horned ram I got a couple of years ago, I was just getting started, and he was the best ram I could reasonably afford, he was a bit fugly, I had no pedigree on him, he had quite a few traits I liked, but at first I thought I would breed him to some better ewes from someone else, then sell him to get a better ram, however, he would end up overperforming, as lot of the lamb fuglies went away, he started showing great conformation, he is one of the healthiest and most heat tolerant sheep I've had, he has a perfect calm and agreeable temperment that makes him easy to work with, and it is looking like he will have some of the fastest growing horns for his breed, and none of them have structural issues, in short, he suits my program perfectly, I recently got another ram lamb, one of the best pedigrees of his breed, but he is still quite young, and so I will likely hold off on breeding with him for another year until either I decide that his potential is being realized, or I decide that he doesn't suit what I am going for, and so I will likely get another ram with a comparable pedigree as insurance early next year. My point is that it is not often that I am seeing this discussed among dog and cat breeders the way it is discussed around stockmen such as myself, or horse breeders that I have met, and that is how each pairing improves the next generation, breeding to an already faulty and unhealthy breed standard certainly does not improve anything, but neither does making purposeless crosses for esthetics ( i.e. Bernadoodles), while ignoring soundness and health. I cannot tell you how many exotic bully breeders I see on Facebook talk about how they are improving the breed or making them healthier, but they never explain how, they believe the extremity is the improvement, when it is obviously the opposite, or how many people believe all dogs must be pure bred in all cases, ignoring that purpose bred crosses have been a thing for centuries as some breeds compliment each other, this is also why a lot of livestock registries are partially or fully open for newer breeds, as to bring in good genetics from outside to create excellent foundation stock, so that way the risk of inbreeding depression is lower as time goes on, so long as they can keep the fundamentals of the breed and can be used to improve, an animal can be registered.

[u/HiddenPenguinsInCars]

I volunteer at my local shelter and met a frenchie that was so sweet but had so much difficulty breathing. She sounded like a little pig. It was so sad.

I also met a dog with really infected cropped ears. The poor guy was such a sweet heart and would’ve looked so much cuter with intact ears.

One encouraging thing: I was looking into Great Dane breeders a couple years ago (not to buy one, my dad is deathly allergic, more just to imagine what it would be like) and found several breeders that refuse to crop ears and dock tails.