4 ms·

The problem with this widespread belief is that there is no such thing as a "pit bull". Or rather, there are many and some of the breeds are entirely unrelated.

by hnbad 3y ago

The problem with this widespread belief is that there is no such thing as a "pit bull". Or rather, there are many and some of the breeds are entirely unrelated. Likewise news stories are usually thin on the specifics and fail to identify exact breeds or may mislabel them entirely. Generally most people shouldn't have dogs because they lack the time and energy to properly train them (or in the case of adult dogs: to compensate for their lack of training). But you're right that there are some dog breeds that are more prone to biting accidents than others: but if you go by the actual numbers your advice should also explicitly apply to German shepherds.

ltbarcly3 3y ago
Pitt Bulls are responsible for far more attacks. Pitt breeds are responsible for basically 100% of attacks on their own families.
dragonwriter 3y ago
> but if you go by the actual numbers your advice should also explicitly apply to German shepherds. Pretty much everything people say about Pit Bulls today was said about other breeds before, including German Shepards and Doberman Pinschers. I think the change over time is mostly fashion trends among people who deliberately keep and train dogs for actual or perceived viciousness, and media trends interacting with that.
google234123 3y ago
Plenty of evidence against the Pit Bull Terrier type dogs. I can get you a dozen more studies https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8597704/figure/f6-wjem-22-1301/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8597704/figure/... (bitten by a pit bull increased as the level of intervention increased from no repair (6.0%) to repair in the OR (25.8%)) https://www.dogsbite.org/dog-bite-statistics-multi-year-fatality-report-2005-2017.php https://www.dogsbite.org/dog-bite-statistics-multi-year-fata... 2/3rds of fatal attacks.
- boppo1 3y ago
  Thank you, I don't have time to dig through my research folder at the moment.
cityofdelusion 3y ago
Not enough nuance in your comment. Shepherds are mouthy, bitey breeds as part of their bred disposition to herd -- they can draw blood and hurt infants, but they tend to have a "gentle" bite with their families -- they are strongly protective. Pits have a different lineage and a different neural pathway with their biting instincts.
- hnbad 3y ago
  Okay, how's this for nuance? There are plenty of news stories about shepherds killing or severely injuring toddlers. Heck, even the POTUS' shepherd has injured and hospitalized multiple people: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-67015811 https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-67015811 People make up all kinds of pseudoscience about why pit bulls are involved in so many severe attacks (e.g. the myth of "locking jaws" after a bite - which isn't a thing in any dog breed). The core problem with most of these claims is that "pit bull" is not a breed but actually a number of different breeds and mutts, many of which aren't even related: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pit_bull https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pit_bull All of these contribute to statistics involving "pit bulls" (contrast this with German shepherds, which are very narrowly defined) and even then this ignores that people looking for aggressive dogs often want "pit bulls" because of their reputation and make them aggressive (i.e. traumatized) before they eventually end up as rescues in situations where the aggression endangers children. I don't like dogs, generally, and I don't like most "pit bulls" because of their looks alone, but most of the studies people like to cite uses garbage data that fails to consistently define "pit bulls" (if you look at the methodology the groupings usually rely on what breed the dog is registered as which tells you nothing given that "pit bull" isn't a breed and various mutts will be lumped in as well) on top of being misrepresented by people trying to reaffirm their biases instead of looking at the complex socio-cultural context. Heck, most studies don't even correct for population sizes (i.e. giving statistics about registered dog breeds relative to the number of dogs registered for each breed). Most of the difference between dog breeds are cosmetic, some are physical, very few are "neurological" but at the end of the day, all dogs are domesticated predators, all dogs can bite and dog bites can be life threatening to humans. All things considered, dog breed is one of the least important factors to whether a given dog poses a threat or not. Yeah, big dogs are more likely to bite in a way that is life threatening and anxious dogs are more likely to bite and abused dogs are more likely to be anxious and dog breeds seen as "aggressive" are more likely to be abused. But given how diverse and hetereogenous the group of dogs classified as "pit bulls" is, any genetic argument is clearly nonsense and just because you can misinterpret studies to reaffirm your biases that doesn't mean you're not just trying to find a simple and easy to reason about explanation to a very complex problem.

by hnbad 3y ago

ltbarcly3 3y ago

Pitt Bulls are responsible for far more attacks. Pitt breeds are responsible for basically 100% of attacks on their own families.

dragonwriter 3y ago

> but if you go by the actual numbers your advice should also explicitly apply to German shepherds. Pretty much everything people say about Pit Bulls today was said about other breeds before, including German Shepards and Doberman Pinschers. I think the change over time is mostly fashion trends among people who deliberately keep and train dogs for actual or perceived viciousness, and media trends interacting with that.

google234123 3y ago

Plenty of evidence against the Pit Bull Terrier type dogs. I can get you a dozen more studies https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8597704/figure/f6-wjem-22-1301/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8597704/figure/... (bitten by a pit bull increased as the level of intervention increased from no repair (6.0%) to repair in the OR (25.8%)) https://www.dogsbite.org/dog-bite-statistics-multi-year-fatality-report-2005-2017.php https://www.dogsbite.org/dog-bite-statistics-multi-year-fata... 2/3rds of fatal attacks.

boppo1 3y ago
Thank you, I don't have time to dig through my research folder at the moment.

cityofdelusion 3y ago

Not enough nuance in your comment. Shepherds are mouthy, bitey breeds as part of their bred disposition to herd -- they can draw blood and hurt infants, but they tend to have a "gentle" bite with their families -- they are strongly protective. Pits have a different lineage and a different neural pathway with their biting instincts.

hnbad 3y ago
Okay, how's this for nuance? There are plenty of news stories about shepherds killing or severely injuring toddlers. Heck, even the POTUS' shepherd has injured and hospitalized multiple people: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-67015811 https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-67015811 People make up all kinds of pseudoscience about why pit bulls are involved in so many severe attacks (e.g. the myth of "locking jaws" after a bite - which isn't a thing in any dog breed). The core problem with most of these claims is that "pit bull" is not a breed but actually a number of different breeds and mutts, many of which aren't even related: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pit_bull https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pit_bull All of these contribute to statistics involving "pit bulls" (contrast this with German shepherds, which are very narrowly defined) and even then this ignores that people looking for aggressive dogs often want "pit bulls" because of their reputation and make them aggressive (i.e. traumatized) before they eventually end up as rescues in situations where the aggression endangers children. I don't like dogs, generally, and I don't like most "pit bulls" because of their looks alone, but most of the studies people like to cite uses garbage data that fails to consistently define "pit bulls" (if you look at the methodology the groupings usually rely on what breed the dog is registered as which tells you nothing given that "pit bull" isn't a breed and various mutts will be lumped in as well) on top of being misrepresented by people trying to reaffirm their biases instead of looking at the complex socio-cultural context. Heck, most studies don't even correct for population sizes (i.e. giving statistics about registered dog breeds relative to the number of dogs registered for each breed). Most of the difference between dog breeds are cosmetic, some are physical, very few are "neurological" but at the end of the day, all dogs are domesticated predators, all dogs can bite and dog bites can be life threatening to humans. All things considered, dog breed is one of the least important factors to whether a given dog poses a threat or not. Yeah, big dogs are more likely to bite in a way that is life threatening and anxious dogs are more likely to bite and abused dogs are more likely to be anxious and dog breeds seen as "aggressive" are more likely to be abused. But given how diverse and hetereogenous the group of dogs classified as "pit bulls" is, any genetic argument is clearly nonsense and just because you can misinterpret studies to reaffirm your biases that doesn't mean you're not just trying to find a simple and easy to reason about explanation to a very complex problem.