Sorry for the language and attitude in the last two threads. I’ve said some things I regret, and used some language I generally abhor, and I apologize.
I had to go dump another bag of soil on Tunch’s grave today. I was walking through the back yard and noticed it was starting to sink in. I guess as his body rots and the gasses are released and he decays, his former mass decays, so his grave was starting to sink in. Doing that just fucks me up in ways I don’t think many of you will understand.
So a couple weeks after he was murdered by a pit mix, when my buddy JenJen texts me that her baby was almost killed by another pit, I lost it. I fucking went through that a couple weeks ago, with my pet killed in the back yard. Hers was on a walk. And yet I am sure as shit both owners just think it was an aberration.
I’m not sure how many more aberrations I can handle before I buy a shotgun.
Punchy
Peeps who’ve been attacked by pits (raises hand) versus pit owners. Never gunna find a common ground. Akin to gun owners v. Non-gunners. Then eemom jumps in to Hiroshima the convo….
Mackenna
What happened to Tunch was deeply traumatizing. You wouldn’t be normal if you weren’t angry.
Hell, I was shocked and cried when I heard the news and I only “met” Tunch on the Internet. (Also cried when Satchmo and Beckham died and never knew them either.)
I know I’m not the only one. So…those of us with brains and an iota of life experience, can appreciate how you must be feeling.
The prophet Nostradumbass
Ear worms.
First
Second
Cassidy
Nothing like a little bloodletting on a Saturday night. Sometimes, it’s just gotta happen.
Corner Stone
We had a problem in my neighborhood with a pit not too long ago. It got out of its yard repeatedly, did crazy shit. One day it treed a mom and her child in their car in the driveway until the police came with animal control. And I mean they could drive off but were scared shitless to get out and try and go in their own home. For some reason the authorities gave that animal back to the owners.
Goblue72
Don’t worry – some of us appreciated it. I can’t stand pit bull owners self-rationalization of walking around with a ticking time bomb in public. Around children. Any pit in public should be muzzled at minimum.
But most people are too emotionally attached to their own self interested biases.
Violet
I’m so sorry about Tunch. Grief is a journey with plenty of ups and downs. Everyone’s journey is different. Be kind to yourself, John.
gbear
Still sorry for your loss, John. Tunch is returning to the earth. He’ll be taking his favorite blanket with him.
shit… :(
gbear
@Cassidy:
Actually, no.It doesn’t have to happen.
John Rogers
@Goblue72: So basically every time I go to a thread, carefully consider John’s feelings, then go find a bunch of research showing that the real, statistical problem is non-neutered animals (94% of fatal attacks are by non-neutered animals), that any breed can and will bite, that you’re more likely TO BE STRUCK BY LIGHTNING than killed by a dog, how both the American Humane Society and the CDC recommend AGAINST breed-specific controls, we start ANOTHER thread about “those goddam pitbulls” and how their owners are selfish sociopaths?
Fine, I’m done. I don’t even own a pit, but this is officially crazy. And it’s late.
Any dog, at any time, should be neutered, and on a leash if around animals it hasn’t socialized with. Anything short of that and any dog, at any time, is a risk.
And even then, its a goddam risk.
TCG
John doesn’t have anything to fell bad about. He’s right. Pit bulls are man made mistakes, that need to be corrected.
John Rogers
@Punchy: Peeps who have encountered multiple attacks, NONE of which by pits (raises hand) vs. other peoples anecdotal evidence. Never gonna find common ground …
Suzanne
John, I’m very sorry for your loss, and I hope that Steve helps you find some joy to ease your pain.
No matter how I feel about pit bulls, I know how much it hurts to lose a member of the family, and I hope that you find some peace.
TriassicSands
John, I really feel for you for Tunch’s death, but maybe you should “lock” your keyboard when you’re feeling down.
@Cassidy:
I agree with gbear. Much of those two threads was totally unnecessary. I think John realizes that now, and we’ll see if he keeps it together a little better in the future. However, when someone is known to be hurting, regardless of what they say (or most of what they do), there simply is no reason to engage that person in ways that will make things worse.
Gustopher
I’m getting old and crotchety, and if I see someone with an aggressive dog, I ponder for an instant whether it is the breed or the owner, and then realize it doesn’t matter. Set them both on fire.
Alas, torching asshole dogs and the assholes who own them isn’t legal, so I just complain on blogs.
NotMax
Contrition is good.
And don’t think it wasn’t noticed, and appreciated, that you said “and I apologize” rather than the all too common “and I apologize to those who were offended.” Not that you employ that weaselly construction, just that it is way too often proffered as being the same as an apology.
fuckwit
Huh? I read those two posts and I saw nothing at all wrong with them.
Maybe they were loud and cranky and emotional and not too well-written, but I can’t argue with the points they made.
Dangerous dogs are very much like guns. I wouldn’t be surprised if people who own them do so for the same reasons. They certainly do use similar excuses for justifying owning them, and for trying to avoid responsibility when their dangerous dog or gun kills or injures someone or someone’s pet.
I would never want to own a pit bull or a gun, personally. I could imagine having a dog again, but not a breed like pits.
Johannes
John, you’re entitled to your grief, and your anger, and you’ve been sharing with us, your online peeps, just like you share the good stuff. It’s only been a couple of weeks, and this all really fresh. And you’re working hard at forgiving your brother in law and sister. I’m with Violet; cut yourself some slack.
@John Rogers: Good to see you here, and dear heaven, do I have Leverage withdrawal.
Arclite
@John Rogers: Hey John Rogers, fuck you, you piece of shit douchebag. Learn how to do basic fucking research and apply some fucking logic.
1. Pitbulls are contribute to over half of all dog-caused human fatalities, despite being only 5% of the canine population. They’re a menace.
2. No one ever died being attacked by a non-neutered chihuahua or Scottish terrier, you douche. It’s the breed, not the balls. Pit bulls are a fucking menace.
3. THERE’S NOTHING YOU CAN DO ABOUT FUCKING LIGHTNING YOU DOUCHE, but you can sure as hell do something about pitbulls: extinction.
4. Speaking of fucking research, in fact, you ARE more likely to be killed by a dog (38 fatalities in 2012 in US) than lightning (28 fatalities in 2012). Learn to use Teh Googel.
Asswipe.
jprfrog
I had my own pit bull experience…a neighbor who kept one and let it run loose was a cop. His dog attacked our Shepherd-Rottie (not fatal) mix on our property and even then the town council (West Newbury, MA, pop. about 2000) wouldn’t do a thing. About 2 years later the same pit bull attacked an old dog further down the lane and that was it — put down the dog or move. They moved.
I was home alone when the first attack occurred, and I raced through the house looking for a baseball bat; lucky I didn’t find it, I guess. But not so lucky for Q, the dog, who needed about $400 worth of vet, for which my crazy neighbors paid not a cent.
When my step-son was Bar Mitzvah, we had a large party in our back yard, which was not fenced. I had to go next door to the pit bull people and ask them to lock the dog up for the evening, as large crowds upset her and we didn’t want a catastrophe. At least they did that.
I agree that pit bulls are like guns in the house; you can never tell when they will go off in the wrong direction.
Tim F.
Was not an aberration at all. In the seventies dobermans were the dog that ignorant assholes all wanted, so you had a lot of doberman attacks. Dogs raised by ignorant assholes (or worse) are unpredictable and dangerous. In the last ten years I could find maybe four people killed by dobermans; one was after years of owner abuse and another was clearly rabies or distemper. Right now the ignorant asshole pretty much drives the trade in pit bulls, so a remarkable number of them end up too dangerous to own. When assholes move pn to Weimeraners everyone will wonder how that famous photographer ever survived taking all those pictures of his dogs. The people I know who adopt pits (in part because in the city it can be hard to adopt anything else) will visit the shelter multiple times if necessary before selecting one with a suitable temperament. People who can’t judge temperament should not own any big dog, most especially pits where the statistics are so heavily stacked against you.
Elizabelle
I don’t carry a gun, but if I regularly encountered pit bulls while walking dogs, I would have a gun and I would use it to protect a pet in my care.
Maybe those who do encounter pit bulls should take cell phone camera footage of when the pits get aggressive, or lunge, and turn it in to local police.
That story about the lady who could barely control her pitbull was alarming. She is going to be shocked, shocked, when her beloved dog destroys another animal or badly injures a human.
Asshole dog owners come in all shapes and sizes. A dear friend of mine has one dog — a Lab that was traumatized early in life — said Lab then took out a smaller dog’s eye during a neighborhood confrontation.
So: my dear friend goes out and gets an even stupider and less controllable and bigger dog, as company for the lab. Not a pit bull. Not that smart.
Now she has two big dogs that are a struggle to control on walks around the neighborhood. Her children cannot walk these dogs. She does not have the time or inclination to walk each big dog separately. (And then they are shut up in the house for 8-10 hours each day.)
She’s stressed. We’re all stressed. She, though, is in denial.
debbie
I’ve read the threads, and I don’t think there’s anything to apologize for. I’ve had a Rottweiller clamp and lock on my leg and refuse to let go (thank god for Frye boots and heavy-weight denim), and nature always wins out in the end. Even as she tried to get the dog to let go, the owner kept insisting that the dog was sweet and had never done this kind of thing before.
If you want a pit bull, fine, but don’t bring them around people. There’s a first time for everything.
sal
Nothing to apologize for. Pit bulls were bred to be fighting dogs, and that’s their nature. Sure, an asshole or ignorant owner can exacerbate that trait, but the trait is always there.
It’s not the dog’s ‘fault’. People bred the trait into them. But that’s what it is. The analogy to guns is exactly right. If we can’t get rid of pits, then maybe we can regulate the hell out of them. Nothing in the Constitution about the right to bear pit bulls. If one attacks, automatic put down. Owners civilly and criminally liable. Insurance required.
There are all kinds of dogs out there. They will love you. Many will protect you, if that’s what you want. No need to get a dog whose nature is to attack.
p.a.
Well that was interesting. Catching up on the overnight posts this Sunday am. We should get T Levenson involved in this nature/nurture dust up. See what the MIT wisdom is on the subject. When you come down to base principles, some breeds are designed to be dangerous. When something happens, I find it unrealistic to thear the ‘few bad apples’ argument.
Another Halocene Human
@Arclite: Well, technically, you can mitigate harms from lightning.
There’s a reason pits are dangerous, and it’s their size and the strength of their jaw. They are very muscular fighting dogs. They were bred to kill other dogs.
I’m in an area where pits are everywhere as pets. They’re unremarkable and you don’t really think about it. But I wouldn’t want one to come after me. It’s like trying to fight with an alligator.
debbie
Could this be the cure for Conservatives?
gogol's wife
I’m sorry for your pain, John. The grave story is heartbreaking.
We didn’t have the remains of three of our cats, who disappeared in the middle of the day, but with the three who died of natural causes, we had them cremated, and their ashes are in little decorative urns on the mantelpiece. It’s very comforting to have them near. “Cat lady interior decoration”!
Another Halocene Human
@Tim F.: You know if people want to do that fatal attraction thing and keep a really dangerous pet in their house I don’t judge… but when they endanger the whole neighborhood I start to have a problem.
That’s why we gave animal control the authority to put dogs down.
Judge Crater
It couldn’t be more obvious. Humans, much less dogs, don’t always act rationally. But dogs are genetically programmed (the very concept of breeds and breeding, makes that obvious) to react to the world in different ways. Pit bulls are designed to be aggressive, territorial and capable of physical violence. They are not “wild” animals, in the sense of lions and tigers and bears, but they have behavioral characteristics that put them at the extreme edge of canine aggression.
When that aggression is triggered, people and other animals are at risk. They are not playing by our human rules – they are doing what they were bred to do. If you’ve got a junk yard that needs guarding, they’re great. Otherwise, owning one is a considerable risk.
ixnay
All righty. I am a veterinarian (the vast majority of my practice is low-cost spay/neuter). I have watched with alarm the rise in popularity of pit bulls, mostly because of the people who have them. Here’s what I know, as a person who has professional dealings with pit bulls on a very frequent basis:
Pit bulls are total sweethearts … right up until the moment they are not. They have anxiety issues, and can destroy most of a home’s furniture and woodwork faster than you can imagine, if left alone. If that anxiety is triggered for any other reason, the nearest living thing is likely to suffer grievously.
Sensible owners know this. Sensible owners do something to keep this tendency under control. That said, sensible owners are not omniscient, and cannot be counted on to predict/prevent collateral damage, and most owners of “pibbles” (don’t you love the cutesy locution?) do not fall into the category of “sensible.”
I’m going to copy and paste this under the top post, because I think it’s important. So there.
wonkie
I’m sorry, but the anit-pit thinking is not different than the thought process behind Willie Horton ads and racial profiling. It’s demonizing a catagory of dogs based on their physical appearance, based on anecdoatla evidence.
“Pitbull” is not a breed. Its a label for dogs that have smooth coats, floopy ears and rat tails. The vast majority of dogs called pitbulls are mixed breed dogs. They might or might not be partly American Pitbull Terrier or Staffordshire Terrier.
It is impossible and intellectually dishoest to claim that mixed breeed dogs have some kind of character flaw that makes them loaded guns.
The AKA commissions temperment testing on pure breed dogs annually. American Pitbul Terriers and American Stafforshire Terrier test for socialbility with humans at or slightly higher than golden retrievers.
American Pitbul Terriers and Staffordshire terriers are terriers which means the breeds do have hundreds of years of breeding i them by humans to treat smaller critters as prey. APT and ST are genearlly not good with cats or rabbits or squirrels or small dogs.
The same is treue for all of the terrier breeds.
“It’s the owner”. No it isn’t. It’s the individual dog. Withiin prue breeds there will be variations. Rosie is OK with cats, while JRT’s ing en. general are not. People need to know ad take repsonsibity for their dog’s individual behavior ad personality.
I’m sorry that Tunch was killed by adog. But deciding that all pits (most of who are mixed breed dogs) are loaded gus is prejudicial thinking.
BTW according the Humane Society there is a dog that has a higher than usual tendency to be aggressive to people: the unsocialized chainedup backyeard dog., regardles of breed.
As far as statistics for dog vs human encounters no breed has a statistically significant record of biting incidents to iinndicate a predisposition toward biting.
No breed at all.
About foruty breeds are represented ii the reported dog bite icidents each year. About hoalf of the are mixed breed dogs. The remaining reported breed are all large breeds wwhich makes since because bigger dogs have bigger mouths.
I don’t own a pitbull. I have a German shepard collie mix who is not safe with cats or other small animals. She’s afraid of female dogs ad is playful with male dogs. She adores all people and expects to be adored by them.
That’s they way dogs are: a bundle of personslity traits and behaviors, only loosely associated with breed.
I’m sorry for your loss. Buit I am also sorry for the literally thousands of good dogs that get euthaized every year because of the perjudice agaist dogs with smooth coats, floppy ears and rat tails that might or might not be partly APT or ST, and the prejudice against pure breed pits..
BTW the bomb sniffing dog for the Port of Seattle is a pit that was rescued from a breed ban area.
Helen
@fuckwit:
This.
HRA
There have been dogs in my life for a long time. We even had one for 18 years. The next dog was given to us by a relative who found him wandering as a puppy around at his country retreat. He had the coloring of a Doberman although he was a lot smaller and a mix of something unknown. He was going on 3 yrs old when he changed towards me. Whenever I came home after work without G., he began to growl at me with a look that raised the hair on my body. G. took him to the SPCA. I felt conflicted about it – relieved and sad to have had to do it. He was adopted in a few days. It took 5 years for me to get another dog and only when our granddaughter gifted us with one.
mattH
@John Rogers:
Nice misuse of a statistical point; I do believe the majority of lightning strikes aren’t fatal either. In fact, the Zuni have a medicine group based around surviving lightning strikes.
Maude
This proves that Tunch wasn’t fat, he was floofy.
Use lime.
Ecks
Tunch will be shrinking a bit, but whenever you dig a hole then fill it back in, you ALWAYS get subsidance, because the dirt you shovel back is much looser than the tightly packed stuff you dug out.
When they made a trench in our yard one time to get to a very deep water pipe (old house, and for some reason it was like 6 feet down), they actually left a 16 inch mound of dirt over the hole to compensate for the sinking. That was a bit much (there was always a ridge there after), but it did shrink noticeably.
Tinare
Well, you lost me as a reader. Those threads were among the ugliest things I’ve ever read, and far beneath you.
TriassicSands
@wonkie:
Statistics on dog bites are irrelevant to this discussion. Severe injuries in dog attacks are what matters. I think you may find the numbers for pit bulls somewhat less favorable in that category, which makes perfect sense given the strength of their jaws and bite and their aggressiveness under the right circumstances.
To me, it would be reasonable to simply stop breeding those dogs that have been bred to fight. The only dogs that need to be euthanized are those individuals guilty of attacks. With a ban on breeding and importation this problem would be gone is less than two decades. At that point dog attack statistics could be reexamined to see if further action was needed. No innocent dog would be harmed, and in a relatively short time the “pit bull problem” would be eliminated.
That’s another part of the problem. Small children fit this description.
ing done to it. The Doberman would have been fine with better supervision. The dachshund was just a cranky, unpleasant little critter whose redeeming qualities were impossible to discern to anyone but its owner.
Ted & Hellen
Cole, you have a lot to apologize for, but none of it involves anything you wrote in the last two threads.
henqiguai
@mattH(#35):
Um, yes, that’s more or less what he wrote; “…more likely to be struck…”, he didn’t specify killed.
Just dropping in to be nitpicky. Otherwise got no dog in this fight.
Radok
I have a dear friend who has a pit who is supposedly the sweetest dog on Earth. I will never take my children to her house.
Pits are sweeties TO THEIR OWNERS…that’s why people who have them swear up and down that the dogs are misunderstood. The *instant* the pits perceive a threat to their owners? Yeah, you’re screwed. And few humans have the strength to pull the dog off once it goes on the attack. Not risking it.
I may be hysterical but I also won’t let my kids play where there’s a gun in the house, either.
Cassidy
@TriassicSands: When you have an abscess, you open it up and clean it out.
Ted & Hellen
@HRA:
Not that you asked, but it seems wrong to me to pass along a dog like that to anyone else. It ought to be put down.
Ted & Hellen
@Tinare:
See ya!
Ted & Hellen
@Cassidy:
Jesus, you’re a pig.
I’m thinking perhaps a bipolar pig.
Richard Bottoms
>I’m not sure how many more aberrations I can handle before I buy a shotgun.
You need to stop right now and get some serious grief counseling.
If someone I knew personally said anything like what you just did it would be time to start thinking 5150, no shit.
Me and my wife still mourn our Lady nearly 20 years later so I understand, but you are coming off the rails and people need to call you on it.
Before it means calling the police.
gbear
@Cassidy: Your analogies show an amazing lack of self-awareness. You were a huge part of what made those two threads suck. I don’t blame John a bit for directing his anger at you specifically. I can see him apologizing for the language he used, but not for calling out the people that were throwing stink bombs into those threads.
karen
@Richard Bottoms:
5150 is?
henqiguai
@karen (#49):
Involuntary psychiatric hold
Yeah, me too.
TriassicSands
@Cassidy:
Even assuming that is an apt analogy (and I don’t), you could clean it gently with care (and perhaps a local anesthetic), or roughly with no anesthetic, just a wire brush and isopropyl alcohol. I’m afraid I’ve seen your method of choice.
John had the decency to apologize for his excesses. Perhaps, you could learn from that.
Cassidy
@gbear: No, the reason the topic is shit is because of John and all the other sycophants here who’d rather believe some bullshit myths and are fucking hypocrites. Everyone single one of you that claims to be an animal lover and supports eradicating a breed of animal for the sin of existence should be ashamed of yourselves. BUt you all don’t have that much self-awareness.
@TriassicSands: 1) John didn’t apologize to me. I don’t particularly want or need one, but if we’re going to talk about doing the decent thing, then that would be it. And honestly I’d rather not see one at all than this non-apology apology bullshit. The latter is just fucking lame. 2) I’ve got nothing to apologize for. Nothing I’ve said wasn’t true. I don’t apologize for being honest.
StringOnAStick
@TriassicSands: Thanks, fellow geologist (I’m assuming on the latter – you’ve used the proper code-word/nym); I couldn’t agree more.
TriassicSands
@Cassidy:
Nothing I could write would be even half as effective at revealing the poverty of your attitude as your own words. I will say this: however, the honest boor is still a boor, though I fear you overrate your honesty or mistake it for something else altogether.
Cassidy
@TriassicSands: Meh. Nothing personal, but your opinion means nothing. I’m not going to humor you that it does so let’s not waste time.
eclare
I’m gone. I have a pit mix. Fuck you for saying a member of my family should be put down. You realize that is the equivalent of saying since some people abuse kids, no one should have kids. I’ll miss Kay and Soonergrunt, but not you.
TriassicSands
@Cassidy:
You may or may not be an honest boor, but you’re certainly a consistent one. The impression you leave is that no one’s opinion — except your own — matters at all. Arguing on the Internet is pointless, but discussions can be productive. I see no way to have a discussion with anyone of your ilk. Clearly, your lofty opinion of yourself is not shared by many who’ve crossed paths with your arrogant posturing. I take your disdain as a compliment. Fortunately, I need never interact with you again.
LiberalTarian
Well, my earlier post got lost in the ether.
My beloved Pearl is a pit mix.
I will endeavor to train her right so that no kitties die like Tunch. I know people with dogs–all kinds of breeds–that will kill cats given the opportunity. Considering how many pits I see everyday, I don’t think there is a huge pitastrophe going on.
You raise a good point. I’ve let myself be lulled into a false sense of security that my dog would never be dangerous. She can be. She needs a ton of training and attention, and I need to be diligent.
It must kill you that your sister did not properly train her dog, or treat it like a dangerous animal, and that your brother brought a dangerous dog to your house. But you can’t say that, so you hate on pits.
I get it. I remember you worrying about Rosie. So this dog was safe for your cat, and apparently your parents JRTs are … So your aren’t wanting to murder allJRTs.
Tunch’s death was tragic. Horrible. I am so sorry.
But all the hate in the world for pits, pit mixes, and owners of pits won’t bring Tunch back. It will make my Pearl a better dog, because I will take responsibility for her potential.
But it won’t bring Tunch back. If it would … I’d say hate away. Since it won’t, try to keep being a force for good. Bitterness is a poor substitute for your dear companion.
anadromy
I appreciate that you feel the need to apologize for being upset John, but I have to say I agree with everything you said–and don’t fault you for your anger one bit.
My mother was out walking the family Cairns terrier when two pits came out of nowhere and killed it in front of her. Nothing like being in college and getting a call from your twelve year old little brother that the family pet has been murdered while your mother watched helplessly.
I don’t even own or interact with dogs very much myself and I’ve witnessed three different attacks by pit bulls on other breeds. Once, on Telegraph Avenue in Berkeley, I saw a pit on a leash suddenly lurch and clamp down on a passing retriever’s neck. The owner of the pit had to pour rubbing alcohol down its throat to get it to let go of the retriever before it suffocated–and while he was doing it, he was assuring the retriever’s owner that his dog was usually “very sweet.”
Just a mile away from my house, a 12 year old kid was killed by his family’s pit bull–a dog that the family also claimed had been docile and “very sweet.”
Those who try to defend pits by saying the breed’s detractors rely too heavily on “anecdotal evidence” need to remember two things:
1) When it comes to pits, there is an awful lot of that anecdotal evidence to go around.
2) Those “anecdotes” being offered as evidence almost always involve the severe injury or death of a beloved pet or, worse, someone’s child.
Given those two facts, you’d think people (ahem, John Rogers would be a little less self-righteous about defending these animals. Like John rightly said in his first thread, of course all breeds of dogs can turn wild and attack people, pets, etc. But you’re talking about animals bred to kill here. It really is like the difference between being shot with a BB gun and .45.
Paul in KY
@John Rogers: Fuck off.
Paul in KY
@Gustopher: Alas.
Paul in KY
@debbie: Lucky for you the dog wasn’t really clamping down. If it had been, Frye boots & denim wouldn’t have mattered.
Paul in KY
@Richard Bottoms: He just means shooting a future dog that comes on his property & kills one of his animals. You know, it is completely legal to do that.