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I love animals, all animals, but when I was about 10 a neighbor of mine got his face ripped open by a pit bull which has since made me steer clear of these animals. My neighbor (about eight at the time) simply leaned over to pet what had previously been a completely passive animal and the dog sunk his teeth around his face, literally tearing and pulling the skin off. He has huge scars to this day.

Chav dogs and crap.

Status symbols for total assholes. Crap. Outlawed in some countries and rightfully so. No waffles.

I disagree. Pit bulls are very sweet dogs and it is usually the owner's fault if they become aggressive. Since they are one of the most popular breeds, it's only natural that statistics will show a greater number of people have been bitten by these dogs. They're great for therapy (company for the elderly, etc.). The Little Rascals dog was a Pit Bull and he spent hours and hours with children. Helen Keller had one... god, she was such an ASSHOLE

Linus Van Pelt wrote:Status symbols for total assholes. Crap. Outlawed in some countries and rightfully so. No waffles.

Agreed on one hand.

On the other: Loyal, faithful and affectionate dog if raised properly. I've had more trouble with German Shepards. Any dog can be a danger if not raised correctly.

Linus Van Pelt wrote:Status symbols for total assholes. Crap. Outlawed in some countries and rightfully so. No waffles.

Yeah, American Pitbulls and Japanese Tosa's are illegal to breed in the UK under the 1991 Dangerous Dogs Act. They've been replaced with the more popular Staffordshire Bull-Terrier, which is an altogether more affable family dog, as the dog du jour.

wes9 wrote:I love animals, all animals, but when I was about 10 a neighbor of mine got his face ripped open by a pit bull which has since made me steer clear of these animals. My neighbor (about eight at the time) simply leaned over to pet what had previously been a completely passive animal and the dog sunk his teeth around his face, literally tearing and pulling the skin off. He has huge scars to this day.

I know some pit bull owners who defend the breed passionately.

But the story told above has played itself out too many times for me to ever trust pit bulls as a breed. These dogs will be perfect for years and years and years and then they will snap for no apparent reason.

No pit bull owner, no matter how responsible they are, can convince me that their dog won't snap, or that they will be able to control their dog when it does.

As a domestic dog for families, pit bulls are CRAP.

Can an individual pit bull be sweet? Maybe. But pit bulls are fighting dogs. They were bred to fight. Some dogs were bred to hunt, some to guard, some for food, some for companionship, some for herding, some for looks, etc. Pit bulls were bred to fight. A sweet pit bull is an anomaly. Better, it's a mistake. A sweet pit bull, a pit bull that doesn't fuck somebody up, represents the failure of generations of careful breeding. Do they exist? Sure, but keep them away from me and mine. I don't want to be around when they remember their genetic purpose.

Why this breed exists in this century is a mystery to me.

If you want a badass dog that is also sweet, I've heard good things about mastiffs.

I don't know... I think it's a little more complex than that. Here's an interesting link I found that tells of the history of the dogs. The problem seems to be that there are different types of these dogs, some are more aggressive than others and it's hard to tell them apart -- or something:

http://www.nyx.net/~mbur/apbtfaqover.html#over

Do you think they should all be put to sleep?

John W. wrote:Do you think they should all be put to sleep?

I didn't read the whole thing - looked interesting, though. I wouldn't advocate putting them all to sleep, no. But if they could all be neutered, then within 10 or 15 years, there wouldn't be any left. Obviously, that's an impossible goal, but I would regard that as a good solution to strive for.