Oregon's proposed anti-pit-bull law

[wanton_heat_jet]

When the idea to ban pit bulls gets floated, well-intentioned citizens routinely make the case that the pit bulls aren't the problem, the owners are. In fact, it's clearly both the owner and the breed that are the problems.

Sure, pit bull owners can be bad. But are we really expected to believe opponents of this law when they say that there's no

Comments

[doccross]

Excellent point there. Pit bulls were developed to be aggressive, fighting animals, just the same way a labrador retriever was developed to love the water and a pug was developed to be a lap dog. Pits are hardwired to be what they are. To think otherwise is eiether naivete or denial.

I tend to support banning pit bulls because they are responsible for so many maulings and deaths, but I also point out to people that if pit bull owners wanted to, they could breed out the aggression in just a few generations.

[jbru]

The problem I have with banning pit bulls is that seems to attack the wrong end of the problem. Yes, they are bred to be aggressive, but it was people that bred them that way. And it isn't the responsible breeders that are breeding them in that fashion. So rather than ban the breed, the government would do better to enforce laws and regulations for dog breeding in general. If the breeding of bad dogs, no matter what the breed, is curtailed, the problem of bad dogs behaving badly will diminish.

[revjohn]

It would take 20 years to extinguish the existing pit bull negative charteristics in the populace and replace them with safer ones. It would also require a substantial federal agency to regulate and enforce the breeding statutes. Identifying a safe pit bull would require a genetic test.

Given that we can't even get the government to keep salmonella out of our food supply, any stautory breeding program is a pipe dream.

Snuff the breed and snuff the dogs. They're our fault, just like nuclear weapons, and just like nukes our responsibility is to contain, neutraize, and eradicate.

They're our horrible mistake.

[jbru]

Probably longer than 20 years, given the breed life span of 12-14 years.

I see your point, but if we kill all the pit bulls we're just left with people breeding a different variety of Canis familiaris to fulfill the same role. We'll end up with killer poodles

[leemoyer]

I believe that we "liberals" want to ban guns (maybe not handguns necessarily, but perhaps sub-machine guns and the like) because they exist for 1 reason only. But since you're into the talking point that "liberals" want to ban all guns, perhaps you can address the numbers.

Pit bull deaths vs. gun deaths.

Both are clearly man-made problems/tools. Which problem is larger. Can either be solved through legislation?

"liberals" and guns

[wanton_heat_jet]

I'm a liberal myself. It's classic liberal behavior to criticize one's own crew. White liberals traditionally rag on the depredations of the white race (and rarely acknowledge the white race's achievements in the field of justice). Male liberals like to rag on patriarchy. US liberals like to rag on the US. So for me to criticize liberals is, well, liberal.

It's ironic and perhaps hypocritical for liberals to use an argument for pit bulls (it's the owner not the dangerous possession that's the problem) when they reject the same argument for guns.

If your point is that guns are worse than pit bulls, you'll have no disagreement for me. I'm all for extensive gun control, and we could improve our national situation just by closing loopholes, let alone by enacting extensive controls. I don't even have much of an opinion on the pit-bull law. My topic is the poor premises and arguments that people use in this discussion.