- Fred M. Kray
Dogsbite.org Quietly Admits Reality of Breed Bans
Colleen Lynn, in an interview you can read in full here, quietly admits what we have known all along: that breed bans don't serve to decrease all dogbites. The relevant part of the article states:
Lynn agrees with arguments that breed-specific laws do not reduce the number of dog bites. But she stresses the need for pit bull bans anyway. "It's not meant to lower all dogbites in a city," Lynn said.
She goes on to say that she wants them anyway. This is the first time I have seen this admission from Lynn. She and her supporters have previously taken the position that breed discriminatory legislation does work to increase public safety, and not just decrease pit bull bites. In an interview with Debra Bresch and again a few weeks ago in a Huffington Post roundtable discussion, Lynn has cited the San Francisco experience to make her point. And she has continued to make the argument despite the fact that there is no real conclusive evidence that breed bans reduce all dog bites. In fact, the data reveals just the opposite. Brent Toellner, who runs KC Dog Blog, has looked at the numbers from almost every place from which he could obtain data. In nearly every case where breed discriminatory legislation has been enacted overall dog bites have not decreased. This includes the UK, Denmark, Omaha, Sioux City, Ohio, and Aurora. We all know about Spain and the Prince George County Task Force. There are other failures too numerous to mention here, but suffice it to say that there is overwhelming authority to support the premise that breed bans do nothing for overall safety with respect to all dog bites.
Lynn's admission then, serves to underscore the fact that she is not out for overall public safety with her breed ban agenda, which is a major part of the dogsbite.org mission statement. In fact, if you listened to her Huffingtonpost interview, you wouldn't even know breed bans were the main thrust of her work. In that interview she stressed mandatory spay neuter of pit bulls as her goal.
It seems that the core breed ban position of dogsbite.org and Lynn's public statements are at odds. But like any politician, it appears Lynn calibrates her message depending on the audience. It may be that this change in position is intended to give her credibility when she preaches outside of the choir. We shall see.
Listen to the Colleen Lynn Podcast
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