The issue belies my rock solid Libertarian leanings....Why should the Govt use force to keep people from owning Pit Bull Dogs? It doesn't seem to be in the 'general welfare' of the public..
Then a friend sent me this:
"What Vick is alleged to do and the others have been convicted of doing is nothing short of the same misery purveyed by meth dealers, pedophiles and terrorists on humanity. My opinion is strongly focused by personal experience: In January, 2006 I was attacked by two pit bulls while out riding my bike on a training route with my workmate.
This didn’t take place in some rural back-forty farm, in an inner city alley, or some gang’s ‘hood. It was on one of the most exclusive roads overlooking the Rose Bowl in Pasadena, CA, in a neighborhood of family homes mixed with the estates of Los Angeles’ elite class. We rounded a corner while climbing a hill and the dogs attacked, without provocation, from a blind spot. My friend sprinted to safety; I am lucky to still have my right foot.
The dogs were a breeding pair. The owner claimed that the dogs were friendly, loving family animals. The female was nursing pups at the time, though for whatever reason, the animals had decided to claw through two significant fences to escape their yard and roam the neighborhood. Pasadena animal control captured the dogs in a private elementary school’s playground a few hours after my attack, and all were thankful that this happened on a Sunday when no children were present.It seems we can’t go more than a couple days before an attack is in the news nationally or locally here in the LA area.
The important aspects that should not be lost are that I, much like other fighting dog attack victims, are not in the wrong place at the wrong time, we did not goad the animal for it to happen, and that not every dog gets “one free bite” before it gets labeled “vicious.”
Pit bulls and Presas are bred for the sole reason that two are to be placed into an enclosure and only one comes out. Whether nurtured by their masters for game, or simply expressing their dominant genetic traits, these dogs are time bombs without a fail safe switches, and no way to defuse once the timer hits zero.
The cottage industry that supports dogfighting is no less organized than any good narcotics ring or child exploitation network: Lurking just beneath the surface of legitimacy in backyards in Virginia, Pasadena—wherever the perpetrators can root and seemingly live in the mainstream. Its not supposed to happen in your neighborhood or where you ride, yet it does with increasing frequency. And more often than not there are severe consequences that destroy lives in the process.
I don’t sleep more than three hours at a time without reliving the attack in nightmares. And not the kind you wake yourself from and pass off as a dream; the kind where your heart accelerates out of your chest like a rocket as the monsters rip the muscles and sinew from your ankle, leaving it a sinewy shredded mass of carne asada and blood clots dripping from your leg. Worse still are the PTSD symptoms I have been in counseling for since the attack. The panic, anger, loathing, and depression have been a debilitating, at times insurmountable hurdle in my personal and professional life.
The bankrollers and advocates of dogfighting are irredeemable, projecting their rage and sociopathic needs into their biological weapons. Most of these— like Davon Boddie and others in Mike Vick's posse — are otherwise insignificant garbage piles whose lives are like drunk driving car wrecks left in high school parking lots the week before prom night: Cautionary tales so that your kids make better choices than those who failed before them. It is the pit bull, rather than any measure of self-accomplishment or contribution to society, that makes Davon Boddie anything more than a forgettable punk. Brings him respect and street cred. A playa at the top of a food chain.Why would Vick bankroll Boddie? My theory is they are one and the same, leeching off each others’ depravity to live vicariously in the others’ shoes. Davon Boddie: To have the fame, wealth, access to sex, and reputation that comes with being an A-list clutch player in the league. Mike “Ron Mexico” (look up his alias on Google) Vick: To be the kingpin at the top of a gangsta empire. These two don’t just need each other— they need to be each other.
This is exactly the relationship I see in the assailants whose dogs nearly killed me and others, and their dogfighting customers whose perversions they supply and for which they are rewarded.
The cost of dogfighting is a seven year-old girl with a pound of skin grafts on what’s left of her face where a pit bull used her as a chew toy. It is a nine year-old boy sewn back together like a doll from discarded rag parts just so his parents could have an open casket funeral. It is people like me who struggle to make sense of vicious, random violence that forever changes us physically and mentally.
The posterchild of dogfighting is Mike Vick, who desperately needs five-to-seven with his buddies in a State pen to learn what it really means to be the alpha dog in the exercise yard where there’s no sideline to run to, nowhere a pathetic coward like him can hide. If you live in a community that is thinking of tighter controls or banning fighting dog breeds, as Denver has successfully done, I urge you to speak your mind to your riding peers, friends, neighbors, and representatives. It is a matter of animal welfare, our safety, and our ability to live and ride peacefully in the communities we call home."
Wow. Kinda makes ya think, huh?
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