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Punish the owner, not the breed is a strong philosophy that many people believe in when it comes to owning dogs. There are dogs that by their breed are automatically put down if they are in a rescue shelter, animal shelter or animal control facility. Is it truly fair to punish these breeds? Punish the owner, not the breed is a philosophy that should be considered instead of automatically discriminating against dog breeds.

Let's look at a dog named Tiger. Tiger is a mutt. She has several breeds in her. The vet said that Tiger (who is named after her coloring and not her nature) is pitt bull, rottie, chow and greyhound combined. These are all breeds that find discrimination in the human world.

At first glance, Tiger is extremely intimidating. She is quick as a flash and very protective. Let a squirrel wander too close to her outside area and Tiger will bark like crazy. Let a stranger come into the yard and Tiger will let out a lot of noise. But is Tiger a mean dog breed or mix of breeds?

Tiger will roll on back to have her belly rubbed. She walks between me and other people in the house for protection. Yet, she does not bite unless you're stupid enough to try to pet her when she's growling at you. Come on now, use common sense. If an animal of any kind is baring teeth and growling it is ridiculous to put your hand toward their head! Punish the owner, not the breed would mean that if Tiger bit you after giving you warning that she would not be put down.

Tiger is a breed that is shy. She would rather put her tail between her legs and go into another room than to deal with you or any other dog. Our beagle is one-fourth the size of Tiger. Guess who wins all the arguments? The beagle breed wins out over a pitt bull, rottie, chow, greyhound breed. Tiger will go into another room and ignore the beagle after growling and showing teeth.

Yet, there are horror story after horror story of some breeds being raised to be mean. It's the owners doing this. Dogs are not naturally born mean. Some dogs are no more prone to be mean than other dogs. The owners instill the hate, anger and attitude in so called bad dog breeds.

A beagle, poodle and even those whiny, lazy Bassett hounds can become very mean and vicious in the hands of the wrong owner. Yes, even a hound can become mean. Punish the owner, not the breed for this type of behavior training and treatment. Do you realize what the dogs go through to become mean?

It's time to stop blaming dogs and breeds and start using the philosophy and practice of punish the owner, not the breed.

Learn more about this author, Joyce Priddy.
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