Just when you think you’ve seen it all, something new and even more bizarre happens. There is no fucking way this is possible, and we’ve taken this pc shit far enough. I would like this councilbitch to explain how this fucking dog could be racist, based on ONE incident. If anyone should be put to sleep it should be her!
That councilwoman is so incredibly lame that I’ll never walk again.
Well, to suggest the dog is racist is pretty stupid…okay, very stupid. But still, according to the article, the dog attacked a child who wasn’t a suspect:
Foolish accusations of racism aside, it seems to me that needs to be adressed. I don’t think the dog needs to be put to sleep, but perhaps it shouldn’t be a police dog?
I read that, and thought WTF???
Some people do anything for publicity. I hope she gets bitten by a cat!
See, I always knew that Samuel J. Fuller was a man ahead of his time.
Of course, I imagine it is possible for a dog to distinguish between whites and blacks . . .
Agreed Ferrous, I just cant believe that people would take her seriously. Now they will hold hearings on this, new protocols, perhaps some legislation will be introduced, etc, all because some dumb bitch thinks dogs can be racist.
This is our taxpayer money at work gahhhhhh!
i had a racist dog once. no shit. he was given to me when he was about 6 mo old. husky, real nice and friendly. would ONLY bark at a certain group of people. weirdest damn thing i ever saw! he displayed these charisteristics when i lived in LA. I lived in a “culturally diverse” part of town, and this dog was surrounded by all types of people, but he managed to single out one group to bark at.
he later moved to live with friends of mine up in the mountains, and the only time he barked then was when there was a bear around. (what the hell does this mean?)
strangest dog i’ve ever seen (the only one i have ever liked, by the way). did not act like any other dog i have ever seen. very nice, quite, didn’t act all spastic like regular dogs, very well behaved and intelligent, but dammit, i swear Lobo was a racist!
he died some years ago, and i miss him.
I understood that dogs have been trained to attack a specific skin colour, such as in the film “White Dog”.
http://www.austinchronicle.com/film/pages/movies/1698.html
http://us.imdb.com/Title?0084899
I had taken this for a real-life phenomenon, perhaps it was just fictitious though?
My dog growing up was a stick-thin boxer with the disposition of a pet bunny. She was a total sweetheart who used to share my popsicles and sleep in my bed. Despite this, whenever we had black visitor–or even a black pizza guy–she turned into a foaming, growling, irrational hellbeast. Every time.
So it seems to me that the suggestion that dog has a racial bias isn’t entirely implausible.
bella
Like gatopescado, I lived with a dog (not mine, but a roommate’s) who was by all other accounts a cool ass dog, but was racist and sexist–she hated Black men (well, more specifically, she hated men with dark skin). The only one she’d tolerate was the one who sometimes delivered pizza to our place.
Similarly, I had a college roommate who said that her family dog didn’t like White people (we joked about whether or not Nugget would have barked and growled at Dinah Shore 
).
I’ve always assumed, in these cases, that something happened to the dog. For example, in the case of Roommate #1’s dog, who was found on the highway as a stray, we always figured that perhaps she had been abused by a man (or men) with dark skin.
But who knows…? Dogs can be inexplicably whack, just like people. And the police dog in question could in fact be a freak who (for whatever reason) doesn’t like Black people, or kids, or people who smell like banana pudding…
That said, I agree with Ferrous. How about getting to the heart of the issue, which is that a police dog should be better trained/more controllable? Maybe this dog would be better suited elsewhere–like in a nice, suburban White family with no kids and no pudding.
Hunh. Okay, I may have to revise my assumptions on whether or not a dog can be racist…
How weird and sad.
Or perhaps I should have said “racist”. With quote marks. I rather suspect, as Auntie Em speculates, some sort of negative conditioning occured. It’s probably a mistake to equate it with human-type hate-based racism.
Well assuming this phenomenon is possible, how are the dogs determining race? If its by scent wouldn’t that be difficult with the myriad of soaps, colognes, hygiene’s, etc? I wasn’t aware that different races emitted some universal scent. If it were by sight, would it know the difference between a black guy, a Moroccan, and a white guy with a mean tan? I just think the dog was screwed up, I just don’t see how this works.
How can you tell the difference between a black guy, a Moroccan, and a white guy with a mean tan World Eater? By looking at them and seeing the difference.
I’m with you, Dude. Although I don’t think that it even has to be negative conditioning, necessarily. For example, the college roommate’s dog, Nugget, grew up in a family of Black people with dark skin. She didn’t get out much–just stayed in the yard or in the house, and relied on my roommate’s family (and their friends, the majority of whom were Black as well) for about 99% of her contact with humans.
So when a White person came walking into the house, Nugget was probably just thinking, “What the hell is THAT???” and wondering if she’d stumbled into a scene from Omega Man.
And frankly, aren’t similar concepts at issue when it comes to human racism? It’s more complex, with people, of course (and hopefully tempered somewhat by the ability to apply logic), but overall, I’d say that prejudice is based largely on negative conditioning (i.e., “one of 'em raped my daughter–those people are no good”), and/or unfamiliarity (i.e., those people don’t even speak English… and I heard they eat bugs!").
Of course, this could just be the mistaken application of human thought to doggy brains…
re:how can they tell?
From here, about halfway down. Suggests to me that a dog–with infinitely greater scent capabilities than a human–would be able to smell the difference.
I’m with you, Dude. Although I don’t think that it even has to be negative conditioning, necessarily. For example, the college roommate’s dog, Nugget, grew up in a family of Black people with dark skin. She didn’t get out much–just stayed in the yard or in the house, and relied on my roommate’s family (and their friends, the majority of whom were Black as well) for about 99% of her contact with humans.
So when a White person came walking into the house, Nugget was probably just thinking, “What the hell is THAT???” and wondering if she’d stumbled into a scene from Omega Man.
And frankly, aren’t similar concepts at issue when it comes to human racism? It’s more complex, with people, of course (and hopefully tempered somewhat by the ability to apply logic), but overall, I’d say that prejudice is based largely on negative conditioning (i.e., “one of 'em raped my daughter–those people are no good”), and/or unfamiliarity (i.e., those people don’t even speak English… and I heard they eat bugs!").
Of course, this could just be the mistaken application of human thought to doggy brains…
And World Eater makes a good point, which is why I amended my statement about my roommate’s dog, who hated men with dark skin. This usually applied to Black men, although she was known to lunge at East Indian men, and (on the flip side) was as pleased as punch to meet one of my boyfriends, who was Black but had light skin.
As for scent, I agree with you there, too, but I was told by a (White) man I met once that Black people do, in fact, have a distinct odor (one which he found unpleasant, though I daresay he’d have boinked ME in a heartbeat; I don’t know if that would mean that I don’t have the typical Black Smell[sup]TM[/sup], or if he’d be willing to put aside his olfactory preferences for a piece of my ass). 
At any rate, I think you’re right in that the factors by which a dog might determine who he dislikes really have nothing to do with race. Still, if a dog chooses, say, dark skin as a basis for deciding which folks to bite, he could wind up with a bad rep.
I’m with you, Dude. Although I don’t think that it even has to be negative conditioning, necessarily. For example, the college roommate’s dog, Nugget, grew up in a family of Black people with dark skin. She didn’t get out much–just stayed in the yard or in the house, and relied on my roommate’s family (and their friends, the majority of whom were Black as well) for about 99% of her contact with humans.
So when a White person came walking into the house, Nugget was probably just thinking, “What the hell is THAT???” and wondering if she’d stumbled into a scene from Omega Man.
And frankly, aren’t similar concepts at issue when it comes to human racism? It’s more complex, with people, of course (and hopefully tempered somewhat by the ability to apply logic), but overall, I’d say that prejudice is based largely on negative conditioning (i.e., “one of 'em raped my daughter–those people are no good”), and/or unfamiliarity (i.e., those people don’t even speak English… and I heard they eat bugs!").
Of course, this could just be the mistaken application of human thought to doggy brains…
And World Eater makes a good point, which is why I amended my statement about my roommate’s dog, who hated men with dark skin. This usually applied to Black men, although she was known to lunge at East Indian men, and (on the flip side) was as pleased as punch to meet one of my boyfriends, who was Black but had light skin.
As for scent, I agree with you there, too, but I was told by a (White) man I met once that Black people do, in fact, have a distinct odor (one which he found unpleasant, though I daresay he’d have boinked ME in a heartbeat; I don’t know if that would mean that I don’t have the typical Black Smell[sup]TM[/sup], or if he’d be willing to put aside his olfactory preferences for a piece of my ass).
At any rate, I think you’re right in that the factors by which a dog might determine who he dislikes really have nothing to do with race. Still, if a dog chooses, say, dark skin as a basis for deciding which folks to bite, he could wind up with a bad rep.
In the piece there at FoxNews, it does say that the dog could have had a problem differentiating between ‘good guys’ and ‘bad guys’ in the middle of chaos and reacted to movement.
The article doesn’t specifically mention it (but the local news might when I get home), so I have no idea if the little boy turned and ran when he saw the dog come out of the car.
I’ll be interested to see how this one unfolds … and whether the national coverage differs from the local.