Can't visit friend as her dog is racist

I think racist is the wrong word but yes dogs most definitely can and do react aggressively toward people of a race they aren't used to seeing. Growing up our placid golden retriever used to properly go for black delivery men. She was completely fine with white ones. I think they were the only black people she had ever met. Mum was properly mortified but we had no idea how to fix it.

Apologies, I haven’t RTFT, but I just wanted to back you up OP with artistic references.

Celebrated French novelist Romain Gary, who was also a diplomat posted in the US, wrote a novel called Chien Blanc (White dog) about an otherwise placid dog that attacks black people in LA in the 60s.

Larry David’s sitcom Curb your Enthusiasm also has an episode about a dog that only attacks black people. Rather inconvenient when he welcomes a black family to his house after hurricane Katrina.

I’ve also come across dogs (including black dogs) who are scared/aggressive only towards black dogs. So it seems “racism” transcends species, and even the colour of the dog itself.

Good luck with the dog training, it sounds like you are doing the right thing helping your friend and her dog.

Right? Lots of comments are just thinly veiled racism but using their dogs as an excuse. Ffs.

It’s hilarious. I love it.

I sometimes think it must be shit being black on Mumsnet. So much bollocks to tolerate.

My old dog hated fishermen. 🤷‍♀️

Our dog is black and we recently encountered another dog whose owner apologised when her dog went mental on meeting ours. She genuinely said that her dog hates black dogs. Not sure if this helps the OP, but dog racism is a thing.

My ex's rescue dog was really scared of white youths, she had been abused and we assumed that it had been done by young white males. She wouldn't bark, she would just cringe and try to make herself look small if she encountered any. It was upsetting to think of what she must have been through. She did get a lot more confident when she felt safe and loved and stopped the cringing.

This thread would be 100% perfect for some sort of competition in which you'd need to submit one thread that perfectly encapsulates the forum's essence, its core essence. This thread alone would win hands down.

I have 3 son/dgtrs in law, one is black, one is East Asian, one is white. Our dog adores the white guy and always eyes the 2 BAME relatives with suspicion. Even though he has known them far longer he still barks when they arrive and won't even take treats off them. It's embarrassing.
He also hates my friends son who is in a wheelchair.

Our old Cavapoo was racist, not his fault, he just didn’t come across very many (if any) black people as a puppy as we lived in an area where the majority of people were white. I remember we sold something on Facebook marketplace and the dog went absolutely mental at the black guy who turned up, I had to make out that he was like that with everyone. He would even bark at black people on the TV.
He also barked at people wearing hats, people with beards, people carrying young children, cats, horses, sheep, anybody walking past the house, a leaf blowing in the garden, tape measures….

I wouldn’t really call it racism though, we shouldn’t attach human thoughts and behaviour to dogs, it’s simply just a case of the dog being afraid of something they’re not familiar with.
Sounds like your friend’s dog probably needs gentle exposure to more people of different races.

ah this is lovely!
my sister had a rescue who had clearly been abused by a man in the past - he was initially terrified of all men, especially tall ones. Luckily got better with time and repeated exposure to normal (non abusive arsehole) men.

Some of the replies on here have been beyond ridiculous. Racist dogs? Really? Racist humans, they exist, sadly. Let’s not impose our prejudices onto innocent animals though, for goodness sake.

These reactions are possibly based on smell. Different cultures eat different food, and dogs 'see' by smell (though their colour recognition is better than had been thought last century) and so the dog is not 'racist' (has no such concept) but upset by what he smells if these smells are unfamiliar. The dog perceives a threat. Possibly take to cooking a wider range of interesting food?

Is the dog from a shelter? Has she had him as a puppy? Are you loud and aggressive? I’ve Someone else made this strange assumption that a dog we knew didn’t like a certain race due to build and height. I find this weird aren’t dogs meant to be colour blind.

Ha ha love Dalmatian's. My uncle had one and he hated men on bicycles. He used to hide behind the front garden wall and jump up and bark when they passed by. I swear he used to grin if one wobbled or fell off.

Unbelievable!!

I once saw a movie on television. A man adopted a (big) dog that then appeared to hate and attack black people. Really went mental.

The conversation went something like this :
man : I don't know why he (the dog) does that
friend : he's a white dog
man : I can see that myself
friend : no, I mean he's been trained to attack non-whites
In America of course. Think KKK.
Ages ago I saw that movie but it stuck with me.

Yup had that said to me before: I give those properties a wide berth.

My dog used to hate men wearing hats and went crazy if she saw someone.

Walk away from the "friend".

Dogs can be trained to be racist. It certainly happened a lot in Africa - South Africa, Kenya, Zimbabwe - 30 and 40 years ago.

Because dogs are able to see a difference in skin colour. They naturally accept all humans the way we accept all dogs. Most people don't react differently to a black or white labrador, you either love labradors or you don't.

Either your friend is as thick as a mushroom, and her dog has taken exception to a human "who happens to be black" - and so many reasons for that, usually the human's fault.

Or the dog has been trained.

But what concern's me most is your thick-as-a-mushroom friend has naturally concluded the dog must be racist.

You have very stupid, ignorant friends.

How many GCSE's does she have?

Oh god this. I was going to say, take some treats with you and you'll be fine! Ffs don't teach the dog that you ARE someone to be scared of!

My friend's dog is a rescue and terrified of men with beards. Goes absolutely mental. The rescue centre said they think he was abused by someone with a beard hence the fear. They've been trying to work with him on it but it's very challenging.
One of my friends adopted an adult dog from a family who were wanting to rehome her (the man wanted to rehome her - wife and kids devastated, apparently, though).
Beautiful border collie bitch, very gentle girl, lovely with most people, especially women. Fine with my friend's husband, who was a big bear of a man.
But she was very timid and scared of my husband, which upset him a bit, he loved dogs, we had two collies of our own.
But my friend told us that the man of the family they'd rescued her from was very similar in build and appearance to my husband. Poor girl had obviously been abused to some degree by this guy, you could tell by how she reacted, she'd cower and hide behind me or my friend.

It took a lot of patience and time for her to come round. Totally understandable, but she did eventually. Thank goodness.
And she lived until she was twenty one, loved to bits and spoiled rotten. As she deserved after the start she'd had.

🤣🤣🤣👍🏻

My (rescue) cats are terrified of men from the Indian subcontinent (possibly others, but as indoor cats in a place where most maintenance people are from there, that’s what shows up. It is sometimes helpful as the terror has been reciprocated but mostly it is just mortifying.

It’s not on sight, though, so not skin colour - maybe scent? Voices? Either way they flee and hide.