Why Does The 'family' Dog Always Attack/blame Me?
I live in a shared house; myself (24) and two friends, Ste (25) and Laura (26). We have been living together for a few years and Ste decided to get a dog, a Boxer puppy which he strangely called.... Ralph? (he thought it would be hilarious to call him Ralph so when you shout his name, you sound like you're actually barking, try it, it really does) Anyway, at a few months old, I was the main person at home doing the general puppy training, walks, feeding etc, and it was said that because of the time I spent with him, he would naturally see me as his owner/dad - how wrong was that thought process.
After about a year old, he had become quite the developed and well trained dog - having friends who owner Boxer dogs they are apparently inherently a tad hyperactive, boisterous, and as one friend said....proper thick! Well to me Ralph was quite intelligent, obedient and very sociable with other dogs (the only time he ever went OTT, was with the smaller 'yappy' dogs that he would dominate by doing an infamous two-paw boxer punch and literally lie on them until submission). Whatever, he can't be perfect, in general I thought I'd done a very good job in this early years upbringing.
So at just over a year, we'd all been out and came home highly intoxicated, me and Ste (the official owner but almost absent father) had a trivial discussion about nothing, voices were raised and it turned into a stupid little play fight. Ralph charged into the room, sat beside Ste and started barking at me, jumped at me on the sofa and started frantically nibbling my hand (it didn't hurt, but with little growls it seemed like a warning) I was like woaaah, chill out, if anything you should be protecting me, I'm at the disadvantage being quite slim and not built like a brick sh*t house like Ste. But no, he sided with Ste.
This would continue to be the case for months, not just at random play fighting, but at times when I'd tell a story and become quite animated, Ralph would get protective of Ste and start pulling at my socks, nibbling my fingers or jumping up at me with a few growls thrown in for good measure. You would think at this stage I'd been some dog-hating tormenter that has been continuously cruel to him during his puppy days, but this just isn't the case - I don't understand his allegiance to Ste or why he would 'attack' me over some loud story-telling.
What's more baffling, is when we have friends over, he will always side with them. He will come to me, start barking, doing his usual jumping, nibbling/biting ritual even if we are just sitting there watching TV. However, the most confusing thing is if Ste, Laura or any of our friends are again just messing about whether it be play fighting, talking loudly, singing, dancing - Ralph will come to me and bark as if its my fault. We put it to the test to see who he would protect between Ste and Laura if they were fighting, so they would gently slap each other to make a sound, he would bark frantically at me as if it was my fault. Again, my friend John and Ste would pretend to be fighting, Ralph would be jumping at me barking with his hackles raised, like seriously, you would think I'd tortured this dog from birth, but I've never as much as tapped him on the nose for misbehaving.
Question is, why? Why does he act like this? Does he see me as the weakest housemate? Can he sense my lack authority or being the youngest amongst my friends? Does he see Ste and Laura as mother and father and me as his 'plaything'? Or does he just sense the evil within that I'm the devil encased in human flesh? (dogs have a good nose for these things they all tell me).