The art of animal breeding has rapidly advanced into an exacting science including such advanced tools as Best Linear Unbiased Prediction (BLUP) and REML estimation of variance components. Unfortunately in most selection programs impacts of animal behavior are not considered, as a result those breeding programs ignore traits that may negatively impact animal welfare. The threats of ignoring animal welfare in breeding programs are three fold: first, if higher producing animals tend to be more competitive, then the effect of selection is to increase competition, which worsens animal’s welfare; second, increased competition has the effect of lowering productivity of other animals that are in direct contention, thus resulting in reduced (or negative) gains for productivity; third, genotype-genotype interactions (competition) invalidates the traditional BLUP animal model and negates many advantages of this technology and could in fact make it a liability. These threats can be addressed through alternative breeding programs.