My weapon is a dog

[kendal]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00kmtl9


Quoted from the BBC 3 website.

BBC THREE Thursday 21 May 2009

"My Weapon Is A Dog"

9.00-10.00pm



On nearly every high street from Penzance to London and Glasgow to Belfast, there's a new "must-have" accessory for some young men. Not the latest trainers or mobile phone, but fierce, snarling dogs.

Rickie Haywood-Williams explores the hip-hop and peer-pressure culture that has led to this growth in aggressive dogs in his hometown of London – on the streets and abandoned in shelters. He discovers that dogs are bred, bought, sold and given away with incredible ease.

In some cases dogs are deliberately trained and even abused to make them vicious. Methods of "toughening up" dogs include chain fighting and beatings. The owners claim it's all necessary for protection – but are they always in control of their animals?

Rickie learns that the "Staffie", formerly a dog of choice, is now being replaced by bigger, fiercer breeds as the dog to have. Shockingly, he discovers that the Pit Bull, the most notorious status dog of all, is back with a vengeance.

Rickie meets victims of vicious dog attacks to hear their reaction to the rise in aggressive dogs. He also visits vets at Harmsworth Animal Hospital as they desperately try to patch up dogs after they've been abused or neglected.

The film also seeks to understand the status dog culture from the owners' point of view – examining the question of why so many young men want to be feared
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microchiping and grooming www.chipnclip.co.uk

[amandawhitelaw]

This sounds terrible but i think it is a much needed exposure of what is going on out there. However i hope it does not put more added pressure on the responsible dog owners of these power breeds.

I am fed up telling people it is the owners not the dogs themselves.

[Lorna]

OMG! Let's hope the don't move on to Danes or Mastiffs. They are such big softies. We have too much experience of the result of such abuse of big dogs already.
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Regards,
Lorna, Basil & Poppy
Great Danes are not substitute children. They are much more important than that!

[Jack]

Lorna, I totally hear what you're saying but I'm sorry to be selfish for a moment here and say I'm glad the Staffie is getting a bit of a break. For WAY too long this beautiful breed has suffered appallingly at mans hand. I cannot begin to tell you the amount of horror stories I have seen, read, heard about. Your heart would break, truly it would.

I'm peed off at the PBT making a comeback - NOT because the breed is returning but the way they are being bred and the use to which they are put. They make FANTASTIC pets, very very much like a Staffie only a tad more unpredictable (but NOT if you know your breed) but yet again all people hear are the horror stories and they just don't stand a chance.

I'm sorry but I'll not be watching. My blood pressure isn't up to it.

Disgusted of Durham signing off
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Staffies are my life! Visit us at www.staffies.co.uk

[leigh101]

they also show dogue de bordeaux in a bad light.i got in touch with the bbc about the program and they said it is meant to highlight what the dogs go through at the hands of these stupid w$&#*!s.

[kendal]

this is the link to bbc i player if you want to watch this program,

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00kmtl9/My_Weapon_Is_a_Dog/

i think it was very well put together.

there are some footage of hurt dogs in the vets and some of dog fighting. but i definitely think it is worth watching
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microchiping and grooming www.chipnclip.co.uk

[Suzanne H]

I missed first 20 mins, but it was interesting and sad.

Showed young lads who really did love their dogs to the point of one getting chucked out of every temporary accommodation he was in because he refused to give up his Rottie. Another with a French mastiff who loved it and looked after it, but was allowing it to breed with some random he met online and sell on for £250.

One was just stupid - let his pal give his pitbull/rottie cross a rabbit so it could taste blood!!!

And the staffies and pitbulls in the vet - well that just made me cry. Specially the pitbull because even though the vet saved it, it couldn't go anywhere as its illegal.

But also interviewed the young girl who was savaged by a pitbull when she was 6 and showed the impact it had had on her life...

That was just as impactful as the poor damaged dogs - both were victims of men (young and old) who were breeding and encouraging unpredictable dogs and didn't know how to handle them.

As the guy said - a knife doesn't have a heartbeat.

[Jack]

I'm glad I didn't watch it. Blood pressure would have been through the roof.

I DESPISE the scum involved in cruelty & dog fighting, I hope one day they suffer great and prolonged pain themselves.

All I want to do is help the dogs and I cannot believe that people can just sit back and watch this kind of thing and do nothing about it. How the hell the presenter & the cameraman kept going is way beyond my comprehension I'd have rung the scrawny necks of all so called humans present They are lower than snakes pee and WAY beneath my contempt.


I am so sad that a PBT was rescued but is not able to be rehomed - what are they going to do with it? Euthanize it?
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Staffies are my life! Visit us at www.staffies.co.uk

[Lorna]

I started but could not watch it. Like you Jack my blood pressure was soaring. As soon as I heard that young man talking about his Mastiff I knew it was time to turn over before I smashed the TV - wishing it was those ******'s misusing and abusing the dogs.
_________________
Regards,
Lorna, Basil & Poppy
Great Danes are not substitute children. They are much more important than that!