Here I am from yesterday’s meeting speaking specifically to Steve Madison of the Pasadena Public Safety Committee. Madison desires to ban Pit Bulls in the city, and since that’s illegal, wants to enact a breed-discriminatory spay & neuter law that will serve to target them as his next best option. He was dismissive and arrogant, but the other members of the Committee thankfully heard all of the people that showed up. At the end of the video I’ve quoted some of Madison’s most egregious statements and then try to show how they align with actual reality. I was also told that Madison has future sights on running for Mayor of Pasadena…

UNTRUTHS from Steve Madison during the 11/19/2012 meeting…

I had some of my staff do some research as well, and we found some data from 2006-2008. I believe this comes from the American Humane Society. In those 3 calendar years there were 88 fatal dog attacks in the U.S., and that of those 88 Pit Bull-type dogs were responsible for 59 percent of the fatalities, or 52.

FALSE. This “data” that he pulled was from the sensationalistic website, DogsBite.org, NOT the American Humane Society.

That’s actually part of a trend where a number of states have been asked to adopt legislation prohibiting this quote on quote discrimination with breeds. And so, as you pointed out, everybody stopped paying attention to it because of this discrimination argument, which to me is insane.

FALSE. You can’t argue that dog profiling isn’t discriminatory in nature.

This whole debate started because I just got tired of reading articles where Pit Bulls killed kids. So we should first decide if there is a problem here, and I gotta tell ya, to me it looks like there is. And, I mean, we know the reasons why. Pit Bulls were bred over hundreds of years to be fighting dogs, they have the strongest jaw of all dogs.

FALSE and FALSE. Implying a Pit Bulls’ “dog-fighting” history translates into human aggression is totally bogus. Human aggression was specifically bred OUT of them, as to avoid a fighting dog biting its human handler. Secondly, in regards to “jaw power,” there is absolutely NO scientific data in existence that allows for meaningful comparisons of any breed. According to Dr. Brisbin of the University of Georgia: “All figures describing biting power in such terms can be traced to either unfounded rumor or newspaper articles with no foundation in factual data.”

Some states also ban Pit Bulls. So for example, I believe Florida has a ban on Pit Bulls, and it was like a race to the capital to get that ban.

FALSE. Florida does NOT have a ban on Pit Bulls.

They are inherently dangerous. I would argue that these dogs are just too dangerous. They kill too many people.

There is 4-6 million Pit Bulls in the United States. That is a low estimate. 99.999% of them never hurt a person. Furthermore: No single, neutered household pet Pit Bull has ever killed anyone.