pit bulls are just better equipped for certain things like using their uniquely powerful, clamping jaws to rip animals apart. pair this with the lowest common denominator human and you have a possible recipe for accident.
What is the hate against Pit Bulls? Everyone I've met are super friendly like my BC. Or are they the new Doberman for this cycle?
Submitted 2 weeks ago by Patnou@lemmy.world to [deleted]
Comments
originalucifer@moist.catsweat.com 2 weeks ago
Treczoks@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
What has four legs and an arm?
A Pit Bull in a playground.
Lasherz12@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
The conversation is nuanced and long, but TLDR is that it is a breed which requires more training than other breeds. It’s also important to note that many owners’ version of training is ineffective or counter productive.
Pitbulls are highly energetic and much like great Danes, grow up physically much faster than mentally. They end up being an extremely powerful dog, chalk full of muscles, who crave constant attention and behave like a puppy. Well, puppies bite, and when a dog bites you, you tend to address it (give it attention). Compounding this, they’re also not very smart and it takes a while to train them. Compounding this further, they have instincts like all dogs where pushing is met with resistance (something Cesar talks about a lot with food etiquette around dogs), and basically everything they do is exaggerated with their enormous energy.
Comparing them to a breed like a Labrador, the obliviousness, energy, strength, and attention needs are not the same.
They can be very good dogs, but effort was made to achieve that. There are dogs who have been bred to be home bodies and they much more naturally fall into a “good dog” category. Pitbulls were bred for dog fighting and blood sports. This is not a good start for family’s first dog.
To put this into other terms. There are chickens who have been bred for cock fights. They can be good roosters, but watch your back and be ready to remove them if they attack your hens. That being said, predators beware. Different breeds have different specialties, if you want one for the look be very deliberate about what actions you are going to take to change the “natural outcome” of their behavior being the behavior you don’t want.
Drusas@fedia.io 2 weeks ago
"chock full
Gerudo@lemmy.zip 2 weeks ago
The vast majority of pit bulls are loving, loyal and make great pets. The problem is if they do attack, they tend to not want to quit attacking. I used to schutzhund train and our club was open to training any breed, we even had a border collie do it for fun. The catchers didn’t let pit bulls do it because the way they tend to bite and re-bite wasn’t safe for the dog or catcher. Even with my American Bull dog at the time, they asked to see when the last breeding with a pit in her breeding line was just to be safe, and they were more cautious in the beginning with her than the shepard’s, rotts, malinois and dobies.
Flax_vert@feddit.uk 2 weeks ago
They’re bred to be fighting dogs. Attacking and killing is in their genes, both physically and mentally. The likes of german shepherds have to be trained to kill, pitbulls have to be trained not to kill.
minorkeys@sh.itjust.works 2 weeks ago
They were bred to fight. They had generations of selective breeding by human being with intent toward that purpose. If you don’t think they’re more genetically inclined to violence than breed who were not bred for that purpose, you need a lesson in evolution.
TubularTittyFrog@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
also lot of the owners… own them because of that purpose. they want a ‘tough’ dog because they themselves think they are really ‘badass’.
many pitbull owners are human beings would be way more likely to start a fight with another person. so naturally that carries over to the dog, as dogs mirror the behavior of their owners often.
jpreston2005@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
I’ve been around dogs my whole life. Big dogs. Mastiffs, Labradoodles, Rhodesian Ridgebacks, German Shepherds, Dobermans… Along with some experience with little dogs. The only dog ever to bite me, or attack my dogs, were pitbulls. Two attacks, my whole life, all pitbulls.
I dunno, man. It’s just my personal experience, but shit. I know what kind of dog I don’t trust.
AA5B@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
Same experience here, dogs of all sizes, shapes, breeds. The only dogs that ever bit me for real were mini poodles, two of them.
Well technically I suppose my pitbull - I stuck my fingers in her mouth to pull out whatever she had picked up off the street to eat, but one time she didn’t see and accidentally bit down a bit. She immediately released and was mortified she may have hurt me
mx_smith@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
From personal experience I had a friend who raised a pit bull from a puppy and his dog was well behaved and trained well. Then when the dog was about 5 years old, it just snapped one day and attacked my friend mauling my friends arm in his bedroom. When he got the dog into the back yard it started ramming the glass door with his head and then ran and scaled a six foot wall and took off never to be seen again. I knew this dog as a puppy and how it was raised. This was also in Arizona, where the vet said they have cases of pit bulls “going crazy” from the heat but ever since I have been wary of pit bulls.
davidagain@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
Training and control is essential, but instincts are hard to eliminate permanently.
joeljoelle@piefed.blahaj.zone 2 weeks ago
It’s not so much the animal as that I don’t really trust people with that kind of animal, just as I don’t want to see people walking around with a lion, or a machine gun
southsamurai@sh.itjust.works 2 weeks ago
Generally, it comes down to which statistics a “hater” believes. I’ll refer to twain here about lies, damn lies and statistics, since numbers always seem so certain, but can be cooked.
It doesn’t help that “pit bull” isn’t a breed, it’s a “type”, which is vague as fuck all. There’s something like a dozen breeds that get called pit bull, each with their own range of traits. What they have in common is an origin as fighting dogs, including those bred to fight bigger animals.
But if a dog just looks similar to any of those breeds, it’s a pit bull, including mutts with no known ancestry in fighting breeds.
So, folks see a scary looking dog and that’s that, they hate scary looking dogs.
Is the hate justified? IDGAF tbh. Assuming any of the statistics are accurate and applicable, I can understand wanting to limit breeding more, as well as the strict side of enforced euthanasia once a dog turns aggro. But with the vagueness of what gets counted as a pit bull in those stats, and the cherry picking that goes on in such debates, I can’t work up any emotional response to the subject.
But that’s why the hate. They’re scary looking dogs, and when a dog that looks like they tend to look attacks, it’ll fuck its target up worse than something like a Chihuahua or poodle. That much is fact, a big muscular dog with strong jaws can fuck shit up.
notsosure@sh.itjust.works 2 weeks ago
Why take on the hassle of a pit bull? Just get a Labrador or a poodle, there are so many easy going dogs. Easier to insure as well.
Elting@piefed.social 2 weeks ago
Lol, Labradors are not easy dogs. They are very friendly, but they need a lot of outlet for their boundless energy and constant direction or they become misbehaved. Every other poodle I ever met was undertrained and misbehaved too.
EvilBit@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
Because sometimes pit bulls need rescuing. We picked one up wandering the side of the road who turned out to be the absolute sweetest and most loving creature we’ve ever known. We walked him and our other dog one morning and a little neighbor dog came running (stupidly) up to attack. Our other dog just spiked this dog’s face into the sidewalk and proceeded to fight back while the pibble just got excited about the new friend.
Madzielle@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 weeks ago
You gotta be careful though, The one who bit me was a rescue. The guy who took him in was a complete moron entitled asshole, and I ended up getting bit due to this dudes negligence.
DrBob@lemmy.ca 2 weeks ago
Pitbulls are the hollow points of the dog world. There is nothing wrong with them per se but the consequences of one being misused are so much worse.
vinceman@lemmy.blahaj.zone 2 weeks ago
Holy shit we’re actually starting the doggie eugenics on lemmy now, this comment section is a fucking travesty.
bluGill@fedia.io 2 weeks ago
The type of people who want a dog to bite are going to be getting something like the size of a pitbull. A much smaller dog and a human can easily fight it off, they can do some damage, but not as much as the people who want a dog to bite would like their dogs to give. A larger dog and the owners wouldn't be able to control if the dog would attack the owners, so they won't accept that.
That is why, in general, (understand there are exceptions). Big dogs tend to be very friendly. Because any big dog that's not friendly, the owner is going to put it down before it kills someone. Thus big dogs are bred to be friendly. A Pitbull is about the largest dog that you could breed to be unfriendly without risking harm to yourself.
Again, this does not say anything about any particular dog breed. It says something about the type of people who would have a mean dog.
JigglySackles@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
Mostly just the new breed to gang up on. It’s made worse because while statistically they are being shown as having higher bite percentages, there is some skew because of miscategorized breeds that get lumped together under the unofficial breed of “pit bull”. There are also many more of them than other breeds. Partly because of being en vogue and partly again because multiple breeds are being lumped together.
ExLisper@lemmy.curiana.net 2 weeks ago
I never had any experience with Pit Bulls, they are not very common where I live. I definitely don’t hate them.
There are dogs that can kill people and are so strong the owners can’t stop them and there are dogs that are easy to defend against. It’s a simple fact, not based on feelings towards one bread or another. The first type has no place in society. People should not own dogs like that. It serves no purpose. It’s simply stupid.
Muffi@programming.dev 2 weeks ago
It is a bigger, stronger breed. The damage it can cause when misbehaving is naturally way worse.
I visited America for a month last year, and I have never met that many ill-behaved dogs. Pit Bulls are fine if they are thoroughly trained, but most American dogs are definitely not. Why do Americans also always have more dogs? They never stop at one. Every time I met a dog owner, they had at least two.
XeroxCool@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
Because when both adults work, it’s mean to leave a living creature home, alone, and enclosed for 9 hours. Pets are domesticated for companionship. It goes both ways
AA5B@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
Yea. I’ve been tempted to this many times over the years. I’ve always had one dog at a time because that works for me, but I know they’ve suffered from lack of companionship when I’m not around. Getting a buddy would likely make my dog’s life better.
In particular my last dog never really adjusted to our family. Way too high energy level, way more need for attention than we were able to give. I specifically considered getting him a buddy but couldn’t risk one buddy’s life as the last ditch effort to save another. We did end up having to rehome that dog but at least didn’t affect another
TubularTittyFrog@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
they don’t. only 1/4 of dog owners have two or more dogs.
you just saw them more because they stood out to you.
Padit@feddit.org 2 weeks ago
I feel like very few people actually have a problem with the dogs them selves and more with the people owning them.
Why would you buy a Pit Bull? Like what are the top 3 reasons that come to mind?
AA5B@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
Pit bull breeds are commonly available as rescues and they tend to become very attached to their family, very affectionate. They can be extremely smart and loyal. Also they look cool, somewhat distinct from the everyday golden retriever ilk. I trust my pitbull with my kids more than any other dog I’ve owned.
Personally I find them the right size: big enough to play rough or to cuddle without worrying about squishing them, small enough to be easy to feed and clean up after
They also seem like a great physical level for family life. They can have intense play but endurance is not their strong point. It’s not like they need to run all day
TubularTittyFrog@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
because of how they look and the image they project.
folks mostly pick breeds based on looks. just like cars or most other things they choose in life.
RBWells@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
We had a Pit & another mutt - yes the pit bull was good natured and polite, gentle under normal circumstances, easy to train to be obedient to me - but she was strong as fuck, and if another dog, including our other dog, wanted to fight, she was all in, I do think they are bred to fight. Thankfully she moved out when my daughter moved down the street from us, we would have kept her or the other dog but not both of them. We still get to see her & my kid gets to see the mutt, they are practically next door, but it’s better with them living in separate houses.
All that to say - yes they are just dogs, trainable and sweet. But so so strong and willing to fight, you have to be able to redirect them quickly if they see another dog get aggressive.
Madzielle@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 weeks ago
I dont hate putbulls, I am however weary of them, because I was bit by one at 24… I didnt blame the dog, but its human countetpart(s).
My sisters Pug used to bite people, I do hate pugs, for many reasons, as I dont think they should exsist, the poor things.
JigglySackles@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
Hey, not trying to be annoying. I see this error a lot, “weary” should probably be “wary” if you are implying you’re cautious of them because you were bitten, “weary” is like tired of them.
Madzielle@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 weeks ago
Thank youuuuu, youre right, I am so very casual in my writting on lemmy, but thanks for the point
crank0271@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
I imagine this may become a contentious thread, but one book I’ve partially read and enjoyed (and now remember I need to go back and finish) is Pit Bull: The Battle Over an American Icon by Bronwen Dickey.
CovfefeKills@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
They get joy from killing other animals. The stats don’t account for what they do to little critters. There is survivorship bias in the stats too, the owners know who they are and treat them accordingly. Well the responsible owners.
corsicanguppy@lemmy.ca 2 weeks ago
They get joy from killing other animals.
You seem to be psychic; or you can talk to them. Which is it?
My family has vet hospital people and spca people in it, and they don’t have your level of certainty.
CovfefeKills@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
Personal observations.
Your family are all psychic vet hospital and spca people that can talk to animals? That’s wild.
Tollana1234567@lemmy.today 2 weeks ago
dobermans arnt really that aggressive, compared to pitbulls, which are bred for baiting bulls and likely fighting too.
ShankShill@sh.itjust.works 2 weeks ago
I had a pit that was a scary-looking but sweet doofus. We lived in the middle of nowhere across the street from a cemetery, and during a burial he got out and went across the street to play with people.
Downside is his version of initiating play was to try and tug on pants with his mouth. That didn’t go well for a lady in pantyhose. Her ankle got scratched. Luckily, she came over and just asked about vaccine records and said she could tell he was just wanting to play. He dodged a needle that day.
He learned that play habit from when we had a 3 wheel ATV which he was afraid of, and he would try to pull the human off the scary machine by their pants. We accidentally taught him that was good by trying to calm him down. Whoops.
Otherwise we never had any issue out of him. Cats and kids could crawl all over him and he’d just wag his tail cuz all attention was good attention.
11111one11111@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
Ill die on the hill that no matter the breed the dog will always be as good as their owner but I also have enough empirical knowledge of seeing what pitbulls and other similar breeds are capable of. DONT ADOPT DOGSCUZ YOU WANNA RESCUE THEM! I know every leading heart dog lover will call me crazy but duck that. If you wanna be a good owner to your dog than the time it takes to be a good owner for a puppy you had from birth should be where you start. Then after raising 5 generations, THEN YOU FUCKING IDIOT AND ONLY FICKING THEN you should entertain he idea of helping at your pound with canines who need rehabilitation. All youre doing adopting is talking yourself out of getting another dog. I have seen more people than i can count growing up who go to the dog store, see the posters to rescue, get their dog and either never see it thru its full recovery before getting rid of it or it was the last dog that person pr couple ever got.
jordanlund@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
When you look at annual statistics of dog bite fatalities, pit bulls aren’t just the #1 cause of dog bite deaths, they account for more deaths than all dog breeds COMBINED.
Image
Elting@piefed.social 2 weeks ago
According to Wikipedia (I understand the irony here) dogsbite dot org has been accused of publishing misleading and inaccurate information. However, pit bulls are terriers and terriers don’t let go when they bite. Most terriers are small ratting dogs where this doesn’t matter so much.
Madzielle@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 weeks ago
When I was bit by a pit, I was in a fight with his uh, human. The dude was being a dick. The dog looked at me, looked at his “owner” and then lunged at me. I put up my left arm to block my face, thats where he caught me, in my arm. The guy jumpped on the dog, started punching it in the head (this guy was a complete moron) and he wouldnt let go.
I played dead. It was isntict, I dont know. After what felt like enterity, I just, took out a deep sigh, pushed all the air from me, went limp. the dog let go, the guy whos dog it was threw him in the bathroom and locked him in there, and I went to the hospital.
jordanlund@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
Dogsbite.org is super diligent about showing the supporting evidence. For example, the last complete year they have is 2019:
dogsbite.org/dog-bite-statistics-fatality-citatio…
Each death marked with multiple citations.
guynamedzero@piefed.zeromedia.vip 2 weeks ago
I think this graphic should also be taking into account the number of owned dogs by breed, kinda like per capita. Because what if almost everyone owns pit bulls, and all the others are just outliers, then yeah, most attacks are by pit bulls because there’s more of them.
In my opinion, this would probably actually make pits look even worse, but it would actually be more representative of real data
velma@sh.itjust.works 2 weeks ago
A lot of mixed breeds are labeled as “pit bulls” which can skew the data as well. There’s several different types of “pit bulls” like American Staffordshire Terrier.
And as another commenter pointed out, this graph is coming from a biased source.
Nibodhika@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
Even if pit bulls are a minority of the population and the majority of attacks that doesn’t mean they’re aggressive, it shows there’s a correlation, but not a causation link. Read my other reply, but in short, this is the same argument racists assholes use to say black people are aggressive, because they’re a minority of the population but are the majority of homicide offenders.
jordanlund@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
The number of dogs doesn’t matter, it’s tracking the number of human beings killed by the breed.
Yeah, Chihuahua might bite you, they aren’t going to kill you.
Nibodhika@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
Repeat after me, correlation does not imply causation. Two things can be correlated without there being a cause/effect relationship.
What you’re saying is essentially: Pitbull-like races are around 14% of large dogs, but are responsible for 55.9% of fatalities, i.e. more than all other combined. Therefore Pitbulls are dangerous.
I bet you would agree with that logic… Except those are not dog numbers, that’s USA statistics on the African-American population. Congratulations on the racist argument.
Similarly to how there are multiple factors that explain the disparity for African-Americans there are also multiple factors at play for dogs, for example:
I’m fairly confident that if you normalize for living conditions the numbers would not show any significant difference for breeds.
Flax_vert@feddit.uk 2 weeks ago
Did you just call black people dogs…? What’s wrong with you…
Patnou@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
But I whole heartedly believe that pit bulls by nature were meant to be farm dogs. And if you get one and raise them from birth in a good and loving home than bites won’t happen. With this statistic did any owner say that yea I hurt my dog but only because he or she deserved it…etc etc etc. I didn’t think so. No one man or animal is inherently mean. That is a learned behavior. And with all avenues of information getting to people and children is more likely going to be people who are mean. But born that way. Fuck No. Anyone feel free to prove me wrong for this discussion.
hypnicjerk@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
the fuck you mean “by nature”? man made dogs.
Lydon_Feen@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
Truly one of the worst takes I have ever read. What you “believe” means nothing.
Pitbulls were bred to be as aggressive and strong as possible. They are literally attack dogs made for fighting.
It’s a shit breed that should be made illegal, period.
Lasherz12@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
It’s pretty well known they were bred to be fighting dogs for blood sports. It doesn’t mean they end up that way, but intervention is needed in places other breeds do not require it.
superglue@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 weeks ago
Speaking from experience. I adopted a pitbull about 10 years ago. Spent countless hours training it, sent it to a daycare to make sure it was socialized.
Strike 1 was when he got kicked out of the daycare for fighting. Strike 2 was when out of nowhere he bit my friends dog. Strike 3 was when he turned on my border collie and nearly killed her. She was the dog he grew up with and spent every single day with. I had to beat him with a grill spatula to get him to let go, and I was bitten in the process.
My observation with the breed was that they have an instinct built into them and when it triggers they become possessed and they lose all control. Humans don’t usually trigger it, but other pets tend to.
jordanlund@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
The real question is “why would you believe that?”
They were bred to kill bulls, bears, and rats, in pits so that none of the animals could escape.
Flax_vert@feddit.uk 2 weeks ago
Animals aren’t mean, but they can be bred to be aggressive and dangerous. A pitbull probably doesn’t feel malice, but the reasoning in it’s head is incapacitated by years of breeding to essentially be a weapon that will effectively kill and attack ruthlessly. That was it’s purpose. It’s just following it’s instinct. And that’s what makes them so dangerous as well, they don’t realise it’s wrong.