Some people just don’t get it.
When you own a pit bull, everything you say and do has an impact far beyond what your neighbors think of you, as an individual, and your dog. You can choose to be a stereotype or break a stereotype. Help the breed or hurt it; it’s all up to you.
Waterford Township resident Roy Beck has been in trouble once before due to his dog ownership. First, he broke the law by merely owning a pit bull in the township, which has had a breed ban in place since 1989. I may not approve of breed bans, but I do believe in being a law-abiding citizen.
Beck said he was watching the pit bull for his daughter. His neighbors said the dog was aggressive and charged them on several occasions. And when the dog was picked up, it had a whole litter of puppies.
How irresponsible can you be? You have an aggressive pit bull in a township which has a ban — there’s two things you’ve already done wrong. Now, you can’t even keep the dog restrained so it doesn’t threaten your neighbors? There’s three. And next, you allow it to breed, knowing full well it has a poor temperament and will likely be passing that on to the next generation? That’s four strikes against Mr. Beck.
Shame on you.
Read the full story from June 2009 here.
Mr. Beck made the news again this weekend. His neighbors say that once again, he has a pit bull in his Waterford Township home. And once again, the dog was not being restrained to his yard but allowed to run loose.
Are you kidding me? Forget the township’s ban on pit bulls, let’s just ban this guy from owning any more dogs!
The story gets even worse. When the neighbor confronts Mr. Beck about his dog, Beck punches the guy in the eye. Mr. Beck is now facing assault charges.
Beck told an Oakland Press reporter on Friday that, “I have a box terrier and a Doberman. I don’t have pit bulls and (my dogs) are not attacking anyone.”
To Beck’s credit, the neighbor did say that while the dog jumped on him, it was not aggressive. Read the full story here.
But I have a different question — what in the world is a box terrier?
The reporter who spoke with him turned to me on Friday and asked me if I knew what a box terrier is. Despite being surprisingly well-versed in terms of dog breeds, I had no idea.
“If I had to guess, I’d say he means a boxer and pit bull mix or something,” I said. “I’ve honestly never heard that term before, though, and pit bull and boxer mixes are a designer dog breed with a proper name and it’s called a Bull Boxer, not a box terrier. How strange.”
To all you non-pit bull folks, I should add in that all pit bulls are terriers — hence why you see a lot of “terrier” mixes that strongly resemble pit bulls. The proper names of pit bulls breeds are American Pit Bull Terrier, American Staffordshire Terrier, Staffordshire Bull Terrier and Bull Terrier. Notice how every breed name has the word “terrier” in it.
I did a Google images search for “Box Terrier” and it returned results ranging from Fox Terriers to Bull Terriers to pit bulls. I went to the AKC website, searched “Box Terriers” and my results said, “Did you mean Fox Terrier?”
Let’s get a couple things straight here too, if Mr. Beck meant to say Fox Terrier, then I expect his dog to be a short, wiry-haired, Schnauzer-type looking dog. Not the type of dog you’d get mixed up with a pit bull by a long shot.
So now we have a man who has broken the township’s law at least once, owned an aggressive dog that he allowed to roam freely and breed, and gave a black eye to a neighbor who complained about the latest dog he owns — pit bull or otherwise.
In doing so, Mr. Beck has really given a black eye to the whole pit bull community.
Let us remember that our dog ownership practices reflect directly on the breeds we own and in no case moreso than with pit bulls.
Be a stereotype or break a stereotype; it’s up to you.
When you own a pit bull, everything you say and do has an impact far beyond what your neighbors think of you, as an individual, and your dog. You can choose to be a stereotype or break a stereotype. Help the breed or hurt it; it’s all up to you.
Waterford Township resident Roy Beck has been in trouble once before due to his dog ownership. First, he broke the law by merely owning a pit bull in the township, which has had a breed ban in place since 1989. I may not approve of breed bans, but I do believe in being a law-abiding citizen.
Beck said he was watching the pit bull for his daughter. His neighbors said the dog was aggressive and charged them on several occasions. And when the dog was picked up, it had a whole litter of puppies.
How irresponsible can you be? You have an aggressive pit bull in a township which has a ban — there’s two things you’ve already done wrong. Now, you can’t even keep the dog restrained so it doesn’t threaten your neighbors? There’s three. And next, you allow it to breed, knowing full well it has a poor temperament and will likely be passing that on to the next generation? That’s four strikes against Mr. Beck.
Shame on you.
Read the full story from June 2009 here.
Mr. Beck made the news again this weekend. His neighbors say that once again, he has a pit bull in his Waterford Township home. And once again, the dog was not being restrained to his yard but allowed to run loose.
Are you kidding me? Forget the township’s ban on pit bulls, let’s just ban this guy from owning any more dogs!
The story gets even worse. When the neighbor confronts Mr. Beck about his dog, Beck punches the guy in the eye. Mr. Beck is now facing assault charges.
Beck told an Oakland Press reporter on Friday that, “I have a box terrier and a Doberman. I don’t have pit bulls and (my dogs) are not attacking anyone.”
To Beck’s credit, the neighbor did say that while the dog jumped on him, it was not aggressive. Read the full story here.
But I have a different question — what in the world is a box terrier?
The reporter who spoke with him turned to me on Friday and asked me if I knew what a box terrier is. Despite being surprisingly well-versed in terms of dog breeds, I had no idea.
“If I had to guess, I’d say he means a boxer and pit bull mix or something,” I said. “I’ve honestly never heard that term before, though, and pit bull and boxer mixes are a designer dog breed with a proper name and it’s called a Bull Boxer, not a box terrier. How strange.”
To all you non-pit bull folks, I should add in that all pit bulls are terriers — hence why you see a lot of “terrier” mixes that strongly resemble pit bulls. The proper names of pit bulls breeds are American Pit Bull Terrier, American Staffordshire Terrier, Staffordshire Bull Terrier and Bull Terrier. Notice how every breed name has the word “terrier” in it.
I did a Google images search for “Box Terrier” and it returned results ranging from Fox Terriers to Bull Terriers to pit bulls. I went to the AKC website, searched “Box Terriers” and my results said, “Did you mean Fox Terrier?”
Let’s get a couple things straight here too, if Mr. Beck meant to say Fox Terrier, then I expect his dog to be a short, wiry-haired, Schnauzer-type looking dog. Not the type of dog you’d get mixed up with a pit bull by a long shot.
So now we have a man who has broken the township’s law at least once, owned an aggressive dog that he allowed to roam freely and breed, and gave a black eye to a neighbor who complained about the latest dog he owns — pit bull or otherwise.
In doing so, Mr. Beck has really given a black eye to the whole pit bull community.
Let us remember that our dog ownership practices reflect directly on the breeds we own and in no case moreso than with pit bulls.
Be a stereotype or break a stereotype; it’s up to you.
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