-Listens to what he means when he is speaking -Pays attention to his nonverbal cues about his emotional state -Respects his boundaries and only assists him in expanding them, not demanding he do so -Rewards him for engaging in new healthy behaviours that he finds uncomfortable

Fellas, is it being an asshole for checks notes engaging with your partner?

If THAT is what counts as "being treated like a dog", woof woof!

Someone who always has a snack for me if I'm feeling down?? Sign me the fuck up!

Me, reading title: "WTF?!? That's messed up!"

Me, after reading the post: "I'm so fucking jealous."

Intent matters, and methods matter. But I think what the friend is missing is that the methods aren't bad; op is using methods developed from scientific analysis of abused animals with the intent to ethically care for them. Coming back to intent, she clearly wants to help this guy who her training is identifying as having some kind of background of abuse. The methods might be a little crude in the sense that they were developed for animals and not for people (who are animals, but animals with several distinct qualities from other animals, like the ability to communicate complex ideas), and there are different, more well-adapted methods for people, but they're only crude in comparison to those modern human-focused methods. They're still quite effective, and I would still consider them ethical for use on humans when paired with an altruistic intent, which she seems to be conveying. As long as she still views the guy as fully a person, a peer, then I see nothing wrong here.

People forget that humans are just animals (that can sometimes reason and talk). I still stand that dog training guides make better parenting books than many parenting books. At least up till around 3 years old.

The extension of this to adults is more challenging. Intent matters. This could be used abusively VERY easily. That is not happening here, however. With great power, comes great responsibility.

It's also worth noting that, if you use this, plan out how you will explain it later. A panicked, "oh shit, (s)he caught on!" will look bad, no matter what. A calm, thoughtful, positive explanation, delivered with confidence will likely get a lot more acceptance.

A: "Ok, what's with the M&Ms?"

B: "You've noticed then. :)"

A: "..."

B: "I noticed chocolate made you happy. I also noticed you were trying to overcome some negative habits. I decided to help. Whenever you put effort in, I rewarded it with a bit of chocolate. It makes you happy, and helps you lock a good habit in better."

A: "... You've been conditioning me?!?"

B: "Yes, don't you like the improvement?"

A "... yes, but I'm not sure I should..."

B: "M&M?"

We’re all animals, whether or not we want to believe that is simply a fact. And on top of that we are stressed the fuck out which pushes people, to vary degrees, back towards monkey brain. I consider myself pretty self-aware and therapy has proven that but oh man did my last job do a lot to leave me defensive and short with even the people I care about.

There’s that phrase “you can’t logic someone out of an argument they didn’t logic themselves into” that very well encapsulates the idea that trying to force some higher intelligence, some emotionless, robotic reasoning onto people does very little to actually help(though it should help more than it does and I’m disappointed in people running on pure, angry emotion all the same).

We need to stop acting like we aren’t the way that we are, it just hurts us. I’m not saying we need to excuse bad behaviour because, unlike wild animals, we have a great capacity to know better and adjust, but we do need to be more ok with the reality of ourselves.

The biggest thing for me is that she's eroding his emotional sovereignty. She's taking covert actions to modulate and decide his mood for him.

Sometimes, when I'm feeling down, I just want to feel that and get through on my own. But she's deciding which of his moods isn't appropriate and is changing his behaviour. If this were out in the open, he would be able to accept or refuse her attempts to cheer him up or divert him. But he (presumably) doesn't even know it's happening. That's not cool.

It sounds fine because it's worded like she's helping him but she's still taking away his autonomy. Just bring it out in the open: "hey, I've noticed, when you're sad or stressed, peanut M&Ms cheer you up. Would you like me to keep some on-hand?" With that, you've alerted them to behaviours about themself and got their consent to "help" them.

If that's the timbre of their interactions, I've got no qualms. But setting the context as "I train abused dogs" brings the mental image to one step above "hiding medicine in a dog treat."

This is probably a me thing, but if I were to catch on to someone doing this I might start wondering at some hidden intent behind everything they do

Honestly if we treated each other as well as we treated dogs we'd already be in paradise.

Some people take great offense when you don’t pretend humans have somehow evolved beyond the animal kingdom. Yes, we are still animals, and much of what works for them still works on us.

IDK as a guy this doesn't seem weird at all. If anything, it sounds like she likes him and is willing to put in work to make him feel more comfortable and make the relationship successful. She doesn't really use any dehumanizing language and the way she connects the dots between what she notices in dogs and her date seems very empathetic. If anything, the guy's lucky to have found someone with so much emotional intelligence and hopefully she's getting out what she's putting in

That's all fine, it's when she gets naked on the bed with a jar of peanut butter and a spatula that things start getting weird

I want this in my life so badly 😮‍💨

It's odd, sweet, I think. She's doing her best in the way she knows best

A man can only dream of having a girl who's so attentive and understanding. She'd make a good mom.

Most of us are so utterly self-consumed.

I lucked out, I have someone to train me with snacks too uwu

Gotta say, this smells a little like a top tier troll post. That out of the way, I also would like someone to carry around peanut M&Ms for me.

Friend is jealous of dogboy

The way she contextualises it is a bit odd, but the actual thing isn't that bad. It's just accommodating him, being aware of his particulars, and helping him over his issues. The gift of a single M&M is unusual, but giving your partner something nice isn't strange. People do similar things all the time in relationships, it's just not thought of as training.

Biggest issue is her framing it that way, because people might either get the wrong idea, or give the wrong idea. Saying she's training him like a dog gives the idea of a lead, like with an actual dog.

Woof

The lady has training with animals and is applying what she learnt to make a guy at ease with her... I'd say the friend is the asshole here. You do the best you can with what you got.

My main issue with this is that the way we train dogs is that we train them to be dependant on us. So yeah, she's training him to come out of his shell, maybe, but if it works the same way a dog does he'll only be loyal and listen to her. Especially because anyone else he meets won't treat him like a dog and will expect him to behave like a person without the expectation of rewards which would probably make him more adverse to others

Of course, he's a human being too so it won't go down exactly like that. I'm just saying that from the very first premise the way we train dogs is by training them to be codependant

No sex or kinkiness needed. Just take me home, animals are treated better than humans ;_;

As Iggy Pop said, now I wanna be your dog.

She seems to have only the best intentions, but I can't help but feel a little creeped out. She's using a psychological trick to leverage this man's trauma in order to get him to behave in a certain way, and she's doing it without his knowledge or consent. I think that's dishonest at the very least, and I don't think building the foundation of your relationship on calculated manipulation is going to lead to a good outcome.

I'd even go as far as saying her emotional intelligence creates a power imbalance in the relationship, which she is deliberately exploiting.

Here Lemmy, have a peanut butter M&M

This is literally how I want to be treated.

Someone wouldn't like watching House M.D. if this is making them feel immoral.

House Trains His Protégé | House M.D..

(if you don't want to see the whole thing here's s timestamp for the more relevant portion)

That's just basic psychology more or less. These are just the thoughts you shouldn't say ouloud perhaps. You can often compare things because there's similarities, but the nature of the things being compared may make it offensive.

It's more like "training dogs has given me an understanding of basic psychology which came really handy in my relationships" than "I'm training my bf like a dog".

When logic doesn't work, appeal to the lizard brain ... often. We're kinda not that complex.

I totally respect this, but worry egoes (his) will get in the way during a lull in the snacks.

Insert "it should've been me" meme here.

Isn’t this just reinforcement, like reinforcement vs punishment from behavioral psychology? It works.

This is just poorly thought out. You offer dessert and to pay, then classify it as food motivation. I mean it could be that he's happy you're paying, or happy you want to be out longer. If anything, he just ate, so food motivation would be at its lowest.

You're taking an animal that isn't as complex as humans or even has a concept of society, and trying to apply that to a person in a relationship. I think the thought is there, but the conclusions are a bit flawed.

The NYT had an article from 2006 which described a very similar "training". It goes into greater detail. Here is an archived version without paywall: https://archive.ph/n4GPa

I don't see a problem here.

I mean this simply gets into the ethics of manipulation. Ultimately, it comes down to choosing happiness.

62yo male here thinks she's a damn genius... maybe she should like, make some of those tiktoks or something...

Yeah I think that's pretty gross. This person stated that the person they are dating is emotionally unavailable and has potentially been abused as a child. But because they find them pretty, they decided to manipulate a person like they manipulate animals for selfish purposes. (Both are bad!) Their partner probably needs therapy not to be emotionally manipulated by their partner.

Hey if it works out works. She is an asshole for not using proper grammar and punctuation though.

Many people apparently loving this, I see it as a red flag. She's manipulative and I'd second guess every action she'd take from the day I noticed it

Edit: funny that people are down voting this, I guess they want to be manipulated by their partners.

Take it from someone who divorced a manipulative partner, it's not cool them all the time lying pushing and manipulating you to be the way they want you to be.