Well - I don’t think that’s exactly what the Federal Courts did, actually…
Cougar58, we’re sort of ‘on the same side’ of this debate, but sheesh; some of your posts aren’t doing ‘our side’ any favors…
http://www.abc2news.com/dpp/news/state/federal-judge-upholds-md-pit-bull-law
Federal court upholds Md pit bull law.
This law states you don’t have to prove a landlord knew pit bulls were vicious …they are presumed vicious by default.
Let me know how you interpret this. Seems very breed specific to moi.
Just looking at today’s ruling specifically, my understanding is that the Federal Court couldn’t find any constitutional grounds to overturn the ruling. I’m not sure that the Federal Court is necessarily agreeing with the ruling itself.
End of issue AFAIC. As long as there’s no (idiotic, ridiculous, ineffective, unenforceable and/or unconstitutionally vague) BSL’s anyone can have any opinion they like of my dog, or of dogs generally (a lot of people don’t like dogs period, I’m not lobbying to have them forced to change their minds).
Must say though the race/class aspect of this issue is very real IME. As older white guy (pretty rich frankly and I while maintain a casual appearance nowadays I doubt I’m often mistaken for a poor person) with a ‘pit bull’ I’ve never encountered a negative comment to my face about my dog. She gets loads of compliments (she’s very striking in appearance). Many people don’t say anything and surely at least some have a negative opinion but I’ve never heard it out loud. It’s probably also were I live. From all I can tell, besides a very few diverse major metro areas with BSL’s (Denver and Dade County FL) BSL fights usually seem to occur in smaller municipalities with a sharp divide between lower middle class white areas abutting non-white areas, including ‘hood’ type areas. Where I live the poor people mostly live in public housing, free market property prices are sky high, and there’s a weight limit there on pets, no big dogs. The ‘pit bull’ owners are almost all upper middle/rich types with dogs from shelters. The dogs don’t cause any special problems, and BSL never comes up.
It’s not just ‘us guys’ insisting one thing and other ‘guys’ having another opinion. Not to say I’m including you, but in general the ‘pit bull’ debate is a lot about the race/class divide and marginally middle class white people who feel especially aggrieved when misbehavior of poor (usually non white but it’s not strictly racial) people spills over onto them. It’s not really some science debate about dog genetics, or else the answer is obvious: there is no scientific evidence of such a genetically driven problem, even if the debate were really limited to a well defined breed (like APBT’s, say). And when ‘pit bull’ is applied to such a ‘dog’s breakfast’, pardon the pun, of various types of dogs as it is, the science/genetics argument is just ridiculous. And if you listen to BSL advocates long enough, they will eventually admit through their arguments it’s (certain) owners they are aimed at.
I didn’t say the Fed Court agreed, I said the Fed Court upheld the ruling. And that’s verbatim the wording I linked to.
Was that because the court was shown science demonstrating that? Love to see it.
Which part are you claiming you quoted verbatim?
It wasn’t “pit bulls are vicious from birth”.
Once again, since cougar apparently has a different definition of “verbatim” than the rest of the English speaking populace, the phrase used in the original Maryland decision regarding pit bulls was that the court decided they were “inherently dangerous.” Whether you think it’s worth a semantic quibble, that’s for you to decide, but it’s not “verbatim,” but any known definition of the word.
I really don’t understand this debating tactic. Why not actually post the correct phrase? It still makes the general point cougar was trying to make, I think (because I’m not clear what the point is), without actually having to lie to make it.
Cougar has proven time and time again he feels no need to be intellectually honest in this debate, I guess the ends justify the means for him.
It doesn’t make his point because all dogs are inherently dangerous if they aren’t trained or socialized correctly.
A courts decision on a law doesn’t really change my perspective here. States can pass all types of stupid laws and still be well within their constitutional restrictions. If the state passed a breed restriction against toy poodles and argued they are inherently dangerous when people object I’d expect the court to find much the same. The court doesn’t really get much say in if a law is effective, they only get final authority on if it is legal. Far as I can tell no one has a right to any breed of dog so any breed restriction is going to be fine with the court.
There is clear debate about the effectiveness of breed specific legislation. There are plenty of other solutions to curbing the number of dog on human attacks, such as mandatory neutering of non-breeders dogs, that are more demonstrably effective. People like Cougar make it very clear effectiveness is sidebar to emotional and knee jerk reactions.
Ask and ye shall receive
Pit Bull Ruling: “Last year’s ruling by Maryland’s highest court labeling “pit bulls” as “inherently dangerous” dogs has been upheld in federal court. The original ruling means landlords can be held liable if one of their tenants pets bites someone – and it’s prompted some landlords to evict pit bull owners if they don’t get rid of their dogs”
End of quotation .
You say tomato I say tomatoes Either way the Federal Court upheld that pit bulls are “inherently dangerous”. How is that different from being "vicious " ?
Pissing, moaning, insulting, and splitting hairs over such trivial points, ain’t gonna help the fact that many, many Maryland renters will either have to be evicted, or their pit bulls will.
Btw, the Ohio law referred to pit bulls as "vicious " until the pit lobby forced it to be amended last year …and within hours, 2 yr old Makayla Darnell was killed by her parents pit bull. Ohio finished the year with more than 2/3rds of fatals by pit bulls. On par with the USA average, with the exception of 2013 at 90% by pit bulls.
http://www.legislature.state.oh.us/bills.cfm?ID=129_HB_14
Deemed "vicious " or “inherently dangerous”, take your pick
Actually, it means that Maryland renters with Boxer Dogs and crosses, American Bulldogs and crosses, Lab crosses, Sharpei crosses, Pug crosses (yes, really), various types of Mastiffs and crosses, various retriever and hound crosses, and many other breeds, crosses, and mutts of all kinds, will get to make the choice of losing their homes or killing their dogs.
Yay! That’s so terrific! Go you Cougar you!
And, as a landlord, I guarantee that if a bill like this passed in my state, I would simply stop letting renters have pets at all. It would not be worth the trouble or risk to allow pets when any yahoo that walks by can claim that a “vicious pitbull” attacked him and get rewarded for it.
Yay for the BSL fans! They’re so awesome!
The pit lobby forced it to be amended? I want to know about this powerful pit lobby. Do tell. When the bill passed, it passed through a Senate vote 67-30, and put Ohio in line with all of the rest of the US in terms of not classifying pits automatically as a “vicious” breed. What kind of pull do you think pit bull advocates have, for real?
Actually, I will be answer my own question, because I try to be intellectually honest. It was Best Friends Animal Society along with the Ohio Coalition of Dog Advocates that helped introduce the bill. Apparently, the dog lobby is so powerful that they can get the Ohio senate to pass the legislation by over a 2:1 margin. That’s impressive.
Why I do this I don’t know.
It is a fairly easy case to make that a Pit Bull is more inherently dangerous than say a Skye Terrier even as one accepts that the Skye Terrier is by temperment a more vicious dog - i.e. more likely to bite. One can accept that Pits are overall calmer than other dogs and accept that they are more dangerous merely by accepting that on the rare occassions they do bite that bite is more likely to cause more significant harm. Of course many other strong dogs are by that measure equally or more dangerous but that fact does not change the ability to defend the statement as true in isolation.
It is also a matter of form. On several occassions your posts have contained claims about what was said, presented as quotes or as “verbatim”, that are perhaps the same in meaning to your interpretation and (limited) understanding but not what was actually said in a somewhat significant way. That technique, along with the constant return to emotional anecdote, the ignoring of any multiple questions multiple times, the silly “landshark” rhetoric, are signs of poverty in the argument. Someone with facts on their side can afford to present the material accurately and in a rational manner; your failure to do so is why even those who more or less agree with you find your posts … problematic.
I didn’t ask anything of you.
The only thing you seem to be able to provide is misrepresentation of of quotes and data, which I’m never looking for. Your intellectual honesty on this matter is bottom of the barrel and at this point you do your own side more harm then good, so stick around and keep blogging in this thread so everyone knows what the proponents of breed specific legislation really look like.
I’m interested in hearing your views on whether this applies to ALL court-upheld law. Tell me, is EVERY law upheld in a court to be raised to the level of scientific fact to be used in debates regarding biology, animal behaviorism, or other factual matters?
And that’s terrible, given that pit bulls are significantly less dangerous than a great many things that remain unregulated or poorly regulated. But of course, any amount of human misery (as people are forced to choose between beloved family pets and their homes) is quite acceptable to you as long as it is upheld by a federal court. Tell me, what do you think is going to happen to all of these dogs in our current climate of no-kill shelter advocacy?
And what **pulykamell **said: the upshot of the problems of breed identification (that you studiously ignore) is that many/most landlords will simply start banning ALL dogs rather than risk a mis-identification that can be proven before a jury of the twelve dumbest people some shyster can get into a jury box.
That’s redtail23’s point, but I do agree with it.
The posts are right next to each other! 
Mea maxima culpa.
For the record, I didn’t say the Maryland law was a *good *law or not. Merely that the Federal Court wasn’t necessarily agreeing with the law in as much as they were refusing to overturn it.
But playing devil’s advocate here: We have a type of dog that is responsible for the vast majority of fatal dog attacks. Banning said dog type would seem to be a reasonable first step. To over-turn the ban, one would think that you’d need to prove that the dogs weren’t actually responsible for the fatal dog attacks.
So far, the only arguments I’ve heard are 1) The dogs were mis-identified! Prove they were pit types!, 2) There’s no scientific evidence that the breed is inherently dangerous, and actually the breed is actually very gentle and loving! and 3) It’s not the dog, it’s the crappy owners!
Well, regarding 1), I still haven’t seen any cites for rampant mis-identification.
Point 2) doesn’t mean jack and is completely irrelevant since it essentialy concedes the fact that the dogs were in fact responsbile for the deaths.
And point 3), as I said above: If you guys want to say that pit bulls are dangerous because of the owners, fine by me. I’ll just assume that pit bull owners are far more likely to be shitty owners and thus are far more likely to own shitty dogs. And I’ll continue to keep my family far, far away from you and your shitty dogs.