Pit Bull Video

IMO, the only people that support BSL are the ones that don’t know anything about dogs. It is ALWAYS the owner’s fault if the dog misbehaves in any way - it has NOTHING to do with the breed. At all. Zero, zilch, nada, nix. The problem is that too many dog owners have no idea what they’re doing.
There is no dog attack problem. It is media hype - newspapers love to report on dog attacks because people are afraid of them.
Unfortunately we have BSL in Germany, too. They don’t kill our dogs, but they make it very hard to keep them. Luckily there is a system where you can have your dog’s character tested - if it passes, it won’t be considered a combat dog. My dog passed this without a problem, because he is the most gentle and loving dog imaginable. Still we face hostility from others on a daily basis. Several neighbors in our apartment building have conspired to mob us into giving away the dog. They went as far as accusing us of letting the dog crap onto the stairway.

As someone who has been bitten at a very young age - and having been afraid of dogs all my life, I have to come to appreciate dogs (from a safe distance) in the last few years.

Also having grown a bit bigger than when I was 3, I feel more comfortable around even bigger dogs. I must admit though that living in the UK, I see the occasional Bull Terrier (yes, I played the recognition game), and indeed they already scare me. Not necessarily because of their breed, but because there are certain physical characteristics (read their athleticism) about them which will make it so much harder to subdue them if the attack.

I understand the attraction of an athletic dog, and having had animals all my life, I do understand the strong attachment people have to their pets. And - yes, I do understand that the problem is normally not on the dog end of the lead. But there lies the crux: it is the humans who create the problem, and it should be solved on the human side. But as we can’t forbid dangerous people, I fear the regulation would have to be on the dogs’ side.

The recent case here in the UK demonstrates that - the owner of the dog had been warned for its violent behavior, and it was later identified as an illegal pit bull type dog under British law.

Whether banning the breed 15 years back was a rational decision can be questioned, but the owner’s non-compliance with the law was relevant. I’m pretty sure that he was thinking ‘I can handle my dog, and he’d never do anything to the child’. Indeed, if he had owned a less athletic dog, it might have still attacked the girl, but its chances of killing it, and seriously injuring an adult woman who tried to save her, would have been a lot less.

Also, the British law not only forbids a variety of breeds, but also dogs ‘appearing… to be bred for fighting or to have the characteristics of a type bred for that purpose’.
Sources:

So, in a nutshell, at the moment, and with limited chances to control stupid people, I haven’t heard of a better alternative to controlling the breed. But I’m willing to be educated. Any views?

Makkun

P.S.:

Oh, yeah, one more thing:

[quote]apwsearch wrote:
October Girl, you are an ignorant piece of garbage.[/quote]

That quote alone shows considerable inability to wield a civilized argument; your general view on the topic may be very valid, and you may disagree with October Girl’s posts, but your choice of words (and your subsequent posts) has weakened your argument. Is that really the image you want to project?

[quote]OctoberGirl wrote:
mostly garbage…
[/quote]

Ok, tell me. Exactly what is your point? Spell out for me.

bushidobadboy,

Thank you for your honest account. Good post.

[quote]bushidobadboy wrote:
[…]Anyway, the other aspect of Thorns character that is mildly concerning is that if I discipline him physically, he will growl at me. This worried me the first time, but now I respect it for what it is, ie “I’ve got my pride, and you are knocking it” Kind of thing.[/quote]

Now I guess you are a big man and you would be able to handle your dog. But what I know from maintaining discipline with dogs (a branch of my family used to breed Giant Schnautzers - great for a kid who was afraid of dogs…), I would fear this as a challenge to your leadership.

May I ask, have you ever seen a professional regarding this? I know this can be a scary thing to do (I do understand that there is a lot of uninformed fear about dogs like yours), but I would guess in the interest of your dog it might be really good to address the growling issue.

Yeay to that. Especially the latter part. It would be nice to see this type of breed go more often with less chavy owners. That would help with the general image of the breeds as well, and strengthen the impression that not only the ‘wrong’ type of people go for dogs like this.

A whole ‘yeay’ to that. Vetting the owner - and consistently checking up on him/her is definitely the way to go. Of course that brings up questions regarding reliable ID of owners (ID cards anyone?) and consequent action in case an owner let’s a dog go ‘bad’ at the first instance.

In order to make my stance regarding breed based legislation more precise - and having seen the OP’s video: I am not aware that there are moves towards a mass culling of cute family dogs.

The UK legislation has been targeting breeding, ie. that certain dogs may not be allowed to procreate anymore. Only dogs that turn aggressive and hurt people are destroyed, others where left to live out their peaceful lives. So as heartbreaking the video was, at least for the UK, it’s not valid.

Makkun

[quote]OctoberGirl wrote:

Your response really seems as if you didn’t even bother to read the article or the link before you responded.[/quote]

I read everything you copied and pasted in your post. I was supposed to wade through even more tedious crap by clicking on links? No thanks.

[quote]What a shame.

If you had clicked the link you would have seen in the articles it does list dog bites, the breed, the areas, the age groups, all that info.

So yes, the answers and the research is there.[/quote]

How interesting (and telling), then, that the portion of the article you pasted singles out death statistics and omits “all that info”.

I’m a lazy slob, so answer me this: Did the first sentence I questioned regarding “genetic hard wiring” have any info backing it up, or like I surmised, was it just unfounded fluff meant to shock the reader and grab their attention?

[quote]But I realize some people already have their minds made and don’t need any other information.
[/quote]

Tell me about it!

On a side note, I couldn’t distinguish where the articles’ text ended and yours began. You might want to make that clearer in the future so you aren’t misquoted.

[quote]OctoberGirl wrote:

I do know that the majority of owners for that breed, mixed breed, assumed to be aggressive dog, are the type of owners that want that dog to be mean and want them to attack.

[/quote]
Really? Can you tell me more about myself that I don’t know?

I feel better about your opinion knowing that you’ve actually met the majority of people that own pitbulls. I mean, you have right? Because that’s quite the statement and I’d like to see you prove it.

sorry, could not resist…
here it goes:


BTW, the little boy in the earlier picture is my gf’s nephew, a 4 year old with severe autism. he routinely pulls joker’s tail, uses his back as a drag-racing strip for his toy cars, and grabs and pulls at his jowls.


cant stop myself now, i am on a roll…

[quote]apwsearch wrote:
Listen.

You are the professional equivalent of little man’s syndrome.

For me to argue with you would be akin to me taking on one of my administrative assistants. You are a secretary (paralegal) who wishes she were an attorney (CEO).

My point is you are obviously good at research (details), but are lacking in practical application.

I suspect you had an assignment which lead you to conduct research parallel to your post.

That’s OK. However, don’t come on this forum and try to make a play at anything beyond a superficial level of knowledge because your post clearly proves otherwise.

Tell you what. Just admit you made a stupid fucking post and go away.

Per my recollection, this is the first time our paths have crossed and will likely be the last.

You are not all that memorable, anyway. I suspect I will have forgotten about this by tomorrow am.
[/quote]

I’d love to know how your claim of being the “CEO of three different companies” (which means nothing) directly applies to an argument about animals. Are you, infact, the CEO of Petsmart? Because if you are, I’ve got a hell of a product pitch.

Listen, it’s an advanced external imaging device, and what you do is you put it around the collar of your dog and if it’s a pitbull and you’re living in an area where they’re banned and someone walks by it creates the illusion that your dog is a bichon frise. Tell me if you’re interested, the patent is already in the works.

Judging by the level of self-validation you feel as if you have to provide without request in an attempt to legitimize yourself in a conversation about dogs on an internet forum for weightlifting I’m pretty surprised you haven’t torn a rotator cuff patting yourself on the back yet.

I too believe that breed is irrelevant and that pitbulls are directly targeted by this because they have an intimidating aesthetic appearance, and I think any laws banning the animals will only make the assholes that train dogs to fight find another breed to utilize.

I’d just thought I’d throw my hat in the ring since I like octobergirl, and while she may be a lowly paralegal wading through the seedy depths of obscurity with a below 7 figure income while you sit upon high in a throne made of gold and diamonds eating fine caviar and getting blown by SI cover models I am not a researcher, and I am an owner of a company. Only one, though. I guess I’ll have to create two other companies and get the paperwork filed to compete with you. After I’m done with that, we’re going to have a race to see who can go into as many threads as possible and talk about little man’s syndrome while speaking on the topic of how spectacular we are.

My dick is huge, by the way.


more!

[quote]malonetd wrote:
OctoberGirl wrote:
I do know that the majority of owners for that breed, mixed breed, assumed to be aggressive dog, are the type of owners that want that dog to be mean and want them to attack.

And how do you know this? Another study?

That’s my dog, Ace. He’s an American Pitbull Terrier. I got him because I wanted an athletic, very intelligent, agile, and loyal dog. My choice had nothing to do with aggression or attacking. He’s never even nipped or growled at anyone yet.

I can understand the fear and distrust of that breed if irresponsible owners are training attack dogs using that type of dog.

I know the majority of Ferrari owners speed and consistently break the speed limit as well as other driving laws. I can definitely understand the fear and mistrust if one sees a Ferrari driving down the street. These cars should be outlawed.[/quote]

You know, it’s funny, but I was thinking this same thing along the lines of H2s last night after I got home; oversized, heavy, steel behemoths that, even at normal speeds have the potential to obliterate smaller vehicles and cause a greater level of harm to other drivers.

Do I think anyone needs an 8-mile-to-the-gallon, non-functional copy of a military vehicle to get around the suburbs? Hell no! I just don’t think that my opinion should be made into law (shamelessly ripping off Bill Maher here).

The point is, the general public would go nuts about infringement of civil liberties (and they would be right) if a vehicle were recalled solely because of the propensity for driver misuse, yet very few seem to have a problem banning certain breeds of dog for the same reason. But hey, the statistics say…

There is much talk bantered about in the lay press concerning pitbulls and variant breeds’ “genetic” predisposition for aggressiveness. I’ll believe this when I see a real, peer-reviewed scientific study that isolates and identifies these dogs’ “aggressive gene(s)”.

Until then, I’ll file that in the same category as urban legends like pitbulls having 1600 psi bite strength and “locking jaws”.

Almost forgot…

[quote]malonetd wrote:

Good post, Digital.[/quote]

Word.

Dweezil,

[quote]Dweezil wrote:
[…]My dick is huge, by the way.[/quote]

Ha ha, I thought exactly the same, but didn’t write it. :slight_smile:

Makkun

[quote]makkun wrote:
Dweezil,

Dweezil wrote:
[…]My dick is huge, by the way.

Ha ha, I thought exactly the same, but didn’t write it. :slight_smile:

Makkun[/quote]

You thought Dweezil’s dick is huge?

:wink: