http://news.msn.com/us/4-pit-bulls-blamed-for-63-year-old-joggers-death
Why do people say pitbulls are nice dogs? Everytime something like this happens, pitbull owners loudly protest what good dogs they are. Gentle, affectionate, etc. How can they say that?
Because most of the time the “pit bull” isn’t a pit bull, or the dog in question was mis-trained to be aggressive. The news media and the police tend to apply “pit bull” to dogs pretty much randomly. The “pit bulls” in that story could in reality have been almost any largish dog breed.
And pit bulls were for most of their history in this country known as nice dogs; they’ve only been demonized recently.
It’s as if you ran into four street-gang members who have guns, and you got hurt. Is the whole human species like that?
Hmmm…seems like you are both justifying this. First, I think police officers have been to enough events of dog attacks to be able to identify a pit bull or a pit bull mix. I can certainly spot one; they do not look like any ‘large’ dog breed. In fact, I’d say they are not a large breed at all, but more of a medium one, or medium large. They certainly do not look like just any dog or would be mistaken for any large dog breed, only by an idiot.
I don’t the think analogy about being attacked by a gang with guns is a reasonable analogy, simply because these attacks by pit bulls don’t happen just with gangs of dogs, but often, in fact more often, by individual dogs.
Your two posts are what I am asking about. I can’t understand how people can defend these dogs. I’ve been in countries where there are feral dogs, dogs that hang out in groups. They do not run out and attack people who pass by.
You’d be wrong. I’ve heard of them identifying a friendly Golden Retriever as an “aggressive pit bull”.
Or even more often, they happen in the minds of people who either misidentify the dog breed, or shoot some “pit bull” that’s just sitting there and claim it was dangerous.
Again; I simply don’t believe that this report is accurate - especially since it claims that no less than 4 pit bulls attacked this woman. Why would 4 be together in one place running around loose? I find it far more likely that dogs attacked this woman, and they were identified as “pit bulls” because that’s become a standard thing to say about dogs that are dangerous or that someone wants to portray as bad.
Uh, perhaps because there are lots and lots and lots of them out there, and many of them don’t attack people?
I mean, I don’t have an opinion one way or the other on the subject, but the argument is pretty straightforward. I don’t really see how anyone could be all that baffled by it.
Most pits will never attack a person, but the facts are that pits are more likely to attack people than other breeds. Far more likely, in fact.
http://enhs.umn.edu/current/6120/bites/dogbiterisk.html
32% of reported dog bites are by pits and mixed breed pits. Half of the fatalities.
the bias against pits is rooted in facts, but, of course, the actual likelihood that any particular person will be attacked is extremely low. That doesn’t mean that a person should deliberately become involved with a pit bull, owning one, letting one’s kids be around one. You never know.
the stories I’ve seen about their attacks also indicate they are not a ‘bite and retreat’ animal. If they bite, and nothing interrupts them, they will tear the victim into parts, literally.
A neighbor and his little boy in a stroller were surrounded by 4 small pits who escaped from a breeder’s fenced yard. They growled and circled and snapped, but were not large enough to keep the man from retreating with his son. Police could not intervene about the dogs because they didn’t actually bite. Their advice? If someone is bitten, call us. If the dogs escape again, call animal control, but don’t expect a quick response, their money has been reduced. Document everything and, eventually, you might get a judge to issue an injunction to remove the dogs from the neighborhood.
I’ve been bitten by a dog once in my life. It was a severe bite that required an ER visit and follow up visits with a hand surgeon. The dog was a golden retriever.
Not at all an expert, but I strongly suspect the frequency and severity of “pit” attacks reflects the total number of “pit-like” dogs, and the personalities and practices of some types of folk who own them.
Pits, rottweillers, etc., tend to be favored by folk wanting a “tough” image. Not too many ganstas leading pomeranians around. I suspect such folk might either tend to appreciate aggressive behavior by their dogs, or might otherwise be less than model dog owners/trainers. They also may not be especially attentive breeders, resulting in even more pits, with little attention towards breeding out undesireable characteristics.
And multiple dogs of any breed quickly exhibit pack behavior. In many of these instances you hear of 2, 3, or more pits attacking someone.
Of course, in the anecdote file, my daughter has a 65# black rescued dog. My best guess would be that it is a pit/lab mix, but it could be boxer or who knows what else. I guarantee most folk would look at it and say “pit.” Of course, it is the silliest, goofiest, lickingest chicken of a dog I’ve ever met. My wimp of a golden is far more aggressive.
I wouldn’t own a pit simply because I would get fed up with other peoples’ reaction to it. It is frustrating enough to have people treat my goofy golden like Cujo.
I’ve played with many pits, haven’t been bitten yet.
I once stepped in a rather large doggy turd when I mentioned the aforementioned in an IMHO thread. I started a GD thread on it, specifically on Pitbull dogs, the law and families. The main point I gleaned is that the term ‘pitbull’ is so nebulous as to be almost worthless.
I am confident this will be the thread that resolves the debate, unlike the 34,729 such threads that preceded it.
Personally, I am against arming pit bulls with semiautomatic weapons. Or even worse, giving them permits for concealed carry of attack chihuahuas.
I support rules and regulations that restrict dangerous dogs. I oppose legislation based upon anything as fuzzy or prone to misinterpretation as a breed identification, especially a “breed” as ill-defined as “pitbull.”
I can guarantee that if “pitbulls” are outlawed, within six months everyone who wants an agressive dog will be owning “Staffords” or “Bull terriers” or some other name to circumvent the law. And a whole lot of law-abiding families will never get the block-head puppy that fits their lifestyle.
Possibly, but they’re not the ones writing the stories. And in the copy room, an aggressive dog is a pitbull, and a pitbull is an aggressive dog.
I’ve even run across stories where it turns out the “pitbull” had been a misidentified Labrador Retriever, a.k.a. the most common and instantly recognizable dog in the world, possibly the entire Universe.
I see unreasonable arguments on both sides, to be honest.
Of course there are friendly pits out there. There are pit fans who breed them for friendly characteristics.
Of course there are terrible pits out there. There are dogfighters who breed them for “game,” i.e., the desire and willingness to fight to the death.
The high number of attacks by pits isn’t just due to misinformation about pits. It’s also due to the “game” breeders (and raisers–I talked to a high-schooler once who helped his brother train fighting dogs by beating them, locking them in a dark closet and banging on the door, feeding them gunpowder, etc.)
But it’s unreasonable to consider all pits dangerous, since there’s the parallel community of pit fans who bred them for loyalty and gentleness and raise them as you’d raise any pet dog.
Here we go again. Look, I am no fan of pit bulls, and think that really aggressive owners buy them up, but I’ve seen the kinds of dogs the cops identify as pits and they are rarely on the mark.
Better to go after any stray dogs - stray dogs are the problem, and bad owners are the problem.
I think this was the most recent one?
FWIW again the CDC’s take on the subject (pdf) is to NOT be supportive of breed specific bans. They instead support targeting dogs that display problem behaviors and irresponsible owners.
Irresponsible owners who want aggressive dogs choose Pit-like dogs (which may or may not actually have any Pit breed in them) and abuse the hell out of them to create monsters. They could do that even more easily with many sled-type dogs albeit they don’t look as scary right off the bat. Those monsters born of abuse need to be put down as they are found, whatever their mix of breeds in their ancestry. The abusers who create the monsters should be the target of enforcement however.
Even the vets don’t know without a full DNA test (and even then, IIRC, the accuracy of these tests aren’t always perfect). My dog is a “pit bull” but she also has characteristics of a Boxer and a German Shepherd and possibly something else. On her adoption papers/dog license, she’s listed as a Boxer. But really, she’s a mutt.
In fact, I’d go so far as to bet that the vast majority of “pit bulls” are actually mutts, but that doesn’t make a good headline.
I’m pretty sure I originally found this in a Dope thread. It’s called “Find the Pitbull”. See for yourself whether you can always tell what breed a dog is: http://www.pitbullsontheweb.com/petbull/findpit.html
If you choose to judge a dog by what it’s breed was created for, then pit bulls should get a pass. They were never bred to be aggressive to humans. They were bred to be aggressive to other dogs. A pit bull handler had to be able to reach into the fight pit and pull his dog out without being afraid of being mauled. Any pit bull that turned fight aggression towards its owner would be killed out of hand. One hundred years ago, even fifty years ago, pitbulls were considered “nanny” dogs. Watch The Little Rascals - the dog that follows them everywhere was a pitbull.
There are many pitbulls have such a bad reputation these days:
pitbulls belong to a class of dog breeds with very similar physical characteristics. It’s easy to mistake a bull terrier, an American bulldog, or a boxer for a pitbull. If you’re not convinced, take a look at this page.
starting in the 80s, pitbulls were a fad breed. They look tough and scary, so some people wanted them as an accessory so they could look tough and scary. These people were not good dog owners, and they were probably the very same people who bought german shepherds, dobermans, and rottweilers and screwed over those breeds’ reputations. They didn’t train, socialize, or discipline their dogs properly. So, there was a spike in the number of pitbulls, and a disproportionate increase in the number of poorly managed pitbulls.
Because these owners were so incompetent at responsible pet ownership, their unspayed/unneutered pets bred with pretty much any other unaltered dog in the vicinity. This resulted in a lot of pitbull mixes with negligent owners, no training, no proper socialization, and often abuse at the hands of humans. That breeds aggression.
The media is guilty of taking uncommon events and catastrophizing them in order to hook viewers. Do you remember the summer of 2001? It was called the Summer of the Shark, and shark attacks were reported with speculation on what was causing such horrific attacks. Of course, statistically, there were fewer attacks that year than the previous ten years. Didn’t matter. The same thing happens with dog bites and maulings. The numbers don’t matter to the media. The spectacle does.
Now, you can get all verklempt about pitbulls or rottweilers or whatever breed happens to be the Bad Dog of the Day. Or you can recognize that the deciding influence in dog bites and maulings are people. Stop trying to outlaw breeds of dogs - which will never work - and get people to recognize their responsibility for dog ownership. Eighty-six percent of fatal dog attacks are committed by unneutered male dogs*. Requiring all non-breeder dog owners to spay and neuter their pets and holding them criminally liable for dog attacks by unaltered dogs would go a long way towards solving this problem.
Stop hating on the dogs and start pushing people to do the right thing for their pets.
From the stats on the page: 92% of fatal dog maulings are committed by male dogs, and 94% of those are unneutered dogs. .92 multiplied by .94 gives us 84% of the total number of fatal dog maulings committed by unneutered male dogs.
