SOME PITBULL OWNERS ARE IDIOTS!
The cover story in the London Free Press has a photo by Sue Reeve of Buster who tore open his owner's throat killing him in front of his horrified wife and a taxi driver. The photo makes this cute dog look so adorable and out of context it could have gone with a happy story. But it was a terribly sad story. Hopefully this was a good lesson for would-be pit bull owners not to adopt one. There are a few pit bull owners I know who I fear for because they have kids and it's only a matter of time till disaster strikes. I'm sorry but if you have kids and a pit bull you are an idiot and I hope the dog attacks you instead of your kids....ok, (a really painful bite that isn't life threatening so you can learn the painful lesson that you are a friggin idiot for owning one!)
This is why I aint a dog lover! I'm sorry but I believe pit bulls should be humanely dealt with and outlawed immediately. The common theme in these stories is that the victim didn't see it coming. There are too many of these stories and most of them involve kids. I was attacked by a German Sheppard when I was 5 and my jaw still doesn't close properly! I hate walking in my neighbourhood because there are a lot of dogs that lunge from their leashes and bark like crazy. If one of these dogs got loose they could really hurt someone.
New Note: Please be sure to read the comment by Andrew. I have to revise this story to Add Pomeranian, Germans Sheppards, and Hamsters to the list. If you have babies don't get a dog until your kid is at least 3 so they have a better chance of surviving an attack. I don't care what breed of dog. I've seen enough scars and attacks from dogs on innocent kids to form my opinion. However you obviously own a pit bull and taken my blog entry very personally. For that I apologize. I have seen my Pomeranian snap and attack with surprising speed and brutality it's those moments when I'm glad she's not a Pit Bull, German Sheppard or Doberman.
By the way I have stopped taking Aspirin as of NOW!
Andrew has an excellent Blog but almost everything I've read on it so far proves my point! The title of this entry has to do with the story in the free press. Why do these dogs hit the newspapers? Because they attack if you just look at them wrong. It is worth reading but did not convince me to change my mind. Yet. I'm attaching the link because he deserves to be heard.
Have a read http://andrew-rozsa.blogspot.com/
This is why I aint a dog lover! I'm sorry but I believe pit bulls should be humanely dealt with and outlawed immediately. The common theme in these stories is that the victim didn't see it coming. There are too many of these stories and most of them involve kids. I was attacked by a German Sheppard when I was 5 and my jaw still doesn't close properly! I hate walking in my neighbourhood because there are a lot of dogs that lunge from their leashes and bark like crazy. If one of these dogs got loose they could really hurt someone.
New Note: Please be sure to read the comment by Andrew. I have to revise this story to Add Pomeranian, Germans Sheppards, and Hamsters to the list. If you have babies don't get a dog until your kid is at least 3 so they have a better chance of surviving an attack. I don't care what breed of dog. I've seen enough scars and attacks from dogs on innocent kids to form my opinion. However you obviously own a pit bull and taken my blog entry very personally. For that I apologize. I have seen my Pomeranian snap and attack with surprising speed and brutality it's those moments when I'm glad she's not a Pit Bull, German Sheppard or Doberman.
By the way I have stopped taking Aspirin as of NOW!
Andrew has an excellent Blog but almost everything I've read on it so far proves my point! The title of this entry has to do with the story in the free press. Why do these dogs hit the newspapers? Because they attack if you just look at them wrong. It is worth reading but did not convince me to change my mind. Yet. I'm attaching the link because he deserves to be heard.
Have a read http://andrew-rozsa.blogspot.com/
posted by IngyMedia at 7:58 AM
34 Comments:
Will you say that when a pit bull bites it's bad? How about a Pomeranian killing a baby? http://archives.cnn.com/2000/US/10/09/pomeranian.kills.ap/
"Labrador kills elderly woman." http://furbabyplace.proboards46.com/index.cgi?board=chat10&action=display&thread=1147437950
Over the 37-year period from 1965-2001, pit bulls have been blamed for an average of 2.48 human fatalities per year.
- You are than 200 times more likely to die from taking aspirin than from a pit bull attack.
- 25 times more children a killed by faulty cribs the total number of children and adults killed by pit bulls.
- You are more than 60 times more likely to be killed by a palm tree than a pit bull.
- You are 151 times more likely to be killed by your bathtub than you are by a pit bull.
- A child is more than 800 times more likely to be killed by their adult caretaker than by a pit bull.
- Medication errors cause 7000 Deaths per year.. so you’re 3000 times more likely to be killed by your medication than an APBT
- An average of 195,000 people in the USA died due to potentially preventable, in-hospital medical errors... 87000 times higher than fatalities by APBTs
- National Weather Service reports that over the last 30 years the U.S. has averaged 62 reported lightning fatalities per year.. 30 times more than those by APBTs
- Slip and falls account for over 20,000 fatalities per year in North America
- Alcohol abuse kills some 75,000 Americans each year
Since, it is estimated that perhaps as many as 1.25 million pit bulls are killed per year, it is at least a 500,000 more likely that a pit bull will be killed by a human than the other way around. For every pit bull who kills, there are hundreds of thousands that DON'T.
So let's ban aspirin, in fact all medications, hospitals doctors, coconut trees, parents, bathtubs, the weather, rolling pins, mountains, stairs, skates, tigers (wild tigers kill on average 40-60 people per year), zoos, domestic cats (care to guess how many babies are still-born because their mother changed the cat litter?), snow, hills, sinkholes pocket knives, cocktails, loud music, Home Depot (2200 people are injured in Home Depot stores per year), fish....
In fact, I decided that the best way for me to make sure that nothing bad ever happens to you is to suggest that you kill yourself right now.
Of course, you are not going to do that, because that would be asking you to take a personal responsibility of what you do, where, when, and how. You prefer to have your welfare legislated, don't you? You probably would sue me if you broke into my house and tripped over a child's toy and sprained your ankle. Would probably also sue the manufacturer for making toys on wheels.
But I tell you, you uneducated ditz, what I WILL do you for you. If my pure-bred American Pit Bull Terrier ever gets out and hurts any of you family members, I will turn myself in to the police immediately and won't even attempt to defend myself against a charge of attempted murder.
How is THAT? Will that do it for you? Or, would you still prefer to kill millions of animals each year so that you and yours are "protected?"
But I am willing to go further... if you can identify the APBT in fewer than 10 tries, from the pictures of the following 25 dogs, I will surrender my dog right this second:
http://www.pitbullsontheweb.com/petbull/findpit.html
The point is that when hysterical media report pit bull attacks we have no way of knowing what kind of dog did the attacking in the first place.
So who the hell are you going ban, ignoramus?
Now that I’ve cooled off, I can write rationally. So sorry about the ad hominem attacks. They have no place in civil discourse. I retract every invective I hurled your way. Hereby, I formally apologize.
Let me depersonalize the issue…
Had you used the title “Some Pit Bull Owners Are Idiots” your title would have accurate. If you had said, “all loose and uncontrolled pit bulls should be euthanized” would have been also acceptable, even if not desirable. If you had said that pit bull owners whose dogs bite or hurt a person should be punished and eventually, if they don’t change their ways, be considered criminals and put in prison, that would have also been rational.
The media “reports” pit bull attacks because it makes news and sells advertisement. It’s has nothing to do with a pit bull attacking people. Genetically, pit bulls are NOT any more human-aggressive than ANY other breed of dog. Just the opposite. In the heydays of pit bull fighting in England, fighting dogs that bit any human, including their owners, were immediately killed. Pit Bulls are one of the most stable people-friendly dogs in existence. The National Canine Temperament Testing Association tested 122 breeds, and Pit Bulls placed the 4th highest with a 95% passing rate! Petey, the dog in The Little Rascals TV series was a pit bull. Nipper, RCA Victor’s “His Master’s Voice” trademark was a bull terrier mix.
“Falsehood flies and the truth comes limping after, so that when men come to be undeceived, it is too late: the jest is over, and the tale has had its effect.” - Jonathan Swift
The social hysteria about Pit bulls is upon us because we have abandoned common sense and the ability to reason and have been duped by inaccurate reporting from a media that thrives on sensationalism and by politicians who traffic in rumors, myths and cherry-picked statistics in their efforts to pass legislation that demonizes dogs while exonerating criminal and abusive owners.
The CDC states clearly that “There is currently no accurate way to identify the number of dogs of a particular breed, and consequently no measure to determine which breeds are more likely to bite or kill.” http://www.cdc.gov/ncipc/duip/biteprevention.htm
My point is that the responsibility rests with the owner/handler. I despise Michael Vick and his cohorts, but I will take exception to being mentioned on the same planet with them. I, and hundreds of thousands of responsible owners, have spent thousands of dollars in training classes, building appropriately secure environments, and innumerable hours of daily training and play time in order to have one of the sweetest dogs (see the American Temperament Testing Society ratings in my blog) on Earth as our companions. Our dogs have awards for good behavior. Our dogs used to be called “nanny dogs” because they protected babies and children. Our dogs have SAVED hundreds of times more lives than they have taken. Helen Keller’s guide dog was a pit bull. http://www.pitbullsontheweb.com/petbull/pictures/helkel2.jpg
The most decorated dog in the history of United States was Stubby, a pit bull http://www.ct.gov/mil/cwp/view.asp?a=1351&q=257958
If you kill all the pit bulls (which is the most popular breed of dog in America today – hence the numbers) or you pass Breed Specific Legislation, all you do is shift the breed. The true idiots, the criminals, will breed mastiffs & Cane Corsos or Dogo Argentinos or Presa Canarios or any other type of really killer dogs and come up with designer macho dogs with spikes on their collar. At some point Italy had put a ban or restrictions on 92 breeds of dogs. Number of dog bites and fatalities INCREASED. Did you know, that when a fatality from a dog bite occurs, and the breed of the dog is exotic or at least new, certain people show up at the dog pound next day and ask if they can have the “dog that kills?”
We cannot legislate dog behavior, just as we cannot legislate decency and common sense.
What we CAN do, is punish the miscreant, the ugly-hearted, the conscienceless.
I anyone is interested in the truth, instead of reflexive hatred, I suggest a perusal of “The Pit Bull Placebo: The Media, Myths and Politics of Canine Aggression” by Karen Delise, of The National Canine Research Council http://tinyurl.com/2jmkzz
"There is nothing to fear except the persistent refusal to find out the truth, the persistent refusal to analyze the causes of happenings." --Dorothy Thompson, (1894 - 1961).
However, I will acknowledge your apprehension regarding dogs’ potential for harm, so my contribution, today, to your welfare is to guide you to an objective and very informative resource, a publication by the American Veterinary Medical Association (AVMA) Task Force on Canine Aggression and Human-Canine Interactions: A community approach to dog bite prevention.
http://www.avma.org/public_health/dogbite/dogbite.pdf
This is based on the pit bull story. i know everyone has the right to their own opinion and i don't think that Pit bulls should be killed and taken care of. i own three pit bulls and i want to open a pit bull rescue kennel. its all on how they are raised if they don't get enough love and attention. then yeah i could see something like that happening. my mother and mother in law didn't like pit bulls until they seen mine and they love my pit bulls they are the sweetest dogs in the world. i have been bitten by more small dogs then big dogs. my pits have been around more babies then i can count on my fingers and my toes and they have never harmed a baby in their life time. so dont judge a book by its cover just because some are like that dont mean all are.
Yet ANOTHER child death today from a Pitbull. There are a lot more than 3 a year. That is BS. I bet many, many more don't make the news that are mauls and not deaths.
Getting bit by a small dog is one thing, but being mailed to death by a pit bull is a while other matter. Any dog that has the strength to overcome it's owner should not be a family dog.
If that's the case, let's start having lions and tigers and bears as pets as well.
OK, Dear Anonymous...although the lady who got ripped her face off by a chimp will tell you that people do have all sorts of pets. But, more to the point, how do you know that the story you read was indeed referring to a Pit Bull. I bet you 1,000 dollars that you cannot tell which is the Pit Bull on this page: http://www.pitbullsontheweb.com/petbull/findpit.html
Neither do the people who identify attacking dogs as Pit Bulls.
Quite simply, normal, well-cared-for, trained, neutered or spayed Pit Bulls Do NOT ATTACK people. EVER! There is not a single documented case in the history of Planet Earth. Not one!
Andrew
Andrew..
I am assuming the people who write the article, the police and the parametics.. all know how to spell the word pitbull.
Read it for yourself.
http://www.mysanantonio.com/news/Child_possibly_injured_by_dog.html
You are all idiots - just because it is more likely someone will get hurt from something other than a pitt-bull does not mean it is safe to have one around, by any stretch of the imagination. Well-trained pit-bulls DO attack people, I have met an extremely well-behaved, sweet, and trained pit-bull who requires a 200 lb man to hold her back from all children and dogs - it is LITERALLY how this particular dog is wired. It makes me sick, and I am thinking of doing something to get rid of the walking killing machine.
Not to mention just because something hasn't been reported, doesn't mean it didn't happen. I can't believe some of you are denying this just because you happen to own a nice one. STUPID STUPID STUPID.
Thanks Nora
Pit bull owners should start their own debate team. They seem like they are able to really craft an argument that flows well and is convincing to pit bulls everywhere.
Pit bull owners are not called "pit nutters" for no reason. They make completely illogical and emotional arguments while accusing everyone with a modicum of objectivity and rationality around the subject of being Nazis or racist or something worse. Arguing or even speaking with them will drastically lower your quality of life.
Andrew did what most pit bull advocates do when they are made: copy and paste a ton of stuff and/or write a huge block of text instead of making a compact, logical statement.
Hey, at least he used paragraph breaks though, which is rare.
To Nora... it's not just me who owns a nice one... there are HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS of us who do. By quanta more than vicious dog owners. We are not privy to what your 200-lb man is doing to the dog when they are alone. You are buying into media hype.
To DubV - when you have a rational and cogent reply to the cut & paste arguments I am making, I will delighted to entertain it. Ad hominem attacks, OTOH, are feeble-minded and are not prone to generate discussion.
Andrew,
I've read everything the pit bull community has tried to throw at the wall to make stick.
I will not sit down and read your ramblings and address each point because I am not that masochistic. If you'd like to try to make a point without resorting to argument verbosium, then maybe I'll read it.
All the standard lines you folks throw out have been refuted. Why? Because it is inevitable that you do not make a strong case when you start with your emotionally-driven conclusion and then reason backward.
You are absolutely right abour the length of the articles and the myriad of arguments and examples I bring up. It is not easy reading. It is also replete with emotional issues, because the topic IS emotional for those of us who love these animals. There are hundreds of thousands of us. Yet, the media hype prevails, because for two and half decades we had no voice. Also this is a blog – much of it, as you say, is recitation of arguments made by others – no point reinventing the wheel. But, just as much of the material contains personal musings, experiences, or just plain free associations. It is the nature of blogging.
What I am advocating is
1) treat the dog rationally and punish irresponsible owners;
2) do not pass Breed Specific Legislation that bans a specific dog because of the criminal miscreants who abuse the dog and the law – that’s tantamount to racism;
3) learn about the nature of the dog so that, if you have an interested in the breed, you become a responsible and knowledgeable owner.
Piggy-backing on the last point, people ought to know what you are getting into if they decide that this is the breed of dog they want for companionship.
If these points have been lost in the verbosity of the blog, then I failed. Mea culpa
My journey started with my seeking a dog companion that was not too small, not too big, that doesn’t shed much, that can be indoors or in any environment, whose temperament my wife, a cat person, would tolerate and a dog that loves people and is loyal. A veterinarian friend with whom we ballroom dance suggested a Pit Bull. I did my homework and discovered a horror story of a million dogs being killed every year, about dogs that are abused simply because of their “sportiness,” and animal that at one point was the darling of the American family but now is viewed as a monster, the story of a dog vilified by the media for no other reason other than it made good headlines.
IF you are at all interested in the topic, read “The Pit Bull Placebo: The Media, Myths and Politics of Canine Aggression” by Karen Delise. It is available free online at:
http://tinyurl.com/5ty3cup or buy it at Amazon.
Andrew just referred to thoughts regarding breed differences and legislation to match as just like racism.
This is a very common trope with pit bull fanatics. When you read it, you can immediately stop and move onto something else.
Dogs will never be people. Breeds will never be like races. Breeds were created by humans and were created to have different behaviors, races were not.
You are in effect asserting that chocolate cake contains salt therefore pretzels are chocolate cake. (X requires Y, Z also requires why, therefore X is Y)
This is obviously false.
Definition of FANATIC - marked by excessive enthusiasm and often intense uncritical devotion
I assure you that I am not a fanatic. I am a thoughtful person, well educated, and a critical thinker. I am a scientist. Before I adopted my first Pit Bull - at a veterinarian’s suggestion - I performed intensive research and fully educated myself. On the basis of scientific, legal, and statistical evidence, I surmised that Pit Bulls are not the monsters created by media hype. In fact, just the opposite is true: they are gentle, devoted, comical, and loyal companions. Hundreds of thousands of owners agree with me. On the other side of the controversy we no scientific evidence, only anecdotal stories by a hysterical media and politicians who want to cash in on now popular subject. The net result is that a million dogs are killed every year for no other reason that they APPEAR to be a breed deemed “vicious” by uneducated and self-serving interests,
If you read my blog you will see that what I advocate is responsible ownership, kindness, and fair treatment of dogs. I like dogs. If I liked cats and they were killed for simply having gray stripes, I would be their advocate. When Breed Specific Legislation (BSL) is passed contrary to the decision of several States’ Supreme Courts, people’s family pets are ripped away from the family and executed. This is done on the basis of a dog’s (frequently misidentified) breed. Not because of a dog’s behavior.
For your edification, genetically speaking, Pit Bulls (look up the actual breeds that comprise this loosely “defined” generic entity) were selected for their “sport,” that is, their willingness to fight another dog. If a fighting dog showed ANY human-aggression, they were immediately killed. The handlers had to be able to able to separate fighting dogs, without danger to themselves or the “spectators.” This was established in England in the 1800s. The net result – a dog that is NOT human-aggressive. In America the vast majority of “Pit Bulls” were bred for family companionship. There is difference between human-aggressive and dog-aggressive behavior. In the entire recorded history of United States there has never been a single documented instance of a neutered and unprovoked American Pit Bull or American Staffordshire Terrier attacking a person. ANY provoked dog can and likely, will bite.
Both the CDC and the American Veterinary Medical Association advocate against BSL and, instead, promote responsible ownership of all dogs and bite prevention education.
My blog is intended simply to share my experiences with my wonderful companions and to educate. I have no other motivation. Clearly, YMMV.
I'm a scientist as well Andrew. And believe me, I know tons of people with PhD that are only mildly above average in critical thinking, and especially fail around areas in which they are emotionally invested. Being a scientist does not mean anything, perhaps doing good science does. Your view of this breed is not good scientific thinking. In fact as scientists, or even a human, we must generalize and make probability statements. It is not wrong to do this in regards to a dog breed.
Andrew, first a few mild insults. I looked through your website, and it is obvious that you are inordinately impressed with yourself. However, I am quite sure that you aren't as intelligent as you would like to believe. So here, I will cut you down a few notches. You deserve somewhat rough treatment due to your manner of approaching me as someone you needed to educate.
Andrew said...
"For your edification, genetically speaking, Pit Bulls (look up the actual breeds that comprise this loosely “defined” generic entity) were selected for their “sport,” that is, their willingness to fight another dog. If a fighting dog showed ANY human-aggression, they were immediately killed. The handlers had to be able to able to separate fighting dogs, without danger to themselves or the “spectators.” This was established in England in the 1800s. The net result – a dog that is NOT human-aggressive. In America the vast majority of “Pit Bulls” were bred for family companionship. There is difference between human-aggressive and dog-aggressive behavior."
First off, I know all about this "hey a pit bull isn't a breed, there a few.." garbage. It has never been a point, just a pseudo-intellectual gotcha that goes no further. All of the breeds in the group are highly similar, are routinely interbreed, and can be spoken of together.
Man biters were not routinely culled. The dogs that were kept and bred were money makers. Google this issue and you will find a diversity of opinion. Here is something from a forum about game dogs.
http://www.scribd.com/doc/29889367/Manbiter-Discussion
The famous Colby who started a line that still persists had a dog kill a nephew. What did he do? Buried the nephew and kept the precious dog.
Further, aren't you folks just "stealing" the entire process of dog domestication? Wasn't the point of our (at first unwitting) selection of more docile animals to produce the current dog an attempt at not having a vicious animal? So, most dog breeds at least have ancestors selected for docility (see the russian fox experiment).
The pit bull terrier was selected for gameness, with the ultimate being dead gameness. This is the willingness to keep up an attack to the death. You can spin it as being determined or whatever you want, but in the context of dog fighting (which was the dominant thing the breeds were selected for for generations, despite any of your protestations) it is about fighting with incredible determination. The pit bull is also one of the breeds with the most devastating bite style, that is bite-hold-and-shake. Labs that bite out of fear will snap and retreat as a warning, they do not do what gripping dogs do. Lastly, pits were selected for dog-directed aggression.
So let me put this together for you Andrew. Old ladies walk around with dogs strapped to their wrists. When dog breeds with dog-directed aggression as a genetic liability get out (as dogs often will given us imperfect humans with our imperfect fencing, etc) they often will attack someone's dog with incredible intensity and a deadly bite style. This is bad enough on its own. In fact, I consider it perverse for a dog lover to consider owning a breed designed to kill other dogs. The thing is though, Andrew, that people aren't content to stand back and let another dog kill their dog. They intervene as they should and the attacking dog will often re-direct. If you had the stomach for it, you would read the stories of pit bull attacks that come in daily and would see this scenario playing out over and over. So, even if fighting breeds attack humans at the same rate as others, all else being equal, they are more dangerous given their bite style, gameness, and dog-directed aggression.
Andrew said...
"In the entire recorded history of United States there has never been a single documented instance of a neutered and unprovoked American Pit Bull or American Staffordshire Terrier attacking a person. ANY provoked dog can and likely, will bite."
This statement is of course a few different things. First, it is obviously untrue and would be to a small child. I'm sure you got it from Karen Delise or the Bad Rap brain trust. Must I really find a pit bull attack where the dog was nutless and no reasonable person would deem it provoked? Do you think Delise or wherever you got this went through all recorded instances of pit bull attacks and then established the dog was both intact and provoked? No, I'm sure it was more an absence of evidence of not being provoked or not being intact, or some other trick you fell for. Now, as far as the provoked thing. Don't you realize that I could bring you any attack and you could squint your eyes and make out some provocation? It is a simple No True Scotsman you would and probably are pulling.
Now, let's assume only intact and provoked pit bulls attack. You astutely mentioned that all intact and provoked dogs can attack. Actually, that last sentence is sarcastic. Is that not a totally fatuous statement? Basically saying, "any dog bite ya". Well, thanks for that, that explains so much of reality. I feel free for the first time. Ok, back to the first sentence, you are aware I'm sure that many non-pit bulls are left intact and are provoked daily. Even if all attacking pit bulls are intact/provoked, what explains that pit bulls have more fatal attacks than all other breeds and that they are constantly in the paper for maulings at a rate much higher than other breeds? It is taped to the end of your nose that there is a breed effect that interacts with the factors you mentioned and others. We simply do not see the other intact/teased breeds doing what pit bulls do. So, again as a scientist you should be thinking in terms of all else being equal and concocting controls in your mind. Here one is and your thoughts fail.
The only other cards you have to play are that pit bulls do these things more because: 1. media conspiracy/bias, 2. breed misidentification, and 3. bad treatment is concentrated toward this breed.
Given the huge apparent breed effect, the 3 points above would have to have huge effects to explain the large differences between the percentage of other breeds that maul/kill versus the percentage of pits and other fighters that do this. I'm unconvinced this is possible. Point 1 is silly and Delise's study that proved a huge bias is an incredibly flawed piece of work. The breed misidentification thing can be spun on you as well. How do you know that your dog is a pit bull? How do the people who give free spay/neuter to pit bulls know a pit when the see one? It is silly. The last point would have some merit, but we find that the pit bulls that attack are usually from loving homes. Surprisingly fewer pit bull attacks occur in poor urban areas. It could be that poor people with these dogs have more common sense than the upper crust trying to prove something with their purchase.
Ya know what I think Andrew? You got this breed to be different, seem enlightened about something, and draw attention to yourself. Now your ego and emotional attachment to an animal are on the line. Many vets and others push pits as a badge of humane honor or something, or avoid saying anything negative to avoid upsetting clients.
Face it, rational people do not choose to adopt a dog of the breed that kills the most people every year and that was bred for a blood sport that is now illegal.
OK, let's suppose we all agree that "Pit Bulls" are a bad dog breed and they need to be killed. All of them. We need to extinguish their existence from Earth. Will that solve the problem of issue of "vicious" dogs? Will the present abusers, cruel, irresponsible owners just lie down and accept the fate that no more "vicious" dogs are to be had? Or will they switch to Presa Canarios, Chow Chows, Boerboels, Akitas, or Fila Brasileiros? Do we kill them, too? Where do we stop? How about, if, instead, we punish the owners that do not take responsibility of controlling their dogs, of contributing to the overpopulation, of not spending the time to train the take care of their dogs? How about if, instead, we punish the criminals and not the dogs? That makes more sense to me. I love my dogs and don't want some politician to decree that it is OK to take my life companions away from my family and kill them simply because they look like a dog they don't like. I like my position on this and am willing to support with facts as I know them. I choose not to give equal credence to emotional blather and arguments unsupported by proper scientific inquiry.
To Anonymous... when I say I am a scientist I mean I know how to do proper, thorough, and unbiased research. I understand about the object of science being prediction based on probability of occurrence of a phenomenon, if and when, a preceding event has occurred. Research in this particular instance consisted of reading EVERYTHING that was available to me via: Internet searches, scientific articles from the Deep Web, Google Scholar, and MedLine searches, position statements from the American Veterinary Medical Association, the ASPCA, the CDC, books, interviews with a dozen veterinarians in our area, interviews with dog trainers, and spending time with many dogs BEFORE I even looked at adopting my first rescue dog. I settled on the American Pit Bull Terrier as the breed that most would most likely fit in our family structure and my personal likes and dislikes. BTW, the whole thing started with our veterinarian friend's recommendation. I performed, what in legal circles, could be called "due diligence" and I am very comfortable with my conclusions. As far as predictions are concerned, 0.00005% of the Pit Bull population is likely to be engaged in a fatal attack. According the Karen Delise of the National Canine Research Council, "in 2006, 97% of the fatal dog attacks were the result of one or more of reckless or criminal practices."
Andrew said...
"How about, if, instead, we punish the owners that do not take responsibility of controlling their dogs, of contributing to the overpopulation, of not spending the time to train the take care of their dogs? How about if, instead, we punish the criminals and not the dogs?"
First, your part about "don't take my dog family member and kill it" thing is a straw man. I am arguing that people view this breed correctly and stop spreading propaganda that results in the naive being in danger. Any BSL I would favor would be mandatory spay/neuter of pit bulls that are not being breed by AKC or UKC breeders and would not kill a single dog. It would only address public safety concerns while preventing pit bulls from glutting shelters and being euthanized in ungodly numbers.
Your suggestions about pushing the human is fine but it does not go far enough? Why it is only retrospective, it steps in usually after a tragedy. So, kids will still be mauled but the owner of the offending dog will get its just deserts. There is a reason that solely a retrospective tact is not taken with most public safety issues. That is that it relies upon people being dissuaded from being irresponsible based upon their correct evaluation of risk. And most people, especially pit bull owners, are bad at this. Further, as I said before, it kicks in after the victim is created, but may act to prevent victim accumulation if you think most pit bull owners are affected by future personal liability.
I posted one more comment because my original was too long and had to be split in half. I hope it ends up being posted.
Andrew, I was the anonymous poster before. It was not intentionally anonymous. Delise's work is horribly biased. I can't believe a trained scientist would find it credible. For instance, here estimates of media bias were done by comparing 4 instances in print media. One that involved a gripping/fighting breed was much more highly publicized because it involved two dogs invading a home and attacking a woman and her dog while they were in bed at night sleeping. Yes, that does tend to grab headlines all on its own.
Also, there is an incredible level of political correctness in humane orgs, especially around the pit bull because this breed has been caused to suffer. However, I believe this is the triumph of compassion over common sense. As far as the various orgs, I know you know that this is an appeal to authority and their names do not matter. Further, it is easy to speculate how some of them would have a conflict of interest here. For instance, the AKC is interested in profits generated by animals and registers animals from very bad puppy mills.
As far as proper scientific inquiry, what do you think about the results of the ATTS test? Does it support your case? Notice, this is a trick question.
As far as observation, it is common knowledge that what appear to be pit bulls appear to be killing more people than what appears to be any other breed. I would expect non-fatal maulings to track these stats as well, but just a valid assumption.
Scientific inquiry as you put seems to be finding a handful of confounding factors and then asserting that they explain away the apparent breed effect. I'm sure all these confounding variables play some role, but they would have to have very strong effects to overcome the apparent breed effect. Regardless, you may be right, but given the raw data, if you know something about decision theory, then you would know it is more rational to pick a common breed that has not killed a single human in the last decade than a common breed that seems to kill most frequently.
So, we can break it down into belief, knowledge, and action. Given that many other breeds provide nearly the same positives as pit bulls and have no bad rap to fight due to perceived negatives, it makes no sense for 99% of the people that own this breed to have one.
You should know you are too close to this issue to be able to judge your own objectivity around it.
Andrew said..
"In the entire recorded history of United States there has never been a single documented instance of a neutered and unprovoked American Pit Bull or American Staffordshire Terrier attacking a person. ANY provoked dog can and likely, will bite."
I'll rephrase my comment that did not make it. I was a bit mean at the end. So, I'll scale back.
Andrew, you know this first sentence must be false. No fixed and unprovoked pit has ever attacked someone? Come on. Are you just not expressing your thought correctly here. You can't possibly believe this. Did you get this from Delise or Bad Rap? Did they assert this based upon an absence of evidence for being fixed and nonprovoked or what?
Also, you should know that you can always strain your eyes to see how a dog was provoked or its behavior was somehow the fault of a human's decisions. It is easy to do, and is similar to a No True Scotsman fallacy (no unprovoked pit bulls attack, oh that one attacked well he wasn't unprovoked then (hmm...let me dig into this case a bit...)).
What you aren't seeing is that there are many nonfixed and provoked dogs out there. All breeds are mistreated (mutts, greyhounds, and more), but you don't see them attacking at the same rate as fighting breeds and rotties. Why is that? Why are provoked and intact male labs hurting people as much? It is obvious that breed interacts with outside influences. You are arguing in effect that a grenade is not dangerous because a human must pull the pin, while you ignore that you can pull a pin stuck in an apple and it will not explode.
Please admit to yourself that you may be biased here. I know I am in regards to pit bulls. I think they are bad pets, given my real world observations and also what I've read. I admit this, but still think I am right. Although I could be compromised, I am the better for seeing that I could be.
And Andrew, do you still stand behind the statement that recognizing differences in average tendency among dog breeds is wrong because it is somehow similar to racism?
Please read especially pages 3 to 5 inclusive.
http://www.scribd.com/doc/13616704/Dos-and-Donts-Concerning-Vicious-Dogs-by-Donald-H-Clifford
This is the type of lit. put out by the AVMA before it became part of a PC movement.
There is another one by the HSUS about pit bulls from a bygone era.
http://www.scribd.com/doc/14396422/ASPCA-Guide-to-Handling-Pit-Bulls-in-Shelter-Environments
They go out of their way to pass on the "no human aggression" meme, but everything else they say clearly points to heightened danger even with a lack of direct human aggression. It's interesting that no other dog is such a liability around other dogs. That's one reason pits don't last as long in shelters, unlike other dogs they must be housed individually to avoid animal deaths.
I'll let the cat out of the bag on the temperament test you referenced (with is the American Temperament Testing Society, which I believe was mistyped).
You can't use it to compare breeds. Why? It is based upon a sample of dogs brought in voluntarily by their owners for a paid test and so you would expect self-selection bias to invalidate interbreed comparison. Well, self-selection bias can operate on many data sets, but this is particularly bad. That is because the variable of interest can be expected to operate directly as a selection filter. Basically, people with aggressive dogs of any breed will tend not to pay to have their dog flunk a test. Even if the same relationship between temperament and probability of being tested is the same across all breeds, you would expect an inflated estimate of canine temperament for all breeds, all breeds to score more closely to each other than expected, and for ordering to be meaningless.
It gets worse because pit bull orgs use this test summary as their silver bullet. They actively recruit people with pit bulls to pass to take the test and discourage anyone who feels their dog may be questionable.
This selection bias can be seen because only a handful of dogs of the 1,000s tested flunk due to aggression toward strangers, whereas common sense tells us a much greater percentage of dogs are aggressive toward strangers.
Further, the test was designed for testing individual dogs for abilities in schutzhund work, and dogs very often flunk for being timid.
Now, I'll move on. I don't want this blog space to be dedicated to a protracted argument between only two people.
I will reiterate... I was looking for a dog. I waited 35 years to have one because I did not have the time a dog deserves and should be given. One of my ballroom dancer friends is a vet and she sits with us on Saturday dances. There are two more vets who sit with us on occasion. When they heard me talking about dogs, they all thought that, given my personality and the type of household we had, a Pit Bull Terrier would be the right dog for me. My requirements were: hypoalergenic (wife is terribly allergic to many animals, especially cats and dogs), not too big not too small, loyal, family oriented - there are certain dog breeds that become possessive of one member of the family at the exclusivity of everyone else - happy in a warm environment, OK with either indoors or outdoors, needing exercise so I would have a reason to walk, not too rambunctious, affectionate, and handsome to my eyes. Wired-haired terriers - the only true non-allergenic dogs - were out because I don't like their looks. I considered Hungarian dogs but they are all working dogs and mostly hard-headed (Puli, Kuvasz, Komondor, Vizsla), some Belgian dogs, etc. I have been learning about dogs for many years and know them quite well. Whern I was told about Pit Bulls Terriers, they seem like a good choice for me. I did my homework and I found they were maligned, abused, and killed by the hundreds of thousands every year. Professionally I take on causes in which I can make a difference. Why not in private life, then? I believe in what I say, I think that I am rational, and like in any emotional issue, I will use whatever argument I think will help get my personal bias/belief across. I am a foster for the largest Pit Bull rescue organization in the State and I will advocate the best I can. I am sure, as with any issue, there will always be folks who think exactly contrary to my views. It would be a terribly boring World if we all thought alike. I am much less tolerant in being argued against my professional stance regarding violence against women and children, pharmaceutical companies, health insurance companies, corporate fat cats, etc. ;-)
Completely agree. And I am aware that I am cherry-picking data. ;-)
I can't be objective. I love these animals. BTW: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/4028797
I used Signal Detection Theory in my Master's Thesis.
Nope. They get killed because nobody will adopt them.
To quote H.L Mencken "No one in this world, so far as I know — and I have searched the record for years, and employed agents to help me — has ever lost money by underestimating the intelligence of the great masses of the plain people.."
my ex husband got a pit bull. we treated her well she was in training(she was 2 1/2 months old) and she would bark aggressively at everyone, bite unprovoked, snarl and snap if asked to "off" from the sofa, attacked other dogs, me while my back was turned not even interacting with her, and got up to race acroos the room and attack my son FROM BEHIND and UNPROVOKED. this was a PUPPY! the dog was dealt with as all pit bulls should be. they are dangerous dogs do not be fooled by people who say otherwise...pitbulls are not likely to be confused with any other breed of dog, especially considering they can DNA test and tell you EXACTLY what breed a given dog is. i wish they would institute a pitbull ban in my county. i am a dog lover but these dogs were only bred for fighting and it has nothing to do with spaying or training or even how you treat the dog. i had 2 chihuahuas and both were treated and trained as the pitbull and they were sweet and great with kids...so were my 2 rottweilers and my german shepherd who was a retired police dog. a given breed's genetics will make up 100% of its behavior and training will serve to reinforce good behavior but you can never train a dog to behave contrary to what its hardwiring tells it. as for spaying it has no impact on a dog's behavior, if its a biter its a biter...unless we start doing lobotamies the dog will behave as it is genetically predisposed to behaving.
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