Loss of Belief

This whole Pitbull controversy is going to cause me to lose my belief in the inherent goodness of human nature. 

It all started with a dog attack on a little boy that wasn’t even done by Pitbulls – the attack dog was a Sheppard-Akita mix. 

A few weeks later a security guard, and mother of two as the newspapers never forgot to point out (failing to add the word “adults” after the numerical value because I guess the image of two orphaned infants makes better copy) was killed by anything from 2 to 7 Pitbulls, depending on what newspaper you read. 

Not a week later, two Pitbulls bit a man who was “pelting Iguanas” in an area that was, or was not, his own yard – again depending on what newspaper you read.  The fact that “pelting Iguanas” is a method of killing a wild species and hunting season is long finished, and so he was in effect commiting a crime, is hardly mentioned.  What is seen is a picture of him lying in a hospital bed, his arm bandaged as though he had just had major surgery – which he might have had as a Pitbull is a strong animal. 

At least Ian Alleyne of the TV show “Crime Watch” did not get to show pictures of his dead and mutilated body on television, as was done in the case of the security guard.  But then, Ian Alleyne showed pictures of the drowned, bloated and decomposing body of the 6 year old child who was murdered a few months ago, so the image of the security guard was not surprising or apparently shocking to anyone.

But the point is that within days of all these attacks, the words “savage”, “Pitbull” and “Dangerous Dogs Act” were on everybody’s lips.  And Trinidad is really God’s land, the proof being that a miracle has taken place - everybody in Trinidad has miraculously been turned into a dog expert.  Blaze and his cohort on the radio has declared that the Pitbull is actually a genetically engineered dog – in case you did not know, that really means the breed was man-made in a laboratory.  One of the most well respected lawyers in Trinidad, Gillian Lucky, gazed earnestly into the television cameras, and with sincerity and authority oozing from every pore in her man-suited body, declared that dog attacks would cease in this country if Pitbulls were all eradicated. One Christian lady (or at least that is how she identified herself) who said that she was an animal lover, wrote to the newspapers and said that the dogs who attacked the little boy should be poisoned.  No politically correct euphuisms for her- not “put to sleep” or “euthanized” or “put down”.  They should be poisoned.  And then there was the Express Editorial yesterday that, although otherwise quite sensible, said that people who kept attack dogs obviously felt that death was a suitable punishment for robbery.  It makes you wonder when last the writer heard of anyone being robbed without violence and/or death in this country.

But I was still hanging on to my illusions about the milk of human kindness – although in retrospect I suspect they were actually delusions.  Until last week when I took Aslan (I can not take Rescue anywhere as we would probably be mobbed and hung together from the nearest Samaan tree) for a walk in the savannah.  There we met two ladies who we have been seeing since Aslan was a puppy – an elderly lady with her daughter who I would think is in her mid 50’s.  They usually have their equally elderly female Pitbull with them, so after the usual pleasantries about how big Aslan was getting (while he showed his superior breeding by peeing on the nearest tree), I asked them for their dog.  They told me that they could not bring her out until all the ruckus had died down, although they were sad because she had whined and cried when they left her that afternoon.  So we started talking about all the incidents. 

“And you know” said the daughter “I hear the little boy used to tease the dogs. Nobody didn’t say nothing about that!” 

I asserted that it was quite likely, as I had had experience with school children teasing my dogs on their way home from school every afternoon and then running away, laughing hysterically like little maniacs, when the dogs rushed the gate.

“But is not the boy the dogs went to bite, you know,” chimed in the daughter.

“Really?” says I, thinking there might have been a third person I had not heard about.

“Nah, nah.  The dog really wanted was to bite the grandmother.”

“The grandmother?” Now I was really at a loss.

“Yes, the grandmother,” said the daughter, while the mother vigorously nodded assent.  “Is the grandmother push the little boy in front when she see the dog coming, and that is how he get bite!”

This was said with all the assurance of an eye witness, but I was too flabbergasted to think to ask for her sources. After all, the woman in question was the child’s grandmother for God’s sake!  Even if, to tell the truth, I have seldom seen a child with a naughtier face, if the picture in the newspapers is anything to go by, I still did not think his own grandmother would be so sick of his behaviour that she would want to emulate Abraham and sacrifice him.  Then I was reminded of something else that had happened to me a few weeks before.

“You know, now that you mention it, I remember once I was walking Aslan around the savannah and an older man was coming towards us with a little boy, and when he saw us he changed places with the child so that the child would be nearer to the dog and he would be furthest away…”

“Yes, yes.  Is money they want!” said the mother.  “Eh-heh – money!” instantly collaborated the daughter.

“You mean a grandparent would deliberately let a child be bitten……” I was too taken aback to even finish the though.  No problem – my two friends eagerly relieved me of the burden.  “Eh-heh – if your dog bite the child, they could get money from you, you see? Is evil people we dealing with in this country, you know! Evil!”

While I was still goggling at them, the mother put the icing on the cake by muttering  darkly “And dem security guards and dem, they like to provoke dogs, you know..”  But I had heard enough.  Any more illusions shattered would have surely endangered my mental health beyond any hope of repair.  I fled.

Pitbull Public Relations

I want to try to counter the hysterical and inaccurate propaganda that is going around about Pitbulls, but it is an uphill struggle because people want to believe the worse. Maybe it brings a little excitement into their otherwise mundane lives.

I know that happy stories and educational articles like the one attached are not going to convince everybody that Pitbulls are not natural born killers.  As my vet said, you have to own one to truly believe that they are really very lovable.  But I hope that people will get to understand that the dog is an extension of its owner and the treatment and experiences that have been given to him.  In other words, it is not the breed, it is how the breed is treated and trained.

I have been bitten once and been nearly bitten once by dogs.  I was bitten by a pothound, and nearly bitten by a Cocker Spaniel. The bite was because I was too close to a yard that the dog had been told to guard.  The near-bite was because I passed my hand over the top of the Cocker's head and that startled him.  Does this mean that the police or the TTSPCA should kill all pothounds and Cocker Spaniels?

I am not saying Pitbulls don't bite.  Yes they do - and when they bite they can inflict a lot of pain and damage, even death.  I am not even saying that we always know why they attack.  But I am saying that in all the cases I have heard about, it has been either due to bad breeding, bad training (including lack of socialization), ill health or fear.  Most, if not all, of these causes were put in place by humans. As humans, we recognize that abuse in childhood can lead to anti-social behaviour in adulthood.  What makes us think that animals are any different? Neglecting a dog's physical and emotional needs is abuse.  Subjecting a dog to rape and beatings is abuse. Not providing proper nutrition, exercise and health care to a dog is abuse. It seems to me to be against the laws of logic, sanity and fairness to punish an animal for reacting inappropriately if he has been programmed to react that way by human neglect or abuse.

The Pitbull is the Dog of the Month right now.  They are being bred in extraordinary numbers.  Statistically, it is therefore logical that more bites will come from Pitbulls. Some Pitbulls are also being deliberately bred for dominance and aggression.  In almost every other breed, the dogs are bred for obedience, sociability, intelligence – the Pitts are bred to be big and bad. Then they are often given steroids to make them even bigger. If that was not enough, they are systematically trained to be the baddest dog on the block. Quite often they are owned by people who also see themselves as the baddest thing on the block. In a study, it was found that of 20 Pitbull attacks, 11 of the owners had criminal records and of them 7 had records for violence.  Eleven of the dogs showed signs of physical abuse.

There are those who would say, well that is all very sad, but the fact is that the Pitbull is a savage dog, regardless of what the reason is, and we must kill them all.  Not only kill them, we must commit canine genocide and kill out the breed.  We humans have a history of trying to kill out whole races of people, so this is not an altogether alien concept.  This will solve the problem.  But will it?  All of the factors that went to making an aggressive Pitbull can be replicated in another dog – the German Sheppard is supposedly the most intelligent dog in the world, and has the most powerful bite of any breed.  Don’t you think a German Sheppard can be bred for dominance and aggression?  Can be pumped up on steroids and trained to attack and kill? Can be owned by people who either enjoying using them as a power tool, or are too careless about keeping them safely secured?

Animals can not speak for themselves.  They need humans to speak for them. They need humans to say that this earth was not meant to be inhabited only by humans.  That humans domesticated the wolf, and made him into a helper and companion, then called it the dog.  That it is up to humans to use their supposedly superior brains and find ways to allow all creatures, great and small, to healthfully and happily co-exist.

My message is: Don't own any animal unless you are ready to commit totally to its care and upkeep.  Get educated about what needs to be done to keep that animal safe and healthy. Respect the rights of animals not to be used for your own self aggrandizement and money making schemes. And to all you people who don't like or want to own animals, keep an open mind and remember that there are two sides, sometimes more, to every story.  Take a look at this story, for example: 
http://www.ywgrossman.com/photoblog/?p=676