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this post was submitted on 12 Oct 2023
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Cue all the "pit bulls are predetermined to be unstoppable killing machines and should never be allowed in public" nonsense comments π
Adorable pup though β€οΈ
Any big & powerful dog with a strong bite like the pit bull has the capacity to seriously harm & potentially kill a person, and since you can't count on every pit bull owner to responsibly train their pets, they do become a liability when in public. Pit bulls are also a popular breed in the illegal dogfighting scene, so violently dangerous dogs that have been bred to be violently dangerous are guaranteed to exist.
Even so, it's rather unfair to treat every single pit bull like a menace when non-aggressive pit bulls that are affectionate towards strangers are not uncommon. Laws requiring big dogs to be muzzled should suffice; banning the entire breed from public (or, in some places, from even existing) seems excessive to me.
Edit: ...well, at least in this comment, most of my points still stand. I should add that pit bulls are not only popular for dogfighting, but also a favorite of criminals in general, so much so that their demand is actively driving the breed to be even more violently dangerous than ever before. This has become such a serious problem that unaggressive pit bulls are nowadays unlikely to be purebred.
I guess it's still unfair to treat every single pit bull (or, rather, every dog that resembles a pit bull) like a menace, but it'd also be unfair to blame anyone for treating them as such, so long as breeders continue to select for stronger, more aggressive, more dangerous traits.
My friend's pit bull got attacked by a Chihuahua and had no idea what to do about it except sulk all day after it was over. To me, blaming pit bulls for violence is like blaming BMWs for not using turn signals
Exactly! Labradors and German shepherds, along with pit bulls, were responsible for more severe dog bites than other breeds, yet I don't see anyone demonizing labs & sheps like they do the pit bull. Its reputation is really undeserved.
This is factually wrong. I have a copy/paste from reddit I've already dumped... Here's a copy.
The CDC had done a study once & gotten similar statistics to what you've quoted, but ultimately they concluded that the data was flawed & unreliable. However, as I learn more about what's going on, the big picture gets more depressing...
Pit bulls are indeed disproportionately mistreated & improperly trained, far more than any other breed of dog. They're the breed of choice for drug dealers and gangsters in the US, and account for the vast majority of dogs seized by police at dogfighting operations. This isn't by coincidence, as pit bulls have always had a variety of traits that make them ideal for dogfighting.
Originally pit bulls weren't bred to be overly aggressive (even in dogfighting, indiscriminate aggression isn't a desirable trait), but modern pit bulls absolutely are, and this trend is only getting worse as breeders continue to select for increased strength & aggression, traits considered desirable by the criminals & lowlifes that now drive the demand for purebred pit bulls. The CDC suspects that there is a gross misattribution of fatal dog attacks to pit bulls, but now this seems unlikely. In fact, pit bulls that have a reputation for being unaggressive, including the ones that I've personally met, are unlikely to be purebred, and are most probably mutts that merely resemble the breed, if not the descendants of an ever-shrinking lineage that has avoided the vile trends that now plague the modern pit bull.
For me, this has all been very disheartening to discover. When I see the face of a pit bull, I'm reminded of the jolly dogs I used to play with as a kid, not the modern monsters responsible for a growing body count. It was very easy for me to disbelieve, and I'm sure many of the folks who are quick to defend the breed feel the same way...
I don't think its undeserved at all. When it comes to fatal dog attacks, pit bulls are responsible for more than all the other breeds combined by a substantial margin. https://www.forbes.com/sites/niallmccarthy/2018/09/13/americas-most-dangerous-dog-breeds-infographic/
I've never known a pit bull that wasn't sweet but that doesn't dismiss the fact that a breed that was bred for violence can be dangerous. Many dogs may bite when upset or feel threatened. Pit bulls are known for continuing the attack in a frenzy and thus have a disproportionate number of deaths associated with them.
They are tho. Look at stats.
Could you please provide those stats? Skimming thru the Wikipedia article on pit bulls, it seems there's no clear evidence that pit bulls are significantly more dangerous that other dog breeds of similar size.
https://www.dogsbite.org/pdf/2009-dog-attack-deaths-maminings-merritt-clifton.pdf
You mean these stats from a 32 your study of US and Canada from 1982 to 2009 that shows over 60% of dog attacks from from pitbulls? Here's a collections of yearly reported dog attacks.
https://www.dogsbite.org/dog-bite-statistics-fatalities.php
Here's a few studies on the medical significance of dog bites and breed.
https://www.nationalpitbullvictimawareness.org/articles/medical-studies-on-pit-bulls/
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/34100808/
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/51034290_Mortality_Mauling_and_Maiming_by_Vicious_Dogs
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4261032/
https://www.plasticsurgery.org/news/press-releases/complex-dog-bites-in-children-experience-and-recommended-treatment
And how about breed specific behavior studies?
https://bmcgenomics.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12864-016-2936-3
https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/509315v1
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/233995885_Breed_differences_in_canine_aggression
These are just a few of dozens of studies and reports that have been done on dogs attacks and biology.
The Fifth Estate also has a good video with proponents of both sides. https://youtu.be/iFa8HOdegZA
Here is an alternative Piped link(s):
https://piped.video/iFa8HOdegZA
Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.
I'm open-source; check me out at GitHub.
Don't use Wikipedia as your source, that's rule number one. Look at the cdc
You mean those weird ass stats where they even agree that evidence is based off of looking at a picture where they admit they barely know it half the time?
Those statistics?
But its not a crab, how can it be good if at anything if no crabiness?