You know it’s been hard enough watching the doggy killers and the gun grabbers repeatedly muddling “pit bull” ownership and gun ownership — like Gary Stein of the Sun-Sentinel did just this week when he advocated for breed-specific laws and gun control, as one alderman did in Watertown, Wisconsin when they were considering a “pit bull”-specific law, and when a neighbor shot at “pit bulls” who were attacking a boy in Washington, D.C. But when I see them exploit the dead, well, then my hackles are really up. What, it wasn’t enough for the gun grabbers to exploit the Sandy Hook dead with their gun-grabbing measures? Now they have to come after “pit bulls” with their gun-grabbing, doggy-hating spiels? Judging from what looks like Dogsbite.org‘s comments on an article regarding the Watertown BSL, what looks like Kory Nelson’s comments on an article regarding the Washington D.C. incident, and today, Merritt Clifton’s comments on an article about a boy who was mauled to death by a dog in Galesburg, Illinois, it’s almost as if the doggy killers all have the same handlers and those handlers tell them what to say and do. What’s another word for that? Oh yeah, puppet master.
The gun grabbers and doggy killers are right about one thing. Gun grabbing and breed-specific laws (BSL) share some commonalities: 1) Theyre both unconstitutional seizures of property without due process, 2) Theyre both done under the pretense of safety, and 3) Neither gun bans nor breed-specific legislation make communities safer; in fact, quite the opposite.
And since I’ve watched these evil gun grabbers exploit the innocent children that were brutally killed in Sandy Hook, I guess it should likewise come as no surprise when I see the likes of Merritt Clifton exploiting a dead child in order to push his massively skewed “pit bull” statistics. Yes, believe it or not, Clifton made comments under the comments section of a WQAD channel 8 story about a boy in Galesburg, Illinois, who had been attacked and killed by what was erroneously called a “pit bull.” Clifton wrote,
I have been logging fatal and disfiguring dog attacks by breed since September 1982 — more than 30 years. Of the 3,970 dogs involved in such attacks, 2,441 were pit bulls; 3,117 were of related molosser breeds, including Rottweilers, mastiffs, and their mixes, as well as pit bulls. Of the 502 human fatalities, 250 were killed by pit bulls; 371 (69%) were killed by pit bulls & other molosser breeds. Of the 2,194 people who were disfigured, 1,391 (61%) were disfigured by pit bulls; 1,790 (79%) were disfigured by pit bulls & other molosser breeds. Of the total deaths and disfigurements by pit bulls, approximately half have occurred in the past five years. This is, in short, a repetitively predictable phenomenon which is occurring more & more often, and, incidentally, is resulting in about 10 times as many animal deaths & disfigurements by pit bulls as are suffered by humans.
As I have so often done where Clifton’s ridiculousness was involved, I can so easily and quickly discredit Clifton’s “more than 30 years” of erroneous and laughable statistics by simply saying this: “PIT BULL” IS NOT A BREED!
Indeed, what Clifton refers to as “pit bull” and lumps all together as if it were one breed, is really a myriad of different breeds. As I so often say, “pit bull” is that non-existent “breed” that can describe countless actual breeds of dog, their mixes, and lookalikes (i.e. “pit bull” is a type). “Pit bull” is anything that the doggy killers want it to be so that they can go on to push policy that kills even more and more innocent dogs who are “guilty” of nothing more than fitting a type, which serves the agenda of the radical animal rights groups who want to end domestic animal ownership. So it’s more accurate to say that Clifton has been serving the agenda of the radical animal rightist doggy killers for over 30 years. And sadly, the public repeatedly falls for these erroneous statistics because they don’t know that the radical animal rights movement has hijacked the moniker “pit bull,” lumped as many dog breeds, mixes, lookalikes, and biting dogs into that vast category “pit bull” as they can get away with, and are presenting these massively skewed statistics as if they were credible.
Meanwhile, Clifton seems to conveniently leave out pertinent information in his “pit bull” statistics like that these dogs of a type that he lumps together under the erroneous moniker “pit bull,” are also some of the most abused animals in the world. And maybe, just maybe, these “pit bulls’” abuse might be a factor. In fact, the article about the Galesburg, Illinois, boy that was mauled to death by one of his neighbor’s “pit bulls,” which Clifton is now exploiting to selfishly push for his doggy-killing campaign, clearly states that the dog in question was abused by his owner:
The baby was taken away from us too soon by a mistreated dog. A lot of us are thinking that knowing Ryan, and the type of kid he was, he was probably going to feed the dogs, because they were starving. We were told their ribs were showing [Paula Johnson, the boys great-aunt] said.
So, the dogs were abused. Do you still want to blame the “breed,” or should we maybe look at the dogs’ owner who was starving them to death?
And the victim’s name was Ryan Maxwell. Does Clifton even care about him? He clearly doesn’t care that the dogs in question were being horribly abused. All he seems to care about is his agenda. Sickening.
Yes, you’d think animal rightists would care about animals being abused, but since we have historically seen the Humane Society of the United States and PETA repeatedly advocate for breed-specific laws and the killing of former fighting dogs (most prominently Michael Vick’s former fighting dogs who went on to be rehabilitated and adopted back out) it is clear that their actions fit just exactly what they’ve been saying for over 30 years. For instance, look at the following quote from Wayne Pacelle, head of the Humane Society of the United States, who told Animal People:
“We have no problem with the extinction of domestic animals. They are creations of human selective breeding.”
Say, isn’t Merritt Clifton the editor of Animal People? Gee, I wonder if there’s a connection? You know what else these two rabid animal rightists seem to have in common? An evident callousness and indifference for the lives of humans and animals.
Related:
Is the Sun-Sentinels Gary Stein Advocating for Hitlerian Gun Control and Radical Animal Rightism?
Watertown, Wisconsin Considering Pit Bull Breed Ban; Restrictions
Gun Grabbers and Doggy Killers Unite over Little D.C. Boy Attacked by 3 Pit Bulls?
2 responses to “Merritt Clifton, Gun Grabbers, and Doggy Killers Exploit the Dead for Their Selfish Ends”
I had the dubious experience of living next door to Merritt Clifton in the 1970s, and I see that he hasn’t changed. Back then he also attacked before he determined the facts, and he caused trouble for people as a result. I guess age hasn’t mellowed him…for a pacifist (or so he called himself back in the day), he certainly is angry – still.
Unfortunately, he’s turned his vitriol on my favorite breed. I’ve lived with pit bulls for years, as have my children, with no problems. But I suppose someone like Merritt needs to find a cause that nets him attention. Old narcissists never change!
Update: I left a comment on Merritt’s Facebook page responding to one of his numbers-laden paragraphs about pit bulls. In this comment, I asked him for his sources and commented that if his sources were press, I did not consider press to be reliable – since any short-haired dog who bites is often called a “pit bull.”
His response? To block me from his page 😀 It seems to me that if he felt good about his verbiage, he’d be more than welcome to discuss in a public forum. I guess he doesn’t hold up well under scrutiny.