Some years ago, I visited the local Boys Club early one morning. There had been a break-in. Two young brothers had gotten caught making off with pool balls and cues. They weren't going to be arrested, merely suspended. Police phoned their mother. It must have taken 10 minutes to persuade her to come get them. She kept insisting it was a case of mistaken identity. Her sons were at home with her the whole time.
The cop kept saying, "Ma'am, I keep trying to tell you we've got them right here." They finally had to put one of her sons on the line to make her quit fabricating alibis.
I kept thinking of that incident during recent encounters with what it's tempting to call the Pit Bull Cult. You see, I'd written a column about an unprovoked attack on my two dogs by an unleashed pit on a city park playground. Because my dogs are 120-pound Great Pyrenees who spent nine years guarding livestock (and cats) on our farm, they were never in danger.
Rather, the danger was that they would maim or kill the pit in front of a bunch of little kids. Thanks to the brave intervention of two young fathers, that didn't happen. One big, strong fellow reached into the melee and lifted the pit off the ground by his collar. Later, I talked to a Little Rock cop, but his attitude was no harm, no foul.
I should have pressed harder, because the pit was seriously crazy. It was the canine equivalent of a welterweight jumping Vladimir and Vitali Klitschko, the Ukrainian heavyweight boxing champions. Also, sane male dogs don't attack bitches.
I ended the column asking rhetorically what might have happened if I'd been walking a cocker spaniel. "Possibly this breed has a place in today's world, although I can't think what it is ... It wouldn't trouble me if it were illegal."
Of course in many places, it already is.
Besides, this is only partly a dog column. It's also about several things that have gone wrong in American political dialogue: dogmatism, disdain for facts, black-and-white thinking, name-calling and generalized hatred of rival tribes.
Also, the bad effects of social media. People just don't abuse each other in person the way they do on social media. It's a coward's idea of tough.Here's what I think has happened: Animal shelters from sea to shining sea are filled to bursting with pit bulls and pit mixes either confiscated from or surrendered by people who never should have owned them. Compassionate dog lovers who volunteer at those shelters have persuaded themselves that these wonderful animals โ as many of them surely are โ need to be protected from mean-spirited people who've noticed the breed's propensity for unprovoked and deadly attacks on animals and people.
But it's not "racist" to generalize. Biologically, race and breed are near opposites
. Dog breeds are among the oldest forms of human engineering: Pit bulls were engineered to fight.Nor is it just bad owners. Some are cruel and stupid, others merely naive. But sometimes it's just the dog.Aggression could be bred out of pits with strong laws and consistent effort, but not by people who deny reality.
Reality being that pit bulls are responsible for the vast majority of fatal human attacks in the U.S. It doesn't matter if I'm an old man who will die soon, as several pit cultists told me, whether I have "masculinity issues," a tendency toward pedophilia, remind them of Donald Trump, nor even if "Cydni" kicks my teeth in, as she vowed.
The website DogsBite.org "recorded 31 fatal dog attacks in 2016. Pit bulls contributed to 71 percent (22) of these deaths, just over seven times more than the next closest dog breed." The cult has two objections: Pits are not an AKC-recognized breed. Hence in a pinch, it can be argued that they don't really exist โ perfectly circular reasoning, but who's keeping score? Also, DogsBite.org is not a "scientific, peer-reviewed" site. Run by Coleen Lynn, who survived a 2007 pit attack, it doesn't pretend to be. Lynn compiles and tabulates media reports of fatal and near-fatal dog attacks, provides links to the original news stories, and tracks court cases.So take the DogsBite challenge: Google "fatal pit bull attacks" for any city or state you choose.
In Atlanta: Three kids attacked at a school bus stop.
In New York: "A pair of pit bulls left Francesco Bove so badly mutilated that a priest read him his last rites outside a New York church." Pit attacks appear to be a regular feature of Chicago life. Even down home in nearby and neighborly Greenbrier, Ark. But hey, the victim in that case was 75. One foot in the grave, although he could end up losing it.
All isolated incidents and "fake news," pit lovers insist.
Now where have we heard that before?
Reader Comments
If the pit community wanted to solve the issue they would follow the formula that the Shepherd, Saint Bernard or Dalmatian and many more breed groups have used. Breeding is virtually stopped, overtly aggressive puppies are culled and pet quality puppies are spayed or neutered. Adults are carefully selected for health and temperament. Ownership is deterred and information stressing the challenging aspects of the breed are emphasized. Breeders take back their dogs regardless of health age or temperament. A byproduct of this formula is the reduction of the mixes.
The pit community needs to step up.
I had a shoulder holster on, but couldn't get to it (under the cat, whose claws were dug into my shoulder.) Then I remembered I also has a revolver on my belt, under my jacket. I pulled it and stuck it in the dogs face at his next attempted leap at my cat,and stared and yelled at it - I don't want to kill you! go: so fuck go! Git! and I backed the dog 20 feet from my porch screaming at it. I don't believe it knew what that pistol could do, but that it was that it understood what I meant.
I got it far enough back that the neighbors saw it and called it home. They were angry at me for pointing a pistol at their dog which had been attacking me on my interior porch! I said "Fuck you!"
"If this cat weighed 150 lbs and killed that piece of shit on your doorstep, I bet you'd be bitching then! Wake up, fucking idiots!"
The dog got loose other times, the home / owners got fined. Then, something I'd seen before for this dog: "Lost American Pit Bull Reward." I'd seen others before but these stayed out for months. I have a good guess what happened: Someone whose kids had been likewise threatened by that dog - Not me! - likely took the poor pup out and put it down.
Again, having government look out for you is equivalent to just waiting around for them to come count the bodies.
R.C.
great education great tools above all else.... grrrreat instinct! The Pit obviously read you well.
Wondering what totem animal instinct of yours had the power to backtrack that powerscum ? (Probably some unretractable-claws megafeline if my intuition is correct)
Whanganui River in New Zealand: First river in the world to be given legal human status
A river in New Zealand has become the first in the world to be granted the same legal rights as a person. The New Zealand parliament passed the bill recognising the Whanganui River, in North...[Link]
Alapaha blue blood bulldogAmbullneo mastiffAmerican bulldogAmerican mastiffAmerican pit bull terrierAmerican Staffordshire terrierAnatolian mastiffAustralian bulldogBantam bulldoggeBanter BulldoggeBelgian mastiffBoston terrierBoxerBuldogue campeiroBull terrierBulldogBullmastiffCa de bouCane corsoCatahoula bulldogDogo ArgentinoDogue de BordeuxDorset olde tyme bulldoggeEnglish bulldogFila BrasileiroFrench bulldogGreat DaneMastiffMiniature bull terrierNeopolitan mastiffOlde Boston bulldoggeOlde English bulldogPugPyrenean mastiffRenascence bulldoggeRottweilerSpanish mastiffStaffordshire bull terrierStandard bull terrierTibetan mastiffValley bulldogVictorian bulldogge
[I think I counted 42 breeds in that list]
So when you say that " Pit bulls contributed to 71 percent (22) of these deaths", that is not a 1 to 1 comparison. If "dogbites.org" or the source for the number "fatalpitbullattacks.com" was able to place a specific "breed" with specific attacks, out of the 42 listed above, the result would not show 71% belonging to one single group.
The is equivalent to saying that whatever-percentage of the fatal attacks in 2016 were committed by long haired dogs, or black dogs, or dogs over 50 pounds, etc. And thus, all long haired dogs are dangerous. Or all dogs over 50 pounds are dangerous.
Pit bull owners kill people.
Although very serious stuff.
@NugaBurd:
Great comment.
In more ways than one.
Houston has a problem.
We all have a problem.
ned,
out