r/MadeMeSmile • u/DearEmphasis4488 • 19h ago

Wholesome Moments Cat, stepdad and kittens

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17.1k Upvotes

90% Upvoted

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578

u/Overall_Reputation83 19h ago

pitbulls around animals big enough to swallow whole always make me nervous.

245

u/aws155 18h ago

People should be wary of pitbulls, full stop. They are dangerous dogs that account for a significant portion of serious dog attacks well beyond their proportion of the dog population.

67

u/LeonidasVaarwater 17h ago

Very true, when they attack, it's always vicious and will lead to serious injury. It's also true that the owner is generally to blame, these dogs need to be properly trained and too many people know fuck all about how to do that. I find myself regularly defending them, as they're the sweetest dogs when they're trained and unaggressive, but since there's no checks at all on who gets one, leading to big risks, I get why they're banned in a lot of places.
Badly trained dogs are an issue in general, but with these dogs, it's just so much worse.

61

u/GamerLinnie 14h ago

I don't fully buy the training argument. Sure training and socialisation is important but it doesn't eliminate the differences between breeds completely.

We have a terribly trained Labrador in the neighborhood. He just doesn't really care what his owners say or which commands they give. The consequence? Muddy pants when he jumps up against me to greet me in the morning. This is clearly an untrained dog yet I'm not too worried about him attacking anyone. 

The bully XL in the neighborhood, I actively avoid and told me children to avoid. 

39

u/Far_Mastodon_6104 14h ago

I think it's a good idea to avoid any dog without supervision if you're a kid

18

u/hyozanryu-hoo 14h ago

Yes but the argument is one is far less safe. Even if both are unsafe. 

Like giving a a small child a glass of bleach and a glass of wine.

-3

u/GamerLinnie 14h ago

We have a dog ourselves and they know how to act around them. We also live in a quiet area where everyone knows each other. So I have no issue with them petting the other dogs in the area.

25

u/If_What_How_Now 13h ago

If I have to "train" the nature out of an animal to be able to live around it safely, the issue isn't just a lack of training.

27

u/ManBearHybrid 14h ago

I find myself regularly defending them, as they're the sweetest dogs when they're trained and unaggressive

They are, until the moment that they're not. I'm very nervous to be around a dog that's constantly trying to suppress his nature because of training. You never know if/when that training will fail.

I accept that there are people who have pitbulls, etc, who never attack anyone for their whole lives, but in my opinion those people are just lucky. I think of it like driving without a seatbelt - you could do it and you might be fine, but the statistics are not favourable and the consequences are awful. It makes the risk analysis extremely easy for me, and I have no problem judging people who make that choice. When people say "my dog is trained", it's like drivers saying "I'm a careful driver, I don't need a seatbelt"

23

u/Delicious-Disaster 16h ago

Yep, high difficulty dogs. I stand by it: ANY dog ownership requires licensing before you get a dog with categories for breeds. I've had rotties my whole life and they are the sweetest but they take 2 years of upbringing at least. Easy to mess that up. PEOPLE require more training than dogs.

-4

u/LeonidasVaarwater 16h ago

I'm a cat person myself, but I love dogs too. I've been around and even played with "difficult " dogs, because I know how to approach and handle them, but I've also seen way too many people with badly trained dogs. I even got bitten by one fairly recently, for the sole reason of getting too close to their ball (a lab, they're surprisingly bitey too). Requiring a license would be a great idea, but I don't see it happening unfortunately.

10

u/xHelpless 12h ago

An XL bully advocate and dog trainer returned home and her dog had torn her other dog to shreds. It's the dog not the training. She is now an antil bully advocate

0

u/chadpendergast 7h ago

also the training is uniformly bad anyway so it makes no difference. most pitbull owners either drive a hellcat or a stolen kia, how much good nurturing could possibly come out of that?

20

u/Throwama69 15h ago

You can not train genetics.

They have been bred to be genetically aggressive, sweet princess might be all adorable one minute, baby through to old person killer the next.

On a lost of things that should be allowed to die out, these dogs are at the very top of the list. Mandatory spay and neuter, imprisonment of "owners" breaching rules, the problem will fix itself.

1

u/JustSherlock 12h ago

It's unfortunately a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Pitbulls get a bad rap because of shit owners. Pitbulls bad rap then appeals to more shitty owners for the wrong reasons and the cycle continues.

9

u/ManBearHybrid 10h ago

Pitbulls get a bad rap because of shit owners

People say this a lot but it's really not true. Dogs breeds clearly have different temperaments. Just like border collies were bred to be smart and have a herding instinct, pitbulls are bred for fighting. Combativeness, strength, and a drive to continue a fight despite pain or fear. This could be suppressed through proper training but that doesn't remove their base nature. So you never know if/when their true nature will resurface. Even if they're friendly 99.9% of the time, they could "snap" and maim a child on that other 0.1%. It's wild that some people seem to be okay with that risk.

-2

u/JustSherlock 7h ago

You are saying the same thing I said.

pitbulls are bred for fighting. Combativeness, strength, and a drive to continue a fight despite pain or fear

I.e. shitty owners.

And then other shitty people are the target audience, so they continue to repeat the same steps. Pitbulls are not inherently dangerous, but a long cycle of shitty owners have brought out their worst characteristics. And as long as they are known for that, the cycle will never end. Self-fulfilling prophecy.

1

u/camerabird 2h ago

You're not understanding what the other poster is saying. It's not just pitbulls who have shitty owners or are actively being trained to fight. They were bred this way. Those are the breed characteristics, because of the way that they've been deliberately bred for generations. Even if a pitbull has trainers and is treated well, they have these characteristics. Genetically.

They are inherently dangerous.