Ah, the age old nature/nurture debate.MoJo wrote:Dogs, a breed of dog is only as good or as evil as their training/conditioning. In the '60's-70's the evil dog was the German Shepard, 70's-80's the Doberman, 80's-90's the Rottweiler, now its the Pit Bull. In the early days of the 20th Century the Pit Bulldog was known as the "nanny dog" because of their gentle nature and protective behavior. Remember "Petey" from the "Little Rascals"? So what breed will be next? The Labrador, Golden, Brittany, or maybe the "Killer Chihuahua?" Dogs suffer the same discrimination as gun owners in the eyes of the media.
I've seen this same blurb posted several times on Facebook. I'm not one to immediately condemn all dogs within a certain breed, but I don't think this paragraph is wholly accurate.
Almost any dog can be mistreated and become aggressive. Sure. But different breeds have strong instincts that give them stronger proclivities to one type of behavior or another. Beyond that, different breeds have different traits that vary the severity of consequences if one goes bad.
I had a weimaraner that had never been trained to hunt, but she pointed at birds and varmints in the yard like she'd been through advanced tactics classes. She naturally knew how to stalk, point, pounce, and kill critters. Similarly, I haven't met a beagle yet that didn't know how to dig or howl without ever being taught.
Individual dogs will always differ, even within a sample or population, but at the breed level, when dealing with generalities, it is fair to take the probability of having an aggressive dog and then comparing that with the probability of severe consequences from an attack (the capabilities of the dog).
There are also different lines of dogs within the same breed, and personality can be heavily influenced by genetics. There may be more docile lines of pit bull and more aggressive ones. Also, mixing breeds can have unpredictable results, but often (not always) results in the calmer breed's personality coming forward (ref: anecdotal).
The fallacy I often see (a few family members have pit mixes): a well-behaved pit is not necessarily any more representative of the breed as a whole than an aggressive one. A docile pit could be genetically predisposed to gentility, socialized and trained so that it's violent instincts are controlled, or be a ticking time bomb. An aggressive pit may remain so regardless of the time and energy put into it.
If you run across an aggressive one, the problem is their size, strength, and ferocity make them dangerous, especially around kids, those with disabilities, and the elderly. I personally have seen little yappy dogs bite far more often than big dogs, and the little ones can break skin. . . but they're often a quick snap and then retreat. . . not a lock followed by violent shaking and a death roll.
I do not believe that the press is solely responsible for the reputation of pit bulls. A lot of irresponsible pit owners and breeders bear that responsibility more than the press. Many of them create the out of control dogs and breed them for the traits that we are discussing, increasing those traits in future generations of their family lines. (I also remember in the 80's and 90's when pits had the same reputation that they do today.)
I'm not arguing against the dogs for responsible dog owners, but I do take exception to the thought that nurture (how a dog is raised) is the only variable in how they turn out.
There's a lot of science behind the fact that both German Shepherds and Dobermans were purposefully bred into family dogs with calmer temperaments and tolerance for larger "packs" in the second half of the 20th Century. Most modern family German Shepherds or Dobermans would be worthless as true industrial guard dogs. . . many LE agencies now import cousin breeds from Europe or specialized breeders. . . the mainstream lines have had their edge bred out of them. They've essentially been turned into a new breed compared to their ancestors.
The good news is that responsible breeding can quickly change the characteristics of a dog breed in less than a decade. I have no doubt that some breeders of pit bulls have done this. . . but I don't know if I'd agree it's the majority yet. I'm also not volunteering my kids to determine which ones are which.
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