Why is it called "Straw Dogs"?

According to Wiki, a variant of "straw man" = "a common form of argument and is an informal fallacy based on giving the impression of refuting an opponent's argument, while actually refuting an argument that was not advanced by that opponent; creates the illusion of having completely refuted or defeated an opponent's proposition by covertly replacing it with a different proposition, and then refuting that false argument instead of the original proposition.

At first I thought David & Amy were the "straw dogs," repenting some ivory-tower elitism that the villagers despised, then used Niles as a replacement argument for violence against David & Amy. Now wonder if the villagers were "straw dogs" and the argument they represented was perhaps "Revenge against Niles is warranted." Then David replaced that argument with his own made-up proposition "My house is a refuge for Niles." This makes sense because it comes out of nowhere at the climax of the movie. That is, when Amy insists he give up Niles, he seems taken aback ("You really don't care, do you?"). But throughout the movie and during the denouement, he didn't care about the villagers any more than she did.

Curious about other explanations.