Dogs, Railroads, and Robots, Part One of Three: Dogs
I own a dog, and he is a Red-bone coon hound. Surprisingly, he doesn’t like water and will stay away from our pool at all costs. But the reason I bring my dog up is that he is not a typical hound. As I mentioned, he hates our pool. Any normal hound will adore water. Also, he really doesn’t mind the squirrels. It seems to be a trade: he provides them with access to the yard, and they provide him with buried nuts to dig up and eat. And that brings me to my main point in this post. Things (dogs as the case in point) are not always as they seem. For example, I read a comic strip in our newspaper, Over the Hedge. It is in a series about the main characters and a pit bull puppy. The dog seems dangerous because of the breed connotation, but he is really a sweet dog.The way I see it, there are no bad breeds of dogs, only bad owners of dogs. If a dog, say, a pit bull or bulldog, is mistreated, then he will be every bit as mean as people think he is. But if one treats their dog right, that dog will most likely be a sweet, lovable dog. If every dog owner were humane and right to their dog, a pit bull’s temperament might well nigh be associated with a bloodhound’s. (Note: The next part in this three-part series is coming in April.)
March 9th, 2008 at 4:41 pm
Very well said, Alex. I agree with everything you said, and further more, there is also a similar thing with horses. Some people call some horses “Crazy”, “Mean”, and “Dangerous”, but that’s only because of the way their owners treat them. A horse is not born mean-spirited, it is MADE mean-spirited by the way us humans treat them.
March 9th, 2008 at 4:48 pm
Also, here’s a story of a Pit Bull that did not act like most people think of when they hear of the breed:
My mom was at a Irish music retreat last year and was tent-camping there. One morning, she had made a breakfast of hash browns, pancakes, and bacon. After she ate, she was wrapping the leftovers in foil when she looked randomly at someplace and saw a pit bull, standing within 20 feet of her. He looked very thin, and was very hungry (poor thing!). When mom made eye contact with him, he cowered (a submissive move), and whined. She unwrapped the leftovers and thought, “I’m not going to eat these at home.” and threw them to the dog, and he ate them very fast. He escorted her to and from her classes, and even tried to come inside with her! By the end of the day, he had made friends with about every one in camp and was following them around.
March 10th, 2008 at 5:50 pm
In reference to your first comment, Lil Mustang, you’re right! An animal (a domestic one at least) is not usually mean-spirited by nature. In the book Black Beauty, by Anna Sewell, the best example is Ginger. She wasn’t mean by nature, she was made so by her owners.
March 10th, 2008 at 5:57 pm
Also, even wild animals are not “mean” unless you provoke them.
March 10th, 2008 at 10:30 pm
yup! Poor Ginger…. I always cry at the part in the book and in the movie when she dies…. it makes me sort of depressed.. Once I watched it when I was sick and couldn’t ride for a while (I never got to see the horse that I rode again…
) and I watched all the horse movies that I had, and that one made me cry for at least an hour after it had ended…