Just curious.
If a Pit Bull is really no more aggressive or dangerous than any other breed (or at least sizeable breed) then why are Pits a favorite for the dog fighting ring?
Seems to me people pick the best tool for the job. If Pits did not have some advantage in physique, aggression, tenacity and so on then why would they be chosen more often than not?
You’re conflating dog aggression with human-targeted aggression. They are two very different things. Pits are great at fighting other dogs, but not so much at fighting people.
You are correct that people pick the best tools for the job. That’s why when people want a good property guardian, personal protection dog, or police (military, etc) dog, that is to say, a dog which will be required to demonstrate suspicion of, and ultimately chase and bite human beings, they choose molossoid-types or herding (including cattle-droving) breeds, depending on the circumstances.
There’s a reason they don’t use bull-breeds. Mostly it’s because for hundreds of years they’ve been heavily pressured against human-aggressive traits, and thus they are terrible at these jobs. It’s possible for a pit dog to, for example, compete in Schutzhund or personal-protection type sports, but they’re not very good at it because they’re just not all that inclined to chase and bite people–that wasn’t ever their job. Similarly, you might be able to train a golden retriever for the job, they’re smart enough and it has been done, but they’re just not very good at it.
Dog aggression stems from more than one source. Partly it’s genetic, but much of it comes from terrible socialization. I spend some time talking about the trait of tenacity (commonly called “gameness” in pit dogs) as well as where dog aggression comes from in this post.
For context, because I know you didn’t allege it, all the talk about “psychosis” was in response to** LHOD**'s earlier claim.
So it’s true, pits are more dog aggressive than other dogs, a point addressed here on page one. However, dog aggression does not equate to added risk of human-targeted aggression. As far as the “physique” issue goes… well, I think I’ve addressed that pretty thoroughly already. There are lots of dogs with big, broad heads and muscular bods, and many much larger, and more physically powerful than a pit dog.
About the idea of “dog fighting” equating “human aggression”, my theory on this is simply that for most of us in normal society, dog fighting is an utterly reprehensible activity… thus in some minds the dogs involved must be just as reprehensible. I think for a lot of people it’s easy to extend that feeling to the belief that a pit dog must then be inclined toward any range of horrific, anti-social behaviors, but a pit dog is no more apt to turn his drive for killing a dog into human aggression, than a foxhound is to turn his drive for killing a fox in the same direction. They’re different drives entirely.
I talked a bit in the last post about purposeful training for human-targeted aggression, and which breeds take to that job most readily. When it comes to the type of “aggression” we’re talking about, dog bite incidents, well, there are a lot of reasons why dogs bite, and most of them aren’t due to “aggression”, per se.
I could respond that I am on my 4th and 5th beagle right now and they never bit anybody. But that is a poor argument because I can not speak for all beagles. That is why the anecdotal stories of posters about their perfect pits is a waste. Stats are against you. Pits are the the worst biters around.
http://www.stltoday.com/blogzone/st-louis-crime-beat/2009/11/02/alton-cops-kill-pit-bull-wound-second-taser-a-third/ This is practically a daily story in the news. In Detroit there are so many pits used in fighting ,the Humane Society and the cops put them down.
Sigh. I guess sometimes you just have to throw in the towel. Some ignorance refuses to be fought.
Just out of curiosity, where in any of this discussion have I relied on “anecdotal stories of posters about their perfect pits” as evidence to support my claims?
Also, I’m still waiting for an answer to the question on whether the CDC and American Veterinary Medical Association are secretly controlled by the pit bull cabal, maybe the dog-fighting branch of the Illuminati? Just wonderin’.
http://lemonzoo.com/funny_videos/20008/Invincible_pit_bull.html This does not happen either.
Oh yeah, this sounds like a real horror-show, I hope those cops make it out of the hospital with some physical capabilities left.
That guy Edwards sounds like a model dog owner, these must absolutely have been savage killing beasts, and despite their owner’s extensive efforts at socialization and obedience training, and despite his every effort to keep the dogs properly contained, the dogs just went loco through no fault of his. It’s in their DNA, you know.
:rolleyes:
This proves that pit bulls are naturally dangerous just about as well as this video proves that all pit dogs are adorable schmoopie-pies. Or, for that matter, that a video of an Iraqi decapitating an American proves that all Iraqis are naturally inclined to go around lopping people’s heads off.
Which is to say, not at all.
I’m Not sure what crocodiles or sharks have to do with this debate but you’re comparing a pit bull against 2 other dogs in an attempt to downplay the ability of the dog to rip and tear flesh. The ability is not in question.
What makes this more dangerous than larger and more powerful breeds is the engrained behavior to go off without warning. Even the mildest pit-bull can exhibit this behavior and it shows up in the percentage of serious attacks. I’ve seen this behavior in puppies and I’ve seen it in dogs I would judge cowardly. When a pit bull goes off, it is a dramatic change of behavior compared to other breeds.
How is this manifested in real life? It is manifested by unforeseen attacks when young children inadvertently trigger this behavior in a familiar setting or a stranger is attacked by a dog as he or she walks by. It is not the reality that these dogs are continuously dangerous, it is the reality that they are more likely than other breeds to attack without apparent warning.
This is similar to why dogs get skunked: When they feel threatened skunks drop to their front elbows and hop back and forth on their hind legs before they spray. Dogs, OTOH, when they want to entice another dog to play, drop to their front elbows and hop back and forth on their hind legs before they lunge playfully. It’s a mistranslation. The kids don’t speak Dog and a misinterpretation is likely.
I’ve seen similar behavior in all breeds of dogs, and I’ve seen a whole lot more fear-biting Dalmations than I have pit dogs. In any case, fear-biting is not genetic, it’s a consequence of poor socialization.
I’m confused. Are we talking about fear biting behavior, or unprovoked (dominance-type) aggression? Are you suggesting they’re interchangeable concepts…? Or that pits are equally notoriously common biters because as a breed they’re fearful and cowardly, and also because they’re hyper-aggressive? I’m having a hard time following your reasoning, here.
Are you trying to tell me that you truly believe an overwhelming percentage of that 4.7 million bite incidents per year involve pit bull dogs? If they’re such savage killers, why are there only a very small handful of fatalities a year attributed to them, when according to you, multiple millions of them are roaming every American neighborhood, attacking savagely without provocation in unOgly numbers?
The thing is, you’re right about young children inadvertently triggering biting behavior, but you’re wrong about the breed correlation. Children don’t have any better ability to communicate with a fear-biting sheltie than they do a fear-biting pit.
Oh look, our old pal, Urban Legend #2! It had been so long.
I have a question about bite force.
I have grown up with German Shepherds (or Shiloh Shepherds which is nearly the same thing) my whole life. To be sure they can bite hard and you do not want to be on the receiving end of a serious GSD bite.
That said, looking at the video linked earlier with the Pit Bull licking a baby bunny, I cannot help but be struck by the massive musculature in that dog’s head and jaws. My GSDs, powerful as they could be, were nowhere near muscled like that.
It just seems amazing to me to think my GSD has a more powerful bite.
Or is it the reverse and perhaps where the “locking jaw” thing comes from? They of course do not have a locking jaw but all those muscles makes it especially difficult to pry the dog’s jaws off something it does not want to let go of.
Dunno…I cannot imagine all that muscle is just show and achieves nothing.
Actually, that’s not why I posted it at all. I posted it in response to the contention that they have a massively more powerful bite than other breeds of dogs.
The rest of the stats were just to forestall the inevitable “OMG pits have 348946093lbs PSI bite power!!!” urban legend, because (believe it or not) plenty of people in the world believe that a pit dog can bite with more force than a crocodile or a shark.
I don’t downplay the ability of any dog to rip and tear flesh, which is a particular difference between experienced dog handlers and the average public, who frequently think a lab couldn’t hurt a flea.
Sure they have a strong bite, and some have more muscle-y jaws than others. They have no more muscle and no physically stronger a bite than most of these breeds. Also, AmStaffs’ “braincase”, the part of the skull between their ears and from stop to occiput is proportionally much wider than their muzzle. Because Sharky’s muzzle is small, it makes the rest of his skull look proportionately massive. An APBT’s muzzle is broader and a little longer, fading more gradually into the skull, like so --it significantly reduces the “bulging muscle” effect around the cheeks.
I can show pit bull bites ,pictures and stories without end. If you can match me with as many with other dogs, I will be convinced Pits are just regular dogs. But you can not. If you watch the news you see stories quite often of pits attacking postal workers, cops and kids. It is a common story. They just are not regular dogs. Sorry.
I should say that I don’t know that Sharky’s of AmStaff background, but of the spectrum of pit-type dogs, that “bulging jaw muscle” effect is more pronounced in some types of pit dogs than others because of the differences in skull conformation I described.
I can show examples of African American people committing crimes without end, in fact, a huge percentage of convicts and prisoners in our system are African-American. If you can match me with as many suburban white teenagers committing crimes, I will be convinced Black people are just regular people. But you can not. If you watch the news you see stories quite often of black people committing crimes. It’s a common story. They’re just not regular people. Sorry.
See how that works? There are lots of reasons why crimes committed by thug-looking guys get reported more frequently than crimes committed by geeky white kids. There are lots of reasons why urban African American teenagers may be more likely to end up in the prison system. All are social and economic. None are genetic.
Oh, and hey, what about that secret Pit Bull Cabal that runs the CDC? I was thinking, maybe the Rockefellers are the ones who started it, and maybe they purposely genetically engineered pit dogs to bite people, and maybe they injected all pit dogs with H1N1 so that when they bite they can secretly spread the global depopulation pandemic. Also, maybe they shoot bees out of their mouth when they bark.
Not sure you can put it all down to essentially an optical illusion. I can see how head/muzzle shape can change the impression of this to an extent. However, I have played with a Sharky-like dog before and certainly played with my GSDs. If you grab my GSD’s head and rub her cheeks there is just not the sense of muscle there that there is in the Sharky-like dog. The muscle is there in both of course, but the sense of mass is distinctly different.
Maybe it is the mind playing tricks because it “looks” like that so we establish a cognitive bias. Not so sure though…I have worked in animal shelters and been around my share of various breeds. Sure seems different.
Heh. I didn’t “put it all down to essentially an optical illusion”. Did you miss my first sentence? Not all pit dogs have equal muscling around the jaws, and there are quite a few breeds with equal or greater skull musculature. Additionally, in some pit dogs the visual effect is more pronounced than in others, because of the differences in skull conformation I described.
Here lies the crux of the thread. Your post was not of a dog attack by a lab but of one trying to help (or so the family says - insert grain of salt here).
I can only react to my personal observations and statistics. There is no way in hell I would leave a toddler alone with a pit bull no matter how loveable it appears to be. Many many times I’ve seen pit bulls and pit bull mixes go off and every time I’m amazed at both the lack of warning and the severity of the attack. It’s not the only breed I have reservations about but it’s pretty high on the list.
