Anonymous wrote:When we moved into our neighborhood with our two spoiled rotten and very docile big dogs, we immediately spent $6000 on a sturdy privacy fence for our large yard. A few weeks later we went to a neighborhood get together and everyone was going around introducing themselves because there were several new families there. When we introduced ourselves and said where we lived, someone immediately popped up and said, "Oh - YOU GUYS have PIT BULLS." You could have heard a pin drop. Everyone looked at us with huge, frightened eyes and mothers held their children close.

Here are our dogs:



Both are mutts. Both are rescued dogs. Both have been spayed/neutered since they were 9 months old. They are both completely worthless as guard dogs because they are so spoiled that they cannot IMAGINE anything bad happening to them (we got them both when they were less than 6 weeks old).

The black dog is, according to our vet, a lab/pit bull mix - not sure of the ratios. She is absolutely wonderful with kids - she has never even growled at man or beast. I am not sure she even knows how to growl! She will, however, lick you to pieces, and she is capable of knocking someone down with her exuberance. She loves nothing better than to have kids roll all over her. She weighs 75 pounds and due to her extremely LOVING nature, I don't ever leave her alone with kids. For that matter, I don't leave any kids alone with either of my dogs, even though the other dog has no features or evidence of pit bull lineage.

But our neighbors still think we have pit bulls. They would tell the media in an instant "They have pit bulls over there" if asked. They have asked us off and on if our fence is secure, and when we assure them that it is, they always say, "Oh good - because we wouldn't want your pit bulls to get out."

Sheeze!

The issue with pit bull and pit bull/mastiff mixed breed dogs is that they are so often sought out by BAD OWNERS - owners who neglect them, leave them chained in a yard, or ignored outside for days at a time. They often don't neuter them either, or allow them to interact with the family much if at all. They encourage "tough behavior" from these dogs.

I used to have a boxer. Not a pit bull - a full bred boxer. We were clearly told by the breeder as well as in books we read, that we should not encourage tugging sorts of games with a boxer, because they can get carried away and clamp down with their jaw - it's instinct.

I know it's an old line, but there are no bad dogs, only bad owners.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My friend and her husband adopted a full pit bull from a shelter. They had a toddler at the time. He is great with all of them, and other humans. They recently had a baby, and he is great with the baby too. He is not, however, great with other dogs or animals.

See, this is what sets pitbull.owners off as a special kind of stupid.

They are so desparate to prove to the world that their pitbull is gentle as can be that they do things like take zero precautions to keep their pits away from children, or worse allow their own kids to walk their pits unsupervised, have their babies sleep on their pirbulls and allow their toddlers unattended with and or to climb allover thier pits.

They cannot reason at all when it comes to basic animal safety and their pitts because "he's such a big goofy cuddlebug"

How can dog owners of such a dangerous breed be so deliberately stupid?

Anonymous wrote:When we moved into our neighborhood with our two spoiled rotten and very docile big dogs, we immediately spent $6000 on a sturdy privacy fence for our large yard. A few weeks later we went to a neighborhood get together and everyone was going around introducing themselves because there were several new families there. When we introduced ourselves and said where we lived, someone immediately popped up and said, "Oh - YOU GUYS have PIT BULLS." You could have heard a pin drop. Everyone looked at us with huge, frightened eyes and mothers held their children close.

Here are our dogs:



Both are mutts. Both are rescued dogs. Both have been spayed/neutered since they were 9 months old. They are both completely worthless as guard dogs because they are so spoiled that they cannot IMAGINE anything bad happening to them (we got them both when they were less than 6 weeks old).

The black dog is, according to our vet, a lab/pit bull mix - not sure of the ratios. She is absolutely wonderful with kids - she has never even growled at man or beast. I am not sure she even knows how to growl! She will, however, lick you to pieces, and she is capable of knocking someone down with her exuberance. She loves nothing better than to have kids roll all over her. She weighs 75 pounds and due to her extremely LOVING nature, I don't ever leave her alone with kids. For that matter, I don't leave any kids alone with either of my dogs, even though the other dog has no features or evidence of pit bull lineage.

But our neighbors still think we have pit bulls. They would tell the media in an instant "They have pit bulls over there" if asked. They have asked us off and on if our fence is secure, and when we assure them that it is, they always say, "Oh good - because we wouldn't want your pit bulls to get out."

Sheeze!

The issue with pit bull and pit bull/mastiff mixed breed dogs is that they are so often sought out by BAD OWNERS - owners who neglect them, leave them chained in a yard, or ignored outside for days at a time. They often don't neuter them either, or allow them to interact with the family much if at all. They encourage "tough behavior" from these dogs.

I used to have a boxer. Not a pit bull - a full bred boxer. We were clearly told by the breeder as well as in books we read, that we should not encourage tugging sorts of games with a boxer, because they can get carried away and clamp down with their jaw - it's instinct.

I know it's an old line, but there are no bad dogs, only bad owners.

Anonymous wrote:I'm 22:32. I remember when my mom was in a rehab facility after surgery, and a man came around with his therapy pit bull who had been rescued from a fighting ring. Her eyelids had been cut off. She was the sweetest dog, very affectionate, loved all people.

Anonymous wrote:My friend and her husband adopted a full pit bull from a shelter. They had a toddler at the time. He is great with all of them, and other humans. They recently had a baby, and he is great with the baby too. He is not, however, great with other dogs or animals.

Anonymous wrote:I don’t understand the appeal of yappy, aggressive, rat/like chihuahuas. Same reasoning. Could be any number of things. Protection. You find them cute. You like their blocky heads and their doggie smile. You prefer a larger size dog.

(And no, I don’t have a pit bull.)

Anonymous wrote:I have family members with pits. Some of them got Amstaffies from breeders, and yes, I think the "cool" and "rebel" factor was a part of it. Others just got a dog from the shelter, and most dogs at the shelter are pits/pit mixes nowadays.

At the Fairfax Animal Shelter right now, they have 22 dogs and 4 or 5 of them are not pits or pit mixes. So 17 or 18 of them are pits or pit mixes.

Anonymous wrote:My friend and her husband adopted a full pit bull from a shelter. They had a toddler at the time. He is great with all of them, and other humans. They recently had a baby, and he is great with the baby too. He is not, however, great with other dogs or animals.

Anonymous wrote:I'm not even sure I know what the "rebel factor" is. Pretty sure they're not found in my town.

Our dog was not a rescue. We got him as a puppy, 6 weeks old, from my husband's co-worker. He owned both the parent dogs and had one litter before the female was spayed. We treated him like any other puppy. I'm not a fan of crates or tie-outs. He was with us in the house almost all the time. We took him for walks and allowed him to socialize with other dogs from the beginning (no "waiting until he has all his shots"). We took him to a puppy training class. We played with him a lot, taught him commands which he learned very quickly, and made a point of desensitizing him to common aggression triggers by taking toys out of his mouth, removing his food bowl while he was eating, etc., He was an extremely good-natured dog. Everyone who met him loved him--unless they hated dogs already. Several people independently called him a "pit bull ambassador."

But you know what? We would have done the same for any breed of dog. Pit bull puppies need the same things all dogs need: love, discipline, and responsible owners. Human aggression is not in their DNA, quite the opposite.

The fact is, many people do want a pit bull because of its image, and they don't raise them or treat them right. As a result, they don't get what every dog needs. Of course, a few become aggressive and dangerous. And it's a fact that they can exhibit dog aggression--though ours never did, and dog aggression does not translate to human aggression. But in the vast, vast majority of cases, a pit bull puppy that is raised as ours was, will be an amazing pet. Call me blind or self-deceived if you will, but when I hear that a pit bull who attacked someone was a "family pet," I have a very hard time believing that it was a dog raised as ours was. It was either a rescue with an unknown background, possibly abused or used for fighting, or it was kept chained in the backyard, or in some similar environment.

There are very, very few other breeds, if any, that are so consistently abused and mistreated as pit bulls. And somehow, the blame then goes to the breed.

Anonymous wrote:I don't happen to own one, never have, but have encountered many that are very sweet that my dog plays with. I don't understand your attitude. There are many ways to tell a mean dog. Breed is not one.

Anonymous wrote:I have 3 female friends with pit mixes. It’s a bleeding heart thing —- “aww they’re just big babies!” Combined with “don’t buy, adopt.” They feel like they are rescuing a misunderstood animal.