How do you feel about banning a breed?

[JohnLloydJones]

I support stronger animal control laws that focus on holding owners accountable for the actions of their dogs. I'm sorry to have to say that the most difficult part of my job is dealing with people, such as the people who own the power breeds and either enjoy their dogs' bad behaviours, or fail to understand why the behaviours are bad.

That's it in a nutshell.

[KrisK]

_{I am sorry to say I live in Ontario where a breed ban has been in place for too many years. The ban is all encompassing. It includes the AMStaff, the bull terrier AND ANY DOG THAT RESEMBLES A 'PITBULL'}

_{Since there is no actual breed known simply as "pitbull" you can imagine the owners sheer horror when their lab/boxer mix is condemned as a pitbull and taken away to be killed...The onus is on the OWNER to prove categorically that their dog is NOT a 'pitbull'....}

_{Personally, I don't really like boxers...and all the 'pittie' breeds I've met, I've liked.}

_{RDM has it right...tougher animal controls for ALL dogs makes sense..not banning a breed...or in the case of Ontario...a whole lot of dogs who don't deserve this ridiculous law.}

[Tommy Coyote]

Jeesh. That's a horrible thing to do to both the people and the dogs.

[D'Elle]

I work for Animal Control in a municipality where bully breeds are (problematically) owned by a vastly low income and largely transient population who do not neuter them, or by recent immigrants who chain them in the backyard and do not neuter them. This is neither a cultural or socio-economic stereotype; it's simply statistical data.

 

I do not work for Animal Control, but the rest of this statement applies here in the area where I live.

The shelters here are packed with pit bulls. More than 50% of the dogs in the shelter at any given time are pit bulls.

I am completely opposed to breed banning.

It is *never* the fault of the dog, let alone the breed.

It is the fault of irresponsible, idiotic and cruel human beings if a dog is dangerous.

What is needed is stronger laws **and Enforcement of those laws** regarding responsible dog ownership.

D'Elle

 

 

[speckle-legged dog]

It upsets me that Pit Bulls are so popular with backyard breeders and that so many more are bred than there are homes for. I doubt these "breeders" are breeding for the best pet qualities all the time either. Human beings are causing all this damage. I have nothing against responsible breeders at all, I wish there could be spay and neuter requirements for densely populated areas though, something that could help stop the people breeding so many dogs that end up in shelters. It is heart-wrenching what people do to innocent animals.

 

I do not believe a "breed ban" would help. It's really not the dogs, it's the humans. Bad humans often want bad dogs, no matter what kind they happen to be.

[maggiesmommy]

I have very mixed feelings about this. My friend's daughter was four years old when she was attacked with absolutely no provocation by a pit bill. He broke her skull and she needed surgery and, if it had just been a little worse, she would be dead or have permanent brain trauma. He had always been a "good dog," had not been trained for aggression, and had never shown any signs of aggression before. He just snapped.

I do think that pits are predisposed to aggression. To pretend like traits like aggression can't be bred into dogs is silly. Look at ANY BC and you can see that hundreds of years of selective breeding has produced them to be herders, whether they actually have a herding job or not. Aggression IS an inheritable trait, not just something that comes from bad ownership. Just look at the Cordoba fighting dog... It became extinct because they bred it to be so aggressive that a male and a female would fight to the death instead of mating.


We know that statistically, more than 60% of dog-on-human attacks are by pits or pit mixes. That's not insignificant and it can't be ignored. A pit bill is predisposed to aggression because of centuries of breeding. To ignore that is unfair to the dogs and to humans.

That said... I don't think that means it's a lost cause, or that killing tens of thousands of pit bulls is the solution. I volunteer at a shelter where most of the surrenders we get are pits, and most of them are as sweet as can be. But you have to be a very responsible owner who is willing to go through obedience training and proper socialization if you're going to try to own a pit-- you can't just get one and hope that those aggressive instincts will never come through.

This was the sort of thing was thinking of when I started the other thread (in which I unintentionally offended some people, and I'm very sorry for that) about needing licenses to own unaltered animals. We get so many surrendered dogs who were bought by willy-nilly backyard breeders and are surrendered because they've become aggressive or because they were simply over-bred and couldn't be sold. Most of them die. I want to see this stop. It's cruel.

I guess what I want to see isn't people killing pit bulls, but people making a conscious and deliberate decision not to breed them anymore, and, ideally, they would become extinct naturally, without needing to be exterminated. I don't want breed-specific legislation because pits deserve a chance at a good life and with responsible owners they can be wonderful dogs...

 

But the bottom line is that they were made to fight and dog fighting has no place in the modern world, but I think there are more humane ways to handle the problem than to legislate against them or to euthanize them.

[Blackdawgs]

What is the source of this statement?? 60%, that is??

 

Historically, pitbulls were bred to be aggressive towards animals, not people. So, "centuries" is another exageration.

 

These things are very complicated. It's meaningless to talk about percentage without knowing the numer of pitbulls in the general population of dogs and even that is regional. And then someone needs to define and identify "pitbulls".

 

And define "attack"

We know that statistically, more than 60% of dog-on-human attacks are by pits or pit mixes. That's not insignificant and it can't be ignored. A pit bill is predisposed to aggression because of centuries of breeding. To ignore that is unfair to the dogs and to humans.

[Liz P]

There are people out there who specifically breed Pitties that are aggressive towards people. They want dogs to guard their drugs, homes, etc. I do agree that, while it's not PC to say, some breeds are just naturally more aggressive. I don't agree with breed bans though.

[GentleLake]

My friend's daughter was four years old when she was attacked with absolutely no provocation by a pit bill. He broke her skull and she needed surgery and, if it had just been a little worse, she would be dead or have permanent brain trauma. He had always been a "good dog," had not been trained for aggression, and had never shown any signs of aggression before. He just snapped.

 

 

There's a good chance that what happened was predatory drift. It's often unpredictable.

[maggiesmommy]

What is the source of this statement?? 60%, that is??

 

Historically, pitbulls were bred to be aggressive towards animals, not people. So, "centuries" is another exageration.

 

These things are very complicated. It's meaningless to talk about percentage without knowing the numer of pitbulls in the general population of dogs and even that is regional. And then someone needs to define and identify "pitbulls".

 

And define "attack"

 

 

"Attack" being an instance of dog-on-human aggression resulting serious injury to the human. The statistics are easy to find and range from 40-70% depending on the source, but they're pretty consistent. This is just one source, but you can easily Google it for yourself and find plenty of literature on the topic: http://www.dogsbite.org/pdf/dog-attack-deaths-maimings-2010.pdf (And note that the stats from this particular study exclude dogs trained to fight or attack.)

 

...That said, it doesn't mean all pit bulls are "bad" or dangerous. As I said, I know many pit bulls who are wonderful, sweet dogs, and I know many responsible pit bull owners. I don't hold it against individual dogs but I think they're overbred, often owned irresponsibly, and that they are genetically predisposed to aggression.

 

 

There's a good chance that what happened was predatory drift. It's often unpredictable.

 

After doing some research, that does sound very likely.

[Blackdawgs]

Your source is JUNK. They used press reports as their source.

[maggiesmommy]

Your source is JUNK. They used press reports as their source.

 

So do you have a better one? Since I seem to be the only person who's willing to use Google here... Here are peer-reviewed medical journals.

 

http://pediatrics.aappublications.org/content/88/1/55.abstract Pit bulls caused 43% of hospitalized attacks on children....

 

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/8657532 Pit bulls as the most common cause of fatal dog attacks...

 

http://pt.wkhealth.com/pt/re/lwwgateway/landingpage.htm;jsessionid=R1JMMgFGRL2S2KGjKGT39L1Tb2vL8KZpbrpBTXx8hSyH4vRXsyj7!-1436410044!181195628!8091!-1?sid=WKPTLP:landingpage&an=00000433-200909000-00002 -Pit bulls caused half of fatalities...

 

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1556-4029.2011.01921.x/abstract -Can't see the full article without a subscription, but this is a review of the totality of medical literature as of the time it was published, and links over half of attacks to pit bulls and pit mixes.

 

http://journals.lww.com/plasreconsurg/pages/articleviewer.aspx?year=2009&issue=08000&article=00028&type=abstract -Pit bulls caused 51% of attacks on children over the course of five years

 

 

...I don't know what else I need to do to make it clear that I DO NOT SUPPORT breed-specific legislation and I have known and loved many wonderful pit bulls. But pretending like they aren't more prone to aggressive behavior does them a disservice. It's like pretending that border collies aren't prone to herding-related behaviors. They can be owned, handled, and trained for other purposes, and they can be great pets and companions in the care of responsible owners, but it isn't fair to them or to anyone else to pretend like those instincts aren't there.

[Blackdawgs]

No, I don't have a better one. This is my point. I have seen and read them all and these studies can all be torn to bits from a scientific standpoint. But, yet they are being used by politicians to ban and KILL dogs.

[rlwzgd]

The first source is for urban children, where pit bulls make up a majority of dogs, from my casual observations. The expected number of bites increases as the number of dogs of that breed increases.

 

The author's conclusion for the second source is that it isn't attributable to one breed in particular but that children are more likely to die than adults.

 

... I didn't check the rest.

 

Bottom line here - to get an unbiased estimate of the number of pit bulls involved in human attacks, you'd need some sort of large scale dataset to get the power on your alpha and beta errors. Internal federal level government datasets are the best for these regressions, I do not know if one tracks dog bites in people by breed. You'd need to control for socioeconomic backgrounds, location, age, gender and probably some cross partials... IMO, everything else is either adverse selection, biased (in the statistical sense), or self fulfilling prophecy. (Source, me... I'm an economist, this stuff is my job - and I have a published paper on bias in datasets)

 

I don't think anyone is denying that pitbulls could be aggressive. So can jrts, and labs, and any dog that is mishandled. You are talking about bad ownership, not bad breeds or bad dogs.

[maggiesmommy]

No, I don't have a better one. This is my point. I have seen and read them all and these studies can all be torn to bits from a scientific standpoint. But, yet they are being used by politicians to ban and KILL dogs.

 

If they can be torn to bits from a scientific standpoint, then please, by all means, tear them to bits. Kind of funny they "can be torn to bits," but somehow made it through the intensive peer-review process required to be published in a scientific journal, don't you think? Wouldn't you think that, y'know, SCIENTISTS would be more able to tear them to bits than someone who simply doesn't like what they say?

 

The fact that they are being used by politicians to kill does doesn't make their findings invalid. You can love pit bulls and also be aware of their traits as a breed. You can oppose BSL and still acknowledge that the statistics are real.

 

The solution isn't in banning the breed but in acknowledging its needs, educating the public, reducing rates of accidental and backyard breeding, and and promoting responsible ownership.

[rlwzgd]

And yes, I'm well versed in Google... but you're the one making the point, so the burden rests on you to provide the proof. Why should I have to go out and find data to back up your idea...

[rlwzgd]

If they can be torn to bits from a scientific standpoint, then please, by all means, tear them to bits. Kind of funny they "can be torn to bits," but somehow made it through the intensive peer-review process required to be published in a scientific journal, don't you think? Wouldn't you think that, y'know, SCIENTISTS would be more able to tear them to bits than someone who simply doesn't like what they say?

The fact that they are being used by politicians to kill does doesn't make their findings invalid. You can love pit bulls and also be aware of their traits as a breed. You can oppose BSL and still acknowledge that the statistics are real.

The solution isn't in banning the breed but in acknowledging its needs, educating the public, reducing rates of accidental and backyard breeding, and and promoting responsible ownership.

I did, you're welcome.

[maggiesmommy]

The first source is for urban children, where pit bulls make up a majority of dogs, from my casual observations. The expected number of bites increases as the number of dogs of that breed increases.

 

The author's conclusion for the second source is that it isn't attributable to one breed in particular but that children are more likely to die than adults.

 

... I didn't check the rest.

 

Bottom line here - to get an unbiased estimate of the number of pit bulls involved in human attacks, you'd need some sort of large scale dataset to get the power on your alpha and beta errors. Internal federal level government datasets are the best for these regressions, I do not know if one tracks dog bites in people by breed. You'd need to control for socioeconomic backgrounds, location, age, gender and probably some cross partials... IMO, everything else is either adverse selection, biased (in the statistical sense), or self fulfilling prophecy. (Source, me... I'm an economist, this stuff is my job - and I have a published paper on bias in datasets)

 

I don't think anyone is denying that pitbulls could be aggressive. So can jrts, and labs, and any dog that is mishandled. You are talking about bad ownership, not bad breeds or bad dogs.

 

Just speaking from experience, I actually believe that pit bulls are more common in rural areas, but we'd need a population-wide study or canine census to demonstrate that. I agree that there needs to be a more controlled analysis to demonstrate these findings.

 

I never said anything about bad breeds or bad dogs.

[maggiesmommy]

I did, you're welcome.

 

I appreciate it. I was responding to Blackdawgs while you posted your response.

[maggiesmommy]

And yes, I'm well versed in Google... but you're the one making the point, so the burden rests on you to provide the proof. Why should I have to go out and find data to back up your idea...

 

I didn't say that you did. I provided a source and Blackdawgs ever-so-politely informed me in all caps that it is junk. I have yet to see someone post links to a peer-reviewed article debunking the idea that pit bulls are predisposed to aggression. I don't understand why I'm being asked to cite sources but people on the other side of it aren't.

 

I especially don't understand why I'm being attacked as if I'm promoting the mass euthanasia or banning of pit bulls, when I've specifically stated numerous times that I don't oppose pit bulls or support BSL.

[rlwzgd]

Gotcha. It is an interesting question, but some how you'd need to merge a dog bite dataset (perhaps reported through animal control, which is already a source of bias since not all dog bites are reported), to a sick economic dataset... The cross is very small, so you'd be lacking power in your parameter estimates... I'm wondering what would become of it, so I'll poke around when I finish my current paper... Talk about Freakanomics :-)

[maggiesmommy]

Gotcha. It is an interesting question, but some how you'd need to merge a dog bite dataset (perhaps reported through animal control, which is already a source of bias since not all dog bites are reported), to a sick economic dataset... The cross is very small, so you'd be lacking power in your parameter estimates... I'm wondering what would become of it, so I'll poke around when I finish my current paper... Talk about Freakanomics :-)

 

Yeah, the fact that not all dog bites are reported is definitely a huge factor to take into account. I think the vast majority of dog BITES are likely coming from toy breeds. I've been bitten by chihuahuas and Pomeranians more than any other breed at the shelter I volunteer at, but those are just tiny little bites that barely even break the skin. Toy breeds seem to be the most prone to fear-based aggression. If you had something with the attitude of a chihuahua in the body of a GSD, it would be a killing machine!

[Blackdawgs]

Hi. I am a scientist and am well-versed in the peer review process from both ends. I don't have the time or inclination to de-bunk the articles. I've read them all.

 

And,yes, plenty of garbage finds its way into the peer reviewed literature.

 

You are being "attacked" because you are perpetuating the same....material... that is being used by politicians to ban and kill dogs.

[maggiesmommy]

You are being "attacked" because you are perpetuating the same....material... that is being used by politicians to ban and kill dogs.

 

Medical literature about HIV in the gay community is used by politicians trying to ban gay marriage. Does that mean that LGBT activists who distribute condoms at gay pride festivals, citing the exact same material, are in agreement with the politicians who are using them for other purposes? Science is by definition unbiased. You can cite a reputable source and not agree with the moral/ethical/legal opinions that another person might draw from the same material.

[rlwzgd]

 

Medical literature about HIV in the gay community is used by politicians trying to ban gay marriage. Does that mean that LGBT activists who distribute condoms at gay pride festivals, citing the exact same material, are in agreement with the politicians who are using them for other purposes? Science is by definition unbiased. You can cite a reputable source and not agree with the moral/ethical/legal opinions that another person might draw from the same material.

I don't know, I've seen a lot of scientists write papers with crappy methods just because it appealed to their personal view point. I've personally had to redo stuff because a coauthor didn't like the answer... Hence, lots of crap makes it into peer reviewed journals.

 

I've done some homework for you - http://www.cdc.gov/homeandrecreationalsafety/dog-bites/dogbite-factsheet.html... It looks like the cdc might have a partial dataset that could be merged with demographics, if one was serious about pursuing it. My coauthor finally got back to me, so my inclination to search more is diminishing.

 

Finally, personally, I'm not attacking you. Bad science or blanket statements driven by false popular beliefs gets my heckles up. I have a driving need to fix them, it's a pet peeve of mine.

 

Personally, I've only ever been bitten by a Polish Mountain Dog... I try to stay away from adult big white fluffy things, but that's about it. It was a neighbors, so we didn't report it to animal control but I did have to have reconstructive surgery on my nose. I wouldn't be in an animal control set, but probably the cdc one, which is why I like it better - you can get around civil reporting, but if you're in the hospital for treatment, it will be in there. Not sure how urgent care, doctors offices and walk in clinics are handled... I'll file thus on the back burner if I need a fun paper sometime...