Posted on 05/24/2006 8:42:10 AM PDT by rawhide
Cecil Wallace awoke about 4:30 a.m. Saturday to the bawling of cows and the howling of dogs. The Buford farmer grabbed his shotgun and went running out the back door.
His son and next-door neighbor, Kenneth Wallace, also jarred awake also carrying a shotgun joined him. Father and son ran toward the pasture...
...Reaching the pasture, the Wallaces saw a cow, bloodied and torn, its calf standing nearby. As they approached the animal, according to reports, two dogs came running towards them.
Kenneth Wallace raised his 12-gauge. Boom! The larger dog hit the dirt, howling. Wallace fired again, and the dog was quiet.
The female kept coming. Kenneth Wallace fired a third time, the blast echoing along the darkened reaches of Bart Johnson Road.
The Wallaces dragged the dogs' bodies aside and tended to the cow, Betsy. She looked bad right ear torn off, the left shredded like paper. Her nose was ripped and torn. Two teeth were knocked loose. Not long after daybreak, Cecil Wallace took Betsy to a Cumming veterinarian, who prescribed painkillers and antibiotics for the Angus/Hereford cross.
"She's still in bad shape," Cecil Wallace, 73, said Tuesday. "She tries to eat, but she can't; her mouth's too sore."
Animal control officers have cited one dog owner with failing to have the animal on a leash.. They also charged the owner with violating the county's vicious-animal ordinance, which requires owners of a dangerous dog or cat to have it muzzled whenever the animal is off the owner's property.
Meghan Martin, who lives near the Wallaces, said she is the owner whom officers cited...p>
When I went to sleep, my dog was in bed with me," she said. A roommate let out her dog, plus a friend's pit bull, Martin said...
(Excerpt) Read more at ajc.com ...
Yep...and change the liability laws so that victims may go after the breeders. Current the laws don't permit going after the purveyors of such dangerous beasts, and if the owner doesn't have a pot to pea in, they are left with massive medical bills.
Why don't you tell the truth?...AKC wanted nothing to do with "Pit" Bulls due to their fighting genetics.
The UKC is the registering organization that recognizes APBT's and originally wouldn't give papers unless the dog had 3 documented kills.
Which breed has a worse record than APBT's?
So this cow was attacked by what, exactly? Apparently even the owner of these dogs thinks they were pit bulls.
The thing is...if I take my gun pull the trigger and blow your kid's arm off I'm going to jail.
If a Pit Bull rips the kid's arm off, there may or may not be a criminal penalty for the owner. It depends on whether the dog lobby managed to get a "One Bite Free" law in place. Meaning that the owner is not criminally responsible until the dog has been proven to be vicious from previous attack. Even though we all know certain breeds like Pit Bulls are more dangerous than others, the owner skates if it is the first mauling.
Thanks for feigning to care about personal responsibility though.
Now... which breed has a worse mauling and death record than APBTs?
"Aside from the fact that there's no such breed recognized by either the American or Canadian Kennel Clubs as a 'pit bull' (& by all means go to their sites to see for yourself if you don't believe me)"
Yes, it is good that we put this fact aside, because it is quite irrelevant. The American and Canadian Kennel Clubs have precisely as much authority as the Knights of Columbia, the Loyal Order of Moose and I do: which is precisely none. They have an opinion. I have an opinion.
"there are numerous legitimate breeds of dogs with - not only similar or worse records of attacks but & more importantly - a awful lot more overall size & weight to back-up their attacks."
Sure: Rottweilers and Dobermans (Dobermen?) come to mind. So do Chows. I reject the notion of a "legitimate" breed of dog, however, because it accords to the AKC, the CKC and the KC authority that they do not have. Speaking in terms of genus-species-subspecies, a dog is a dog. What makes a dog a Doberman, a German Shepherd, a Rottweiler or a Pit Bull is what it looks like, not what the KC, the AKC or the CKC defines as a "breed" using their pedigree charts. They assert that a breed is what they say it is.
I assert they are wrong, and that a breed is what it looks like. And they and I have PRECISELY the same degree of authority to bind others to our these things, which is: precisely none whatsoever. The KC, AKC and CKC's opinion matters for people who want to do something sponsored by them. Want to play in their park? You have to play by their rules. Outside of their little park, though, they have no general authority to define anything.
And they are quite wrong. It is not a pedigree chart that makes a dog a rottweiler. It is what the dog LOOKS LIKE that is solely determinative of that. A dog that looks like a Rottweiler IS a Rottweiler. A dog that doesn't, isn't. A dog that LOOKS LIKE a pit bull, IS a pit bull by definition.
Because that's what "pit bull" means. It means: a squat, muscular dog that looks like that. That's a pit bull. They're all canis familiaris. The difference after that is opinion.
The AKC, KC and CKC don't have a category of "pit bull". So they're wrong about this. Clearly there is such a thing as a pit bull: it's a dog that looks like a pit bull.
And dogs that look like put bulls, rottweilers, chows and dobermans are involved in a lot more attacks than dogs that look like other things.
Should, therefore, we legislate against those breeds?
I wouldn't, if I were in charge.
If I were King, and somebody had a mean pit bull and it mauled a child, I would order the owner to be mauled by dogs. I have very little patience or sympathy for people who are responsible for the harm done to children, and I would hold people responsible for the actions of their pets.
I would NOT put down the vicious dog, however. I would take that vicious dog into the Royal forces and train it up to guard and maul people. A dog that has mauled somebody once has the disposition, and using powerful, trainable, vicious animals to do dangerous work is preferable to sending people in to do it. Besides, I need a trained cadre of vicious dogs to set on those convicted of having had their dog maul a child. The pit bulls in the Royal Mauling Pit would be already proven maulers, self-selected for their viciousness by the fact they'd already mauled somebody else.
I'd likely use the Mauling Pit for executions of particularly heinous criminals too. If you liked law and order and green things and animals, you'd like me as your King. Otherwise, you might have a different view.
Sadly, I am not King, so my view of these things passes for nothing. We live in a democracy, so what most people want gets to be the law of the land (well, unless it's stopping illegal immigration...). If I were to choose, I wouldn't outlaw pit bulls, but I don't get to choose. The masses of people do. And they are not as laissez-faire as I am about them, I'm afraid.
I dont know the history of the pit bull breed but wouldnt it be more appropriate to train the owners that keep them.
one breed of dog isnt the same as another and its my guess the owners forget that
I'd buy the cow a steak, if she wasn't vegetarian or otherwise minded.
"'definition by subjective appraisal of appearance' which has been the fatal inherent legal flaw in most such laws"
Which subjective appraisal system do you prefer instead?
Biologically, a dog is a dog. There is no biological difference other than those things evident from appearance between a pound mutt and a purebred whippet.
You speak of "recognized breeds"...recognized by WHOM? The KC, the AKC or the CKC? And why should the opinions of some dog collectors be the basis for law? They say that a breed is based on a pedigree chart. The lawmaker says that a breed is based on a visual evaluation. Two completely subjective bases for dividing up the united genus species of canis familiaris.
Biologically, a dog is a dog. The division of dogs into breeds is pure subjectivity. Appearance is a better basis for it than anything else, because then you can just look at a dog and tell what breed it is. Any other categorization requires special knowledge of arbitrary documents.
Deal!
BTW, far from "feigning", I'm the one taking a principled conservative position here which advocates holding offending owners personally accountable but still respects conscientious individuals' rights.
A principled conservative doesn't make a reckless breed ownership decision which cast a cloud of high risk over his neighborhood. Nearby, we just had a 72 year old man killed by his daughter's Pit Bulls. She walked in to find him dead and her "sweet Pit Bulls" covered in blood. I really don't mind if they keep it in the family as long as innocent kids aren't involved. The breed was purposely designed for fighting and any redeeming features they may have are purely accidental. Owning one seems quite irresponsibly liberal, but thats just me.
I suggest you Google "Pit Bull Shot" and see what a law enforcement burden and safety menace the breed has become. Like most Pit advocates you seem to be in denial.
Now which breed has a worse mauling record than APBT's?
I usually like to do some of the heavy lifting in these threads where self-absorded, Neanderthal owners of these vicious animals get the bashing that they deserve. But you two seem to have things well in hand!!
Let's just shoot the gas to all of'em that give the impression of having a Pit attitude. God can sort them out.
And to the Wallaces of Clan Wallace: " Pro Libertate"
You have carried your Clan name well and true, again on a field of battle.
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