Yesterday, well known “pit bull” hater, and misogynist apparently, Phil Luciano opened his big, fat head and let Peorians, et al, into another one of his brilliant harangues.   This time, he didn’t just denigrate “pit bulls,” but also their female owners/defenders, and misogynistically apparently.   He must have been taking a page from the Sun-Sentinel‘s Gary Stein (who similarly went off on a “pit bull”-owner-hating diatribe when he and his puppet masters didn’t get their way when trying to illegally push a breed-specific law in Florida’s Broward County), who, like Luciano was virtually nonsensical in his rant.   Luciano wrote:

…many pit bull aficionados launch into fanatical blatherings that make you question their sanity. And more and more ” judging from feedback here ” the most extreme voices are female.

Last Sunday, I wrote about a 70-year-old Peoria woman who took her Yorkie for a walk on a leash. A loose pit bull charged at them, killing the Yorkie and chasing the woman ” until its owner called it away.

One reader, Marie, questioned the motive of the 70-year-old: What was done to provoke this ˜attack? I doubt that your ˜victim is as innocent as they would have us believe.

Well, thats certainly some interesting thinking there, Marie. Even though animal-control officers confirmed the pit bull as the attacker ” as the column clearly explained ” youre suggesting that an elderly woman went out of her way to antagonize a pit bull, using her 6-pound dog as bait. Im not sure investigators looked into that angle ” perhaps because its sheer lunacy.

Gee, Phil, misogynistic much?   How would you feel if I said you were acting like Snookie from the Jersey Shore, thereby calling attention to the fact that your behavior might have something to do with you being Italian (which, in case people don’t know is the underlying joke in Jersey Shore but I guess it’s okay and not racist because they call themselves ‘guidos’).   My point is, it’s so pathetic to simply name-call, or point to someone’s gender or ethnicity disparagingly, because you can’t refute someone on their argument.   Typical playground, bully mentality.   And everyone knows bullies are geniuses right?

What Marie was trying to say, though I’m guessing you took her comments out of context to simply name-call, is that dog attacks aren’t unprovoked.   She wasn’t pointing to the elderly woman as the culprit.   She was pointing to the Yorkie.   For instance, the parenting section of a typical question-answer website informs parents of the common signs of an impending dog bite or attack ” which can include stiffening, raised hackles, a standing tail, a showing of the whites of the eyes, and of course bared teeth and growling ” adding,

Dogs typically dont attack without warning.   In most cases, dogs are sending subtle cues that signal distress before resorting to an attack.

Simply because people may be ignorant of the subtle cues that a dog of any breed may give before attacking, doesnt mean they arent there.   So Marie’s point was probably that the woman’s Yorkie was most likely barking or stiffening or otherwise showing some kind of bravado to make itself look big as little dogs will often do (You know what that’s like don’t you Phil?), and it provoked the “pit bull” to attack.   I’ve seen the same behaviors between Chihuahuas and Labradors and other breeds at dog parks.   Little dogs can have inferiority complexes too, just like little men, and they can pick fights with dogs many times their size, but it has nothing to do with the breed of the little dog that attacks, and it has nothing to do with the breed of the bigger dog that was provoked.   What Peoria should have learned from that incident is that their leash laws need to be better enforced, and that perhaps they need to make the punishments a little stiffer for the people who let their dogs free-roam.

Luciano wasn’t done being ridiculous, though.   He continued in his whining adding,

Another reader, Kristina, smelled a vendetta on my part: I just finished your article and Im really surprised that is considered journalism. First of all, do some better research. … If you ever really want to know the reality of pit bulls, youre welcome to meet mine.

Look, I wrote a story about a dog attack. And both dogs owners got their say. Thats it. And Im glad you have a nice doggie. But pets are supposed to behave. If I write about a homicide, I dont trot out a Chamber of Commerce rep to offer a wider perspective: Well, sure, there was a murder last night. But the good news is, the other 115,006 Peorians didnt kill anybody! Crime is news, period.

Lastly, reader Cathy alleges a pit bull prejudice in the story: It focused so much on the fact that the dog was a pit. Would you have written the same story if the dog that had done the attacking was a mean, vicious poodle?

Kristina and Cathy are not pointing to the fact that you reported on the attacks; they’re pointing to your subjectiveness.   Really?   Was that point too complicated for you to grasp Phil, or could you just not defend your prejudices and so you belittled these women instead?   Again, both Kristina and Cathy have properly employed deductive reasoning.   Given the decades of history of poor journalism that has falsely maligned that non-existent “breed” “pit bull,” Kristina and Cathy are reasonable in wondering if Luciano is a “pit bull” hater.   (And here’s a hint: Luciano has written many a hate-filled diatribe about “pit bulls” for years, so Kristina and Cathy probably know whereof they speak.)

I’m sure the Journal-Star (which is a borderline tabloid rag) loves that Luciano can bring traffic to their site with his incendiary, misogynistic, hate-filled rants.   After all, media outlets everywhere are suffering low readership. (Gosh, it’s almost as if people no longer feel like being lied to everyday by “journalists” who have the audacity to say they’re impartial with a straight face while they offer nothing but their opinion and the opinions of their puppet masters.)   But the media shouldn’t be surprised if their little plan backfires since even Conan O’Brien makes frequent jokes about how the news everywhere is derived from the same source, meaning it’s anything but impartial or even original.

It’s a funny thing, too, about misogynists. They’re typically afraid of women, so they often employ bully tactics to address them.   Guys like this don’t know what to do with themselves when a woman presents a well-reasoned counter argument to refute them.   So they do what all bullies do.   They name-call and defame their opponents for being <fill in the blank>.   In this case, Luciano is calling these women’s well-reasoned criticisms of him and his flawed reasoning into question by pointing to the fact that they are female.   How contemptible.

So how do you address a boorish hater who acts like an ill-behaved child desperately trying to get attention, even negative attention?   I guess you could ignore him, but this bully unfortunately has a bully pulpit.   So I guess we do what we always do here: We tell the truth.