Tram Town
Wednesday, September 14, 2005
Category: DogsTWO pit bull terriers were shot and killed at point-blank range to stop a savage attack on a seven-year-old girl.This is a pretty horrifying story but it has its problems. For example, the claim that "Pit bull terriers have been involved in 51 attacks in a year" is almost useless without some context of how many attacks there have been overall and the involvement of pit bulls relative to other breeds. Just a few simple stats and we might have learnt something. It seems that the one-week-old incident was "announced" by Agriculture Minister Bob Cameron as part of his campaign against pit bulls: "Pit bulls don't belong in our community," Mr Cameron said.The story is full of those blank nouns like "sources" and "authorities". When they did try to speak to somebody on the spot, though: Hepburn Shire communications manager Sue Moses said council records did not detail a pit bull attack on a schoolgirl in their area.A bit suspicious, isn't it? It is probably true that pit bulls are statistically the most dangerous dog (by how much we don't know) but what happens when they are eradicated? Do we then chase after the next most dangerous dog? Oh, and this par is a bit puzzling: Council officers will be given the power to seize and destroy any pit bulls that are unregistered or entire.Presumably a dog that has had a chunk bitten out of its ear is not subject to the powers. |
