A FANCIER ’ S NOTEBOOK
SUSI SZEREMY
Sumo Wrestling and the Dog Fancy
Two men , each weighing 300 pounds , slam into each other with the force of freight trains coming at each other from opposite directions on the same track . Body fakes , shoves to the face and agile grappling moves seem improbable in men this size , neither of whom is wearing anything more than a padded loincloth . Standing by are referees dressed like Kabuki performers , their white-painted faces shiny under stadium lights . The bout will last less than a minute .
Sumo wrestling is baffling and bizarre to the uninitiated . Never once , however , has a lack of understanding about what I was seeing diminished my fascination with it . I ’ ve never been able to take my eyes off a match whenever one is televised . In that regard , sumo wrestling is a lot like a conformation ring . Televised dog shows have historically drawn an audience that found it captivating to watch beautiful , if not exotic , dogs gaited around a show ring in competition . That the public largely didn ’ t understand the nuances of free stacking or a point system , let alone how the dogs were evaluated , didn ’ t seem to impact the popularity of these shows . Viewers understood dogs , but dog shows were a world they didn ’ t entirely “ get ,” and that was OK .
The aging of fanciers , the impact of the animal rights and adopt-don ’ t-shop movement , and fewer new people participating in conformation have certainly made it challenging for the sport to sustain itself . Perhaps it was this confluence of factors that lead some in the fancy to feel it necessary to appeal to an even broader TV audience with the addition of side stories and performance events .
Has this , however , been the right approach in affecting public perception ? Does society like us better now than it did before we included mixed breeds in performance events or created titles for dogs that can bark on cue and crawl on their bellies ? Is the parody film Best in Show still the image people see in their mind ’ s eye when they hear the term , “ dog show ?” Have our efforts to be inclusive made a difference in how the dog fancy is perceived , or have they influenced legislation that shrinks the rights of dog owners and heritage breeders ?
I ’ m not so sure . In what feels like an almost desperate drive to be better liked , I fear we have diluted the essence of who we are and botched delivery of the more important message that what we do is relevant and matters . Some dog breeds are on life support in their country of origin , unconscionable at a time of relative peace . The breeders of these dogs are nothing less than conservationists struggling to preserve their breeds , some of which are outnumbered by giant pandas . When , however , was the last time ( or even the first ) that a concerted effort was made on a national scale to paint our breeders as preservationists ? Why have we not done a better job of capitalizing on the importance of “ diversity ” ( surely a buzzword in our times ) by pointing out that it was diversity that created the tapestry of dog breeds we have today in the first place ? If these breeds vanish , they take with them the legacy of the cultures that created them for a reason .
Among our ranks are fanciers calling for the creation of classes that would allow altered dogs to be exhibited at all-breed shows . It ’ s not lost on me that revenue would be generated by additional entries afforded by a new class , but the purpose of conformation isn ’ t to provide exhibitors a venue through which they can show their spayed or neutered dogs , it ’ s to evaluate breeding stock . The “ outside world ” may consider “ breeder ” a pejorative term , but we shouldn ’ t . Shying away from the historic purpose of a conformation show , or waffling at the challenge of presenting heritage breeders to the public as conservationists , feels like an apology for being who we are : stewards of current and future generations of purebred dog breeds .
“ Designer breeders ” who spew out any number of bizarre combinations of breeds seemingly get a pass from the same finger-pointers that vilify purebred dog breeders . Memes show up on social media that lament what “ we ” have done to dog breeds over the last 100 years by sharing photos of the worst examples of our breeds , but there ’ s been no national voice to rebut these claims , and there ’ s plenty to refute . We seem to struggle to find relevancy with a generation that cut its teeth on the importance of saving rescue dogs , but some of us are trying to save entire breeds .
What we do fits in perfectly with the narrative that diversity matters , preservation is important and no one despises indiscriminate breeding under substandard conditions more than the heritage breeder doing it right . Except for a few televised dog shows , those messages are largely silent the rest of the year . That ’ s not how the Humane Society of the United States did it . Even now , their heart-rending commercials can be found on late-night television . Misleading as they are , they work . And they ’ ve hurt us .
Our dogs are our best PR , and we have a fabulous message . Why is our story not wafting into the bedrooms of people at night ? Why are there not public service announcements promoting the healthy dogs we produce ? That none of this is happening makes sumo wrestling seem understandable . DIR
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