Sharon Cobb sent me a link to this story about the Michael Vick dogs.
I bring you the information I want you to carry away with you:
How can this be? Reports of gruesome pit bull maulings make international news. Pit bulls are one of the few canine breeds thought to be so dangerous that they are banned in some places.
The answer, says Frank McMillan, a veterinarian who is studying the recovery of some of the Vick dogs, is that we don’t know. “We’ve assumed all pits are the same, and we’ve never let this many fighting dogs live long enough to find out. There are hardly ever studies, because these animals don’t survive,” he said.
I am completely of the opinion that a regular joe should not take on the rehabilitation of any fighting dog. That’s something you should do only if you have the resources and the knowledge and the experience and the time. But I think what the doctor says here is important. We’ve always assumed these were bad dogs and never bothered to find out under what circumstances they could be good dogs.
I will relay to you one anecdote and tell you one short story.
The anecdote: I heard recently about an animal control worker who, when faced with any dog that had bitten someone, called them a “pit bull.” When called on it–over a black lab–the worker said “We have a lot of labs come through here. If word gets out that they can bite children, they’ll never be adopted out. We don’t have that many pit bulls come through and we don’t adopt them out as policy. So, what’s it hurt?”
When my Aunt B.’s boy was six, he hit Mrs. Wigglebottom on the head with a large bone and she clamped down on his arm and he pulled his arm away and there was blood. My Aunt B. said that this proved the dog was dangerous and demanded that she be put down. That’s the short version of how she ended up with us.
Now my nephew is six. He was up at my Aunt B.’s. He was horsing around with her mastiff and did something the mastiff didn’t like and he, yes, bit my nephew. Oh, the explaining, how if he’d really wanted to hurt my nephew, it would have been much worse, but clearly, he was just saying “no.” And really what a good dog he was and it was just a misunderstanding.
My parents were kind enough not to point out what a weird thing it was that Mrs. W.’s behavior was unforgivable and a sign that she needed to be destroyed, but Max’s behavior was just a dog being a dog.
Funny how that works, isn’t it?
Filed under: Adventures with Mrs. Wigglebottom
People’s prejudices about dogs remains truly idiotic. It reminds me of a way of their other prejudices. Apparently there are some folks who, if you don’t speak their language (whether you are a dog or someone with a different native tongue), will form an idea about you from which they cannot be swayed.
An animal that is attacked or cornered or tormented, whether it’s a cat or a poodle, will fight back. It’s called survival.
Somehow, the Pit Bull’s proclivity for biting down and holding on has morphed into a totally different, inaccurate and unfair reputation as an inherently dangerous animal. It may be difficult to dislodge one, but is that more dangerous from a dog that can bite or slash repeatedly?
They look dangerous, therefor they must be dangerous about sums up the conventional wisdom.
Now, Pomeranians…they are killers.
Boxers. That’s the breed that scares me.
My neighbor who is a vet, says that Pit Bulls are like trained assassins, you know what you’re dealing with. Not so with German Shepherds which she calls suicide bombers!
NM,
True.
That whole rebellion in China was frightening.
And the there is Mike Tyson.
Aunt B.,
On a more serious note, this is one more example of the lack of effort by reporters in all media. Why do research when you have a ‘good story’ an a great visual?’ Ask any thoughtful defender of gun rights about the uninformed coverage they usually receive.
Mark
The meanest, most “vicious” dogs I’ve ever experienced in my life were a former co-worker’s pair of Schnauzers and the Chihuahua I lived next door to as a child.
I’d have taken 100 of my Doberman (who thought she was a poodle-size lap dog) instead of one of any of them anytime.
What about pit bulls who are trained to drive ice cream trucks
Maybe our friends in the media can bring some fear-mongering, er, I mean investigative journalism to expose this threat to YOUR KIDS!
Sarcastro, I’m afraid the ice cream truck driving pit bulls are America’s only line of defense against the child molester ice cream truck drivers. Back in the 80s, Satanist ice cream truck drivers were an enormous problem, but the Mafia ran them off after they were run out of Las Vegas.
Or so I hear.
A pet may be precious, but a child is absolutely irreplaceable.
A dog can not be interviewed to determine whether it’s overcome its trauma. You can never know for sure.
But little kids are erratic, too. You never know when they might shout or jump up and down or hit a dog over the head with a bone. The balance of potential damage is lopsided. There’s no way in hell I would ever take the risk with my child, and I don’t think responsible civil servants should either.
Yeah, but then no one should own a dog larger than 20 lbs, because every dog is going to bite and the only way to mitigate the potential damage is to have a dog so small that the bites can’t be that bad.
Is that the decision we want animal control to make? That no family can have a large dog?
I confess. I’ve been lurking. I would like to come out of the shadows (it’s dark in here, my feet hurt, the cobwebs are sticky, and I’m going to need to visit the bathroom REAL soon).
To prove my good will: the story on the Vick dogs isn’t on msnbc anymore, but here’s a link to the original story at the Washington Post: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/07/06/AR2008070602351.html
Tears come easily to me when animals are being abused, but sometimes good comes from wrong – the story you sited helps, and these as well:
http://animal.discovery.com/tv/animal-witness/michael-vick/index.html
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2008/01/080128-vick-dogfighting.html
http://channel.nationalgeographic.com/series/dogtown/3684/vick-dogs-update
The “Animal Witness” episode was hard to watch, but worth the pain to see how most of these dogs have blossomed. My favorite: a scarred behemoth named Leo rehabilitated, dolled up in a clown’s collar, and bestowing kisses on cancer patients as he works as a certified Therapy Dog.
The NatGeo special is on Friday, September 5th.