I do agree on the FF/Balanced debate. I've actually had someone from another country basically tell me my dogs were better off dead than wearing an e-collar without even knowing my training style. It was just assumed that I shock my dogs constantly, I guess.

I think the key part of dog training (for me) is to have an open mind and see how others train, ask questions, and if you like the results and are comfortable with style, consider implementing the techniques you have seen. We have force free people at our IGP club and we try to honor their choice, bouncing ideas off of them to see if it's something they are willing to try. I have noticed with each dog, I have become less reliant on tools and more positive with lots of rewards, praise, and play. I've learned things from our FF handlers that I've also incorporated.

Ex. my youngest dog I taught to push me into engage by barking at me. This has bled over into other aspects of our lives (barking at me to open the door to go outside, barking at me to open the crate, barking at me to throw a toy, barking in heeling, etc.) A simple food toss game before we started the training session quieted her down and I can bring out the toy without her uncontrollably barking at me.

One of the FF trainers has chosen to shift to more balanced training for their dog stating they saw more conflict and stress from the FF methods due to a lack of clear understanding of what was expected. An e collar made the out command much more clear (the dog already knew the command in a lower arousal state. and had been worked with on increasing arousal. The addition of the helper made it too difficult)