Pit Bulls & Golden Retrievers

It’s almost like one of those Animal Planet’s Most Extreme match-ups: America’s most feared vs. its most beloved. Now, if we were going to compare the two breeds using something standardized – like, say, the American Temperament Testing Society’s uniform temperament test that they use to test thousands of dogs every year – how would they match up?

In the 2006 round of tests (with results similar to the preceding years), the three breeds that are commonly lumped into the “pit bull” group (American Pit Bull Terriers, American Staffordshire Terrier, and Staffordshire Bull Terrier) had a passing score of 84.1%.

Golden Retrievers passed at a rate of 83.8%.

So what are people afraid of?  That extra .3% of licking power? Granted, I’ve had some pit bull encounters where I wish I had a snorkel, but I don’t think that’s cause for the hysteria surrounding the dogs.

There were lots of breeds that scored significantly lower than pit bulls, but I won’t name names because this isn’t about villainizing any other breed (including Golden Retrievers). This is just another example about how the things we should be considering when rationalizing fears and passing laws are completely ignored. Instead, people turn to hearsay and the media, which, more often than not these days, is basically just  hearsay with a production budget.

You can check out the test results yourself www.atts.org.  You can find more info on pit bulls on my links page.