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Pit bull to be renamed 'New Yorkie'
NEW YORK — Start spreading the news -- the notorious set of chompers otherwise known as a pit bull is being renamed the New Yorkie in an effort to improve its image.
While already banned in parts of Colorado, Florida and Connecticut, the dog is just misunderstood, animal lovers contend. But a bloody history of aggression and attacks has branded the dog dangerous and deadly to some.
In the city where a reputation can make or break you, the dogs are getting a fresh moniker.
Ed Boks, director of New York City Animal Care and Control (search), told the New York Post he came up with the idea to change the breed's name after moving from Phoenix, Ariz., to New York City and realizing that the dogs' reputation was as erroneous as that of Big Apple citizens, who he said are "some of the most generous an open-hearted people I've ever met."
Broadway baby Bernadette Peters, who owns a loveable pit bull, told the Post that she thinks the name change is a great idea. "'New Yorkie' fits their personality better."
Over 6,000 pit bulls are dropped off at New York City animal shelters each year -- 90 percent of which end up being put to death, the Post reported.
"Pit bulls need to have the same opportunities as any other breed of dog," said Richard Gentles, NYCACC deputy executive director. "They are very sociable animals. They are very trainable and they can make great companions to the right pet guardian. And that's what we kind of want to get across to everybody, that they can be just as good as any other kind of dog."
For years advocates have said that bad owners, not the dogs, are to blame for the breed's malicious reputation.
Indeed, Maxie Riveria, who runs a housing agency in the South Bronx, N.Y., has witnessed the brutal way in which the breed is sometimes raised: "I've watched these kids feeding jalapenos and crushed glass to their dogs. They hang them from a tree with a rope or a towel to toughen them up."
Still, numerous headline-grabbing attacks haven't helped pit bulls' cause.
In October 2003, doctors raced to save the mangled foot of a 7-year-old boy after a pit bull named "Murder" attacked him outside his family's Newark, N.J., apartment building, cops said.
And just last month, seven pit bulls mauled an 82-year-old Florida woman to death after escaping from their owner's home in Citra, Fla.
Also that month, three pit bulls attacked a couple, fatally mauling the 40-year-old woman in Kiowa, Colo. "As strong as she was, she just didn't have a chance," Kristi Van Etten, the woman's daughter, said.
But pro-pit bull advocates point out that the breed is loyal, loveable and trainable. In fact, pit bulls perform slightly higher in behavioral tests than even golden retrievers, according to the American Temperament Test Society.
Positive qualities of the pooch never make the news which Gentles said is detrimental to their adoption appeal and helps spread unwarranted fears.
"Any time on the news you hear pit bulls you hear about a mauling, and that's what gets the attention," he said. "You don't hear the other stories about what great companion pets they make, and that they can be just as loving and sociable as any other breed of dog."
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