this

wiper is coming across like the girl that wants to date the bad boy because only she can change him. We get it, you like that you have a dog that is considered dangerous and it gives you a sense of power to have this dog listen to you. Doesn't mean the breed doesn't have issues.

jmakin,

The following 3 things are all able to be true simultaneously:
1. jmakin is capable of good logic
2. jmakin posts in this thread
3. this thread is chock full o nuts who aren't capable of good logic, or who are displaying very poor logic in this thread

You are (possibly) an exception to the rule.

Hope that clears it up for you.

Your friend,
citanul

Haha I know your post wasn't directed at me, I was just unsure of what you were trying to say.

jmakin,

Oh. That's reasonable.

From a quick skim of this thread, it appeared to me that there are legitimately a lot of people who hold as a cohesive argument in their heads something along the lines of:

a) the types of people who choose to be (the majority of?) pit bull owners are dumb/dangerous/whatever
b) this is contributory to the danger posed by pit bulls
c) therefor we should the sale of ban pit bulls

That's just a really bad logical chain. (a) isn't necessarily unreasonable. (b) is not unreasonable. (c) is not a conclusion of (b). Further, we can see the logical failing of this argument by simply subbing out pit bull:

a) the types of people who choose to be (the majority of?) _______ owners are dumb/dangerous/whatever
b) this is contributory to the danger posed by _______
c) therefor we should the sale of ban _______

Guns is a facile example of why this is bad logic. (Again, I'm not saying there is no possible good line of logic to reach the same (c) conclusion.) Basically "some owners are not responsible" should not be the precursor to "so no one should be allowed to buy."

More reasonable conclusions (imo) from that chain of statements are those like yours, like "in order to push people toward the decisions we would socially prefer, we should institute fines/laws/licensing that make it difficult/expensive/etc to be a bad actor."

A gun is not a sentient creature that can be unpredictably choose to attack on its own accord. A gun owner can never say "I don't understand, my gun has never done anything like that before."

Ah, okay. My point of contention is that I don't think it's purely an owner problem like a lot of pit apologists like to say. You can have a perfectly trained dog that just goes HAM on a toddler for no reason, it's instinctual and there sometimes is no amount of training that can prevent this.

Which is why IMO the laws should be stricter so people realize this and take extreme precautions with their animals. There's only 1 pit owner I know that I'd say is aware of this, he's extremely careful with his dog (who is super friendly) and warns people who want to pet her.

suzzer,

Again -- that's not the argument that I have seen made by some of the stupider people in this thread.

jmakin,

I don't have any problem with your POV, which is logically consistent to the data you have consumed and have reason to believe.

Right, I'm just making the point that I don't think the gun analogy is exactly 1 to 1. Everyone knows a gun is a dangerous weapon, and even the biggest reject in the world keeps a handle on their gun around children. Many pit owners seem completely oblivious that their dog could be dangerous until it's too late.

lol'd

I'm all for stiffer penalties for dog owners, btw. One issue that hasn't been brought up (and perhaps is its own subject) is that I am a very strong believer in getting a dog from a rescue vs. a breeder or a store. Dogs are so freaking overpopulated, and honestly, not getting a rescue is just adding to the problem. What does this have to do with pits? Well, an overwhelming % of the dogs are pit mixes or chihuahua mixes. That's why you see so many of these dogs where I live in LA. So I'm just saying that it stands to reason that if we want to encourage people to do the right thing of rescuing, we should also be focusing on supporting good dog owner education, since there will inevitably be that many more pits in the community.

Rescue dogs are pretty much all fixed, right?

def not true

DD,

Are you or are you not currently done with this thread?

There were some rationally minded posts made since I'd last posted, so I was (and am) more than happy to respond to those.

Not sure if you are being sarcastic, but yes, virtually 100% of the dogs that you get from a rescue agency have been fixed (by the rescue agency)

Well, that's why i linked that story of the pit bull killing people that came to help the owner who was having a heart attack. That dog could be perfectly trained but recognized that the owner was in extreme pain and distress and, being a powerful but stupid animal, misattributed the cause of the pain to be the people trying to save the owner's life. It crunches the numbers in it's dog brain and decides to save its owner by tearing the throat out of the guy doing CPR.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l41MZ6gN62c

Lots of shelters won't spay/neuter dogs until they are a certain age.

I figured they were. I was just pointing out that rescue pits aren't really germaine as they are already not allowed to breed.

So DD basically you agree with the premise of the thread, just not the tone?

I don't think this is as common as it used to be; the shelter I volunteer at fixes them at 2 months.

I think that pit bulls have a right to exist just as any breed, and I think that saying that the answer to less pit bull attacks is to just let the breed die out is like saying the answer to ending gun violence is to get rid of every single gun. It's ridiculous.

As far as specifically breeding them, I actually think that there should be ALMOST ZERO BREEDING of ANY dog breed for awhile, because the numbers of stray dogs is overwhelming, and it ****ing sucks to have to put a huge number of dogs to sleep or have them starve to death on the streets, just because a bunch of dumb ****s don't get their dogs fixed and just let them procreate, (or purposefully breed them for dog fighting or to sell). When the numbers get down a little, then we can start to breed them again, but it should be moderated according to whatever the market can bear. And we should crack down harder on illegal breeding (puppy mills, etc.) especially if it's for the sake of dog fighting.

I also have a similar stance on humans btw. I completely understand the innate natural desire to create offspring, but considering how many kids out there need to be adopted, it just feels really ****ing selfish to have any more than one of your own.

I know that some pits attack, just like any breed, and I'm obviously aware that a pit attack is potentially more damaging than a chihuahua. I'm not an idiot. But I have seen so much good come from the existence of pit bulls, that I can say without a douby that the existence of pits is a net positive for our society.

DD,

Let me know when they bust the next Labrador Retriever dog fighting ring. Or any other dog fighting ring other than pit bulls for that matter.

Also, I'm kind of surprised you're not going the Staffordshire Terrier route tbh.

Would the pro pitbull people allow their kindergarten aged kid to go play at a classmate's house that had a couple of pet pitbulls?

All the back and forth on who is to blame between dogs and owners is useless.

The main and irrefutable argument against them is the utilitarian one. They add little to no value over replacement breed and have a bunch of negatives. There is no actual need for their existence. I'm sorry if you like them, but the world doesn't revolve around you and society would undeniably be better off without them.