Also I’m not going to feel bad or apologise for highlighting the fact that there are people in our society who have a negative impact on our quality of life. You would need to have the IQ of a blueberry to try and argue that our society doesn’t have people who are for lack of a better term undesirable. I live in London, in London like most places there are areas where you simply can not go because there is a greater risk to your safety and the reason there is a greater risk to your safety is because of the scumbags who inhabit that area.

These scumbags should they own a dog (and most do) don’t hang around on street corners proudly showing off their poodles and yorkies.

Controls have to be established and as nobody wants to muddy the waters and get into a debate over how animal rights animals should be balanced against human rights we have to at least try and manage the almost limitless potential for human stupidity and the dogs are going to bare the brunt of that.

I can’t understand why people are still crying about this though, these dogs are foreign breeds and very popular they’re not in any danger of going extinct and there really shouldn’t be any left in this country to put down, the dangerous dogs act was amended 13 years ago.

Also i didn’t say the dogs were scum, i said the people who own them are and again I’m not going to apologise for it and I’m not going to let you write me off as some sort of reactionary who gets all their world views direct from the daily mail.

I never wanted my dog, my uncle bought a puppy Yorkshire terrier and died 2 weeks later. The reason i have this dog is quite simply because i didn’t and don’t trust anyone else to take better care of it, however in the 3 years that I’ve had him I’ve become very aware of the dogs around me and I’ve learnt a lot not only about the dogs themselves but the kind of people who own them.

Of course you do have people who own big houses with big gardens who have their Staff as a pet and treat it as such, dogs like staffs have certain requirements which are very hard to fulfil in an inner city environment. They need lots of exercise and lots of space to do it in, they need to be well socialised with other dogs especially smaller ones at a very young age but most of all they need an owner that understands just how stubborn they are to train.

Your perfect staff owner is calm, assertive, patient, has a lifestyle that can accommodate the dietary and exercise requirements of the dog and has the means to offer it a good home and any extra care it may need.

How many 16 year old morons living on council estates with an asbo fit that description? I’ve met staff owners who do fit that description but its easily 1 in 50.

I’ve been bitten numerous times by staffs attempting to get my dog, one even permanently scarred me. One also managed to get hold of my dog once and hes never quite recovered, that little experience set me back roughly £1500 in vets bills so don’t piss on my head and tell me its raining.

One specific thing i want to highlight:

————-

“Maybe its a good thing that the scum of society as you call them has an extremely well trained dog by his side that can be trusted without lead or muzzle and that dog is one of the most trustworthy on the planet.”

————-

You realise how moronic that statement is right?

Dogs don’t train themselves, the fact you could overlook this not only calls into question your motives for posting but also how qualified you could possibly be to comment on these matters. The reason staffs are considered to be trustworthy is because of how much time and effort they take to train and keep, a staff that only gets taken for a walk once a week and never hears anything but “SHUT UP!” from its owner isn’t going to be the same as a staff who gets 3 walks a day is regularly played with gets lots of affection.

Now i hear you saying “so?” you need to remember the context of our conversation, which is the bigger risk to someones safety a poorly cared for Staff or a poorly cared for Labradoodle?

I’m not saying anything about the dogs themselves, there is no bad dog.

However there is something which attracts certain people to certain dogs, when people see my dog they look at me like I’m some kind of freak because people generally view dogs as an accessory and have certain inclinations towards certain breeds. My dad grew up with Lassie so his first dog was a rough collie, when i was a kid i used to have an infatuation with Snoopy and a cartoon called “Dogtanian and the Three Muskehounds” so my managed to hassle my parents into getting a Beagle, friend of mine grew up with a Lab so hes just always had that breed.

If you’re a kid on a council estate and all your friends have staffs, all your favourite rappers or whatever have staffs chances are you’ll want a staff.

The thing is as i said and as most people should know simply wanting something doesn’t mean you should have it.

What I’m saying is fact, i don’t know what situation you’re in where you are but in London at least Staffs are in serious trouble. If you want references for that:

————–

Battersea Dogs Home today called on the Government to make dog owners “more accountable” as the number of Staffordshire bull terriers coming into the rescue centre hit an all-time high.

Figures show that the breed accounts for almost half of Battersea’s intake as their numbers increased for the fifth year in a row.

Between January 1 and June 29, 43 per cent of dogs coming into the home were either Staffordshire bull terriers or related crosses. Last year the figure was 42 per cent.

Staff at the home put the rise down to “irresponsible” dog-breeding and popularity among young people in the capital.

—————

Full article:

http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/standard/article-23851478-dogs-home-calls-for-action-on-bull-terrier-breeders.do

This is beyond a simple media witch hunt, i’m sorry to say there is actually a very real problem here and nobody is even willing to talk about the root causes let alone do anything.

i’ve been reading this thread for many months and i’m glad you’ve joined in,

i’ve been looking at tosa’s for years and to come across one is exceedingly rare , like you said ‘luck really’ i’m a great believer in a dog from a pup is a complete blank canvas and its the human involvement that makes or breaks a dog, it infuriates me that these breeds of dog are subject to this law purely on there history (which is 200 years ago) and the fact that just because these dogs have the physical capability of causing harm.
There are numerous breeds larger and stronger which do not fall into this descrimination, plus if people are going to judge them on their history they would do well to remember that they were trained to harm other dogs , a human could walk into that pen with two savage dogs and they are not interested, and i’m sure other 200 years on, this aggression has been completely eradicated, sure in the wrong hands this breed could be a weapon but what about the people who genuinely have a passion for this breed and will never have the fulfillment of owning one because of all these people who know nothing about dogs.
Your very lucky to have stumbled across one and i really enjoyed reading about your experiences (makes me want one more now though).
Rant over, but one last thing for anyone reading this , i just wanted to say a WLO that is a brilliant idea about the dog licence.

Maybe its a good thing that the scum of society as you call them has an extremely well trained dog by his side that can be trusted without lead or muzzle and that dog is one of the most trustworthy on the planet.

You WOL are as guilty of stereotyping as the uneducated ignorant beings stereotyping staffs with your description of scum. You totally contradict yourself.

Banning a breed is totally the wrong thing to do. It destroys a breed as they are not bred how they are meant to be. Dew to the inflation in price they are bred solely for money and any defects or bad characteristics are not bred out and are ignored. Alot of show dog trainers are also guilty of this. This last statement infuriates me and I am now fuming so I will leave you with this.

It is all about ethics and morals and sadly this country is losing them, I am thankfull that I am half Irish.

Maybe I can shed some light on Tosa from my past 3 years living with one.

Bizarrely enough I actually got her in Fulham and it was only on the third visit that the guy actually told me she was a Tosa – by this stage i have to admit i had already found the perfect dog for me an my family and after a few hours online researching the breed went for it and took her back to the farm in devon.

For the first 3 months (she was 9 months old and 40 kilos when we got her) we all spent quite a bit of time seeing what she was capable of in terms of training, retrieving, carrying (I have 4 kids from the ages of 10 to 1 all keen to see if they had a new form of transport….)and control around livestock and other dogs.

Conclusions I have reached is that they are actually pretty intelligent our girl can retrieve pheasants and release them after some cajooling (they have very soft mouths), exceptionally patient and confident (can be an issue with nervous dogs as she is now 55kg and galumphs over for a chat with any beast and both dogs and people can be a little concerned to start with), absolutely brilliant with children although she is large she hardly ever knocks over any of the kids unlike our collie and doberman who whilst quicker thinking are considerably less considerate of small people around them, they have exceptionally good noses (again handy for anyone keen on country pursuits – I am hoping this autumn to get out with two truffle hunters down here as i think she may be really well suited to this) and all in all I think if you look at the breeds that go into them – english mastiff, dane, german pointer, bloodhound, st bernard, bull terrier and the original tosa which actually was inferior at the time to the Akita as a fighting dog (interestingly the Akita is not a banned breed – even got top 5 in crufts this year….) you have a pretty good idea of what you are getting – Loyal, affectionate, stubborn, intelligent and as all the kids would agree the most cuddly dog in the world…

We had 4 visits from rescue centres with mastiffs, danes, weimaraners and hungarian vislas (sp!) and to be honest i am so bloody happy we landed up through luck rather than judgement with our Tosa she is perfect for us – she loves it up the mountains, beach countryside everywhere she is basically well adjusted to is not spooked by anything and is not aggressive at all although her confidence does mean that she has had a few run ins with male dogs who feel a little like they need to demonstrate their manlyness – the reality is she is a bloody strong dog and there have been times when her size has meant you do need a human of over 55kg to help her – unfortunately my wife is 52kg and could not lift her out of the pig pen when the pigs which had been great fun to chase when they were piglets became 80kg pigs and decided to turn on her!

That would be my only word of caution among Pigs and deer she is a nightmare – cows and sheep and horses and chickens fine she will listen but there is something about deer and pigs which she cannot resist must be something in her japanese ancestry!

When we lived in Devon it was always slightly akward when people would ask you what breed she was as the kids all knew they were not supposed to tell people and we used to say dane/mastiff or mastiff/ridgeback but after the first year we gave up as it was pointless no one recognises tosa’s no one really knows they are banned and so as a bit of good PR we told everyone she was a tosa and we even found 1 other person who had one.

The irony of it all was when we moved to france and on her pet passport it said mastiff x we had to get the Vet to change it to Dane x as you are not allowed to take mastiff crosses into france but you are allowed to have Tosas!

Finally they are just a big dog nothing more nothing less, they love people and are considerably easier in my opinion to train than something like an english mastiff (and half the size) or a dane and can do a lot of things kids enjoy (fetch, swimming, catch pulling on skateboards skis etc) so in my book they make really good family dogs a bit like a big retriever only with not as good eyesight and an extra 20kgs – it is just a shame you can only come across them by luck rather than by choice…. such is the intelligence of man.

Why would you breed a pit bull or tosa (not saying anyone here does) when you know it could be killed just for existing and why would you own and care for one knowing that was the case?

You can show a video of a tosa and a pug fooling around but we all know it just takes one split second impulse in the dogs entire life span, just one bite, and that pug could be dead. Thats why they’re a banned breed because the potential for harm is far greater from a Tosa than than it is from a Pug.

Sure between a pug and Tosa the line blurs, Rottweilers for example have the potential to do just as much damage as a Tosa but the line had to be drawn somewhere so it was drawn under dogs that were specifically breed for fighting. You can put forward whatever case you’d like but you can’t rewrite history.

While the first poster “Duncan” may have been very Daily Mail in his response your replies leave a lot to be desired. He may know nothing about dogs or the causes of dog attack but unless he owns a dog…he shouldn’t need to!

Not everybody likes dogs and as members of our society they have every right to walk down the street without fear of being mauled or slipping on dog turds. Its these people that laws like this exist, you can’t outright ban all dogs but you can limit the risk to society at large by banning those most likely to cause harm.

This (Stuart!) is why we also banned handguns, some knives and hand grenades. They are made to do harm to others and my desire to not be shot on purpose or by accident by your handgun supersedes your right to own one for no other reason than you think they’re neat.

We all know its the owners not the dogs but the fact is dogs like the pit bull were victims of their own image. They’re portrayed as vicious fighting dogs so people took them because of that image, someone who wants a vicious dog doesn’t want a pet they want a status symbol or a bodyguard.

Staffs (Staffordshire Bull Terrier) have almost completely taken over the pit bulls domain in the UK. Staffs are the fifth most popular breed in the UK but although i have no figures to back this up if you did a study it would be the most popular breed in the inner citys.

Why is it that anytime you see a “youth” in a hoodie smoking skunk screaming on their mobile “YA YE NAW WAH IZ SAYINZ BLUD!” two steps beside them off the lead with no mussel is a staff? Typically if you look at the scum of society you’ll find a staff or Rottweiler with a chunky gold coloured chain around their neck close by.

If i ruled the world I’d introduce a dog license where you have to prove you’re capable of taking care of your perspective breed and sign something stating that you personally are willing to suffer the consequences of your dogs actions so if your dog mauls a kid you’re the one who does 15 years for attempted murder and you pay the state the cost of caring for your dog for the rest of its natural life.

Of course that would never happen since humans incapable of feeling are worth more that animals that do.