Pit Bulls: What's the appeal?

Adorable.

Our office dog is afraid of salt shakers and other small bottles, and she reacts like that if you set down a treat and the salt shaker next to each other.

http://sphotos-b.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ash3/528832_4254412046351_2035213995_n.jpg

What's the appeal of pit bulls?

It has been my observation over a lot of decades that the breeds which are most often trained to be 'attack dogs', such as pit bulls, german shepards and dobermann pinschers have personalities that tend to form very deep and very loyal attachments.

They're extremely sensitive to their owners and they both mirror and magnify how their owners treat other people. How these dogs are socialized is ultra-critical to how they act as adults. They're just as likely to be emo as vicious, depending on how they were brought up. As a rule, though, they will react strongly to how they much of a threat to their owner they think you are.

This makes me very wary of them, but it makes me very aware of how their owners act, too. And if their owner isn't visibly around, this makes me super-wary of them.

http://www.heatworld.com/Celeb-News/2013/03/GALLERY-31-pictures-of-Tom-Hardy-playing-with-a-dog-Whats-not-to-like/

http://www.heatworld.com/images/116514_615x2000_STD/2013/3/Images/Gallery/aa0it734.jpg

I don't know who that man is but I've seen those pics and that dog is cuuuuuute.

Lisa Watkins
I wish I was that puppy@.
Reply · Like · Follow Post · 20 March at 13:07

Lisa Watkins
I wish I was that puppy.
Reply · Like · Follow Post · 20 March at 13:07

Lisa Watkins
I wish I was that puppy!
Reply · Like · Follow Post · 20 March at 13:07

Ew. Maybe if he shaved. Otherwise I am not willing to contemplate getting that close to that mouth beard.

here, even the puppy is not a fan of the scraggle on his face:

http://media.avclub.com/images/426/426730/16x9/627.jpg?9874

http://www.avclub.com/articles/tom-hardy-forced-to-eat-puppies-to-maintain-physiq,94195/

Well thank god at least someone is thinking clearly.

ok that is pretty cute

my friend who is a hairdresser adopted a 2-year-old pit bull a couple of month ago and has somehow managed to make her the softest dog ever, like silk this dog's fur

the other pit bull in my life is less soft but very cute and sweet and jumps really high when catching frisbees
i am still more of a cat person though, prob can't really change that...

that puppy rules <3

my arm, a content pit bull:
http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8371/8591682542_134f1d8304.jpg

*melts*

my next door neighbors have an increasingly well-trained pit and he is such a good guy

saw a bunch of pits on the border of the seedy part of SF this weekend including the cuetest puppy

https://sphotos-a.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-snc6/261218_476445865743887_30387624_n.jpg

http://www.cbc.ca/news/yourcommunity/2013/03/chihuahua-helps-thwart-pitbull-attack-on-bc-girl.html?cmp=rss

Chihuahuas - what's the appeal?!

I don't understand the appeal either.

people who dock/clip the ears on pit bulls are savages imo

https://sphotos-a.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-prn1/559206_430011527093892_609883912_n.jpg

http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/03/28/17504438-georgia-toddler-mauled-to-death-by-familys-pack-of-dogs?lite

:((

hooooly...

yikes.

but also: so there's FIVE people home and the 12 year old is assigned to watch the toddler?

...

and they have seven free-roaming dogs

my parents old neighbors raised these russell terriers and those little assholes would occasionally come over and terrorize my parents' rottweiler! if she was on a leash in the back yard they'd gang up and nip at her from multiple sides.

gangs of dogs are dicks, mostly regardless of breed

i think it's more that you you have to be SUPER on your training game to manage a group of dogs, whether it's several breeds or multiple of the same breed. they can be good, and manageable, but only with heavy owner-involvement.

my inlaws have always had multiple dogs -- from st bernards and a pitbull to german shepherd, mastiff and great pyrenees...never any problems but BiL and SiL were vigilant about making sure the dogs were social 'face dogs' (ie you could put your face right up in their face and they wouldn't blink an eye) and not aggressive from the time they were puppies.

yeah i dogsat for my sister last week and walking her dog w/ my two i was like 'three dogs is too many for me' and we're talking a corgi, skye-yorkie mix, and a maltese here. a pit in town here got put down yesterday, two little boys wrestling in the yard, pit attacks the boy he doesn't know (pretty likely 'defending' his little boy in confused dumb dog mind), adults not supervising, kids needs stitches dog gets euthanized very very sad. pits are super sweet unless they've been trained by some scumbag but pretty much any dog has the capacity to lose control some when riled up and pits have been bred to have super effective jaws for that kind of thing, if you're not crazy responsible or you haven't owned dogs before maybe not the best breed (albeit the most common in shelters sadly), if you're the above and you have children maybe get a basset hound. i can remember a piece on profiling in the nyer a few years (gladwell alas) but in it it mentioned that the 'dangerous breed' w/ the most attacks has changed many times following fashion - pits, rottweilers, dobermans, german shepherds - but what i also remember was that chows were constantly second or third throughout the years for attacks, god help us if that ever becomes the fashionable breed for would-be badass schmucks.

yeah my dogs are 'face dogs' apparently, i often wake up w/ one of their faces inches away staring at me creepy little weirdos.

adults need to be with kids around dogs, period. child-friendly dogs, or guard dogs, or whatever. kids grab and poke and pull and do all kinds of shit that dogs don't like, even placid dogs.

pitbulls having a 'locking jaw' is a myth. they have a strong jaw, but the whole locking jaw thing has been exaggerated over time and has become accepted 'fact'

^^^ when I was a kid, there was a party at a house up the road from us, and a guest had left their labrador in the car with the window down. A little kid playing hide and seek popped his head up in front of the window, startled the dog and the dog bit his face pretty badly. Xp

yeah i mean these things (ie dogs in general not just pits) have the cognition of a two year old and are carrying a pair of carpet scissors in their mouth which also happens to be their primary method of grasping things. potential for shit happening is there.

chows are crazy skittish, really friendly, though

yeah there's one around the corner from us that will just pop up on you w/o you knowing (he's fenced in but seriously one second empty yard next second that chow is right beside you and you wouldn't have heard a thing), when i got my first dog he'd pop up on us and i could tell it intimidated her (or, very possibly, she could tell it intimidated me). now my dogs are total bros w/ him, they'll try to drag me to it when we're near and i can see him get excited and do a little dance when we round the corner, i call him boo radley.

Jesus wept people! don't start picking on labradors. I got a black labrador called Dogsby and he gets bullied by cats, is scared of pigeons and he doesn't even understand the concept of biting. I have had to rescue him from the kids at some of my son's birthday parties in the past. I have never seen a dangerous labrador in my life.
http://s20.postimg.org/b13yumou1/SAM_0913.jpg

http://postimg.org/image/b13yumou1/#codes

no-one's picking on labs :) and that's a cute one!!

i think ppl are just trying to illustrate the point that there's no such thing as a 'safe' breed of dog.

lol actually from the data i've read there is one breed of dog there are apparently no records of having seriously mauled or maybe it was killed anyone.

http://images.nationalgeographic.com/wpf/media-live/photos/000/346/cache/basset-hound-howard_34698_990x742.jpg

fucking hippies

lol!

Unless they're armed.

http://thesportshernia.typepad.com/blog/images/2007/06/01/droopydog2.jpg

Balls otm, chows will fuck you up

http://sphotos-a.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ash4/389025_593362934010111_1633195883_n.jpg

I see murder in its eyes.

j/k i wub pitties

Also, my parents have a bassett and she is adorbs.

what a cutie!

this thread title has been making me mad for like a decade now.

elderly pit bull content:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/d49u7gwavrsvpqo/ellie1.JPG

ellie dont give a fuck

old pit bulls are the best

Good grief, kingfish! what an adorable dog.

stupid dropbox image. imagine an old pit bull draped over a chair just like what.