Talk:police dog

RFV discussion: April 2018

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police dog

Sense 2: German shepherd. Some police dogs (not all) are German shepherds, but is the term used for German shepherds that have never worked for the police? Equinox ◑ 18:13, 14 April 2018 (UTC)

Possibly. There's this exchange from a book by James Thurber, but it isn't 100% clear that the dog has never worked for the police. —Mahāgaja (formerly Angr) · talk 19:08, 14 April 2018 (UTC)

This 1930 article states German shepherd is "commonly known as a police dog", as well as this one. I don't know how to search for appropriate uses, though. Einstein2 (talk) 19:22, 14 April 2018 (UTC)

Given the dates of those quotes as well as the Thurber story, it may be {{lb|en|dated}} by now. It's interesting that in the first link Einstein2 gave it says that German shepherds have been called police dogs "since the war" (i.e. World War I), so it may have been a "freedom fries"/"liberty cabbage" phenomenon where words associated with an enemy become taboo. —Mahāgaja (formerly Angr) · talk 19:58, 14 April 2018 (UTC)

This is cited. In addition, I recall the use of "police dog" to mean German Shepherd when I was a young child, although I haven't heard it used that way since the 1960s. Kiwima (talk) 23:55, 14 April 2018 (UTC)

RFV-passed Kiwima (talk) 19:31, 22 April 2018 (UTC)