urbpan | Defending Pit Bulls

I felt compelled to respond to this editorial

Dear Mr. Nevius,

You make some valid points, and I appreciate that you give reasoned arguments for your position. I agree that pit bulls owned in the city should be spayed/neutered (the ones involved in the most recent attack were not) but that it shouldn't end with pit bulls. All dogs owned in the city should be sterilized. The only valid reasons for having intact dogs are to present them in dog shows (which an exception could be made for) or to breed them. The kind of reckless back yard breeding is why there are pit bulls that attact humans. Probably you have been told this hundreds of times, but a well-bred pit bull, from dog fighting stock, would never attack a human. No pit bull owner that I know wants dog fighting to come back, but it was the arena that honed them into strong animals that are dog agressive but never attack humans. (a dog fighter whose dog bit him would simply cull the dog)

Back yard breeders are the source of the kind of unvaccinated, unregistered dogs that usually wind up being involved in attacks. They are responsible for the thousands of dogs in shelters across the country, including the two that my wife and I have rescued.

Of course, existing laws must be enforced--new laws will have no effect on people that are already breaking the law. The reason your columns receive such backlash is because law-abiding dog owners are punished by new legislation. In Denver, the people who registered their pit bulls were the first to have them taken away, when their legally-owned dogs suddenly became illegal. There are probably hundreds of pit bulls in Denver that are unregistered, or are registered under a different breed name (one of mine came to me as a lab cross) that are still with their owners.

I know you think we are an organized lobby (I hope we're half as organized as you think we are) of passionate nuts. We are just trying to protect animals that we have compassionately let into our families. We are trying to protect our family members' right to exist.

Your comparison ot the pit bull lobby to the NRA tickled me. I made the same comparison in my blog some time ago! Feel free to read it here: http://www.livejournal.com/users/urbpan/27770.html

Here's hoping you see us as human, and our dogs as just dogs,
(signed, me)