I’m not a dog breed expert, but…
The other day an agressive dog that looked like a pitbull, suddenly lunged at me barking loudly… It was about 10ft away from me but still scared the shit out of me
The owner yanked the dog back on its leash and i thought, “FML, the only thing that saved me from a deadly mauling was a 3/4 inch wide piece of nylon with a metal clip the guy bought off amazon for $5”
“But my little velvet hippo couldn’t hurt anyone!”
Hippos are super aggressive, territorial, and will bite a crocodiles in half. It’s amazing that’s supposed to be a cute, disarming nickname for a breed notorious for the same traits.
It’s also the most deadliest land mammal, the hippo that is.
Pretty sure that is technically humans, but hippos are definitely a second.
To be fair most won’t, but they definitely can and do.
Especially when they are jaws on legs that are more inclined compared to other dogs.
Yup. I’ve crunched the numbers before, and it’s something like 1 in 10,000 pit bulls will attack a human or other companion animal every year. It’s not likely for any given pit to attack a person (which I can anecdotally support–they’re obnoxiously friendly and loving in my experience), but it’s also like 10 times more than the next most vicious breed. In my opinion, it’s not worth euthanizing every member of the breed, but it is worth neutering every one. We don’t need dog breeds, especially ones responsible for over half of the violent attacks on people and other animals.
Of course, I’m in support of neutering all companion animals to reduce the stray population and ease the strain on shelters, regardless of breed or species. Breed specific laws are only one step towards fixing the larger problem.
Of course, I’m in support of neutering all companion animals to ease the stray population and the strain on shelters, regardless of breed or species. Breed specific laws are only one step towards fixing the larger problem.
Bob Barker is smiling down on you from heaven for this
I must be unlucky because I have yet not run into one that didn’t try to kill me if not for the muzzle or them being a puppy or a fence.
Don’t you think that pit bull attacks are dangerous and cause medical trauma which leads to reporting of the attack? I think it’s likely that they don’t attack people more than any other dog breed. I was bit by a black lab mix. I didn’t report it to anyone. If it had been a pit bull I probably would have needed medical attention.
It’s actually not the strongest bite. And not the only breed with a locking jaw. It is the breed with a reputation though…
A reputation of the most kills.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_fatal_dog_attacks_in_the_United_States
Yes. Built by shitty people doing shitty things to these dogs because they like that fact about them.
As you’ve pointed out the dogs are perfectly capable of being lovey couch potatoes. The problem isn’t the dog it’s the people. The breed has a reputation. And the people who like that are just going to move on to the next breed after this one is gone.
You literally looked at the numbers they produced, ignored that and locked onto a tiny portion of their comment.
You, ma’am, are not arguing in good faith.
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We can, by looking at their kill ratio.
Human serial killers get the same treatment.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_fatal_dog_attacks_in_the_United_States
The actual issue is that’s it’s a degenerative disease in dogs of similar breeds. At some point they get old and less able to recognize friend from foe. That might be ok if it weren’t for the jaws you mentioned.
Exactly.
I’d go one step farther and even say if they even had the same amount of attacks as other dogs, had no possible mental diseases, and all want to caring homes I would still put restrictions/ban on them.
They are just too large to handle, too big of a bite to brush off, and end up in dog attacks a lot. That’s enough for me.
I’m gonna need a source on that.
Cerebellar Cortical Disintegration or Degenerative Myelopathy could exacerbate a situation.
I unexpectedly found this on the genetic mapping of aggression which seemed interesting: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4977763/
That’s a great article…
However the only examples of aggression being related to breed is with Daschands and Yorkies, although the study says that’s likely just to that specific gene also making legs shorter.
While there is a genetic component to aggression, it’s variation is pretty standard amongst all dogs, except the tiny ones who may have accidentally been selected for it.
But someone asked you for a source for a cognitive thing and you just randomly linked an article about how breed doesn’t determine behavior?
Did you know what that article was about before you linked it?___
However, it is also notable that a subset of large breeds carries the chrX reduced-fear/aggression and increased-size variants in perfect LD.
I know reading is hard, friend! I linked that as it was the most interesting thing I found while looking off there were other degenerative diseases common in pitbulls, while not being pitbull specific. Did you think me finding evidence contrary to my beliefs would result in me hiding it?
I’d give you snarky “let me Google that for you” on the degenerative diseases as they’re genuinely interesting, but I guess you’ll never know what they’re about since you can type a comment but not use a search engine.
It’s funny they call them hippos considering that hippos are extremely dangerous and vicious wild animals.
And hippos too are known to turn on their human caretakers out of nowhere.
That’s funny because hippos kill more people than dogs
13000 vs 500 a year. So not really close. But hippos are more dangerous than most people think!
A shitbull owner using a leash, rare combination.
I was walking my dog through my neighborhood once, and one of my stupid ass neighbors had his dog loose in his garage with the door open across the street. When it saw me, it charged at us, barking aggressively. It didn’t attack me, it just stood a few feet away baring its teeth and barking while his overweight owner waddled over to it armed with a sandle. I think it was a labrador.
If it was a pitbull though I’d likely be missing a limb or two today.
not if that is sarcasm or not, but most likely there was no pitull in that that dog.
Based on what?
many many studies have shown that people can breeds apart.
not sarcasm at all…
regardless of breed, this dog looked like he was about to fuck up my whole day, so my point stands
as does my point.
blame the owner not the dog
Blame both if the dog is a known dangerous breed.
Blame the parents not the serial killer.
Unsurprising. Large “power breeds” like pit bulls I have always found questionable to have.
No restrictions or licenses? No muzzles at least?
A good thing they banned them.
Though I still dislike the outright malice and hate I see when a pit bull in a photo might be doing nothing but staring at a sunset. A bit hate crazy.
Literally all I’m saying is that the vast majority of pit bulls aren’t violent. I fucking said I’m in favor of spaying and neutering the breed out of existence because the few that do become violent are excessively dangerous.
If you’re a dog owner and you’re paying attention, then your personal experience should include the following truth: any dog can go postal. If you then combine this with the knowledge that pitbulls are much more deadly than other dogs when being agressive, then you must reach the conclusion that this breed should be banned, even though that is admittedly a sad conclusion.
Pitbulls are not the deadliest dog out there. Not by a long shot. They’re just the ones people like to make aggressive.
Except they are, though. They’re bred to be as deadly as possible. This is a verifiable fact.
There are dogs that are bred to help bring down bears. Some asshole breeding for noise and muscle does not make the most dangerous dog.
Pitbulls are the most deadly breed of dog, to humans. This is a solid concrete fact. There are reasons for this, and evidence to back it up. Your thing about bears is irrelevant, unless those dogs have been proven to be more dangerous to humans than pitbulls, which they haven’t.
Sure, just ignore all context. Big number bad. Keep playing whack a mole wondering why the problem never gets fixed.
It’s important to understand what people mean when they say things. These people aren’t saying that pit bulls are more physically capable of killing people than any other breed, they’re saying that they’re responsible for more deaths than any other breed.
It’s a bit like saying the flu is deadler than ebola. Ebola may have a higher mortality rate, but it’s so much less likely to infect people that it has a much smaller kill count.
Then they can say that.
by that logic you would ban every dog on the planet
Every dog on the planet is more aggressive than all other dogs on the planet?
Each more similar than the last!
Literally all I’m saying is that the vast majority of pit bulls aren’t violent. I fucking said I’m in favor of spaying and neutering the breed out of existence because the few that do become violent are excessively dangerous.
I know a handful of pits who have bitten and severely injured people. For your positive anecdote there is a negative to match.
Literally all I’m saying is that the vast majority of pit bulls aren’t violent. I fucking said I’m in favor of spaying and neutering the breed out of existence because the few that do become violent are excessively dangerous.
Technically it is disengenuous to say statistically and then make up a statistic
Literally all I’m saying is that the vast majority of pit bulls aren’t violent. I fucking said I’m in favor of spaying and neutering the breed out of existence because the few that do become violent are excessively dangerous.
Can this possibly be true?
If a dog switches to aggressive mode and stops listening to commands, trying to attack (another dog, a cat, a deer, a bird, a human) that’s what I mean by “going postal”. In most cases they are restrained on leash. The outcome, and the target (for the sake of this argument) are not important. It is not possible to predict accurately when they will do this.Literally all I’m saying is that the vast majority of pit bulls aren’t violent. I fucking said I’m in favor of spaying and neutering the breed out of existence because the few that do become violent are excessively dangerous.
I mean that’s fairly obvious from subtext. If you had, you would most likely be too traumatised to be defending them on an online forum.
If you did you wouldn’t have been alive to say so.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_fatal_dog_attacks_in_the_United_States
People with access to verifiable data overlook the appearance of safety to express a legitimate concern about a breed that’s demonstrably more likely to kill? What dorks!
Literally all I’m saying is that the vast majority of pit bulls aren’t violent. I fucking said I’m in favor of spaying and neutering the breed out of existence because the few that do become violent are excessively dangerous.
My childhood pitbull bit me in the face and I have permanent face scarring from it. I had to get 60+ stitches to reconstruct my face.
It’s not a valid point to say “most don’t attack people” when the breed is much more likely to attack a person compared to other breeds. Then it’s made worse by the fact they’ve been bred to be extra good at attacking.
Literally all I’m saying is that the vast majority of pit bulls aren’t violent. I fucking said I’m in favor of spaying and neutering the breed out of existence because the few that do become violent are excessively dangerous.
Just stop. You can’t even put a decent argument together and you aren’t helping anyone. Please, just stop.
Literally all I’m saying is that the vast majority of pit bulls aren’t violent. I fucking said I’m in favor of spaying and neutering the breed out of existence because the few that do become violent are excessively dangerous.
They have the most kills because they are more likely to attack than any other breed, and more dangerous when they do.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_fatal_dog_attacks_in_the_United_States
Every couple of weeks I feed mine a toddler, it seems to keep the violent tendencies away.
Whoa grab some popcorn folks cause this comment section is a dumpster fire. Do we have a lemmy drama community yet?
How is it a dumpster fire? I don’t see anyone defending the breed.
You summoned one!
I think we should genocide every dog because any dog is more dangerous than no dogs.
Agreed, but lets start with pitbulls
That’s because this isn’t a breed specific problem. Unless that breed is Human. Humans can fuck up any dog on purpose or not and the shitbags who like this breed specifically because it has a reputation will just choose a new breed to fuck up after you ban this one. This has been the pattern of Breed Specific Legislation everywhere it’s been introduced. You can do all of the same aggressive training with a Golden Retriever. And the list of dogs known to have a protective streak is as long as my arm.
That is hilarious. But there is a real problem here. It’s like we just transferred systemic racism to dogs. We create the problem in the stats and then blame the dogs that were abused to do it.
It’s like we just transferred systemic racism to dogs.
I actually saved this into a list of ignorant comments I keep. Is easily top ten material. Comparing the banning of pit bulls to the result of the slave trade is a hell of a comment. Congratulations?
I’m sorry, you think systemic racism stopped when we outlawed most slavery?
Screw the dogs, tell me more about this utopia you live in without modern day systemic racism.
You just compared black people to breeds of dog.
Sit down.
Not to say I agree with him but he didn’t compare those two things at all. He said it’s the same mentality that underlies racism and ‘breedism’ for lack of a better word.
Comparing people to dogs is fucked up. Asian, latinos, etc aren’t “breeds”. There’s also the implication of certain races being more prone to committing crimes. Honestly, both of you stink like racists.
I have a dream where Pitbulls and Chihuahuas can play in the same dog park together.
Dude Chihuahuas are never going to be welcome in the big dog part of the park.
Dog breeds are not comparable to human races. You might as well compare your woodshed to London.
Whoosh. The point is we enable these shitty owners who encourage aggressive behavior then we blame the dog when we set the system up that way.
I mean ban shitty owners from owning another animal, put them in jail for animal abuse, fuck do both. But there is a huge difference in damage between a pitbull attack and say a greyhound.
Whoosh. The dog was bred for a long time to be mean and cause a lot of damage when it was angry.
Dog breeds all exist for a purpose either still relevant or now redundant.
Before you get a dog, understand what that breed exists for. Even the best obedience training may not overcome generations of refined and selected natural instincts.
It’s never the dogs fault. It is always your fault.
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My neighbor has a pit mix and it snarled at me gnashing its teeth once as she walked by. I was just standing there by my car minding my own business barely even acknowledging them. I jump and yell Jesus wtf lady omg. She just made pathetic excuses, he keeps me safe, never does that, it’s fiiiiine etc. Ive told her numerous times she needs to train it at the bare minimum, preferably destroy it. I’ve observed it doing the same to other people as they walk past. I bought pepper spray and look out for them very carefully whenever I go to my car now. I bet it’s just a matter of time before someone gets mauled and I hope it’s not me. Fucking hate those things.
After watching my cop neighbor try to drive a dog away with pepper spray, it’s not going to help much. Even direct hits to the eyes didn’t seem to affect the dog much.
Oof, noted, thanks. I figured it’s a decent last resort but I guess not. Vigilance and avoidance are the best bet as usual. I’m not quite ready to buy a handgun over this.
When a pit latches on, the only thing you can do is choke it out. Strangle it until it sleeps. Nothing else will make it let go. It doesn’t feel pain, doesn’t notice knife stabs or bat beatings or anything at all. Just hope it has a collar you can pull with all your might.
Maybe I’ll buy that handgun after all. Really pisses me off that I’m forced to consider this option because people are too stupid and stubborn to realize they themselves owned walking untrained lethal weapons.
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Hahahaha troll better, loser
That is like blaming the parents of a serial killer for the murders.
I agree, we should blame the parents. they should have raised their kids better, and in the case of the mentally unwell helped them get the necessary treatments.
sorry you experienced that, it’s a poor owner, not a bad breed. we have a staffy mix that’s an adorable mutt, great dog.
Do you agree that retrievers are bred to retrieve things?
Do you agree that herding dogs are bred to herd things?
Do you agree that pointer dogs are bred to find things?
Surely you’ve been around these kinds of dogs before. It’s not something that they learn; they are specifically bred to do a job and they will do that job even without training. You’ve seen or heard of how a sheepdog will herd small children, I’m sure. It’s why the breed exists; they are specifically bred to do a certain thing and genetically their instinct is to do the thing that they were bred for over the course of thousands of years. You can remove them from their mom and not give them any training and they will naturally do the thing that they were bred to do. You don’t have to train a golden to bring you back a ball.
So is it a surprise that a dog bred to kill things will want to kill things?
That’s not simply because of “a poor owner”, although the fact that people refuse to train their killer dogs to not be killers is part of it. It’s because their dogs are genetically predisposed to kill, just like a pointer dog is genetically predisposed to find things.
It is absolutely a bad breed. Killer dogs should be banned worldwide. Every single pitbull, rottweiler, etc. should be spayed/neutered and the breed should end. They’re too dangerous and dumb owners have proven that you can’t rely on humans to keep them under control.
It’s not the dogs’ fault, mind - it’s their instinct. But that doesn’t mean that future generations should have to deal with it.
They’re too dangerous and dumb owners have proven that you can’t rely on humans to keep them under control.
That’s why we have laws in Germany that say that if dogs of certain breeds don’t pass character tests they have to be muzzled, and you might need a license (as in driving license) and a certificate of conduct.
States tend to put American Staffordshire-Terriers (and therefore Bullies) in the harshest category, Rottweilers get off way easier.
Those two breeds are nowhere close to comparable when it comes to aggressiveness. Rottweilers aren’t inherently aggressive, on the contrary they’re exceptionally chill and have a high anger threshold. But they’re also protective and if you aren’t chill yourself they will quickly become to think of themselves as the pack leader.
Rottweilers are about as easy or hard to mess up a German Shepherds, it’s just that messing up passively becomes more dangerous as they’ll become overprotective, see imagined threats because you imagine them, suchlike. If you want to see a breed with inherent anger issues that’d be the Chihuahua.
Yeah Rottweilers are herding dogs, they herd children too and just love leaning into you. Herd dogs also protect their pack so they do need training and an owner who knows what they’re doing on top of extensive socialising.
I had a retriever, she liked chasing ducks. Sometimes she would run to duck and then run back to me with this look on her face of “there is a step missing”.
Do you agree humans are made to shitpost? Because your demonstration is revealing.
No one bred staffies or pits to kill. Cute though. Bet you’re a wonderful human being.
Bullshit. You think shitbulls got their reputation from thin air? Shit dogs for shit owners.
well with that airtight argument you’ll go far! you should work for the GOP with these kind of ideas, they’ll fit right into that shit show
Hey look, someone with a shitty troll username making shitty troll comments.
Not at all a troll username - it is a new account, but I don’t like making up usernames so I just keyboard mash. I stand by everything I say though.
Edit. I looked through your comment history. Bit hypocritical to accuse others of trolling with comments like that.
Copy pasted comments that are totally in good faith:
If only we could use statistics to cull people, too.
I think we should genocide every dog because any dog is more dangerous than no dogs.
I just think we should be consistant. If we’re using statistics to cull creatures, racists are going to have a field day.
If we’re using statistics to cull creatures, racists are going to have a field day.
Did you just insinuate black people commit more crime?
Comparing other races to dogs is pretty fucked up to start with.
Why not defend your argument instead of attacking another person? It might be more effective and useful, you know unlike your vicious pitbull
Aren’t like 70% of fatal dog attacks from pits or pit mixes?
I think 70% of your statistics are bullshit. Citation requested.
This is exactly what they are complaining about 😛
I do wonder how much is the breed and how much is shitty owners being attracted to perceived scary breeds. My guess would be a bit of both.
You don’t need to train a pointer puppy to point. They do it from birth. You don’t need to train a sheep dog to herd. They do it from the moment they can walk. You don’t need to teach a pit bull to latch and shake. They also do that from birth. Training can mitigate the risk, but they’re still very dangerous dogs.
Literally every breed with a prey drive does the death shake. And they aren’t the only ones with locking jaws either. This is very much a problem of shitty people who like the reputation.
If that logic holds true than pure American pitbull terriers should actually be the safest dogs to own in regards to people. Pitbulls where bred for dog fighting, but even more specifically they were bred to not bite the handlers. As getting a dog to fight is just a matter of time and selection, but getting a dog to fight only dogs and not people is something much more difficult and valuable, at the time.
But, that was many, many years ago. And the breed has been bred and bred and inbred and bred again. An American pitbull terrier average weight is about 35 to 60 lbs. Average. 35 is no bigger than an average corgi. With 60 at the high end being a small golden or average chow.
These XL bully breeds aren’t pitbulls. Hell, even pitbulls now days aren’t pitbulls. They are a mix of staffy, mastiff, American bull dogs, English bulldogs, and random other terriers. And then sold as designer breeds like the American bully with no regard for behavior, temperament, or loyalty.
They were trained for fighting. Hard stop.
Just so happens their normal sport was fighting dogs.
Literally no.
In the past I’d say it’s a bit of both, though moreso the type of shitheads attracted to ‘scary’ breeds is also as likely to be shit at training/ socialising them. There’s some good evidence though that this particular ‘XL’ breed has higher rates of inbreeding and has already been selected for agression (not to mention their increased size & power).
Think it’s a fair point some are making though that just banning the latest dangerous breed is missing the wood for the trees. There should be serious penalties from any dog attack, for the owner; treat it the same as possession of a dangerous weapon like a gun or zombie knife.
It’s bit of both. These morons aren’t lining up to buy daschunds.
You need to go one step further - why do people feel the need to own such dogs in the first place? Some people would say the dog is for protection (from who? And why are those people a threat? It’s well known that lack of social and communal services lead to young people ending up involved with gangs and violence), others use it as a status symbol (don’t even get me started on consumerism, and commodification of natural shit like animals), and in almost all cases there is a lot of toxic masculinity involved.
These are all deep rooted systemic issues that go far beyond both dogs and owners (don’t get me wrong - I am not excusing bad dog ownership, and don’t think people should be raising violent and aggressive dogs), and they all need addressing to actually resolve the problem, but it’s much easier for those in charge to focus on the end result, and make it an individual issue, they don’t care about making society better, they just want power and money.
Not arguing here, all your points are correct, just sharing why I have a big scary dog. He’s half GSD, quarter american pit (not xl) and quarter American staffordshire. I got him for two reasons, 1) I have a first floor patio in a bad neighborhood and he’s got a great guard insinct, and 2) he’s a big baby and makes a great emotional support animal (ptsd anxiety and ASD). I don’t need protection, I just need a buddy to scare off the crackheads who have tried to walk into my appartment just because I wanted some fresh air and left the door open. He loves everyone, but oh boy if I don’t let you in myself you’re in for one hell of time. I’ve raised dogs all my life, knew what I wanted, and what I was getting into. That is unfortunately not the case 90% of the time and it pisses me off when I see it. Honestly I would love to require people get a liscense to own a dog (let alone have children)
Honestly I would love to require people get a liscense to own a dog
That’s the case in Germany, depending on state and breed. With what I heard about US dogs and their utter lack of training (e.g. not being able to lie under a table under a restaurant and chill) you should probably make it universal, though.
(let alone have children)
…that’s not going to happen. How about teaching pedagogy and developmental psychology in school, say ages 14 to 16, start of the “seeing kids as kids” age. Speaking of, domestic animal psychology is actually a great topic for biology, doesn’t need to go into depth but some fundamental stuff about cats and dogs so that people are less likely to misinterpret what they see should easily fit the curriculum.
(let alone have children)
Who exactly would be in charge of approving those licenses, Herr Führer?
Literally all I’m saying is that the vast majority of pit bulls aren’t violent. I fucking said I’m in favor of spaying and neutering the breed out of existence because the few that do become violent are excessively dangerous.
Horses are fragile as fuck. Let’s talk about dogs that were bred to kill bears. Oh but wait they didn’t get a street rep and a million shitty owners abusing them. Alaskan Malamutes were bred to help with Polar Bears, they get to about 100 pounds, have a very strong bite, and a big independent streak making them harder to train. Oh yeah and they come with a warning about being around children.
What’s the difference in the actual breeds? The Malamute is giant fluffball. The Pitbull has many manly muscles.
Ive seen people attack and kill buffalo. We should kill whichever breed of people do that.
There’s a story that a family dog got loose after a car crash. They found the dog a few days later … herding sheep. No one ever taught the dog to herd sheep.
Pitbull?
The article I found says border collie and red heeler.
Dog ejected from vehicle in Idaho crash found two days later herding sheep
most people that know how to train dogs have perfectly well behaved dogs, of course they’re always going to be animals at the end of the day but we shouldn’t be surprised when they act out either
In the case of decent owners probably 50/50. Bad owners more like 10/90 (dog/owner).
oh oh I read a study answering that.
It depends on behavior. They found high correlation between breed and how many time they turned around before laying down. Certain common trip like sit or come. But not aggressive behavior. They highest correlation for that was back ground. Dog from the streets or abusive backgrounds. Followed by a small correlation with genetics, which is not the same as breed.
Breed did have anything to do with aggression. Also most people can’t tell a pitbull from other dogs, and studies that look at dog attacks only rely on the victim just saying what breed attacked them
Good. Too bad more countries aren’t doing this.
We regulate cars pretty heavily, we regulate guns decently.
When it comes to dogs, across the entire world, literally crickets chirping. No government does anything.
I think there are some strict laws in Germany when it comes to dog ownership.
There’s a whole bunch of countries where they wouldn’t even think of regulating them as pets because dogs are purely working animals or feral.
There’s a whole bunch of countries where they wouldn’t even think of regulating them as pets because dogs are purely working animals or feral.
Don’t stop there, champ. Which countries?
Large parts of the global south see dogs as unclean.
Pity, teachers should have a good pitbulls to stop the bad ones.
This isn’t the time to discuss pitbull control.
ITT: bleeding hearts who don’t understand the difference between animal species and dog breeds.
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This is the best summary I could come up with:
A ban on American bully XL dogs was already being looked at after shocking footage emerged of an attack in Birmingham last weekend that left an 11-year-old girl with serious injuries.
South Yorkshire Police reported four separate dog attacks on children in two days, including one where a 15-year-old was taken to hospital after being savaged by an XL bully in Sheffield.
Any ban should be based on “robust evidence”, a spokeswoman for the coalition said - adding it was “deeply concerned” by the “lack of data behind this decision and its potential to prevent dog bites”.
But there is concern a move to prohibit the animal may not be practical due to the American XL bully not being recognised as a breed by the Kennel Club, which could mean any ban may inadvertently outlaw other kinds of dogs.
As head of the Merseyside force back in 2007, he had introduced such a measure following the death of five-year-old Ellie Lawrenson, who was mauled by a banned pitbull-type dog at her grandmother’s home in St Helens on New Year’s Day.
In a joint statement, Bully Watch, the Campaign for Evidence Based Regulation of Dangerous Dogs (CEBRDD) and Protect Our Pets claimed the breed was a “a clear and present threat to public health”.
The original article contains 976 words, the summary contains 213 words. Saved 78%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!
This probably wont be the last breed they ban…
They’re just gonna keep playing whack a mole with whatever breed is popular among people who like to abuse dogs until they’re aggressive. You can breed for temperament but you can’t eliminate bad temperament by banning breeds. The bully xl is itself a hybrid of a breed that was already banned in the UK for aggression.
They’re just gonna keep playing whack a mole with whatever breed is popular among people who like to abuse dogs until they’re aggressive. You can breed for temperament but you can’t eliminate bad temperament by banning breeds.
True,
It won’t be.
People that want an aggressive dog, buy the dog with the reputation to be the most aggressive, then they raise them to be aggressive.
Ban pitbulls, and they’ll go back to buying rottweilers, which are usually bigger and stronger too.
Just wait till they get to Malinois…five years ago you never saw them outside of law enforcement and military…now im starting to see them in shelters…
It’s becoming more common to see police departments ban Malligators. Less predictable than GSD.
Any dog can be aggressive, yes. Most pits have great personalities, sure. But I’ve known a few pits that weren’t aggressive towards people. Until they were.
The owner problem is a real factor (owners who are likely to raise aggressive dogs are more likely to get pits), but there’s an extra layer to pits. They are raised to be muscular with very strong jaws. If a Yorkie turns on it’s owner, someone’s getting bloody ankles. A pit (and chow, and Rottweiler) can really hurt people.
On top of this, there’s two types of aggression in dogs: performative aggression with barking and short charges, and prey drive which is quiet staring and sudden lunges towards the throat of another dog or animal. I was under the impression for a long time that dangerous dogs had terrible tempers and were “grouchy”. No, dangerous dogs are social creatures like most dogs and many show affection to other pets and humans, until something triggers their prey instinct. The website I cite below has a statement that pits are less likely to act aggressive before an attack.
There were a string of dog deaths in my city last year. All pits. Two were family pets that both attacked their toddler playing in the family’s yard. The mom ran to help and the dogs attacked her and their infant. Both children died and the mom was hospitalized. And a friend of mine had to mace a dog doing his job last year for the first time, it was a pit. Anecdotal, I know, but it’s changed my mind on pits.
This group says 69% of dogs involved in fatal attacks in 2019 were pits: https://www.dogsbite.org/dog-bite-statistics-fatalities-2019.php
One 2019 fatality was from 8 different breeds. This means that if you flip that statistic around to “percentage of fatal attacks involving pits”, that number is even higher.
Pits are estimated to be 6.5% of American dogs.
If you lumped every retriver into a single group, they’d have a lot more bites.
If rottweilers were better fighters, they would have the reputation pitbulls have.
Part of the problem is it isn’t a breed.
Part of the order (request? whatever it is) is to define the breed first. Which makes the rest seem pretty reactionary. Not far off from saying “ban dogs I find scary”.
A lot of that is selective breeding. Humans add a ton of extra stuff to breed, but groups of breeds are not as arbitrary. Pointers have been bred for bird hunting, shepherds for livestock, retrievers for waterfowl, terriers for small game hunting. Bulldogs were bred for 150+ years to attack bulls, bears, and other dogs (until animal welfare laws banned dog fighting). Further division of breeds (like rat terrier vs feist) is arbitrary and doesn’t represent anything meaningful genetically.
My opinion is that bulldog / terrier mixes (like the pit) represent a greater risk to humans than the average dog. I don’t think it’s anything unique to the pit, which has a lot of media hysteria. The data look so bad for pits because they are so popular. If Staffordshires were more popular in America, they’d show up in the stars more.
The name “pit bull terrier” did originate from bull terriers used in professional dog fighting. Dogs would fight in a pit. Until animal cruelty laws became a thing.
Just being upfront: I wouldn’t own a pit due to the number of instances of friends having a pit that is the “nicest dog ever” and it randomly attacked them one day. I also extend this to Persian cats, btw. But we can’t ban particular breeds. Punish bad owners, continue selectively breeding dogs to reduce aggression.
Extreme example: Adults who were abused as children are more likely to be child abusers themselves. Should we ban people who were beaten by their parents from being teachers? They are statistically more likely to abuse children.
I think we agree? Breeds have tenancies towards certain behaviors and pits tend to be singled out in part because they’re popular, so there are more incidents, and in part because they’re strong, so the incidents tend to be more serious.
But that doesn’t make the order less arbitrary.
If Huskies/Akitas/Malamutes were more common and in the news a lot and they decided to ban “wolf-like dogs” or somesuch that would also be questionable.
This article was interesting, and suggested that there could be a specific issue with the breeding lines of the XLs in the UK. Worth a read for anyone who’s actually interested in reading further than a headline.
