Caveat

Got an opinion? Great. Is it informed? No? Then keep it to yourself

The Ontario  ‘Liberals’ – and I put it in quotation marks since, as with everything McGuinty, they are the exact opposite – have not only failed to protect the public with their widely opposed "pit bull" ban, they have created a serious threat to the dog-owning public.

When I say widely opposed, I mean among people who know something about dogs.  Today's news media like to present the opinions of people who know nothing about a subject, supposedly presenting a 'balanced' report.  It is not balanced if only one side is informed.  Duh.

People are entitled to their silly second-hand  opinions but they are not entitled to a platform that gives them equal time with the educated.  

Here's an example of what I mean.  There was a story in a newspaper saying that, based on data, Brantford was number 10 out of 32 Canadian cities of comparable size  in terms of crime.   They interviewed somebody on the street who said "I don't think Brantford should be number 10."  Another passerby said "I'd have to see the actual information to make up my mind." 

These fatuous comments  nicely illustrate the new "fair and balanced" bullshit touted by corporate media outlets.  The fact is, these people's opinions aren't worthy of space in a news report and I repeat, it isn't fair and balanced if only one side knows the subject matter.

I wonder if it's connected to the new exhibitionism we seem to enjoy - the non-celebrities, the untrained non-actors on badly scripted 'reality' TV, the embarrassingly under-endowed on talent contests, the spilling of our guts on Facebook to all and sundry, the appearances on tell-all talk shows and so on and so forth.

Dog owners  see this time and time again.  A person has been bitten by a "pit bull" and "what if it had been a child" and blah blah blather blah blibbedy blobow blech.  Yes, well, it could have been all kinds of things but it wasn't.   And it's unlikely it was  a "pit bull" since there's no such breed.  And even it were a breed, it's irrelevant to the story at hand, which the media wankers seem to realize when it's a bite by any other shape of dog.  You have to dig down to paragraph nine to discover it was a 'German shepherd' or a 'Golden retriever' or whatever that sent a kid to the hospital, but if it's a "pit bull" that jumped on somebody, it's in the headline.  I wish media hadn't wised up and stopped running pictures of these "pit bulls" because some of them were pretty funny - double-coated dogs with curly tails and prick ears, that kind of thing.  Hardy har har, newsies.  You're a laff-and-a-half.

Even more insidious is the tendency to include victims in the decision-making process.  Victims are overly emotional and are looking for vengeance.  Oh, sure, it's always "We don't want this to happen to anyone else"  but really, it's "I want to hit back".  The thing is, based on statistics, it's extremely unlikely that it will happen to anyone else, most of 'em were just in the wrong place at the wrong time.

We saw this victim involvement with the "pit bull" ban where McGuinty's minion, Attorney General Bryant,  managed to find a couple of people who had been attacked by alleged "pit bulls", trotted them out to scrums and gave them a platform to voice their completely ignorant opinions on the national news.  Ultimately two or three people were given more weight than the collective opinions of 87 expert organizations and individuals from Canada, the US and the UK.  Not to mention the hundreds of regular people who wrote in to protest the ban when it was first announced and those who sent in written presentations to Committee.

One presentation at Committee was rather funny in a dark way, albeit typical.  The person started out by saying they had been bitten by many varieties of dogs, the list went on and on.  One could only think "Man, you haven't got a clue about dogs  if you've been bitten that many times.  You're doing it wrong!".   He was treated with more respect than veterinarians and other professionals who presented at the Committee hearings.   The Attorney General's bum boy, David Zimmer (Lib Willowdale) was questioning witnesses as if they were defendants on the stand.  His was a disgusting performance throughout.  Of course, he had been heavily lobbied by the WSPA for years over roadside zoos and as we know, they are an affiliate of the HSUS, so I imagine that's how the whole ban thing got started.

If you're sick of staring at bad acting and lousy directing, garish sets and embarrassing exhibitionism on TV and elsewhere, you can find a lot of entertainment in the Hansard record of the hearings.  Here's the link:

The "Pit Bull" ban hearings

But we know the ban wasn't about "pit bulls"  was it?  Hell, no, the government has the same, or more, information than we have so they knew the whole thing was a crock.

Nope, it was a test run, a trial balloon as it were to erode the civil rights of every property-owning citizen in Ontario.  It was written by a constitutional lawyer who also happened to be a law professor and the language is so vague and tricky that almost nobody understands it.  Animal control departments used to contact us at the DLCC to have the law interpreted for them, that's how well done it is.

Thanks to McGuinty and his minions, the police can enter your home without a warrant if they ‘believe’ that a dog inside is threatening a human or a domestic animal. That’s regardless of breed. So basically owning a dog is probable cause.

Then there’s the warrantless search and seizure on the street, inequality under the law, restrictions on mobility, reversal of the burden of proof of a negative on to a defendant, etc, etc. Let’s not even get into overbreadth and vagueness.

Oh yeah, I almost forgot – thousands of dogs have been killed because of their appearance, from 6-week-old puppies to senior canine citizens. All of those dogs were mutts. People are still having their beloved dogs seized and threatened with death because they have short hair and whippy tails.

There's nothing 'fair and balanced' about any of that.

WHAT'S THE DEAL WITH POLITICIANS AND DOG OWNERS?

I don't get it.

Whenever I'm at a political function, I always bring up the fact that there are an estimated three million dogs  in Ontario - and somebody owns them.

My old buddy Goodpooch, who dismantled her excellent website a couple of years ago, used to say that she used people's opinions on "pit bulls" to gauge their overall intelligence and level of education.  I have to agree it's one of the best barometers around.  

News media types don't count because they get such a thrill out of watching their web hits increase every time they run a puerile editorial or dog bite story about "pit bulls".   Ethics and news reporting part ways when "pit bulls" come to town.  It's all about the money, honey - increased hits equal higher ad rates.  That's why I ignore all but informed, intelligent news commentary about dogs in general and "pit bulls" in particular.

But I digress.

Back to the matter at hand.

Whenever I mention the dog owner demographic and point out that people think of their dogs as family members, that they spend huge amounts of money on equipment, food, training, medical care, travel, etc to keep their dogs happy and that there are nearly three million of them, give or take, I invariably get the same reaction:  "Yeah, right, now as I was saying, these 'Working Families' could present a problem...."

Huh?  How many of them are there?  A hundred thousand, maybe?  Dude, I'm talking about three million dedicated people who love their dogs and are opposed to McGuinty's breed ban and by extension, McGuinty himself.  We can dust all the 'Working Families' types combined.

Why is this constituency ignored?  A few souls such as Cheri Di Novo (NDP MPP Parkdale-High Park) and Julia Munro (PC MPP York North) and a couple of others have kept the issue alive but overall, unless it's hot, it seems that politicians just don't care about us.

If it's because they think "pit bull" bans are 'old news' or wildly popular, they're wrong.  They matter to those of us who a) know something about dogs and b) believe that laws should govern behaviour, not appearance.  Laws like the Ontario "breed" ban (and others passed by McGuinty) are un-Canadian.

I have read all the emails that were sent to City TV back when the ban was initially being debated.  The stack is about 8 inches high.  In it are just a handful of notes supporting the ban.  And I mean three or four.

Remember the AG's comments about how he had heard from people?  Depending on the day, he claimed to have received 4,000 or 5,000 emails.  Funny that he never read any of them out during the House debates, eh wot?  Gee, do you suppose that 99.9% of them could have been - gasp! - against the ban?

At Committee, as we all know, every expert organization and individual who appeared opposed the ban.  The only people who were in favour were  a sad and sorry few who had weak complaints about appearance, dogs chewing tree branches, dogs chasing cats, attending festivals, etc.  Two were actual victims of attacks by who-knows-what kind of dogs and for them I was sorry but banning a breed or, more accurately in Ontario, a shape of dog won't prevent that from happening.  Duh.

I have read all the written presentations that were submitted to Committee - you know, the ones that don't hit Hansard.  There were a couple of hen-scratched one-pagers supporting the ban and the rest of them were opposed.  It is a big, heavy carton.

While people like former Attorney General Bryant liked to give a platform to chronic whiners and know-nothings to the exclusion of the well-informed in order to create the illusion of support, most people were neutral and dog owners were opposed.

Let's face it - people don't send hundreds of emails to TV stations, show up at Committee hearings, write letters to newspapers and politicians, start blogs, etc because they are in favour of some hare-brained political scheme.  The do it because they are opposed to it.

So, come on, Ontario politicians!  Stand up for the dog owners of Ontario and - trust me on this - they'll stand up for you on October 6.

The "pit bull" ban really is a no-brainer.

 

 Crossposted at the exciting new blog, Blowharder

WE'VE COME FULL CIRCLE - IT'S PETITION TIME AGAIN

Our first batch of the current petition was presented in the Ontario Legislature two weeks ago by MPP Julia Munro.

We plan to send petitions along as they are signed to keep the issue on the floor until the next election, when McGuinty will hopefully be ousted. 

If you LIVE IN ONTARIO, please print out the petition and try to get it signed. Each page holds 10 signatures, so it's easy to count how many you have collected.

Be careful when getting signatures. Smudges, crossouts, etc, can invalidate an entire page of petitions. 

All RESIDENTS OF ONTARIO may sign, including those who have not reached the age of majority.

I will be taking these to dog shows on a clipboard and asking people to sign. There are many opportunities to get signatures - at the dog park, the pet food shop, the groomers, among family and friends, etc.

Once you have some signatures - you don't need a full sheet - please snail mail them to:

Julia Munro, MPP

P O Box 1129

18977 Leslie Street

Sharon ON L0G 1V0

OR:

Room 204

North Wing Legislative Building

Queen's Park

Toronto, ON M7A 1A8 

THANK YOU FOR YOUR PARTICIPATION.

TOGETHER, WE CAN END BSL IN ONTARIO!

*

The petition reads as follows:

TO: The Legislative Assembly of Ontario

WHEREAS: Aggressive dogs are found among all breeds and mixed breeds; and

WHEREAS breed-specific legislation has been shown to be an expensive and ineffective approach to dog bite prevention; and

WHEREAS problem dog owners are best dealt with through education, training and legislation encouraging responsible behaviour;

WE the undersigned petition the Legislative Assembly of Ontario as follows:

To repeal the breed-specific sections of the Dog Owners' Liability Act (2005) and to implement legislation that encourages responsible ownership of all dog breeds and types.

Caveat's New Home

 

Hey, thanks for dropping in!

 Once I figure out Typepad, it should go smoothly.  It doesn't seem to have the flexibility of blogware but since they are no longer supporting their product, I had no choice but to move.

In the meantime, I might post some of my older articles to get things rolling again.