It doesn’t really have anything to do with shots. When I had to put my little angel kitty down because she was dying of kidney failure the vet still had to check that she hadn’t bitten anyone in the past two weeks before he could do it. And, he was her vet so he knew her medical history (and he also knew that to get her to bite you’d probably have to put your hand in her mouth and then close her jaw for her 
), but he was obligated to ask. I know he was obligated because when he asked me my answer was “are you freakin’ kidding me?” and he explained to me that it was the law.
I agree with you up to this point…
Yes. I allowed the dog to be there. On MY property. MORE than adequately confined from the person who was an uninvited trespasser on my property. My property is my dog’s turf and dogs defend their turf. It’s what they do. It’s part of the reason some people have them (hence the term “guard dog”).
If anything we should apply a stricter standard of ethics, for it is not our place then. We already enslave, kill for sport and raise for food a large percentage of our fellow mammals. It’s arrogant to decide what factors establish your right to life, especially if it seems to conviniently include only us.
A large sign that says “Keep out. Beware of dog.” and a fence is warning enough. If somebody disregards this warning due to lack of capacity, it’s one thing. However, if one disregards this warning with intent, then they are a malicious trespasser, even if they are a kid looking for a baseball. If a parent fails to convey the danger of large carnivorous animals to their children, I call natural selection on their family line. The dog doesn’t know the kid isn’t going to cause any harm, hell, I don’t know that either. If a kid jumps down on the tracks in front a train to get his baseball, do you propose we euthanize the conductor?
I would euthanize for unprovoked aggression… this is largely because we have put a massive amount of time and energy into extensively socializing and training our dog. I know he’s been proofed against any imaginable scenario, and if he begins to exhibit inexplicable aggression, I know there’s something amiss. I am also very, very familiar with canine behavior, and trust myself to recognize the signs.
I would not euthanize a dog for provoked aggression. My children will be raised to know and respect animals for what they are… which is not little people in fur suits. One of the many reasons I chose the breed that I did is a massive tolerance for children and pokes and prods that would be intolerable for many breeds. I expect tolerant and respectful treatment of the dog by the child, and vice versa.
One of the other many reasons I chose my breed is their protective and deeply loyal nature within the pack. I was very comfortable with the idea of having a dog large, powerful, and protective enough to defend myself and my family against intruders, or what have you.
I do think it’s deeply saddening that if a maniac breaks into my house and my dog defends me, and bites the guy, my companion and protector will be killed as a vicious animal, and I will have a lawsuit on my hands.
Just my tuppence: I think that if you’re worried that dogs are “timebombs”, waiting to go off when least expected, then you certainly shouldn’t own one. I get the feeling that having such an attitude towards dogs doesn’t really go hand-in-hand with dog-ownership. Euthanasing dogs for exhibiting pack behaviour such as snarling sounds to me very much like overkill – and close to viewing dogs as disposable.
Dogs, like people, can be mentally unbalanced. But short of an exhibition of abnormal behaviour that is unprovoked in any way, or is not part of the pack-response which can be treated with proper training for both dog and owner, I think euthanasia is not the answer.
I’ve seen reports of dog attacks where the incidents are apparently unprovoked, and also seen cases where the attacks were provoked. It is, of course, the owner’s right to have their pet killed if they feel they can’t go down the road to determining why their pet behaves the way it does, if there are no other factors – but I do think it’s sad.
BTW, I’m a cat person myself, but prefer to remain without pets for the foreseeable future. I’d rather not euthanase an animal unless they’re in severe, incurable pain, or on the way to a slow death. I did grow up around dogs, including an ankle nipping corgi-cross. Why did she nip? Because she was protecting my grandmother’s sick-bed. A bit of a nuisance that – but understandable. That dog was not put down.
I was thinking on this particular statement, which I’ve seen a number of times from various people.
The thing is, the first thing I worry about is my safety. I don’t think a tresspasser’s safety is more important that mine. I don’t think a malicious child’s safety is more important than mine. Anyone out of toddlerhood that kicks a dog deserves the bite they get. Someone came onto my porch at 4AM, once, and I remember listening ferocious barking comming out of the mouth of a dog that normally lives in dopey submission to a 6lb cat and thinking, well, no body’s ever going to just jimmy my lock and break in and sneak upstairs. I don’t WANT a dog that won’t fend off invaders of it’s turf. I don’t want a dog that won’t warn my kids when they’re being a pain in the ass (warn as in growl, not as in bite).
Also, biting a child is not always a sign of unpredictable agression. Kids can be assholes, and it’s pretty inhumane to expect an animal not to defend itself when hurt.
I find some of the attitudes expressed here to be disturbing. While I certainly advocate the humane treatment of animals and I don’t believe an animal should be killed just because it’s a nuisance, I also believe that human safety must always come before animal safety.
The legal principle of defending yourself and your property is tempered with the restriction that you must only use the minimal force necessary to do so. You can’t shoot someone for simple trespass, so why would you believe that you can allow a dog to seriously injure or kill someone. Dogs do not have the ability to assess intent, they act on instinct. You can be the best dog trainer in the world, but you’re never going to convince me that you can train a vicious dog and 100% guarantee that the animal will never attack again.
With very limited exceptions where very strict control is exercised, I think dogs, inclined or trained to attack humans should be destroyed. Due to the current trend toward people insisting on keeping these vicious animals in densely populated areas, I see the laws controlling pet ownership trending in that direction.
You want to keep an attack dog in your yard and you believe that you’ve properly fenced and secured the area so the dog can’t get out. As your neighbor I’m supposed to accept your word for that. Sorry, I shouldn’t have to worry about the possibility that the animal will discover a way over, under or through that fence and attack me or a member of my family. Vicious dogs must be isolated from the population and if they transgress, just once, they should be destroyed.
I wouldn’t have an issue with this statement if, within the “intruder” category, your dog was able to tell apart roaming kids, oblivious second cousin not seen in a long while, EMT personnel and police officers coming in following a 911 call, etc…
If you present me with a breed of dogs with this ability, we might agree…
Actually, if there is a minimal amount of intelligence present in the hypothetical kid/cousin/EMT/police person, most well-trained guard dogs would be perfectly OK. A guard dog will do just that - warn off by growling/barking/showing aggressive behavour, and then escalate if necessary. If the ‘intruder’ has enough sense to back off, no bloodshed will ensue, and any emergency responders will probably have adequate equipment/training to get past guard dogs if necessary. A dog that just attacks straight off is a different kettle of fish, and needs to be retrained or destroyed.
One of my parent’s friends once happened to pass near their house one evening and decided to drop in for a visit. Since he’d been there before he thought nothing of parking outside the gate, climbing over and strolling up the drive with the plan of sitting and waiting on the verandah for them to come home.
When they arrived they found him standing half-way up the drive with one of the German Shepherds holding him by one wrist and growling softly whenever he tried to move. He was totally unharmed apart from some slobber on his arm. That sort of behaviour is OK in a dog that is not going to be roaming around loose in public areas, because it gives people sufficient time to stop and think.
On the other hand, one of the other families in the area had to shoot their much-loved dog because one of their kids fell over and hurt herself, and a passer-by leaned over the hedge to find out why the kid was crying and if she was OK at the same time their dog came running out of the house to investigate the noise. The dog went straight for his throat and very nearly killed him (he arrived at the hospital with his jugular vein hanging out, but unsevered). That’s understandable behaviour from the dog, but still unreasonably dangerous for other humans around it.
I don’t think people make a clear enough distinction between vicious dogs (which will make unprovoked attacks on animals or people), and those dogs which will defend areas, people, objects or whatever with aggressive behaviour that escalates up to a physical attack if necessary. The first category shouldn’t exist, the second category is one of the reasons why humans originally domesticated dogs and continue to use them as working animals. Dogs aren’t child substitues or toys - treat them with the respect they deserve.
Well said. I agree with you. Which is why I was startled by the comment regarding euthanasing a dog for snarling. But perhaps the dog in question in the OP was a “vicious” dog, from a “vicious” breed. That wasn’t made too clear.
Animals speak a different language to humans. They have different customs, body language, social structures and hierarchies to humans. I think humans need to understand these languages, and learn to interpret the signs.
I’ve been bitten by dogs, chased by bulls, kicked by horses and cows. I’ve looked at my conduct leading up these incidents, and I’m quite happy that I was misreading the situation. No harm, no foul. If a farmer culled every cow that kicked, or every bull that charged, pretty soon he’d be milking mice.
Come to think of it, cows are a little like women, they don’t take too kindly to strangers touching their nipples. No wonder I got klapped.
Dogs snarl and bite, it’s just what they do. That’s how they communicate. Granted, if a dog loses all loyalty to it’s owner, and the owner’s family, in other words, biting the hand that feeds it, then we have a problem. But I think it’s more the exception than the rule.
To me there is no difference between a human “fuck you” and a dog’s growl.
Apologies for the double post, but I missed this on first glance.
I hear you, **A.R., ** however, you might be seeing more Cujo into the situation than what is in the general nature of dogs. Dogs are territorial, and they tend to limit their “fight and bite” dramas to invasions of their territory. The chances of a dog, without provocation, actively seeking a hole to get through, just in order to attack a human on the other side, is in my experience slim.
I have often walked past a German Shepherd pissing in its pants on its side of the fence, and as we match each other step for step down the drag, we get to the open, yes open, gate, only to have it continue to hurl abuse, but still keeping to its side of the imaginary border.
Again, just in my experience, YMMV.
Although it is a common usage error, and thus perhaps understandable, it is nevertheless a clear error to use “euthanize” as it is repeatedly being used in this thread.
You may very well kill a dog you deem to be vicious, but you are in no way performing euthanasia, you’re just killing him or her.
Coming from the Greek roots “eu-”, meaning “good”, and “thanatos”, meaning “death”, euthanasia means mercy killing of a person or animal too sick or injured to recover – the classic “putting him out of his misery” sense. In the United States, perhaps because pets ARE routinely euthanized by lethal injection when aged and sick, the misunderstanding has developed that killing by lethal injection is “euthanasia”. It is not, unless the animal itself is suffering. That’s just the method; euthanasia is a term describing the purpose of the killing.
This is not a minor detail. The misuse of the term is largely intentional – people want to feel better about this killing, so they adopt the “we did it for the sake of alleviating suffering” term, when often the real reason for the killing is something else – convenience, overcrowding, fear of lawsuits, and so on. Those might be reasons to kill, but such killing does NOT constitute euthanasia.
In this thread, it looks like the term is being used politically – you’d “euthanize” a dog that growled. Well, dogs growl all the time – people do too, look at this very thread. If you don’t understand what a given dog is communicating; if you are too lazy or fearful to learn to interact properly with this animal that God made, but man has so extensively bent to his purpose, you may find it in your heart to kill him or her.
But you are NOT euthanizing when you do so, and if you claim that you are, you are distorting language in ways George Orwell would understand perfectly.
Sailboat
This is what I agree with. I was speaking to the concept of growling/snarling/barking being a sign of agression worthy of putting the dog down. Out dog does what I want her to do. If someone suspicious is at the door, I want her to wake the house. The barking and growling is a warning. Don’t heed it, and you deserve what you get. I don’t want her to sit and watch while someone robs the house. (And, in August her Daddy will be a cop, and said intruder is going to have a lot worse than a dog to worry about if he comes crawling in our windows)