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BS(L)
A supporter asked me to respond to Scott Bennett's article in The Examiner in support of a ban on "pit bulls". First, I'd like to ask Mr. Bennett what a pit bull is. It's one of the first problems with breed specific legislation directed at the so-called pit bull - "pit bull" isn't a dog breed. It's an unofficial group, and the actual breeds included in it vary depending on what 'expert' you talk to. The American Pit Bull Terrier is generally included, although the AKC doesn't recognize the breed. The other two that are almost always on the list are the American Staffordshire Terrier and the Staffordshire Bull Terrier. Some insurance companies list the Presa Canario, the American Bulldog, and others as pit bulls, despite the fact that the aforementioned breeds were developed for use as stock dogs, not fighting dogs. And in addition to this nomenclature-generated confusion, there is also the problem of questionable lineage - that fact that the overwhelming majority of so-called pit bulls are not purebred dogs, and many lack any American Pit Bull Terrier, American Staffordshire Terrier, or Staffordshire Bull Terrier ancestry at all. Breeders are notorious for forging paperwork and crossing breeds to produce traits not commonly found in true pit bulls; for instance, the 'blue-nosed pit' that is so popular of late often has a Weimeraner in its family tree.
The situation is at its worst in animal shelters, where any muscular dog with a fat head is labeled a pit bull, and in many cases destroyed purely on the basis of its appearance. In other cases, dogs are held to a far higher standard to other breeds/types with regard to their behavior, expected to be ambassadors for a breed they don't even belong to - a practice promoted and defended by many claiming to be pit bull rescuers.
"Simply stated," Scott Bennett doesn't know what he's talking about. He states that pit bulls are more intelligent and athletic than other dogs, which simply isn't true. According to Stanley Coren's work on the comparative intelligence of different dog breeds, none of the pit bull group even made the top ten, and the two Staffordshire breeds were considered merely average or slightly above average when it came to their abilities as working dogs and their responsiveness to obedience training. With regard to athleticism, I submit that pit bulls are considered amazing athletes compared with other breeds because they have short fur and tight skin, traits that show off their musculature. They are nearly absent from many contests of canine athletics, like agility and flyball, sports dominated by the herding breeds and smaller terriers, though they excel in weight pulling, alongside huskies and malamutes.
Mr. Bennett's suggestion that pit bulls are stubborn and aggressive defies quantification and suggests a great deal of Freudian projection on his part; in my own work I've found pit bull-type dogs to be focused and single-minded, hardly the same thing. The notion that they are "hell on wheels" without training is a matter of opinion, to say the least, and in this case, it's the opinion of a dog trainer - Scott Bennett, who would love to have your business.
Mr. Bennett says that pit bulls are working dogs and their job is fighting to the death. I hardly think this is what the kennel clubs have in mind when they talk about the working breeds. Mr. Bennett insists that the dogs love to fight and kill; he clearly doesn't have experience with fighting dogs, or if he does, that experience was so colored and tainted by his prejudices and preconceptions that he didn't learn a thing from it. I feel like I can speak to the subject, as I have several trained fighting dogs in my sanctuary and am in regular contact with a community of people who are involved in fighting dog rescue: these dogs fight because they're taught to do so, and their lives are filled with misery and torture. The life of a fighting dog is not one of ecstasy, where the dogs get to do what they love. The dogs are in hell. They hate what they do, and they do it out of fear - 'kill him before he kills me'. The dogs are never happier than they are when they're taken away from that life and never put in a position to fight again. To suggest that the dogs fight for pleasure, purely on the basis of their breed, is ridiculous. Some dogs fight. Some don't. Some pit bulls are highly reactive. So are some border collies, poodles, golden retrievers, and my favorite dogs - mutts. Other pit bulls are shockingly non-combative. And by the way, most of them would rather chase a ball than kill another dog.
Mr. Bennett really reveals that he doesn't know what he's talking about when he says that 'one cannot look at a dog and recognize its breed' but that if the dog is a pit bull the chances are higher that it will bite you - if you can't recognize the breed, how do you know it's a pit bull (which is not a breed)? Mr. Bennett goes on to appeal to the likes of Kenneth Philips and Merrit Clifton, who are notorious for shoddy studies and twisting data to support their foregone conclusions. Want to know why there are more pit bull bite incidents than bites from other breeds? It's pretty simple:
- Pit bulls are popular dogs. If your city has 100 golden retrievers and 10 Labrador retrievers, guess which breed is going to be reported more often for biting.
- Pit bulls have a bad reputation, so when they do bite, it gets reported more often than when other types of dogs bite.
- Pit bulls are one of the favorite dogs of idiots and irresponsible people who fail to observe the type of safety precautions that should be taken with any dog.
Mr. Bennett asserts that it is 'miraculous' that dog owners stated that when their dogs bit, it was their first known dangerous behavior. When a dog bites someone, the owners often think of their own liability, and they don't often tell people about all the warning signs leading up to the incident. It's also worth noting that most people don't know enough about dogs to recognize a lot of those signs, something Mr. Bennett should realize as a professional dog trainer.
Mr. Bennett tries to conclude his article as if he has presented a simple, deductive argument, but he fails to prove any of his assertions leading up to his conclusion. He states that pit bulls are potentially dangerous and must be regulated. Well, Mr. Bennett, "potentially dangerous" is a legal designation given to a dog, in most jurisdictions, after it injures a person or animal, not before. If the potential for danger is reason enough to ban an animal, we may need to look at some of the other hazards in our daily lives and regulate them appropriately as well. For instance, the statistics regarding injuries and deaths to children from dog attacks are nearly identical to those from school activities. Perhaps schools need to be declared dangerous. About 30 people are killed by dogs every year in America, but thousands die in auto accidents. About 17,000 are murdered. Over 200,000 are killed as a result of mistakes made by doctors. Huh. It's starting to look like people are a lot more dangerous to one another than pit bulls, not to mention the danger they pose to pit bulls - we kill around half a million of them every year in this country.
I work almost exclusively with dogs with bite histories, and of the hundred animals in my facility, only a handful are what Mr. Bennett would call 'pit bulls'. The pit bulls I have are not my more severe cases; they are typically victims of the type of hysteria Mr. Bennett would like to promote. One declared potentially dangerous for scratching someone with his toenail; one deemed non-adoptable after a bite that no one witnessed and that produced no visible wound; you may remember Snaps, who was beaten and forced to attack two women in Seatac in 2009 - he's one of the gentlest dogs I've ever known. He's also, despite the reports about him, not a pit bull. Oops.
Yes, some dogs bite, and some of those are pit bulls. Regardless of how you choose to interpret the data, whether you love pit bulls or hate them, whether or not you like dogs at all, perhaps the most compelling reason that breed specific legislation is a terrible idea is this: it doesn't work. Shelters are already having a hard time handling the number of impounded animals they have to deal with; how much worse will it be when they are flooded with pit bulls? What will it cost the taxpayers to kill all of those dogs? Shelters offset the care of the dogs they house with the fees they charge for their adoption - not an option with a banned breed dog. We'll all get to eat that expense. Then there will be the appeals; the burden of proof falls on animal control when it comes to what breed a dog is or is not, so the taxpayers will have a lot of canine DNA tests to pay for as well. And if you think that making something illegal is an effective deterrent, you're right, because robbery, narcotics, murder, and rape are all things of the past since we made them illegal. Oh, wait... that's not true at all, so I guess you'd be wrong. Some people will comply with the law. Some will move to a more animal friendly community, which hurts the local economy. Many will simply keep the dogs in secret, which begs the question, would you rather have pit bulls in the open where we can keep track of them, where they're licensed and vaccinated, or would you prefer them to go underground, where they are unable to be accounted for, where they don't receive vaccinations and basic health care because people are afraid to take them to the vet. Want rabies? Want your dog to get parvovirus or canine distemper? BSL's an excellent step in that direction.
It used to be German Shepherds. It used to be Doberman Pinschers. It used to be Rottweilers. Today it's "pit bulls". Tomorrow it will be something else. Or maybe common sense will prevail. It pains me to say so, but I kind of doubt it.
Posted on January 20, 2011