Dominance in dogs, what we don't know

A lot of people think dogs are all about dominance, who is the leader of the pack. This idea fits in pretty nicely with the (imho) hooey about survival of the fittest and the exploitation of the many by the few in human populations.

But if you really watch the dogs in your local dog park, I think you'll find the story much more complicated. Big dogs are not necessariy dominant, nor even the strongest dogs. But more importantly, the relationship between dogs is not really about dominance at all. I don't know what it's about. It mystifies me why my dog will almost instantly play with a certain dog and run, tail between legs, from another, growl at one puppy and frolic with another.

I do think it has something to do with smell, dogs size each other up damn quickly with a sniff, usually at both ends. People could do as well.

I had some list-serv interaction with someone about this and they totally cleaved to the dogs and dominance orthodoxy, as if they tell us more about us than we know... ha ha, I said, other way around... we try to understand dogs by imposing clicheed ideas about human interaction and come not even close.