
Shelters should not report dog breeds - bryanrasmussen
https://www.animalsheltering.org/magazine/articles/no-more-guessing-games
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jmpman
My sister in-law is quite enlightened with adopting rescued pit bulls.
Unfortunately that means that for my children to play over at their cousin’s
house, I have to trust that these dogs are properly confined. After a kids
birthday party, the kids were playing (rough housing) and with the party
clearing out, my brother in-law released the dogs. One dog (defensive of his
immediate family) attempted to attack my son, who was only saved by being
pinned behind a recliner.

The stereotypes are there for a reason.

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SOLAR_FIELDS
I think that this article does a good job of highlighting, and it really
should have been the center focus of the article, the problematic term “pit
bull”. The article points out that the term “pit bull” is used for several
breeds that aren’t actually “pit bull” and goes on to discuss an anecdote of
an animal shelter employee who discouraged a potential adopter from going
towards a potentially good match with a dog labeled “pit bull”.

There is a lot of negative stigma around the “pit bull” family of breeds,
probably for a lot of good reasons. How many apartment complexes these days
outright refuse to allow dogs of this family? I’m willing to bet it’s over 50%
in some areas. But what the article points out, and it’s an important lesson,
is that there is a lot of variance between dogs of the same breed, such that
breed isn’t as important as people make it out to be. I think it will be a
long time before society comes to that same conclusion, however.

For a long time, I have always deeply despised the yearly dog show, and had
several reasons for it, but haven’t really been able to voice my feelings into
a coherent narrative. This article does a great job of doing just that. By
compartmentalizing dogs into breeds that supposedly exhibit personality
traits, aren’t we limiting the way we view dogs in general?

