I was at a friend's place with some others from school, we were about 14-15 years old, his family had this seemingly sweet pitbull, always wanting to be pet, super playful but kind. That day it attacked one of our classmates, out of the blue, we were sitting on the backyard, the dog playing with some rope toys, brought it to us sitting, this guy picked up the toy to throw it and before he could even started the motion this pitbull jumped on his face and started attacking.
It was so jarring, unexpected, and brutal that I got traumatised for life from pitbulls, I don't like to be close to them, don't like when I'm biking and there's one without a muzzle being walked around, and I don't want to pet one as much as it can look super friendly and calm. Seeing how fast it could turn into a murder machine even when growing up in a loving family that never trained it to be a guard/attack dog, and probably never treated the dog badly, made me very anti-pitbulls.
Most dog attacks in the country I grew up in are from pitbulls, including a few kids killed every year, the statistics don't lie. The breed requires people who aren't assholes so it doesn't become dangerous, I don't trust owners to do that, even more when it's a breed for "macho" guys to show off at the same time.
I got bit by a dog a while ago and the thing that really woke me up was how unexpected it was. I generally think that I'm fairly observant and empathetic with animals. All B.S. aside I genuinely think I can tell when a dog is scared. The dog that bit me though, totally out of the blue. I saw it. No body language, no nothing - and I walked by it and next thing I knew it jumped out and bit my hand.
Since then if I see a strange dog and the option is there I keep plenty of distance between it and me no matter what I take to be it's state.
If we are to be pedantic I should have defined it as "most dog attacks causing serious enough harm to be reported" but I don't think it was needed to communicate the same thing.
I was at a friend's place with some others from school, we were about 14-15 years old, his family had this seemingly sweet pitbull, always wanting to be pet, super playful but kind. That day it attacked one of our classmates, out of the blue, we were sitting on the backyard, the dog playing with some rope toys, brought it to us sitting, this guy picked up the toy to throw it and before he could even started the motion this pitbull jumped on his face and started attacking.
It was so jarring, unexpected, and brutal that I got traumatised for life from pitbulls, I don't like to be close to them, don't like when I'm biking and there's one without a muzzle being walked around, and I don't want to pet one as much as it can look super friendly and calm. Seeing how fast it could turn into a murder machine even when growing up in a loving family that never trained it to be a guard/attack dog, and probably never treated the dog badly, made me very anti-pitbulls.
Most dog attacks in the country I grew up in are from pitbulls, including a few kids killed every year, the statistics don't lie. The breed requires people who aren't assholes so it doesn't become dangerous, I don't trust owners to do that, even more when it's a breed for "macho" guys to show off at the same time.