That's a fairly easy enough to understand point of view. And, a wise way of looking at things, to say the least. THAT awareness is something that *may* be there in most attempts, but it seems to show itself a lot less than you might think it should.
WITHOUT ignoring the first part of your response, I would like to say in response to the last sentence you wrote, you should ABSOLUTELY NOT be meeting anyone from the internet going straight into the k9 related anything. ALWAYS ALWAYS ALWAYS meet anyone, somewhere VERY PUBLIC and nuetral, person to person before even THINKING about involving an animal. Meet for a chat and discus everyday topics, get a feel for that person, and their personality before you take a single step toward any other goal.
Man OR woman, it DOES NOT MATTER. Don't under-estimate your senses. When you meet a person, it's not only the things they say, it's the things they do, the way they hold themselves, the facial expressions, the tone of voice, all kinds of things that tell you much about who this person is.
Often, when you meet any other person, you form almost instant ideas of whether you like or don't like this person, for any kind of reason you can imagine, even things you don't really understand. Regardless of who the person is in any form of text or voice chat, who they are in a face to face meeting is your number one defensive measure. A person can bullshit you in DMs pretty easy, it's FAR more difficult to do so in person. You don't always have to listen to your gut reaction, but you should NEVER ignore it.
I'll go one step further here.....ANYONE who attempts to sidestep having an initial meet is someone you should not just walk away from, you should RUN.
