UPDATE: VanSun published some letters today, a week after the piece. How slowly does its staff read?
The Vancouver Sun has published only one letter rebutting its asinine op-ed piece of May 29th, when I know of dozens that were written. Well, I'm publishing my own letter, hehehe.
The writer had some good points but completely loses them (and me) with her abuse of statistics, regurgitation of media hysteria, and unfounded pronouncements based on her personal biases.
Ms. Baker's suggestion that "People need to fight back" may result in a fat lawsuit against her and the Vancouver Sun if anyone is injured while responsibly walking their dog.
The Ontario resident giving advice to carry a big stick was probably a "pit bull" owner, since "pit bull" owners and their unoffending dogs have been harassed and assaulted since the Ontario Liberal government started its hysterical and inaccurate campaign against a shape of dog.
Ms. Baker ignores the fact that the Ontario breed-specific legislation makes responsible dog owners into second-class citizens, and has killed unoffending dogs. Ontario's breed-specific legislation has been challenged in court, and as I understand it (I'm not a lawyer) the judge hearing the legal challenge threw out several major points of the law.
Ms. Baker also ignores the fact that Ontario Attorney General Michael Bryant, the architect of Ontario's breed ban, was unable to identify the American Pit Bull Terrier in a series of pictures of purebred dogs. Let's have Ms. Baker do a "find the pit bull" test.
Ms. Baker does not serve her readers well when she fails to identify the source of her statistics; her source and motive are therefore questionable. If she has taken numbers out of context from the study conducted by the Center for Disease Control in Atlanta, she should know that the Center has repudiated any use of its statistics for breed identification purposes and clearly stated that breed identification is the great confounder in dog bite and attack incidents.
Ban irresponsible owners, not the shape of a dog. And ban writers who don't properly research their subject matter.
4 comments:
Bang on!I`m an Ontario "Pitbull" who`s owner has walked me with a baseball bat since this all started.That`s to protect me from off leash dogs and people that might try and harm me.We also keep the baseball bat handy on our own property because of off leash dogs that come on to my property.We don`t blame the dogs, because dogs like to run.I would like to be off leash and running free also, but it`s not allowed,for obvious reasons.It`s owners that are the problem but unfortunately the dogs always pay the price.
I would like to put a link to your letter on my blog if that`s ok with you.
We can bypass the biased media and get the word out ourselves.
Please, mac and friends, link away!
It's bad enough that the writer organized her thoughts like a spider on LSD, but to promote violence against people...that is truly unacceptable.
Isn't it fun to have your own news outlet?
Blogging is where it's at - the truth, I mean...
btw, did you notice that the TO Sun didn't run ONE letter regarding their lurid front page story 'They Killed My Baby' about the alleged 'pit bull' (tranformed from a Rottweiler) that killed the puppy mill dog in Malvern?
Not one letter for a front page story complete with pictures.
Go figure.
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