Pit bulls represent only 6 percent of the canine population in the U.S. but were responsible for 65 percent (254) of the 392 human deaths by canines from 2005 to 2016. This statistically significant fact is gravely concerning. It is also concerning that to speak out against pit bulls — dissenting against the pit bull training industry’s party line that “if you raise it right, it won’t hurt anybody” — you will be labeled ignorant. My neighbor recently expressed, on this editorial page [published in the May 24–30 edition], concern about pit bulls after her daughter had been chased and another neighbor bitten by the same pit bull, and she promptly received a call from an anonymous person behind a blocked number verbally assaulting her as “ignorant” for having expressed her legitimate concern.
I genuinely believe that most pit bull owners rescue pit bulls with good intentions and heartfelt beliefs their pit bull won’t do harm because they will “raise it right.” However, this overlooks generations of breeding which have entrenched within pit bulls the capacity to kill. Just as retrievers instinctively fetch sticks and hounds track scents without being trained to do so, when pit bulls interpret situations as threatening, they instinctively attack and clench on their prey, often until death because they’ve been bred over generations to do so. Raising a pit bull “right” cannot eliminate animal instincts which been entrenched over generations.
Is it likely that all of those 254 human deaths by pit bulls were only perpetrated by pit bulls, which were raised by their owners to kill? Not likely. Many of the victims were the owners themselves — the same owners who had raised those pit bulls “right.”
In New Jersey, a municipality may not outlaw specific breeds, but we can require that specific breeds be contained by adequate fencing and be muzzled and harnessed when in public. Haddonfield should adopt such a statute before a life is lost.
Chris Maynes
