You cannot ban ignorance. It is a describing word. You cannot have a war on ignorance or a war on hate any more than you can have a war on terror, as they are all adjectives. Describing words are subjective labels given to something by somebody. There’s no consistency in defining such a thing.

When you get into legislation meant to police “hate speech,” you leave everything up for an incredible level of interpretation. Another dynamic of this that would be vastly important is who is thus defining something as hate, and what is their potential agenda, as 1 person’s definition of “hate” or “offensive” wouldn’t match the next person’s definition. It’s a subjective topic no matter what, left up to the whim of some random person or a group of people. This is precisely what the 1st Amendment is for, to protect all speech, because if you take certain speech away then you begin to go down a path that just keeps extending itself. This would most certainly lead to the selective enforcement of such a law, one primary example being that it could be used to squash and criminalize political dissent.

On 4/16 such legislation was introduced by Senator Edward Markey (S. 2219) and Congressman Hakeem Jeffries (H.R. 3878), calling for examining the role that telecommunications plays in encouraging hate crimes. Can someone please define “encouraging”? Of course, there were no specifics made available, and there won’t be. Instead the bill is ripe with open-endedness, as likely intended. So if you say something in the future that another person may deem controversial, you could potentially be swept up and blamed for a physical act that may have been perpetrated by a completely separate individual. These erroneous links could and would be made under such legislation. Do not be naive.

The Boston Herald put it best…

U.S. Senator Ed Markey wants to empower an obscure federal agency to begin scouring the internet, TV and radio for speech it finds threatening.

Bringing this into the realm of dog-related issues… I would not advocate for dog-hating psychopaths like Colleen Lynn of DogsBite.org or Dawn James of Craven Desires to be silenced or erased from the history of the internet. Why? Because I believe in the 1st Amendment and would not want to be silenced myself, or have anyone else silenced by someone who doesn’t agree with them. It is Colleen Lynn’s right to want to see Pit Bulls banned, and to lobby for their bans. It is Colleen Lynn’s right to spread lies and misinformation, fear and irrationality. It is Colleen Lynn’s right to say, both publicly and privately, that she wants to see shelter Pit Bulls dead and have all dogs looking like them euthanized out of existence. As repugnant and evil as those views are, she lives in America and she can have them.

You fight this awfulness by exposing it and by educating people on the opposite ideas. You fight this awfulness by promoting the truth, by showing prejudicial individuals for who they are, by having rational debate, by pointing out the human recklessness that’s almost always involved in incidents that are used after the fact to drive fear, and by delving far deeper into the many issues that so often scapegoat Pit Bulls and/or lead to their death.

Banning things doesn’t fix these problems. Banning dogs surely doesn’t fix them. You may not be able to define what kind of dog it is, but it’s still a dog; and a dog isn’t an adjective, it’s a noun that’s identifiable by categorizing a certain species. How would banning undefinable adjectives fix anything then? That’s an exercise in futility, as you will spend more time arguing over what is and what isn’t, and less time over promoting actual issue-related education and inclusiveness. Slogans don’t educate. Ending “ignorance” and “hate” in regards to dog breeds takes fleshing out the many issues that lead to that ignorance and hate.

One more thing… Ignorance is different than hate. Are you hatefully ignorant and bigoted or are you just uneducated on a specific issue? Because both types of people would technically fall under the phrasing of “ignorant,” would they not? Just know that the “uneducated on a specific issue or indifferent” portion of the population is colossally greater than the “hatefully ignorant and bigoted” portion of the population. So if you denigrate them equally by tossing around the phrasing of “ignorance” with little to no context, you run the risk of alienating the biggest group of genuine society.

To those advocating on behalf of Pit Bulls or any other type of dog, remember this: “The enemy of love is not hate, but fear.” ~ Gene Robinson.

It absolutely would not be a stretch to say that most people who claim to have certain negative feelings about Pit Bulls, that those feelings are actually rooted in fear and not hate. Even if they are adamant about their dislike, it’s usually fear that’s driving their concerns. Fear, lack of exposure, traveled information, populated rhetoric. You can’t ban fear either, or force someone to meet a dog. These concerns need acknowledged, empathized with, attempted to be understood. Go from there. When you respond to fear with anger you have little to no chance of reaching another person.

Colleen Lynn’s favorite journalist, if not the infamously inaccurate Merritt Clifton, has got to be Barbara Kay. Not so coincidentally Barbara Kay almost exclusively references “statistics” from Lynn’s anti-Pit Bull website, DogsBite.org. These are statistics that Lynn has either already gotten from Merritt Clifton, or has gathered herself using Clifton’s tactics of selectivity. Imagine that! Mr. Clifton derives his Pit Bull vilification “statistics” from selectively plucking information from media reports, and putting the faulty premise of cherry-picking through unverifiable data aside, I’d just note that media reports have proven to be quite unreliable when referencing incidents involving dogs and dog breeds.

Still, the bias is heavy. All 3 of these folks have got an unmistakeable ax to grind with any dog that they’ve deemed to be a Pit Bull. Like the sun rising every morning, Lynn and Clifton continue to maintain a hateful bias against millions of dogs, and it’s based solely on how those dogs appear to them and nothing else. Barbara Kay is a follower of such imbecility.

Speaking of bias, this brings me to confirmation bias. Confirmation bias is basically the act of surrounding yourself with people that serve to reinforce what you already think. This tendency is at the foundation of those who philosophically follow Colleen Lynn and her fraudulent “public safety” website, a website that pays no attention to actual ways of improving public safety. Like I mentioned earlier, it amounts to not much more than a hub for a delusional hate group whose life work is based around scapegoating entire groups of undefinable dogs. You can see it for yourself by simply observing how many of these individuals conduct themselves online. For example, try commenting out of tune on one of their Facebook pages and you will be instantly banned for not striking the expected tone.

I’d advise the anti-dog crowd to step out of the darkness of anonymity and engage someone every once and awhile who’s not a shill for their entrenched beliefs. If they’re so confident in their interpretations then that should be an expected next step, right? I’d happily invite any of them onto the Bull Horn podcast, even all 3 of them at the same time. This invitation will continue to stand for whenever they’d want to accept it. But moving on…

On Monday Barbara Kay said, which was then echoed by Colleen Lynn, that “if you can only love a Pit Bull, you don’t really love dogs.” Woosah! First off, that standalone statement is a complete misrepresentation of most people’s feelings. How many people do you know that love only Pit Bulls? What? For Heaven’s sake, “Pit Bulls,” as most people speak of them, are mostly dogs who’ve been mixed amongst many differing breeds. That alone negates the stupidity of such a statement. But breed identification aside, I literally do not know of a single person that has shown or stated Kay’s sentiment to be even remotely accurate. Let me repeat, I know not 1 person who would fit that characterization!

See, this is the backwardness of their arguments and the emptiness of their attempts at framing rhetoric. Pit Bull-owning people are just like any other dog owner, just as Pit Bulls and mixes are just dogs. Every single day this is proven in millions of instances, none of which garner any media attention. Pit Bull owners do not love only Pit Bulls. They do not dislike other dogs. Reality would show the opposite to be true, and almost entirely across the board. Of course, there will always be negative outliers to any positive observation, as a certain percentage of people will always exist from all walks of life. But with that, bad individuals, in any realm, do not serve to spoil the entire group of millions of categorized individuals. Further, Pit Bull owners are not fragmented persons from the rest of society. Those claims are total lies and misrepresentations meant to plant seeds of hostility and divide dog owners against themselves. Such inaccuracies are obviously what dog-haters like Colleen Lynn want uninvolved people to think, but these notions will routinely fall flat upon any type of examination.

Instead, it’s the cult of DogsBite.org that’s built upon the premise of the “only.” They routinely only focus on begrudging the Pit Bull, filling their obsessive existences with vilifying the self-defined “only” factions of both the dog and people populations. It’s all prejudicially argumentative at its core, and that’s clear as day. These attempts being always based in trying to project upon society that Pit Bulls are not dogs and that Pit Bull owners do not care about any other dog or person. Both concepts are extremely false and 100% unproven at any level. Yet they will go back to these claims time and time again because using a broad brush to incite irrational fear is literally the only leg that they have to stand on.

In Barbara Kay’s latest article, referenced above, I counted a whopping 22 separate instances where she made a Pit Bull-specific claim that in actuality goes unsubstantiated. This is appalling and embarrassing and pathetic. But still not surprising, coming from a woman who in 2012 wrote that Pit Bull owners were purposely “fetishizing” dogs “bred for blood sport and savaging slaves.”

On the same day that Kay put out her latest anti-Pit Bull rant, Merritt Clifton put out a ludicrous piece entitled “Hitler’s Pit Bull.” Yes, you read that right.

This insane diatribe basically implies that since (more appropriately if) Hitler allegedly had a dog that Clifton calls a Pit Bull, then that must prove that Pit Bulls are universally evil… Um, okay guy! That’s the stupidest fucking thing that I’ve ever heard in my entire life. Impressively done.

Clifton goes on to claim that Hitler had this dog from 1915-1917, which, just for the record, was years before he even entered into politics and 22 years prior to the start of World War II. Comically there was no effort made by Clifton to demonize German Shepherds, who Hitler consistently owned throughout his reign of Nazi terror. And that’s not to say that his owning of German Shepherds was a bad thing, as it doesn’t reflect a single thing about any individual dog being bad, or further, about an entire breed or type of dogs being bad. I’m simply using his vague asshatery against him.

In an incredible dose of irony Clifton then ends his poop fest with this…

Though Hitler’s maniacal hatred, paranoia and obsession were already becoming self-evident, the loss of his dog and subsequent gassing may have contributed to his desire to scapegoat others.

The scapegoating Merritt Clifton can diagnose a scapegoating Adolf Hitler? Too rich.

In closing, Clifton’s writing shows how incredibly lame his attempts at demonization are. He spends most of his article trying to discredit Sergeant Stubby, timelining the dog’s existence as if he was there, and then arguing over which breed he was or wasn’t. He then states that one of history’s most wretched human beings had many dogs, but only opts to focus on 1 of them. Again, he diagnoses the dog’s breed through a picture and then states emphatically that this time it is a Pit Bull, imagine that! He then uses his claim as proof that a certain type of dog is evil. Really, man? Good grief. Speaking again of irony, these repugnant people are the same folks that want to do to Pit Bulls what the Nazis did to the Jews. Just saying.

Colleen Lynn and DogsBite.org cult members who want any dog even remotely resembling a Pit Bull dead: Meet your philosophical guideline and how it views in relation to a class of people!

It is unbelievably embarrassing that any fellow human being could/would ever think in such a way. What’s more pathetic is that they are actually proud and work to promote and spread such a fucked way of thinking.

The Lake Elsinore City Council seems hellbent on rolling forth with the breed-discriminatory plan that was first passed in October by the Riverside County Board of Supervisors at the behest of Riverside County pound director Robert Miller. Interestingly enough, this peddled ordinance has nothing to do with anything that has actually happened in the city of Lake Elsinore.

It sadly passed its 1st reading on 3/11 by a vote of 4-1. The 2nd reading and vote is currently scheduled for 3/25. If you’d like to attend this meeting I’ve setup a Facebook event that you can join which has all of the pertinent details regarding how to get there. It is this upcoming Tuesday at 7 pm. Here is the agenda, the staff report and the ordinance itself.

Worth pointing out is that this Lake Elsinore effort is taking quite a different public face. Those involved are using tactical doublespeak and political maneuvering to appear less prejudice towards the dogs themselves.

Councilman Brian Tisdale seems to be the main Councilman desiring to see that this legislation is passed. From my eyes and ears he is taking a less rhetorical approach in demonizing the dogs. He makes statements like “I love the breed,” while using disingenuous justifications in order to promote this effort to target them. In essence, he’s a hell of a lot slicker than a Steve Madison from Pasadena or a John Tavaglione or Jeff Stone from Riverside County.

But then again, why do all of that stuff when you have “expert witnesses” attending who are doing so with the sole purpose of publicly shilling for the bill? Riverside County chief veterinarian Allan Drusys, known here for being the guy that compares breed identification to viewing pornorgraphy, and Animal Friends of the Valleys director Willa Bagwell, known here for being the local shelter manager who practices breed regulations in-house, were both in attendance and also both gave testimony as to why Pit Bulls needed to be targeted. Along with them was animal control supervisor Monique Middleton, who is also an employee of AFV.

On the backs of their statements, which each came after the public comments (all of which were opposed), this bill was essentially rubber-stamped with little hesitation by every member of the Council not named Steve Manos. You can watch those deliberations below…

I’d like to examine the statements of Tisdale, Drusys, Bagwell and Middleton, and explain why they just don’t seem to comprehend (at least publicly) why this bill is being opposed by many concerned citizens of both their community and other communities as well.

Above is Councilman Tisdale explaining his “comprehensive plan.” A plan in which he promises to stay vigilant at crafting and expounding upon. I use the word expound sarcastically, as there was no details shared regarding how he plans to go about the processes of spaying and neutering, licensing and microchipping the animals of the community. There was also no focus paid to legitimately reckless owners, or the “dog fighters” that he likes to reference when explaining this ordinance’s need. He says…

It’s unfortunate that the folks that are here, and I guarantee that everyone that spoke who has a Pit Bull, probably has a altered, licensed, vaccinated Pit Bull, or a Pit Bull-mix. Most Likely. Anyone not?

So? What exactly is your point? Not only does that statement attempt to vilify those who haven’t altered, licensed, or microchipped, but it also attempts to paint them as the problem in regards to why the community of Lake Elsinore apparently needs BSL. Let’s make something perfectly clear: The irresponsibility involved in failing (or choosing) to not do those mentioned things is not even remotely the same as the irresponsibility and recklessness involved when someone allows their dog to freely roam all over the place, or chains it 24-7 in its yard, or gives it no attention or socialization, or treats it like dirt, or exploits it by fighting it or using it as a yard deterrent or an alarm system. So let’s make that clear. Yet there’s no context given to these types of statements and it comes off as a pretty lazy way to legislate.

He says “if we don’t do this then people aren’t going to register their animals.” Um, all existing evidence shows the opposite of this to be true. When laws like this are put into place more people actually avoid registering their animals, as to avoid paying the fees aligned with the surgery, and further, any potential fees that become tacked on by them being in violation of said law for whatever period of time. This is not VOLUNTARILY going out to your community and EDUCATING them about the needs for these things, and then making it AFFORDABLE for them to do. No. This is the opposite, and mandating that all of these things be done under the guise that those who have not done them are bad and irresponsible people. Worse, this law attempts to criminalize their chosen dog, simply by the way that it looks, and then enters their dog into a database for another politician to possibly further target at a later date. I talked about this at length in a YouTube video that I made regarding what was happening in Pasadena.

So how does this help dogs or people for that matter?

Tisdale references a Pit Bull attack “in the county area,” one that the newly passed Riverside County breed-discriminatory law did not stop by the way, and jokes about not being able to spay and neuter the owner of the dog instead. Okay, but he literally takes no time to point out the circumstances behind this specific “attack.” Let me do it… It was a property with numerous roaming yard dogs, intact males and a female in heat, and little puppies on the property. What’s been reported is that there was a scuffle between 2 of the dogs, over a puppy, and that someone on the propery came out and picked up the puppy. He was then attacked by 1 of the dogs and a neighbor had to run his van through a chain-link fence in order to scare the attacking dog away. What an actual eyewitness said was that the person came out hollering about the dogs, kicked the dog, and then he was bitten by the dog that he kicked. Regardless, these are all yard dogs who are not being treated as family pets, and they are openly breeding them. None of this goes mentioned by Tisdale. Just that it was a Pit Bull attack.

He then talks about how many unaltered pets he sees while out running and tells a story about his fondness for visiting the shelter. He talks about seeing docile and sweet Pit Bulls, and states that he “loves the breed.” He goes on…

We have to start somewhere. And this is part of 1 plan. This is 1 piece of our plan that we are going to put together to tackle this issue. And again, this issue is not just a Pit Bull issue. $500,000 that can be used for roads and streets and sidewalks folks. We shelter animals. $500,000.

No mention of the state of California already having a dangerous dog law that is truly specific to individual dogs that have shown a propensity to be dangerous. They could use and enforce this. That goes ignored. No mention of the Lake Elsinore leash law that clearly goes unenforced. No mention of both the anti-dog fighting law and the anti-chaining law, either of which could be used and enforced in any number of different scenarios. And he wants to note how much money is being spent “sheltering” animals, while giving no attention to the fact that Willa Bagwell halts the majority of Pit Bull adoptions via her 7 in-house regulations that she’s put in the path of them potentially being adopted. He then says that “no one is taking them.” C’mon, man. Not to mention that their law is a carbon-copy of the Riverside County law, created by a man (Robert Miller) who houses the majority of their impounded Pit Bulls in buildings that are not made accessible to the public. Miller then, like Tisdale and Bagwell and Middleton and Drusys, says that “nobody wants them.” C’mon, man. What about the money that it’s going to take to enforce this type of a law? Or will it be enforced? Or how about the amount of money that you could potentially have to cough up if someone sues the city for violating their due process and property rights? This is apparently of no concern.

After the meeting I briefly spoke with Councilman Tisdale and he told me that I could hop in his truck and within 5 minutes of entering Lakeland Village he could “take me to a dogfight.” That we’d “just have to listen for it.” If he’s so knowledgeable about specific illegal activities such as this going on then why in the hell is he doing nothing about it? I also tried pointing out the problems with demonizing certain breeds or types of dog and he cut me off to say that “they’re already demonized!” That he “didn’t have a choice” because they are already demonized, “that’s what you guys aren’t getting.” He said that “people are scared.” I said that people are scared of a lot of things. That no offense, but some people are scared of black people (Tisdale is black). Some people are scared of white people. That still doesn’t make it right. His response? “Yeah, but this black person won’t bite you.” Clearly he didn’t get my point. But he doesn’t have a choice? See, now that’s where he’s wrong. You always have a choice, and he’s choosing to go down the discredited path of vilifying vague groups of individual dogs in order to basically offer up nothing more than a false sense of security.

Animal Friends of the Valleys director Willa Bagwell says “the Pit Bulls do cause damage.” So what is the implication there, that no other dog doesn’t? Or is it that every dog deemed by you to be a Pit Bull is more capable of causing damage, or more significant damage, than every dog deemed by you not to be a Pit Bull? Some extremely incoherent and all-encompassing language, as it’s unclear what she’s even saying and yet she’s apparently comfortable with talking on behalf of millions of individual dogs as if they are all the same in those ways. The only way in which dogs are all the same is that they are all the same species, meaning any dog being called a Pit Bull is scientifically categorized as being no different than any other breed of dog. They are all dogs. They all originated from the same place. And most dogs are mixed amongst different breeds and types. So if you are going to be so vague in your statements then you should not discriminate with your vagueness. On the contrary, if you are going to go any further than being as vague as humanly possible then you have to acknowledge that each dog is an individual, with its own temperament and experiences, and that they should be judged on their individual merits or not judged at all.

Bagwell tells the Council that she “provided some information, provided pictures” for them, in regards to justifying the damage claim, and based on my further communications with her (and others who have had interactions with her) I’m quite confident in saying that it was very likely numerous images of a senior woman’s arm who is alleged to have been attacked by 2 roaming Pit Bulls in 2011. I say “alleged” not to lessen the reality of the attack that clearly happened, but to point to the fact that none of us ever get to see the actual dogs in question. They were just called “family Pit Bulls” and then that became the evidence. What we do know is that these dogs were definitely out roaming freely. Willa does not know the background of these dogs, she knows what the owner told them after they had attacked a human being. I’m sorry, but how is using 1 set of images from 1 specific incident in any way indicative of what all Pit Bulls (or any type of dog) would do? That’s a crap move and it’s implying to the Council that her vague claim about damage is a factual claim that is somehow backed by evidence. Take dogs out of the equation and use, as an example, any other group of domesticated sentient beings… How in the world would singular evidence such as this be used to scapegoat everyone fitting an appearance-related parameter? This is fear, and fear tactics shouldn’t be used to set public policy. She continues…

In the last 2 months we’ve impounded 50 Pit Bulls, 2 were adopted, 3 were rescued, 8 were returned to the owner. 60 Chihuahuas in 2 months 24 were adopted, 9 were returned to their owner. Most of the shelter is Chihuahuas and Pit Bulls.

So by my math that means 37 Pit Bulls were killed totaling a 75% kill-rate for this period and that 27 Chihuahuas were killed totaling a 45% kill-rate. Can’t we then focus on increasing adoptions of these animals instead of using 7 different regulations to thwart the possibilities of Pit Bulls making it out alive? Being “very careful” in Willa’s words amounts to this in reality, which is not right. And can’t we stop pushing legislation that promotes the idea that Pit Bulls are somehow different from other dogs, further creating a gap between them and potential adopters?

During a phone conversation on 3/14 with Willa Bagwell she outright told me that this law would not be enforced and that the Council members already knew that. She should know, as her department is the department that’s set up to enforce it. Does no one see a problem with this?!? How are they voting on something that they already know they have no intention of enforcing?

Also worth note is something that I found while researching AFV… Here is the “potentially dangerous dog” list for 6 cities (including Lake Elsinore) from the years of 2010 through 2013. The existence of this list proves that they know the actual process of identifying individual dogs as “potentially dangerous” or “vicious” based on actual things that they may have done. This list details 30 dogs, 29 of which have been declared “potentially dangerous,” 1 who was declared “vicious.”

Here head animal control officer Monique Middleton says about the public commenters: “These are the responsible people, this will not affect them.” I beg to differ! I specifically drove all the way out there because every inch that someone takes towards breed-specific legislation and prejudice against a huge group of dogs absolutely affects my dogs. This then, by extension, affects me. My dogs are my family members, so any bullshit law meant to imply that my dogs are “different” or “dangerous” certainly does affect me and my dogs. It perpetuates stereotypes and scapegoats dogs, that most will never even take the opportunity to meet, for all of society’s ills. I resent Middleton’s flippant statement and way of coddling the audience away from this quite clear reality.

Middleton also echos Tisdale’s statements that “we have to start somewhere.” How about any other spot other than breed vilifying? This is a multifaceted problem (public safety in regards to dogs) which has many solutions. Many things that, if done, add up to a safer community. I repeatedly detail these things in my writings. I’m saying things that many folks have said before me. This entire effort is a pacification of their city’s genuine concerns, if there are legitimate safety concerns being voiced. Demonizing types of dogs is not going to make your community safer. Enforcing actual laws, meant to deal with reckless owners of whatever dog or dogs, do that. Not any of this. Monique Middleton knows this. Willa Bagwell knows this. Brian Tisdale knows this. She goes on to say that “we have to make people responsible for a breed.” How?? By mandating that this or that group be sterilized? How in the hell does that, in any way, deal with those human beings who have already been reckless with their dogs and who will be reckless again in the future? And why will they be reckless again? Because no one dealt with it or held them accountable when it happened in the past, that’s why.

Lastly, Riverside County veterinarian Allan Drusys telling the Council members that identifying Pit Bulls is like watching pornography, and that you “know it when you see it,” is quite literally one of the most asinine things that I’ve ever heard. There is no evidence to support this claim. None. The peer-reviewed evidence that exists on the topic says the exact opposite, and that most shelter workers can’t even properly identify their own impounded dogs.

A Victoria Voith study, which was in part done at the shelter that Allan Drusys works at, showed that 73% of the time animal control officers and shelter workers got it wrong when compared to actual DNA evidence. Allan Drusys knows both Dr. Voith and Dr. Irizarry, who were part of the extensive study, and this information is just discarded. Dr. Irizarry, a geneticist, was actually present at the Riverside County Board of Supervisors meeting in October to give a public comment opposing their ordinance. He referenced the study. He explained the genome. Allan Drusys was present. They ignored him. Irizarry also referenced a 2010 study done by Dr. Elaine Ostrander which showed that “the morphological appearance of a dog is controlled by 50 genes, out of the 20,000 genes that make up a dog’s genome. And so when you say a dog looks like a Pit Bull you’re really saying it has 4 or 5 genes that affect its physical shape, its head-shape, its snout, and it has no basis whatsoever on its behavior.” They ignored him. Maddie’s Fund and Dr. Julie Levy did a similar study, and it showed the same types of results.

Going further, 3 different pieces of legal case law exist deeming definitions of “Pit Bull” as unconstitutionally vague… American Dog Owners vs. City of Lynn, MA (1989), American Dog Owners vs. City of Des Moines, IA (1991), and State of Ohio/City of Toledo vs. Smith (2010). The 2010 court case Cardelle vs. Miami-Dade County (2010) found that animal control officers were not qualified to visually identify Pit Bulls. It also found that there is no scientific basis for admitting such an opinion. The Animal Control Association doesn’t even offer a course in breed identification! Yet Monique Middleton, an animal control officer, would confidently suggest otherwise. Mr. Allan Drusys gleefully continues repeating his pornography metaphor. This utter crap is being accepted by the Lake Elsinore City Council as “expert testimony.” It is truly a shame.

There’s nothing comprehensive in Councilman Brian Tisdale’s comprehensive plan, and there’s nothing specific about breed-specific legislation. This is a sham being perpetrated against the Lake Elsinore community, dogs of all kinds, the genuine idea of actual public safety, and the state anti-BSL law. Please oppose this move, and the nasty philosophy behind it, with all of your might.

To email the Lake Elsinore City Council: njohnson@lake-elsinore.org, smanos@lake-elsinore.org, dhickman@lake-elsinore.org, rmagee@lake-elsinore.org, btisdale@lake-elsinore.org.

This email address recently emailed a UCLA law professor last week, coincidentally less than 24 hours after I spoke at her class, with an unsolicited pile of steaming anti-Pit Bull rubbish taken from a string of blogs created to lobby for bans on Pit Bulls and the extermination of dogs deemed to be Pit Bulls.

The email message comes being addressed from a “Humane World” and with a subject line of “The Annotated Cultural Bibliography of Pit Bulls.”

This professor certainly didn’t ask for the email, and no one publicized my speaking at her class, at all. What I did do was create a zip file entitled “UCLA” and put the link to the file onto my Twitter feed, with no explanation as to what it was, so that the students of the class could easily access different documents that I’d potentially be discussing. Hmm… What this leads me to believe is that both my website and social media pages are being staked out by someone with the intent of promoting BSL and demonizing innocent dogs.

After doing a Google search on “7canines@gmail.com” it also was shown to have been sending the same type of materials out to people involved with opposing Pasadena’s attempt at BSL. These emails were also not asked for and people were wondering how this sender even got their email addresses in the first place… Well, the Pasadena City Council publicizes the correspondence (both for and against) that they received to their ordinance. Whomever is behind this 7canines email must have went through and noted everyone speaking out against breed-specific legislation in this instance and collected their email addresses, with the future intent of sending them this canned email blast promoting both hate and fear against all Pit Bulls.

At the top of the body of their email it says this…

SRUV email alerts are currently mailed to over 3800 international humane and animal welfare professionals, scholars of animal law and human-animal studies, ethologists, bioethicists, veterinarians, and journalists with an interest in canines.

So yeah, this type of obsessive behavior is likely being forced upon God only knows who else, any number of people that whomever is doing the spamming would deem potentially influential to their anti-Pit Bull cause. It’s lame, but being a faceless fearmonger is all that these hateful people have left.

This writing would be my personal counter to such trollish behavior. The goal being that next time someone gets an unsolicited email from this email address, simply googling the address will bring up this article.

To whomever you are: Know the source of the misinformation that you receive from 7canines@gmail.com. Know that these persons are oftentimes faceless and not accountable to anyone or anything. Know that their agenda is one of lobbying for breed-discriminatory legislation, bans, and the extermination of any dog even remotely looking like a Pit Bull. Know that they advocate for a philosophy that deems millions of dogs “guilty” or “bad,” and simply based around the way that they look and nothing else. Know that they are actively promoting both hate and fear, appealing to the lowest common denominators of human thought. Finally, know that not even a single dog or human safety expert organization has come out saying that breed-specific legislation is effective. Know that all mainstream and professional animal welfare groups are totally against breed-specific legislation as well. You can click on each organization to read their own words as to why.

A few weeks ago I was standing in a doorway watching a woman cry for her dog. Her frail voice spoke about Pit Bulls and how they are “good dogs” and how “there’s nothing wrong with them.” Truer words have never been spoken. Between those 2 statements tears started rolling down her face, surely coming for her dog who now has an uncertain future. Her tears led to a few of mine as I listened to her from the side of the room. My girlfriend, who’s a tenant’s rights attorney trying to get her a reasonable accommodation, was holding her hand and trying to give her some hope for a better result. Hope in the midst of what is absolutely both physical and mental torment. Medication bottles surrounded her napping position. The dog was missing from the bed. Here’s why…

Susan is a middle-aged woman who is suffering from end-stage endometrial cancer. She is actively undergoing radiation treatment and she works in Pasadena. She has no remaining family, she has no kids. She does have a 12-year-old senior dog named Sadie who’s at some level probably mixed with Pit Bull, amongst other things.

4 months ago she lost her home due to foreclosure. She’d lived there for many years. She now lives in a trailer right outside of South Pasadena where she pays $1,000 a month to rent. On her lease she put that Sadie was a “mix.” This is certainly not a lie. The property manager didn’t show any interest in meeting Sadie. All was fine.

Well, 3 months after moving into the unit the property manager was onsite and saw Sadie laying out sunning in the enclosed yard. This person immediately began verbally accosting Susan and then filed paperwork demanding that the “unapproved Pit Bull” be gone or that Susan was going to be evicted. Nice. They were ready, and are still ready, to put a dying cancer patient on the street to die on the street.

So why do Pit Bulls and their mixes fill so many shelters? Why are so many considered “hard” to adopt out? This is one of the biggest reasons why!

Susan’s had Sadie for almost 12 years. She found her after she had been thrown out of a car on the 110 freeway. She loves this dog and Sadie is all that she has. To immediately try to remedy the situation Susan turned Sadie over to what she thought was a trusted colleague for rehoming. This man then immediately turned Sadie into the kill shelter behind Susan’s back. She got called when the shelter staff scanned for the microchip. This is how Susan found out.

Sadie’s still at the North Central pound and Susan’s now been in the hospital for almost 2 weeks. She’s dying, and she’s worrying, and she’s heartbroken. She’s missing her dog, she’s hoping her dog isn’t killed. Quite literally all that she wants is to see her dog, and when she’s gone, know that her dog is safe.

The point being that breed-targeting is able to be implemented philosophically in all kinds of different ways, and with or without legislation. This happens all over the place. This is not the fault of Pit Bulls. This doesn’t say anything about them, but rather about the individuals opting to implement such unjust and vague practices. But Pit Bulls and others looking like them are the scapegoats who routinely pay with their lives.

If you’d like to help Sadie then please do so. She is impounded in Los Angeles with an ID# of A1453500. You can reach the shelter by calling 213-485-5767. Remember, Sadie is a lovely senior dog who deserves nothing short of a fantastically loving home with a warm bed and a caring hand. The peace of mind that this genuine act of kindness would give Susan would also be beyond measure. Please help me share their story.

The anti-Pit Bull hate group DogsBite.org has recently put out a “call to action” in response to something meant to spread happiness and good will. Surprised? Me neither.

Founder Colleen Lynn wants everyone to go after the United Nations, not for anything that they’ve actually done politically, but for opting to put the smiling face of a Pit Bull-mix on 1 of their 6 stamps that are being created for the 2014 International Day of Happiness. What a crime! Not only will the dog be featured on 1 of the stamps, but that particular stamp was also chosen to be on the cover of the holiday’s promotional brochure… Choices which have caused dog-hating individuals such as Lynn to shit blocks of red ceramic material generally used for mortar construction.

They say this choice “offends” victims of dog mauling incidents and, get this, promotes dog fighting. How? Well, first it’s simply because any dog that even remotely looks like a Pit Bull was chosen. God forbid. Never mind the indisputable fact that millions upon millions of these dogs exist, and that they are all individuals, 99.9% of which have never harmed anyone. But further, apparently the DBO hate group has also taken issue with how the picture has been tinted blue and red, to go along with the dog’s white coat (um, American Pit Bull Terrier = United States = red, white and blue?). Colleen Lynn claims that the placement of the red represents a blood “stained chest” and that the glorification of the dog’s happy face represents the “very emblem of immoral cruelty,” an “obscene” choice.

Honestly, what kind of freak can see ^that image and think that it promotes dog fighting and killing? Colleen Lynn can! That’s who.

So in response Lynn has begun begging her followers to start emailing the UN obscene images of victims, as a way to vilify all dogs deemed, by her, to be Pit Bulls. Verifying what picture represents what doesn’t matter in the slightest, so long as it’s bloody and gruesome. Exploitative much? Incredible. Wait, weren’t we just talking about what was offensive and obscene? Yeah, that’s what I thought. This irony only registers with those who are rational. But okay.

Point is, they want the stamp stopped before it begins to circulate. They want to throw their fit, attempt to dumb everyone down, attempt to ignore public safety, attempt to evasively misrepresent millions of dogs, and attempt to relay their message of “non-obsceneness” by continuing to embrace the bottom of the barrel philosophy of being eternally obscene.

To counter this wicked effort, please contact these same individuals from the UN and let them know how much you appreciate the beautiful choice:

unpanyinquiries@un.org, katzr@un.org, postmaster@paho.org, linnl@paho.org, eberwind@paho.org, maysonia@paho.org

This is the sweetie cake of a dog, her name is Macy. She was a shelter dog that was deemed “not appropriate for adoption” at a kill pound in California. This oftentimes happens to dogs simply because of how they look, or their breed, and having nothing at all to do with their actual temperament.

Macy was thankfully rescued, fostered, and then ultimately adopted by the same person that decided to foster her. Now she happily lives out her life as a lap dog. It’s a great story.

From Macy’s adopter:

I had never considered myself a Pit Bull person, and if I were honest, they scared me a little. However, Macy completely blew my stereotypes and preconceptions out of the water. The thing Macy loves above all else is human interaction and attention. The main takeaway is, please everyone, just give them a chance — pitties and other shelter dogs alike. That’s really all they need.

The inclusion of a rescued shelter dog, Pit Bull or not, to represent a day promoting happiness is a huge honor that is absolutely deserved.

Mr. Madison continues on his crusade to scapegoat all Pit Bulls for any speck of mayhem he can pin in their direction. This time it’s a screenshot of this story on his Facebook page, which tells the tale of a Riverside County man being saved from numerous dogs by a Good Samaritan who drove his van through a chain-link fence. The Councilman then “liked” the comment that said “wow, they even turn on their masters.”

I’d like to point out, since Steve didn’t, that this incident occurred in Riverside County. The same Riverside County that just 6 months ago passed a piece of breed-discriminatory legislation against Pit Bulls. Coincidentally the same exact type of legislation that Steve Madison desires to pass in Pasadena (he wants a ban but can’t achieve that, so this is the next best thing). I’d also like to point out that the BSL in Riverside County didn’t stop this attack, just like the Board of Supervisors were told that it wouldn’t. Also worth pointing out is that there were 6 dogs on the property, all resident yard dogs, 2 being puppies. None of the dogs were spayed or neutered. None of the dogs were licensed. Robert Miller and the Riverside County animal control did nothing to assist in bettering this environment, nor would their BSL (breed-specific mandatory spay and neuter) have stopped this. They have it, it still happened, and they were all still unaltered. The attacked man allegedly became involved after trying to break up a fight between 2 unneutered males. Does anyone care to wager on whether there was at least 1 female actively in heat on this property as well? I’d take that bet. One of the roommates, in this video, claimed that the man that was attacked was first swinging on 1 of the dogs after picking up its injured puppy.

Further, the post by Madison comes 10 days after I stayed for multiple hours sitting through the 2/3 City Council meeting so that I could briefly speak to him about going with me to the Pasadena Humane Society. The stated intention would be so that Councilman Madison could meet some of the dogs. He told me that he would. He admitted that he was scared but told me to contact his office to arrange. I emailed him that night, as well as called his office and left a voicemail on 2/6, 7 days prior to him posting this. Still haven’t gotten a response to either attempt. I, along with another person, also invited him to the local shelter during a Facebook exchange on 1/30 that came 14 days prior to him posting this. He’s still yet to respond to either of us through that platform as well. His post also comes 17 days after BSL was “tabled” in Pasadena, when well over 100 people showed up to oppose his desires. It was also on this night where numerous others genuinely invited him to come by and meet their dogs, including trainer Brandon Fouche who invited any of the Council members down to his Los Angeles training facility to see the dogs or talk about aggression.

So all of that needs pointed out, as Pasadena City Councilman Steve Madison continues trying to blame every single dog who in any way looks like a “Pit Bull” for any and every singular attack or incident ever recorded.

Yesterday the Orange County Board of Supervisors wanted to amend their dangerous dog ordinance to not only ensure that any dog taken from a suspected fighting environment, bait dogs and puppies amongst them, would be deemed “vicious” and thus destroyed, but also to further evade due process with sweeping language that would put strikes on a dog or group of dogs suspected of harming any animal (bunny, lizard) in its/their own yard!

Public comments and relayed community opposition to such moves:

I compared the dog confiscation stuff to authorities busting up a child kidnapping and sex operation, and then subsequently deeming all of the victims to be “deviants, prostitutes and sex offenders.” I also wanted to point to the lack of due process with all of it, but especially the labeling of a group of family pets who could get vaguely accused of harming a squirrel (for example) on their own property and then deemed “dangerous” by the county. Many times with shelters and animal control they are able to get away with outright ignoring due process, and simply because many people don’t have the information or the resources to be able to stand up for themselves. I see the Carson shelter do this type of stuff all the time. But that doesn’t make it any less wrong.

Here you see shelter director Ryan Drabek say some pretty suspect things about following the law. I was sitting next to an attorney and she was squirming in her chair. Then you see Supervisor Nelson give a condescending speech from his perch, attempting to needle the people who had come out to oppose his plan. Then his plan fell flat and didn’t even get a single motion, needing 2 motions to even garner a vote. Death to his desires, and then he huffs and puffs.

In the end we had Boss the surfing Pit Bull and local supporter Keebo spreading love after the meeting.

This shows yet again, and on the heels of Pasadena, that people having the courage to oppose such unjust laws can actually make a mighty difference.

If this wasn’t evidence enough, or this, or this, or this, or this, or this, or this, or this, or this, or this, or this, or this, or this, or anything Nathan Winograd constantly details, or this, or this, or this, or this, or this.

Then how about this?

Quoted in the above article is PETA’s VP of communications and Pasadena resident Lisa Lange, the same lady that I confronted back in 2013.

Doing this for Pit Bulls, the dogs that need the most help from society, is a very good thing and it makes no sense that anyone who cares about dogs at any level would oppose this.

Let’s cut the bullshit. This is the guy that is pushing the legislation, thus the man that PETA is supporting…

^Watch the video.