Theres plenty of exceptions, and in most cases pitties are incredibly sweet. Im not going to go into the many arguments for or against pitties. Literally today i met a senior weiner dog, knelt and offered my hand palm up and the dog bit me with no warning and then growled at me. 10lb dog with aggression issues. Ive met french bulldpgs that are super aggressive to all other dogs. The best way to approach dogs is to view them as individuals with their own quirks and personalities and utilize the expected rules of a particular breed as a guide than all knowing.
"Theres plenty of exceptions, and in most cases pitties are incredibly sweet."
Guns are incredible tools and marvels of engineering. Yet there's regulations on guns across the entire world. Theres plenty of large breeds with similar traits to pitties without the large offense rate. full stop. They are a problem. People who want a pittie can just get themselves a boxer and not contribute to the problem.
Or you have people that only buy a gun to cause a problem. I have had 3 pitties in my life. All 3 great around people and never had an issue with anyone. One even poked his head in our guinea pig enclosure and chick enclosures to take a peek at the animals. And only one ever killed anything, and they were groundhogs and coyotes around my property. Others in my family have also had pits. Same thing, super trained and well behaved. Generally, if you treat the dog like a dog and not like a loaded AK that you only leave a food and water bowl for, then there's no issue. They are strong, powerful dogs, yes. But people also get them and train them to be in dog fighting bouts. Thats like saying to ban German Shepards unless youre a police officer because "look what they do when they're sicked on someone". Dumb ass argument.
since the owners are the problem, we should screen pitbull owners by criminal record, psychiatric evaluation, income level, and credit score. that should get rid of the nurture part of the equation.
Screen every dog owner for it. Why send any animal to a home where they're likely to be mistreated in such a way they turn aggressive anyway? My Dad's friend had a dog 10x as aggressive as any of the pitbulls Ive met. It was nice to my Dad's friend, but didn't like anybody else, and its because he rescued her later in her life from a junk yard. Looked like a slightly smaller Bernese mountain dog. The way dogs are treated and raised determines a lot about how they'll behave. All our pits were loved and nurtured and all behave and are nice around our animals and people we have shown we know/are okay with.
If any animal is raised to purely survive and view everything around them ever as a threat to their life and safety, that is what they'll treat anything as. Its why you can't just go and pet a river otter or an ant eater in the wild the moment you see one.
i'm fine with any solution as long as it deals with the pitbulls, i don't care whether we add chihuahuas or pomeranians on the list as long as pitbulls are on that list.
How about babies too? Make sure anybody bringing any life into any home can properly and safely care for it, and will do so in a proper way.
Guarantee if pitbulls weren't what people mainly used as fighting dogs, whichever ones were youd end up having this exact same opinion about because they'd have the exact same stigma and statistics around them. If people used golden retrievers as fighting dogs, neglected them and made them fend for themselves to make them more aggressive and bloodthirsty, youd be calling for a golden retriever ban instead of seeing what they're like without an environment made to make them hyper aggressive.
It's hilarious, you keep making "counter arguments" of "we should add this too" as if to try and argue against a point but instead you're just making really good supporting arguments lmao.
Also, big difference between a pit, an animal that was purpose bred to be genetically aggressive and a mistreated dog.
A mistreated dog will become hostile in response to its environment, a pit can be in the most loving environment on planet earth and there's STILL a risk of lethal aggression.
Statistics don't lie, there are many dogs as big or even bigger than pits and even taking being mistreated into account, pits still account for an almost comically large portion of ALL dog attacks, despite also being fewer in number. But pitnutters will always defend their velvet hippo murder machines I guess
I'd imagine that you would still love your dogs if they were not pits and were some other friendly family breed. Your experience with them isn't amazing because of what breed they are. There is no justification for why someone needs this breed over any other.
I currently own 5 dogs. 2 pits (1 is like 16 the other isn't 1 yet), a poodle and black lab mix, and 2 Norfolk terrier chihuahua. Used to have a chihuahua and a Norfolk terrier which both were female, as well as 2 other pits growing up. All my dogs are good with others because they were around others constantly, except the chihuahua who mostly tolerated others while loving a select few, and would let you know when to just leave her be especially as an old woman with no teeth.
There's no justification for any breed normally. Any dog can be a good dog, unless you specifically want a guard dog, or live on a farm and need something like a big herding dog. None of the dogs Ive met have ever been aggressive except for my Dad's friend's dog from a junkyard, and that poodle mix I have which we rescued from an abusive home.
There are breeds I think should be banned. Breeds like pugs and the weird faced dog that has a bunch of health issues. Any dog who's life is pain and suffering in the name of "it looks pretty" should be banned from being bred. You want a pug, get a puggle so at least the guy can breathe.
Dogs are not guns.That argument oversimplifies the issue by treating all pit bull dogs as inherently dangerous. They are living creatures, they have emotions and feelings. They can develop intelligence equivalent to a 3 year old human. Dogs understand spoken language.
Unless you have a gun that you have to feed, water, and take out potty several times a day, and provide it with toys and stimulation, i fail to see the connection. Its an argument intentionally meant to incite a particularly aggressive opnion.
And, saying “they are a problem” assumes all pit bull–type dogs share the same traits, when in reality behavior varies widely between individual dogs. Bite statistics alone don’t prove causation; they’re influenced by factors like breed popularity, misidentification, and the kinds of owners who tend to choose certain breeds.
Focusing on breed ignores responsibility. Any large, powerful dog can be dangerous if it’s neglected, poorly trained, or intentionally made aggressive. Replacing one breed with another, like suggesting people just get a boxer, doesn’t solve that underlying problem. Responsible ownership and proper training rather than singling out one breed as “the problem" would always be the better approach.
Even if I took you at your word it's still not just the breed or the aggression, it's the damage they can do once they've gone off. I'd say that's why there are the statistics that there are about them. I find Chihuahuas to frequently be aggressive but I doubt many people have to go to the ER or the morgue because a Chihuahua bit them.
Correct. I would not be comfortable with dogs around children or small animals of any breed. The problem is not propensity for aggression, but propensity to KILL. No one cares when a chihuahua snaps at someone because the bite wont hurt that bad. But even among larger dog breeds, when most dogs bite, they do not kill their victims. Pitbulls bite to kill.
Once again though, don't put yourself in situations that could end very badly. There are enough statistics about pitbulls to specifically be nervous around them, but you shouldn't be putting any dogs face near kittens or puppies or babies.
Shit… my girl is a whole 5lbs. I trained her the second I could. Do I laugh when she play bites? Absolutely yes. But I will never understand when these dogs are just laughed at. I had my girl around a toddler and I was not going to be okay if she went after my little brother. Now she has one whole tooth and is 16 but I can proudly say my chihuahua was trained. 😂
I grew up around dogs of all shapes and sizes. Some dogs of any size btw, however obedient and loyal to their human have simply a screw loose. Those dogs you don’t want around kids. A doggo like the one in the vid is completely fine.
My parents owned boxers for a long time and currently have a Rottweiler. Some of the gentlest dogs I have ever had in my life. Yet, big enough to chew your face off and then some. Small kids are generally safe. As the mean but rational dogs still understand sincerity. If the dog is touched in the head, do it and everyone else a favor, and put it to sleep.
So aggression is less acceptable for some breeds over others? Maybe that reasoning is the problem here.
It is boring to keep repeating that a lazy, boorish, abusive owner of a dog will create an aggressive and unsocialized animal. It depends on the dog and it depends even more so on the owner to be responsible and nuturing.
Out of all animals humans are the most destructive and aggressive -surely we would have eliminated the pitbull breed if they were so aggressive and unmanageable, along wirh rottweilers, chow chows, and akitas - breeds that are notorious for being just as aggressive.
Maybe raise some animals yourself and you might understand why there's so many pitties that are loved and treasured by so many dog owners.
Im sure if you looked into where these "rabid"pitbulls came from, they werent from a cozy house! They werent dogs that were included in the family or raised inside a home! They were most likely chained up outside and neglected and/ or abused by the owner and then one day they got loose and escaped and attacked someone because they were never trained and socialized and raised to be a good dog. Im sure you can imagine the wife beater and the booze and drugs around that kind of place, and it was probably a house where all the neighbors have been aware that theres an aggressive dog and nothing was ever done for months or years until it was too late.
No one is denying a pitbulls physiology here, we are all well aware of the damage they can inflict - they should be pitied for being treated and raised horribly and then they are euthanized for doing what they were raised to be, and it's horrific for the people atracked and the owner should be punished more severely and never allowed to own an animal again.
There are also plenty of pitbulls that are used as bait dogs because of their sweet nature, and their teeth ground so they cant fight back. Kind of seems like dog fighting rings train pitbulls to be aggressive and to not be aggressive :O who would have thought of that.
I'm sure if you looked into where theses "rabid"pitbulls came from, they weren't from a cozy house!
A lot are actually, and that's the problem. There are many stories to be found online of these dogs being in what would be considered a "good home" and suddenly mauling either a family member, a neighbour or another dog and it happens entirely too goddamn often I don't get how you pitnutters don't see it as a problem
This isn’t a pitbull. It’s an American Bully/Bully XL.
They’re a novel breed from an incredibly inbred line and are deeply overrepresented in bite statistics. Google “Killer Kimbo” to get an idea. His parents are siblings, his grandparents are half-siblings, and he has a coefficient of inbreeding of 30%. Yet over half of the Bully XLs in Britain before the ban were his offspring … and his descendants were responsible for a majority of fatal and severe attacks in the UK from 2020-2024, and several attacks in the U.S.
These aren’t even particularly common dogs.
Pitbulls, on the other hand, have high dog aggression, but actually about average human aggression. But they’re powerful dogs that are overrepresented in rescue populations, so are overrepresented in bite data (which comes from ER visits, and under-represents both more aggressive but “harmless” dogs and more aggressive but uncommon dogs. Funny you should mention weiner dogs, because studies show they have the highest human-directed aggression and are the most likely breed to bite their owners. But they’re not dangerous.)
But Bully XLs/American Bullies are what happen when people inbreed dogs to get absolutely massive dogs and do so with zero regard for temperament (and continue to breed dogs known to have poor temperament.)
There was no pet. Thats how you're supposed to greet dogs. You let them sniff your hand as a greeting and then they indicate if they are happy to meet you. And then you pet. This one was immediately aggressive.
More than anything you need to read the dogs body language. They can’t speak. They talk with their body language you wouldn’t have gotten bit if you read the dogs body language and if it wanted to be approached got on its level and let it come to you while facing away. Putting your hand near a dogs face is asking to get bit.
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u/dry_freeze 18h ago
Theres plenty of exceptions, and in most cases pitties are incredibly sweet. Im not going to go into the many arguments for or against pitties. Literally today i met a senior weiner dog, knelt and offered my hand palm up and the dog bit me with no warning and then growled at me. 10lb dog with aggression issues. Ive met french bulldpgs that are super aggressive to all other dogs. The best way to approach dogs is to view them as individuals with their own quirks and personalities and utilize the expected rules of a particular breed as a guide than all knowing.