Certain ones are evil?

General Chatter
1

This may be a pretty pointless thread, but I’ve actually been thinking about this for quite a while. It has to do with something they’re trying to do where I live, and after reading about it in the paper enough, I’ve just started thinking WAY too much about it. Time to get some input, I suppose.

But it concerns how certain places (in the United States at least, dunno if they do it anywhere else) are trying to ban certain breeds of dogs. Specifically, pit bulls (which I guess I’ll use for this, although they’ve also started targeting Rotweilers and other breeds). They set up a deadline, and if the dogs aren’t gone in a certain time, they haul them all up and kill them. They say it’s for the safety of others, but… How? The argument for it is that pit bulls were bred for fighting, and that fighting and killing are in their blood. And that no matter what you do, you can’t breed it out of them. That is their purpose, that is what they always will do, so nobody is safe around them.

Well… There’s a breed called the Rhodesian Ridgeback. It was bred to kill lions. People keep it as a pet, and they are never targeted for doing anything violent. And I’d imagine that a dog bred to kill a lion would be a lot stronger and more violent than a dog bred just to fight. But no, they bred the violence out of them. Why not for all breeds?

Seems a bit uneducated to me. I’ve done some research and found that an average of three people are killed by pit bulls each year. True pit bulls. A lot of people can’t tell the difference between them and other breeds.

A lot of people say that they are not all violent, but (because of their breed’s history), they have the potential to be violent. But, isn’t this true of any breed of dog? Or cat, or bird, or lizard? Or humans? I mean… If they want to make sense, they’d have to just outlaw the animal kingdom as a whole, wouldn’t they? They all have the potential to be violent, don’t they?

Does it make any sense to ban certain breeds of dogs? I mean, I’m not an animal-rights activist by any means–I like them, but I think animals are animals-- but I can’t find any sense to this. No matter what argument they use, there’s always something that proves them wrong. It just seems like some mindless law they came up with, like the law in Seattle that says it’s illegal for a fish to swim backwards on public transportation. Just a very extreme, senseless law.

But maybe I’m looking too much into it.

(And yes. I was gone for a while. You may take me to court over my truancy now.)

2

No it doesn’t make sense. As far I’ve seen there aren’t ‘dangerous dogs’ there are ‘dangerous owners’. Any dog can be vicious and dangerous if not trained a raised right or mistreated. In almost all dog attack cases I’ve seen the dog was just reacting how any dog would have if raised/mistreaded how the attacking dog was.

The distorting thing is the the owners most likely to mistreat dogs and people like gang members that want a ‘tough’ dog as a status symbol but care nothing for the dog. They are most likely to get a pit bull for their reputation and then how they treat it makes a vicious dog which makes all the ‘dangerous dog’ crowd go see, we told you they were dangerous…

It’s really stupid, getting rid of certain breeds will do nothing to improve safety, the owners who have dogs like that are what need to be targerted. Until then it’s just treating the symptons and not the disease.

3

Yes, it’s true that pit bulls were bred for fighting. Yes, there are other breeds that were bred for similar purposes (sharpeis, mastiffs, the ridgebacks, the original bulldogs, etc). The problem partially lies in perception, and the other, the projected public image by the owners themselves.

Due to the disproportional coverage of the media on pit bull attacks (or the perceived pit bull attacks… most people can’t differentiate between a pit and a cane corso, for example), people already have a negative image of the breed. Couple that with the fact that a vast majority of breeders always advertise their dogs with chain leashes, bling, standing in an aggressive stance, etc, it further feeds the image. In addition, there are too many people out there who produce impure pit breeds (you can tell the difference between a true pit bull and a diluted mix by the shape of their head) and those who breed them for guard work and/or dog fighting.

In addition, the dogs need to be socialized properly from birth. Without the proper socializing, a pit bull will be much more likely to injure someone due to their sheer strength and their loyal nature.

It’s sad for the breed, but unless the breeders themselves try to do something to clean up the image of the breed and fight the legislation, nobody will.

(Oh, and there’s a bit of a flaw in your argument as well. You can’t just make a blind comparison between animals, or claim that “only 3 people a year die.” How does that compare to other breeds and/or other animals? You should present the information in context…)

4

Three people on average, in the United States. I got it while reading this thing on “both sides of the argument” article. I’ll look through and see if I can find it, and now that I think about it, I shouldn’t have used it. I took something out of context that was already… Taken… Out of context. Not a smart move. But I’m actually too dense to realize these things when I say them. Erm… My mistake.

And if by blind comparison, you mean the “potential to be violent” part, all I was trying to say was that anything–not just a pit bull–has the potential to be violent. I mean, maybe not life-threatening, but anything can be.

If that’s not what you’re talking about… You lost me, and I’ll concede that I’m not very smart.

5

Oh, no… I’m not saying that. You are very right to question this. My brother used to work for Dog Fancy magazine, so he dealt with breeders and stuff all the time. This was a sore spot for him…

But, what I meant by “blind comparison” was simply just for your edification. It doesn’t help support your argument by only presenting a single figure like that without context. For example, if you were to say that pit bulls were responsible for only 3 deaths, which is the average amongst dog breeds of a similar size and weight, it would make more sense. But, if no other dog breed, for example, killed anybody in years, then that 3 begins to look a lot bigger.

Get my drift? :slight_smile:

6

Ooooh. Yup. I understand.

Heh, I’ve got to work on things like this.

7

alavaliant said about what I was going to, so I’ll just tell a simple story. I personally always had a negative image of Rotweilers since every one I’ve ever encountered seemed vicious, loud and agressive. And for some reason their owners usually have more than one.

Then several years ago I met a friend’s Rotweiler, Demon, so named for being phenomenally obstinate and rambunctious. And yes the loyalty of the breed them makes them innately agressive watchdogs, but after a couple days of getting to know each other I discovered him to be one of the sweetest and funniest pets I’ve ever seen.

Truly a breed cannot be blamed for their innate potential, that’d be like imprisoning people over 6’ 4" who can bench 400+ pounds for being dangerous. Owners should be held accountable for their pets actions in every way, if someone can have their past behavior and transgressions considered in a rape or murder trial then the treatment and training of a pet should be used to try it’s owner for manslaughter.

I can’t say I know to what degree that is the case yet, if at all though.

8

It’s true they should hold how the person treats the pet into consideration. But every time I’ve heard of a trial that has to do with a dog attacking/killing a person, and the owner is punished, I’ve only heard one of two things truly considered…

a.) If the person actually owned the dog.
b.) If it was illegally bred.

And that’s about it.

9

Actually, the famous case from San Francisco in which a couple of Cane Corsos killed a woman, the owners were tried for negligent homicide, which is what made it so controversial.

I believe they were found guilty in the end, as the argument was made that they knew how vicious/dangerous their dogs were, and that the dogs had tried to attack people before, and they did nothing about it.

10

But it’s uncommon for them to try somebody for that in these cases though.