Marty
08-01-2008, 10:24 PM
Waverly,IA -- Why is it that when one pit bull attack occurs, an attacking epidemic sweeps the nation? Is there something in the dog food? Are irresponsible owners simultaneously agitating their dogs? Or is the media to blame for sensationalizing the attacks?
As a member of the media, I have no answers. But I do have some suggestions for this ridiculous wave of dog crime.
In the past month, the Omaha-metro area has seen numerous attacks, the most serious being an attack on a 15-month-old who lost part of her scalp from a pit bull's bite. Now an Omaha committee is exploring possible restrictions on the breed. The City of Omaha already has dangerous-animal and menacing-behavior laws, which allow individual animals to be labeled dangerous, or even euthanized, if they attack without provocation or have been trained to fight.
While this looks good on paper, is this approach really solving anything? Clearly not. And the reason why is, like so many other problems in the world, the real issue behind the pit bull attacks is being swept under the rug. And the real issue, of course, is the owners.
Many pit bull owners are responsible and caring. But just like parents, many are quite the opposite. This is an issue of nurture versus nature. Just as a child with a negligent parent is more apt to becoming a dangerous or psychologically disturbed adult, a pit bull will transform from a gentle puppy to a full-grown monster when not trained properly. But do we kill the children who make bad decisions partially because of their parents? No. But we apparently see no harm in killing dogs with careless owners. What's worse is, unlike people - who possess free will and advanced intelligence that allows them to choose whether to follow in their ignorant parents' footsteps - dogs simply follow what their owners teach them.
Let's take another recent example in which a pit bull was literally used as a weapon in an attempted local robbery. The pit bull had about as much free will as a gun. But when a gun is used in a robbery, the blame is obviously not placed on the weapon.
Idiotic pit bull owners have existed since the breed's creation. The name "bull" originates from the dog's original purpose, which was to bull bait. Bull baiting is a sport in which a tethered bull, brought to the market for slaughter, would be attacked by the dogs in order to tenderize the meat. From the beginning, these dogs were bred to be defensive and aggressive by no fault of their own. But where has the finger always been pointed? At the innocent dogs.
A more logical solution than banning or killing pit bulls is to crack down on irresponsible owners. Logical solutions could include requiring special training for the dog and the owner, raising the price of pit bulls, running background checks on potential owners and issuing severe fines to those owners whose dogs act maliciously.
My family had Chows for years, also an aggressive breed of dog. The dogs were some of the friendliest I've seen, and I even have photos of myself as a child sleeping on one of them. When my family moved long distance, my mom thought it would be best to sell the dogs. Years later, we discovered the new owners had been charged with housing a multitude of dogs on a farm and abusing them. We were told that Buddy, the male Chow, was terminally ill and at an animal shelter. My dad wanted to see Buddy one more time before he was put to sleep, so we drove to the shelter. I can still remember how mean Buddy had become (to every one but my dad) and how traumatized I was that my family's dog had become so vicious because of cruel, careless people.
So in the wake of these pit bull attacks, let's all remember that people and animals alike come into this world - for the most part - as good and innocent beings. It's the people who raise them that fuel their corruption. And until some of these pit bull owners stop being so irresponsible, the breed doesn't have a dog's chance of surviving.
http://www.newswaverly.com/site/tab6.cfm?newsid=19883506&BRD=2712&PAG=461&dept_id=557008&rfi=6
As a member of the media, I have no answers. But I do have some suggestions for this ridiculous wave of dog crime.
In the past month, the Omaha-metro area has seen numerous attacks, the most serious being an attack on a 15-month-old who lost part of her scalp from a pit bull's bite. Now an Omaha committee is exploring possible restrictions on the breed. The City of Omaha already has dangerous-animal and menacing-behavior laws, which allow individual animals to be labeled dangerous, or even euthanized, if they attack without provocation or have been trained to fight.
While this looks good on paper, is this approach really solving anything? Clearly not. And the reason why is, like so many other problems in the world, the real issue behind the pit bull attacks is being swept under the rug. And the real issue, of course, is the owners.
Many pit bull owners are responsible and caring. But just like parents, many are quite the opposite. This is an issue of nurture versus nature. Just as a child with a negligent parent is more apt to becoming a dangerous or psychologically disturbed adult, a pit bull will transform from a gentle puppy to a full-grown monster when not trained properly. But do we kill the children who make bad decisions partially because of their parents? No. But we apparently see no harm in killing dogs with careless owners. What's worse is, unlike people - who possess free will and advanced intelligence that allows them to choose whether to follow in their ignorant parents' footsteps - dogs simply follow what their owners teach them.
Let's take another recent example in which a pit bull was literally used as a weapon in an attempted local robbery. The pit bull had about as much free will as a gun. But when a gun is used in a robbery, the blame is obviously not placed on the weapon.
Idiotic pit bull owners have existed since the breed's creation. The name "bull" originates from the dog's original purpose, which was to bull bait. Bull baiting is a sport in which a tethered bull, brought to the market for slaughter, would be attacked by the dogs in order to tenderize the meat. From the beginning, these dogs were bred to be defensive and aggressive by no fault of their own. But where has the finger always been pointed? At the innocent dogs.
A more logical solution than banning or killing pit bulls is to crack down on irresponsible owners. Logical solutions could include requiring special training for the dog and the owner, raising the price of pit bulls, running background checks on potential owners and issuing severe fines to those owners whose dogs act maliciously.
My family had Chows for years, also an aggressive breed of dog. The dogs were some of the friendliest I've seen, and I even have photos of myself as a child sleeping on one of them. When my family moved long distance, my mom thought it would be best to sell the dogs. Years later, we discovered the new owners had been charged with housing a multitude of dogs on a farm and abusing them. We were told that Buddy, the male Chow, was terminally ill and at an animal shelter. My dad wanted to see Buddy one more time before he was put to sleep, so we drove to the shelter. I can still remember how mean Buddy had become (to every one but my dad) and how traumatized I was that my family's dog had become so vicious because of cruel, careless people.
So in the wake of these pit bull attacks, let's all remember that people and animals alike come into this world - for the most part - as good and innocent beings. It's the people who raise them that fuel their corruption. And until some of these pit bull owners stop being so irresponsible, the breed doesn't have a dog's chance of surviving.
http://www.newswaverly.com/site/tab6.cfm?newsid=19883506&BRD=2712&PAG=461&dept_id=557008&rfi=6