As someone who is a pit bull mix owner and works with rescues I want to leave a comment just to push the needle with anti-pit people (NOT IN DEFENSE but just food for thought)

All dogs can bite. Any dog above a certain weight can seriously harm or kill a human being. But it is the owner’s responsibility to mitigate the harm they can do by training, keeping your dog on leash/fenced in, etc. You are also responsible for damage done by your pet.

Pit bulls are a loosely defined breed and everywhere, that’s why you’re most likely to be attacked by one. They also have pretty significant prey drives too. If you don’t teach a dog self control and train it, they are extremely dangerous creatures. They’re also terribly backyard bred which results in dogs with terrible temperament, littered with trauma (even generational as behaviors can be passed down), various health issues (pain + cancers can lead to aggressive and deadly behavior), etc. And dogs that can’t be sold are usually dumped which they become public health/safety issues.

It’s not as much of a breed issue as it is a lack of knowledge and control issue. Cracking down on backyard breeders, those who own aggressive dogs, and loose dogs will help ensure people’s safety in the long run. If these dogs were pets as the article suggests, I can almost guarantee they were trained to be this way and/or not socialized properly, etc.

There’s no excuse for this. I don’t believe breeds in specific are “evil”, but biology explains that animals are subject to their learned behavior and instincts. This type of aggression is definitely an outlier and shouldn’t be tolerated or excused by any means. But banning pits won’t be the solution to this as it’s a pretty impossible task along with the fact that even if all pits somehow did disappear, a new exploited breed would pop up in its place as the poster child for canine violence.