Pit Bull Mania

Responding to Criticism, Pet Insurance, and Additional Thoughts

I have never owned a pit bull and never have any intention of owning one. I have friends and family that have been attacked by pit bulls, and I am well aware of the reputation this breed has. Obviously, not all pit bulls are violent. I have known many who have never hurt a soul. I just do not want to voluntarily assume the risk. Also, I am more of a small dog or lizard kind of guy. Regardless of my own fears and personal preferences, pit bulls should not be banned. I outline some less common arguments against pit bulls in my recent article on FEE entitled, “Why Matt Walsh Is Wrong to Call for a Pit Bull Ban.”

[This article is long because it is really three articles. One of which is a response, another which talks about the economics of insurance, and the third is copied and pasted from an unused article I wrote a while ago.]

I Hate Dogs’ “Critique”

Despite having never expressed a preference for pit bulls, anti-dog Youtuber aptly named “I Hate Dogs” (I will from here on call him IHD) refers to me as a “pit-nutter” (a person who is pro-pit bull) in a recent video. If you want to be entertained, watch some of the video here. He spends a decent amount of time saying that I am “disturbed,” “sick,” and perhaps even a “Satanist”!¹ I am happy to add all these to the list of things that I have been called (The list grows larger every day with comical entries such as “Level 10 Vegan” and “LINO or Libertarian-in-Name-Only").

IHD even alleges that I have a partnership with FEE, which I do not. I wrote the article in my free time because I care about private property foremost and unintended consequences secondarily, not because I love pit bulls. I see many pit bull critics focus on the alleged benefits of pit bull ownership and the drawbacks of legal pit bulls, but they never address the drawbacks, or the unintended consequences, of bans.

In the article, I give a few arguments against Matt Walsh. Here are some of the arguments summarized succinctly:

1. Risk alone is no grounds for public policy.

2. Some people may want a dangerous dog.

3. People will alternate into different breeds if pit bulls are banned.

4. Pit bulls will be abandoned to live on the streets if they are banned, potentially leading to a higher number of pit bull incidents.

5. Statistics alone are no grounds for public policy.

I also posit some “policies” that are consistent with the non-aggression principle, but this can be dealt with more later.

IHD completely ignored point 4 in his read through of my article, perhaps because it could be true and is, in fact, a sane argument against banning dogs. He furthermore just completely dismisses point 2 and claims that I am only saying that because I am a small, scrawny guy. In addition to making me chuckle, he is just wrong. I do not want to own a pit bull. As for deterrence, I own guns, so that should suffice.

He also throws any ethical inquiry out the window. What’s right? What’s wrong? Who cares! IHD certainly does not give a fig about right and wrong. Seeing a statistic or headline is enough for him to call for the prohibition of all dogs, but he hardly cares about the ethics of doing so. He does not consider the potential, unintended and undesirable consequences of such a policy, and he does not care about whether the policy is consistent with justice.

In the article, I lay out this problem.

So, what makes an activity unfair? What does it mean to “unfairly forc[e] all of your neighbors to assume” risk? Walsh leaves the definition of fairness ambiguous. A libertarian response would be that the only grounds for intervention in another’s affairs is if that person violates private property. There is no fairness standard, only justice, which is defined by non-aggression against person or property.

Justice should be the only criterion by which a law is judged, and given that owning a pit bull does not violate private property, it cannot be unjust. Walsh’s call for banning pit bulls can be likened to a child calling something he/she dislikes “unfair.” You may call it unfair, but in the end, all you really mean is that you do not like it. This amounts to preference, which is ultimately arbitrary, and can be rejected arbitrarily. What’s asserted with no evidence can also be rejected without evidence.

Of course, actions that violate private property can result from owning a pit bull, such as dog attacks. If that happens, then the victim or the victim’s representatives should be free to bring a lawsuit against the owner of the pit bull

However, he glosses over this section for the most part, laughing when I say that Matt Walsh leaves the definition of fair ambiguous, stating “No, he didn’t!” But he did! He did leave it ambiguous! And if he didn’t, IHD didn’t clear it up.

As opposed to the fairness criterion, I pose a private property answer. If it does not violate private property, then it should not be prohibited, plain and simply. This position has been elaborated by many thinkers, such as Murray Rothbard² and Hans-Hermann Hoppe.³

I know that IHD seems to only read pit bull related articles, which is fine (It’s actually cool that he has a niche and found a decent sized community to share content and discuss topics with), but if he is in the mood to learn about ethics, I highly recommend him (and anyone else) to read “Law, Property Rights, and Air Pollution,” by Murray Rothbard. It is an accessible article about the non-aggression principle and legal liability that, in my opinion, thoroughly explains the libertarian worldview with few errors. This does not pertain to the issue at hand; however, please, IHD check it and the other writings in the footnotes out and you might see the world through a different lens, but I digress.

There are some points of clarity that I wish to raise. I state in my article, “Instead, people should be allowed to kill, without legal obstacle, pit bulls that trespass on property and/or attack.” My critic and I thankfully agree on this; however, he counters that this is already the law. It is true, to the best of my knowledge, that you can kill an overtly aggressive dog. However, my position is much more expansive; that’s why I said “and/or” instead of just “and.” I won’t fault him for missing that. It was subtle, so that is my fault. My position is that dogs that merely trespass on property and pose no overt risk should be allowed to be killed as well. If I am not mistaken, the right to do that will vary from municipality to municipality. So, perhaps we can be in agreement that this should be changed.

A further point of clarification is needed for deterrence. He states that all a criminal will have to do is feed your dog a few times in order to gain its trust. That may be true, so I agree with him there, but do all criminals think about the long term? Do all criminals plan their burglaries? Definitely not. Pit bulls (as well as home security systems in general) will deter short-sighted criminals. It should not be expected that all criminals will be deterred. I never insinuated that. Additionally, raising the point that people should be able to sue owners of aggressive pit bulls is just to posit another means of deterrence. IHD says himself that he would be worried if he owned one of these dogs. Facing more of a legal liability for dog attacks would increase the liability and deter dog ownership. This, I imagine, is something else that varies across states. Perhaps we both can agree on this point.

Lastly, he hyper fixates on me saying it is an “imperfect world.” Me saying that is just stating there will be costs and benefits to all policies. This was clearly not a main point of my article. That is obvious.

Now, enough of responding to the criticisms. What does IHD get right? Not much other than simple statistics that everyone is familiar with. But he is not wrong to harbor anti-dog sentiment. Having such preferences is perfectly legitimate.

He should be asking himself what legal system he would be able to accomplish his goal of banning all dogs. The current legal system or a libertarian legal order? Pit bull or breed bans may be embraced in some municipalities or maybe states, but a total ban on dogs will never come to fruition in a democracy. IHD is out of luck in the current political system.

However, a libertarian legal order might be more favorable to him. Under the paradigm of government, we are forced to live under arrangements we neither choose nor have any say in. In the absence of government and those that seek to control us, we would be free to arrange ourselves in political communities that reflect our personal preferences better. In such a society, which has been called a libertarian legal order or “private law society,” covenant communities can be freely formed/chartered for the purpose of bringing together people who have similar preferences for rules and regulations. Of course, anyone can contract with their neighbors today and establish covenants, but the government already provides rules, so the average person is less likely to go out of their way to establish political communities on top of the pre-existing municipal governments.

Where banning pets comes into play is that under a libertarian legal order, covenant communities can be formed, and pet bans can be written into the covenants. The covenant community can additionally make the banning of pets an irrevocable rule. Compare this to the current system, you need to convince all of your neighbors to encourage your local government officials to vote for banning dogs or get enough people to vote for a majority who will.

In a libertarian society, all that needs to be done is finding neighbors who agree with the rule, come together, and form a covenant community. Additionally, in order to get your neighbors to join the covenant, other services can be “tied-in” with the covenant community in order to encourage dog lovers to join. They may judge that the benefit of joining the community is higher than the benefit of owning a dog. For the stragglers, the members of the covenant can ostracize or bully (never using aggression) them until they either move away or join the covenant themselves. Anyone who violates the covenant can be legitimately forcibly removed from the community. Punishments the government currently levies to enforce their rules fall short of this.

Doing all this to ban all dogs seems far-fetched; most people are probably not dedicated to go through with all of this, which should be a testament to how undesirable such laws are. But IHD and his followers would be free to do this in a libertarian society if they so choose. I stand with their right to organize themselves outside of the shadow of the state and live according to rules that they find desirable.

Furthermore, in a libertarian society, all land would either be privatized or unowned. There would be no government roads, parks, or sidewalks. If roads or sidewalks are privatized, dog haters would be free to prohibit dogs and dog owners from using their portion of the sidewalk or road. If the dog hater owns the park, they are free to prohibit people from bringing dogs into the park. The formerly public property is owned by a joint-stock company, the dog haters would be free to vote to prohibit dogs from these properties. If the former government property is abandoned entirely, dog haters would be free to homestead the property and establish rules prohibiting dogs from the premises.

I hope this can be of use to, IHD. But, my friend, I am afraid that this is the last of what I will say to you in this article. You are, of course, free to continue reading. You may find more to criticize or learn a thing or two. Thank you for highlighting my piece and giving me exposure. Your video thoroughly entertained me if nothing else.

Pet Insurance

Some friends and commenters on the article stated that insurance is also a good solution to the violent dog problem. In fact, animal liability insurance already exists! Animal liability insurance protects dog owners in the event that their dog attacks someone and spurs a lawsuit.

Premiums for pit bulls or other bully breeds will probably be higher than the premiums for insuring chihuahuas or golden retrievers, which are less violent dogs.

Insurance, essentially, internalizes the cost of owning dangerous dogs. The legal burden that dangerous dogs might impose will positively affect premiums and deter some people from purchasing dangerous breeds and perhaps opt for a less costly to insure breed.

Adding more legal liability on the pet owners for a wider range of trespasses that their pets may cause will increase premiums across the board, deterring pet ownership further.

Banning certain breeds or all dogs in general would make pet insurance disappear from the market. The result? Illegal pet owners will maximize by choosing more violent breeds given that all breeds will have an equal premium of $0. Insurance may increase the total quantity of dogs owned, but eliminating animal insurance for dogs, as dog bans would, decreases the quantity of dogs owned, but increases the proportion of dangerous breeds relative to less dangerous breeds.

People are right to point out that insurance is a powerful tool. Libertarians can certainly apply the concept of insurance to a wide range of issues, such as defense and security. It can equally be applied in this case.

Bonus Round

I wrote an article earlier this year addressing comments on pit bull bans made by Matt Walsh. However, I never got it published. I was busy at the time and it just never came to completion, which is a good thing. I honestly prefer the version that was published by FEE, but here are some lesser points that I raised in that article (these are almost entirely copied and pasted from the old document). None of these are slam-dunks, but they should serve to illustrate how far and wide unintended consequences are.

[If you notice a change in tone in the following article or different hyperlink formatting, it is because I was a different writer when I wrote this piece.]

1. Pit bull-related deaths are not that high

In 2019, only 33 people died from pit bull attacks. This  is hardly a cause for public outrage; more people die from being submerged in their bathtub and falling out of bed every year. When taking this into consideration, it can hardly be used to draw out a greater trend. Banning pit bulls would have a dubitable effect on the total number of fatalities, especially considering that pit bull ownership would continue illegally.

Since Matt Walsh is only advocating this for the good of the general welfare, he should also be open to banning other unnecessary things that cause violence and death. Football is one example; between domestic violence that occurs after a football team loses and injuries that happen on the field, the human toll for football is high; therefore, according to Matt Walsh’s logic it should be banned, but I doubt he would agree. Outrage is almost always selectively applied.

2. Pit-bull owners will substitute into another breed

Owners can cause their dogs to become aggressive through neglect and abuse. Banning pit bulls will cause neglectful owners to substitute into other dog breeds, causing dog bite/fatality statistics for other dogs to increase, merely shifting the fatalities to another breed.

3. Pit bull owners might not turn in their pit bulls

Why would owners turn in their pit bulls to the government? They do not want to place “fido” in the hands of some government bureaucrat who may very well euthanize their beloved dog. I can see pit bull owners doing two things besides turning in their dogs: 1) Keeping the dogs inside the house 2) Releasing the dogs onto the streets.

The first response would increase the probability of pit bull-related violence. Keeping the dog cooped-up in the house all day to keep it unseen may also cause anxiety for the dog, which may lead to more bites and more fatalities. Worse, if you are bit by your illegal pit bull, you are unlikely to report it as a pit bull bite, so some bites/deaths might not appear in the annual dog bite data. The second response will just increase the interactions between people walking the streets and pit bulls; therefore, increasing the opportunity for bites.

If the government wanted people to turn in their pit bulls, owners should be paid, but buy backs would have their own nasty consequences as well. Which leads me to my next point:

4. Government pest control programs have a history of failure

If you are to start paying people to turn in pit bulls, one thing that will definitely happen is that people will start breeding pit bulls to then sell them to the government. Once the government catches wind of this, they will cancel their buyback program, and where do you think the pit bulls will go? They will more than likely be released onto the streets. The same thing happened in India when the British tried to eliminate the cobra problem. They paid people for turning in snake tails, so people started breeding cobras. When the British figured this out, they canceled the program, and the breeders released the cobras, increasing the cobra population. Not only would it be a drag on the government’s budget, but it would also work against the goals of the policy.

5. People might mix pit bulls with other breeds to avoid breaking the law

This will depend on how the law in question defines a pit bull, and there would more than likely be a cutoff. If people do mix breeds to escape the law, the mix breeds may be more aggressive and exhibit violent behavior. This study suggests that mix breeds exhibit noise phobia, which causes more aggressive or problematic behavior. Like designer drugs, people will create designer breeds that are just on the cusp of being illegal.

6. People’s caution will be altered

The threat of pit bulls will be slightly diminished due to this law, and as a result, people would become marginally less cautious when in public. The ability to detect pit bull owners is lessened; therefore, detracting from the ability to consciously avoid pit bulls, resulting in marginally more dog bites and fatalities.

7. Youth in gangs use pit bulls as a sign of masculinity

Similar to piratical torture, owning a pit bull establishes a brand of being tough and masculine in youth gangs. This branding deters other gang members from enacting violence against them. If pit bulls are eliminated, assuming the gang members get rid of them, members will search for alternative ways to signal their strength and capacity for violence, which may lead to more gang-related violence.

8. Decreases the cost of crime

Owning a pit bull after the ban goes into effect makes you a criminal. This just reduces pit bull owners’ opportunity cost of committing other crimes. If someone is already committing a crime, they are likely to commit other crimes to maximize the benefit of violating the law. Violence between humans becomes more likely, as well as using pit bulls in illegal activities such as dog fighting, which may result in more incidents.

9.  More abuse, more incidents

Owning a pit bull after the ban will make your asset (the pit bull) insecure. When a good is insecure, the expected future value of the good decreases, causing owners to extract more value out of the dog by fulfilling lesser valued ends in the present, which may take the form of animal abuse. As a result of abuse, the dogs will become more violent, leading to more incidents.

1. I am a Christian. I was baptized in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. The Fear of God is the beginning of all wisdom/knowledge. I love Jesus Christ and yearn for His return.

2. For a New Liberty by Murray Rothbard.

3. “The Ultimate Justification of the Private Property Ethic,” Hans-Hermann Hoppe.