Fake service dogs are a menace even to other dogs that AREN'T service dogs. I was at an event last year with my dog; the event was outside in a public park so there was no reason NOT to have my dog with me, but I was also being very careful to stay on the outskirts of the event with him because he was quite young (he's 14 months as of writing this) and just learning to handle himself in a crowd. We would have been okay except for somebody who chose to be nearby (we were there first and they could have chosen another spot) with their "service" dog. I'm not saying this dog absolutely didn't provide SOME service to its owner (who was in a wheelchair), but it was very clearly not a trained service dog as it was jumping around and even lunged at my dog, who was actually behaving himself and not paying this other dog any attention whatsoever until the "service" dog (who was older, bigger, and as I say, clearly untrained) started jumping and lunging at him.

I'm actually physically disabled myself but I had to finally PICK MY DOG UP (and he's not light) so this fake service dog would cut it out. I couldn't believe that this person was getting away with this and I was even getting dirty looks from their friends when my dog was not the problem.

I'd LOVE to be able to take my dog a lot more places than I can, but I'm not going to stoop to putting a jacket on him and claiming he's a service dog when he clearly is not trained as one. It hurts everybody and especially hurts people like the writer who aren't trying to game the system.