Be the Bull of the Herd: A Better Warrior Metaphor

The failure of the sheepdog model—and what evolution really says about protectors

In his highly influential book On Killing, Lt. Col. Dave Grossman introduced the now-famous metaphor of the “sheepdog.” In this framework, humanity is divided into three distinct types:

• Sheep, who are kind and harmless

• Wolves, who prey on the weak

• Sheepdogs, who protect the sheep from the wolves

It’s a metaphor designed to honor protectors, soldiers, law enforcement, and others who are willing to use violence to guard the innocent. The sheepdog sees violence as a tool, not a desire. He doesn’t crave harm but stands ready to deliver it when necessary.

The problem is: the metaphor is wrong, biologically, psychologically, and morally. And its most loyal adherents are often the ones it hurts the most.

Grossman’s Claim: 3% of Men Are “Hardwired Killers”

Grossman’s sheepdog analogy builds on his claim that about 3% of the population consists of sociopaths, people born without empathy, remorse, or guilt. According to him, both the “wolves” and the “sheepdogs” come from this same genetic slice. What separates them, he says, is that sheepdogs choose to direct their violent potential toward defense, not predation, because they possess empathy.

This is a flawed foundation.

• First, sociopathy isn’t a source of courage, competence, or protector behavior. It is a deficiency of social bonding, not a refined form of moral restraint.

• Second, empathy isn’t binary. It’s a multi-dimensional, context-sensitive system regulated by evolved neurobiology, not a switch between wolf and sheepdog.

• Third—and most importantly, this framing detaches protectors from their own communities.

In Grossman’s model, the sheepdog doesn’t belong to the flock. He serves the shepherd. He patrols from the outside. He watches. And without a master, the sheepdog, like the wolf, may turn on the flock.

And that’s where the metaphor fails completely.

In Nature, Detached Protectors Become Predators

Dogs left unsupervised around livestock often don’t protect, they chase, bite, and if left alone long enough eventual kill. Their instincts don’t default to restraint; they default to chaos unless carefully trained and controlled.

This is not just canine behavior. It’s a human risk too.

When soldiers or law enforcement officers are trained to view themselves as fundamentally separate from civilians, it creates a cultural wedge:

• “We are strong, they are weak.”

• “We are needed only in crisis.”

• “They don’t understand us, and never will.”

This leads to isolation.
Isolation leads to distrust.
And distrust, over time, breeds contempt, not protection.

For law enforcement officers, this spiral is especially dangerous. When your daily reality involves dealing with the worst moments in society—violence, addiction, neglect, deception—it becomes easy to lose sight of the good in the people you serve. That’s not weakness; it’s a natural consequence of constant exposure to human failure.

This is not how humans evolved to operate. And it’s not how warriors are supposed to live.

Evolution Tells a Different Story

In every hunter-gatherer society ever recorded, there is no “sheepdog class.” There are no detached warrior-castes separate from the rest of the band. In fact, one of the defining features of early human life was egalitarian coalition-based defense.

Anthropologist Richard Lee, in his work with the !Kung San of southern Africa, observed that adult males were expected to contribute to both food provision and collective defense (Lee, 1979). There was no allowance for able-bodied men who did neither.

Among the Yanomamö of South America, as described by Napoleon Chagnon (1983), male prestige was directly tied to participation in group raids and defense of the village. Even high-status men were expected to fight.

This same pattern holds across time:

• In pre-agricultural Europe, burial sites like the one at Talheim, Germany, show evidence of group-based combat and protection.

• Even chimpanzees, our closest relatives, form coalitionary patrols to defend territory, and raid into enemy territory, behavior governed not by sociopathy, but by deep kin and alliance bonding (Wrangham, 1999).

What does this tell us?

That protectors aren’t outliers. They’re not rare.
They are the default for any functioning male in an ancestral tribe.

You are not the descendant of sheepdogs or wolves.
You are the descendant of warriors.

The Warrior’s Role Is to Belong, Not Patrol

The sheepdog model turns the warrior into a specialist, activated only in crisis, never fully integrated into the tribe.

But evolution shaped something different: the bull of the herd.

The bull doesn’t circle the perimeter waiting for violence. He lives inside the group. The herd is his family, his responsibility, and his reason for existing. He protects not from detachment, but from love.

This is what the best warriors know, intuitively, if not intellectually.

• The squad leader who will risk his life for his men

• The officer who knows his badge means service, not authority

• The veteran who still feels the pull to protect something, even after his war is over

This isn’t sheepdog behavior. It’s bull of the herd behavior—rooted in kinship, identity, and enduring responsibility.

The Mission Doesn’t End When the War Does

The greatest psychological danger to warriors is not trauma. It’s the loss of purpose.

Grossman’s metaphor intensifies that loss by making protectors into temporary actors, needed only in emergencies, then sidelined. But the bull of the herd is never sidelined. He protects in war. He mentors in peace. He leads until he can no longer stand.

And even then, he stays among the herd.

This is how warriors find meaning after the battle.
Not by separating from the people.
But by re-integrating as their defenders.

For Law Enforcement and Veterans Alike

To those who wear the uniform:

You are not separate from your community.
You’re not above it.
You are of it.
The people you protect are not sheep.
They are your tribe.

If we teach warriors to view civilians as helpless, they will start to view them with contempt. But if we teach them that strength is for service, and that protection is an act of love, they will return from war with something to live for.

This is how we fight isolation.
This is how we build trust.
And this is how we bring our warriors home.

Be the Bull of the Herd

This isn’t about metaphors. It’s about survival.

The “bull of the herd” gives the modern warrior something the sheepdog never could: a place to belong, forever.

You become and remain strong because your people need you.
You learn to fight and keep your edge because they matter.
And when the fighting is done, you stay, not to wait for the next war, but to pass on what you’ve learned to the next generation or warriors.

Because the herd still needs you.
Because the young men are watching.
Because the mission never ends.

References

Chagnon, N. A. (1983). Yanomamö: The Fierce People (3rd ed.). Holt, Rinehart, and Winston.

Lee, R. B. (1979). The !Kung San: Men, Women and Work in a Foraging Society. Cambridge University Press.

Wrangham, R. (1999). Evolution of coalitionary killing. Yearbook of Physical Anthropology, 42(S29), 1–30.

Grossman, D. (1995). On Killing: The Psychological Cost of Learning to Kill in War and Society. Back Bay Books.