Pit bulls: It's the other end of the leash that you should fear

Martha (aka the pit bull who never grew up) went to the vet for shots and her annual checkup this week. So of course she got herself weighed.

From what I’ve read, adult female pit bulls run from 30 to 50 pounds. Martha, who actually is a pit bull/lab mix, weighed in at a measly 34 pounds. She’s 15 months old now, so she probably won’t get any bigger.

Despite her mixed ancestry, Martha is, at heart, a pit bull. She does not have a lab’s instinctive desire to please, nor does she have a lab’s determination to eat anything and everything. Martha is stubborn, strong, bossy and independent-minded. She adores people, which is a recognized trait among pit bulls, but she is not all that crazy about other dogs (except for our chocolate lab, Aquinnah, who is her best bud).

Thanks to Martha’s appearance - small, slim and puppy-like - strangers who might otherwise fear pit bulls are immediately attracted to her, as she is to them. (The photo doesn't do her justice because the flash from the camera washed out her brown eyes.) Folks will pet her, coo at her in baby talk, even hug her without hesitation. All of which is perfectly safe because Martha is a “people dog” who would willingly go home with anyone, if given half a chance.

Full-sized pit bulls trigger the opposite reaction. Seeing a large, muscular, 60-pound pit approaching them, people will often cross the street even if the dog is leashed, or glare nervously at it, half expecting the dog to break free and tear them to pieces.

Yet a full-sized pit bull is, essentially, nothing more than a larger version of our “pocket pit." If, that is, the dog has been properly trained by loving and responsible people.

I know. That's hard to swallow. Let's face it; the breed has a serious image problem. The country is awash in irresponsible owners who get pit bulls for all the wrong reasons. When lousy owner meets untrained dog, it can be a recipe for disaster.

But did you know that pit bulls make good therapy dogs? That Petey of Little Rascals fame was a pit? That there was a time in America when the pit bull was called “the nursemaid’s dog” because “bullies” were so good with children? That Helen Keller, Teddy Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson had pit bulls?

More recently, sad to say, pit bulls have become the dog of choice among punks, thugs, yahoos and people who are a few fries short of a Happy Meal. But the ranks of pit-bull fans are quite varied, even today.

“Dog Whisperer” Cesar Millan recently lost his beloved but aged pit bull, Daddy. Jon Stewart is an owner. So is Ira Glass, the bespectacled host of This American Life on public radio. In an interview posted on newsreview.com, Glass once described his 50-pound pit bull as “kind of a coward” who is “afraid of everything” and has no desire to go outside.

Writing in The New Yorker back in 2006, author Malcolm Gladwell discussed pit bulls in a lengthy article about profiling, human and canine. He made it quite clear that some pit bulls are dangerous, while also noting that pits do well on a test administered by the American Temperament Test Society to measure a dog's stability, shyness, aggressiveness, and friendliness in the company of people.

In fact, Gladwell wrote, pit bulls score better than beagles, Airedales, bearded collies, and all but one variety of dachshund.

Yet we all know that some pit bulls bite, sometimes with fatal results. So what gives?

“The dogs that bite people are, in many cases, socially isolated because their owners are socially isolated, and they are vicious because they have owners who want a vicious dog,” Gladwell wrote.

“The junk-yard German shepherd - which looks as if it would rip your throat out - and the German-shepherd guide dog are the same breed," he wrote. "But they are not the same dog, because they have owners with different intentions.”

Owners with different intentions. That’s what it comes down to, more often than not. A 30-pound female pocket pit might be more likely to attack you than a 60-pound male, depending on who owns each dog, and how well each has been trained, treated and socialized. But we make assumptions based on appearances. The little dog must be friendly; stay away from the big dog.

Responsible pit-bull owners like to say that people should judge the deed, not the breed. They know that dogs - even pit bulls! - do what they are trained to do, what they are encouraged to do, what they are allowed to do.

Instead of generalizing about the breed, size or appearance of any dog, focus on the other end of the leash. In the end, dogs are no more dangerous than their owners, who may be very dangerous indeed. Or not.

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If you want to learn more about pit bulls, check out Malcolm Gladwell's New Yorker article or a 2008 story from Sports Illustrated on what became of Michael Vick's dogs after his dogfighting operation was shut down.