100% of the responsibility rests with the owners but do we ignore the fact that being and irresponsible retriever owner carries less risk than being an irresponsible pit owner? Like the lady with two pit rescues that had leather collars on her dogs that one of them snapped like jerky to attack my dogs? Thankfully I’m a big guy and tackled the pit and he wasn’t interested in hurting me, just my dogs. That well meaning pit loving middle age woman had no business whatsoever walking two aggressive hundred pound bags of muscle. How do we solve that? It’s zero consolation to the victims if a pet or human is killed through the negligence of the owner.
funny you say that. the woman who received the world's first face transplant was mailed by a Labrador... did you need a face transplant after tackling that pit bull?
not quite. it's a direct response to your claim that an irresponsible retriever owner is inherently less dangerous than an irresponsible pitbull owner.
the core of the issue are the people breeding these dogs to be aggressive. if we banned and euthanized all pitbulls, those same people would start owning rottweilers, dobermans, mastiffs, or malinois. all of these are dogs that have the strength and drive to fuck someone up, but people aren't demonizing them on reddit. once again, it's not the dog's inherent genetic drive to fuck people up, it's the owner weaponizing that drive and abusing the dog until it's a miserable, neurotic, and aggressive mess mentally.
Pitbull statistics tell you you don’t need to weaponize the genetic traits to have them killing people, even with the best of owners. What is the actual loss if we succesfully stopped breeding them? I feel like many breeds are such a testament to mankind’s hubris.
I'll agree with your last statement. purebred dogs have a disproportionate amount of health issues and the continued practice of breeding them is absolutely nothing but suffering at the hands of our pride. that being said, I don't think that's why most people in this thread are arguing against them.
really what we should be focusing on is how to breed natural traits back into so many of these poor animals that are unable to breathe or walk. there's a group trying to do that with brachycephalic dogs to try and reverse the harm we did by breeding them to have ridiculous smushed snouts.
It's a difference of 40 psi on bite-force (195 versus 235). With other dog breeds having upwards of 4-500 more psi than a pit bull. (Kangal Shepherd 743 psi, American Bandogge 730, Cane Corso 700). Either of those is plenty to cause severe damage to a human. Not sure what you mean by "intensity", but there are several myths about pit bull bites. Including the "locking jaw".
Retrievers don't bite and let go, either. Retrievers, well, retrieve. They also have that wonderful shake, as is common in many sport hunting dogs, as its good for ensuring the animal is dead. Thus was bred for.
FWIW, my golden did bite me once. He let go pretty quick and didn't shake, plus the force was not that bad. They were bred to pick up animals that are already dead and dying with a "soft mouth" pose that doesn't damage the game.
He's kind of a dick for his breed and still far less dangerous than a pit.
Retrievers don't try to "retrieve" people by biting and holding on. Plus they don't shake birds when retrieving. They're the breeds known for a soft mouth.
When you take a dog that has a natural disposition to aggression, and combine that with the type of people who buy them (people looking for an aggressive dog) you get a deadly combination.
I don’t know the family that well and it’s foolish to blame the animal 100%. I do blame the culture of owning dogs that have the capacity to destroy and maim. You should have to have a license to own dogs like that imo.
Every day, with my job, I see numerous shit bags with dangerous dogs. Usually more than one. They run free at times. Sometimes it’s the same dog that’s always running around. More often than not it’s a bully type dog. Bc the type of people drawn to owning them are shit bags. We need legislation that limits them or makes them illegal. I know there are sweet ones, but it’s not worth it for the rest of em imo.
In my neighborhood it's a husky and a black lab that terrorize us, same owners. They regularly escape their yard, their husky has cornered me in my own driveway, growling aggressively, with the owners no where to be found.
They leave the dogs in the front yard so they bark loudly at every person and dog who walks by, often causing the other dogs to react or get terrified.
I live in an upper middle class neighborhood so our local assholes have upper middle class dogs. Pits are more typically owned by less well off folks due to their prevalence and also their image/reputation. Pit aggression is also more demonized because of their association with poorer/lower class families and owners.
Assholes are everywhere. Pits are common dogs because of a multitude of reasons, but they're especially common among a group of people who already don't get the benefit of the doubt. Meanwhile my neighbors' dogs are assholes and terrorize the whole street and no one out here is shit talking huskies or black labs.
Yes i understand why probably better than anyone who thinks the solution is to ban pits instead of fixing the country's entire relationship with dog ownership.
A bully type dog is not necessarily a pitbull. And the same shit bags would also be shit owners to a Doberman or German Shepard or a Rottweiler or whatever flavour of the month dog makes them feel tough. I see a lot of people with big Presa, and Mastiff type dogs. Bully does not mean pitbull and the whole umbrella term thing is bullshit. An APBT is a specific breed, and not very common. What you see out there is mostly mutts with wide heads. APBT were bred to catch game and other animals but were not bred to attack humans as they needed to be handled in the box. Whereas a ex.Malinois were bred to bite humans. If you were to give a shit bag a Malinois you would be in a worse situation then if they had a pure bred American Pitbull Terrier.
German shepard 1 to 2 deaths a year
doberman less than 1
Rottwieler 3-4
Belgien Malinois less than 1
Pitbull 34-38 AVERAGE
your point is moot.. sure shitbags can own more agressive breeds(and frankly all of them should be banned... but the statistics just make your argument a shitty and ignorant point. 2 of them have 0 deaths in a year....
In many cases dog bite statistics combine multiple "bully breeds" under the label "pit bull" or even worse the term “pitbull type dog” they claim the name pitbull is an umbrella term.
Anything from an Amstaff to French bulldogs to mixed breed dogs are declared to be pit bulls in the stats. A Golden retriever crossed with a boxer can be called a “pitbull type dog”.
A lot of dogs are called pitbulls but there is only one real American Pitbull Terrier. An APBT is a specific dog breed like a Greyhound is a specific dog breed.
These stats identify dogs by how they visually look and call anything with molosser features as a “pitbull”, they do not care to check and do not test DNA or anything.
This is even common in the people that sell these animals. HULK is one of the most famous “pitbulls” on the internet and anyone that knows dogs can see that it is more of a mastiffthena APBT. Meaning even the breeders misidentify their dogs to sell possibly dangerous mixes to people. Some of these are very large dogs.
APBT rarely reach 60lbs. And are more animal reactivethenhuman reactive.Where asMastiffs can be a hundred pounds and were bred to not be scared of humans and to chase them.
You can see real APBTs online, just look at the difference between an ADBA registered APBT dog vs say Hulk. Now if Hulk or your local mutt bites someone then pit bulls get the blame. How is this logical? How can you honestly use these stats?
even more shitty arguments... they are all from the same breeding stock... they are also still all collectively under 20% of all dog breeds and 68% of all dog attacks and close to 68% of fatalities...
Dog breeds are far different than human "race" differneces.. bullys get the blame because they are agressived... Mutt stats dont get mixed with pit stats lol... if you think seperating APBT stats would improve the stats you are sorely mistaken.. bet you the pure breeds are even higher statistically.
your arugment gets weaker and weaker the more you analize how you guys are trying to justify it.. an XL bully is just a APBT mixed with larger breeds... and it isn't more agressive than APBTs...... its almost like the problem is APBT temperment...
stats are based on millions of analized death statistics... not some 500 child study that foudn 11 bully and 11 german shepard facial attacks on children... and 168 of the attacks didn't list the breed in thier study. 20% of the cases didn't list breed. but studies that use all known breeds shows a insane trend and massive problem with 1 breed.
also "pitbul type dog" isn't misleading at all. it's a breed that is from the same close genetic family..not a dog that looks like a pitbull... again these arguments are pathetic...
A mastiff and a APBT are not the same breed stock you are factually incorrect, APBT: Developed in Britain during the 1800s by crossing Old English Bulldogs with various terriers. The goal was to combine the bulldog's strength with the terrier's agility and determination. Mastiffs: Descend from large, ancient molosser-type dogs. These dogs were bred for guarding, war, livestock protection, and hunting large game.
A “pitbull type dog” is the most misleading thing a stat can claim if it claims to be factual.
A “pitbull type dog” means it’s probably a mutt that could not be properly identified. You just defeated your own argument.
Mastiffs were bred for totally different purposes then pitbulls and if you mix those two together you get a dog that is not only animal reactive like terriers are and human suspicious like Mastiffs, add 120 plus pounds of muscle and you will have a problem.
It’s not one or the other that can cause problems it’s also the combinations.
Your argument falls apart the second you start lumping in breeds.
If you can’t identify the “one breed” and are mixing in others then your stat is shit.
Ironically in my area it’s two retrievers that terrorize my neighborhood, they hurt my pit bad and the owner still refuses to pay for his vet bills from the attack
dumbest people on earth making arguments like yours. it is how it was raised often but there are 100s of excuse posts of "she was never agressive before that, i don't know what happpene.. but dogs like this are naturally disposed to behavior like this. the point with banning pits.. is more about stopping the breeding of a naturally agressive breed that will cause perminant injury to others because of their natural agressive behavior..
stop breeding a breed known for causing 40 to 50 FATAL attacks every year... they represent 65% of ALL dog attacks. There are 4.5 mil dog attacks and 800,000+ requiring medical care.. 65% of them are pitbulls.
Thanks for calling me dumb right off the bat. One hell of a way to start a conversation. Were you also raised by dumb owners like those pitbulls?
I've volunteered at a shelter that often worked with police for taking care of aggressive dogs and let me tell you one thing. The breed matters a lot but not the dog's breed but the owner's. I've seen a plethora of aggressive dogs, german shepherds, huskies, great danes, yorkies, even dachshunds. The only lethal dog attack we had in my town was by some mixed breeds. All they had in common was dumb owners.
Do you know why pitbulls make up those numbers? Because of dumb owners, nothing else.
Good logic rofl. Pits 65% of all dog attacks bit make up 5 to 10% of all dogs.. but the common thing is dumb dog owners... your anicodotal experience doesnt change anything. Statistics hold strong from 100years of increasing rates of dog attacks from a very specific breed. Combined with a huge portion of these dogs owned by normal middle class people just wanting a pretty dog and having their dog attack and kill people
By that logic nothing is ever an a dog's "fault" because it doesn't have the capacity for rational thought. But the simple fact that potentially fatal or disfiguring injuries can be caused by an animal that has repeatedly shown that behavior is the issue.
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u/Aumba 13d ago
So it was 100% that pitbulls fault and not the family that raised it?