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And I am very glad they don’t get that big.
That made me laugh. Thanks, Dan.
I would argue, though, that bulls are more dangerous because they’re so damn big, they don’t even have to be trying to kill you to fuck you up. James Herriot (author of All Creatures Great and Small etc.) wrote about how a bull almost killed him when it tried to scratch itself on a wall, not knowing the veterinarian was caught in between.
Dan, you’re not even TRYING anymore with your comment / page-hit baiting anymore:
pitbulls
polyamore
pitbulls
anti sports wank
etc..
Dan Savage, you are being an idiot. I expect better.
I think I’d chalked it up to a self referential irony. That’ll learn me!
Dan, you lost the race to Charles early this morning.
This would have been funny if Charles hadn’t posted it this morning.
I’d prefer a 2000 lb pit bull to a 2000 lb Boston terrier. Can you even imagine?
Stop demonizing pet bulls by comparing them to pit bulls. Bulls weren’t bred as fighting animals designed to efficiently kill child-sized mammals.
Dan, your crusade against pit-bulls is very irritating. I miss the days when your commentary outside of your Savage Love column made me wish you would end that thing and run for office. Remember those pro-monorail colums you used to write? You were one of only 2 or 3 people in the media who said anything logical in the subject. Where is your commentary on our public transportation system now?
Instead you engage in and obsess over this petty issue that makes you come off like one of those overly fearful suburban moms. Really? C’mon Dan, you can do better.
Dan, do you even like dogs? Do you have one? Any pets at all?
Ha! I don’t even know who Charles is and I like you better. That is hilarious. I am ok with pit bulls, as long as they don’t flaunt it.
He (or rather, his kid) has got a deformed poodle which he hates. The thing that really confuses me about the whole issue is Dan’s complete reversal from his usual stance of letting people live their own lives in there own way, provided it harms no one else. The percentage of pitbulls that actually do harm anyone is infinitesimal compared to the number kept as pets, so why the idiotic pitbull fatwa, Dan? There are more valid issues out there to which you could be using your considerable pull to draw the public’s interest.
Look, getting through life unscathed and dying in your bed means avoiding stupid unnecessary risks, however low they may be. All the evidence about pit bulls (and a few other breeds) points toward these facts, however sweet and tractable they may be MOST of the time: 1) they have massively powerful neck and jaw muscles capable of doing more damage than most breeds, 2) they are relatively resistant to pain and so tend to hang on and worry their target when they bite, 3) they seem to have something in their brain that trips in poorly defined circumstances and sends them into attack mode, and 4) they’re also really persistent about climbing fences and pulling out picketing stakes. Can we quit with the “bad owners” justification already? Not every dead baby or flayed elderly neighbor can be blamed on a drug-dealin’, dog-fightin’ pit owner.
The doggy benefits of dog ownership, however you define them, accrue to owners of virtually all other breeds (and Heinz-57 mutts), so WHY OWN A FUCKING PIT or pit-predominant mix (or one of the small number of similarly dangerous breeds)?
We don’t throw handfuls of blasting caps in the dryer every week or egg-toss glass ampules of Ebola virus for fun and sport, though we might be able to do those things without incident MOST of the time. We do take our Toyotas in for the bullshit fixes of the recall, though the odds of a disaster if we ignored them are less than getting struck by lightning.
If you wanna skydive or shoot up with shared needles or drink absinthe (kidding on that last one), that’s your choice, but don’t implicitly make a similar choice for your children and neighbors.
Bulls aren’t usually kept as pets, but end up as such when there’re no longer cows about.
Lack of cows is pro’lly what pissed off the bull.
Rob, way to try to poison the well. You are wrong!
@13, but according to Dan, you are placing others in harms way by owning a pit or pit mix. Outside of sex, Dan isn’t the live and let live type of person you might think he is. His obsessions with fat people and pit bulls proves that.
Ah Tingleyfeeln….
Dan DOES hate dogs and makes no bones about it.
But Rob!@14 is right- there is something inherently dangerous about these dog breeds that even avid dog lovers are forced to admit.
It’s not just “bad owners or poor training” either. Neighbor had a well-trained and socialized pit bull mix- played with his kids and others no problem. But one day a guy with his small dog came up to the fence- that pit bull tore through that fence like it was string and attacked/killed the dog before anyone could get it off. Until then, no indication the dog was anything but normal.
I don’t play (or try to) with Dobies for the same reason- there’s something psychotic about the breed and they can’t be trusted. Why folks keep them is an ongoing mystery.
Malcolm Gladwell has a wonderful article about stereotyping -“Troublemakers and what pit bulls can teach us about crime.” Paraphrasing from the Article: Pit bulls are bred to attack other dogs, not people. In fact, if they attacked people (trainers, handlers, spectators), they would not be effective fighting dogs. Average pit bulls do extremely well in temperament tests and are excellent therapy dogs because of their stability and resoluteness. If it is their job to be gentle, they will be gentle, regardless of the circumstances. Violent social misfits like to own dogs with reputations for violence. The owners own violence and their dogs lack of socialization increase the problems. Add to that the lack of enforcement of legal restrictions applied to animals already shown to be violent. Of course, some people should never be allowed to own dogs, just like some people should never be allowed to drive.
18 – A dog that is feeling protective of his charges (children) is going to be aggressive toward other dogs and people. We had a german shepherd that was great with all the neighborhood kids – they came in and out of the fenced yard with impunity. However, the parents couldn’t get near him or their own kids unless my mom was there. Referencing another Malcolm Gladwell article (What the dog saw) – dogs are very attuned to human body language and will usually only attack another dog because of the body language of that dog’s owner. Unfortunately, fighting dogs are trained to kill rather than restrain. It is the owners responsibility to ensure that their dog is properly socialized whether with people or animals.
Didn’t Lyle Lovett get injured, and badly too, by a pet bull? And there’s a man who should have known better.
Maybe people should just opt for pet deer, like Audrey Hepburn.