It's been
big news in the US for a couple of months that one of the better known players in America's most popular sport, Atlanta Falcons NFL quarterback Michael Vick, is implicated in running a dog fighting business out of one of his many Georgia properties. Vick has steadfastly denied any involvement, even as the investigation has proceeded and evidence and eyewitness reports have mounted. It's pretty unquestionable that there was dog fighting going on, the only issue is whether Vick can convince anyone that he didn't know about someone raising hundreds of pit bulls and hosting regular dogfights at one of his houses. Most people are assuming he's guilty, and now that one of his co-defendants has rolled over and pled guilty, expectations are that he's singing like the proverbial canary, and that Vick is screwed. Michael is almost certain to miss at least this season on suspension for bad behavior, and that's assuming he doesn't get serious jail time for multiple felony charges.
I'm probably leaving a lot out of my summary since I haven't really been following events. Football is my favorite sport and I enjoy watching it on TV, but it's been many years since I've taken a personal interest in the players. I do follow some teams, and overall trends in the league, but I don't really pay attention to any individual players or their stats, and I don't care at all about their personalities or private lives, except in terms of how it might affect their on field performance. Vick's not a very good quarterback, but he's an exciting player since he runs very well -- exceptionally well for a quarterback. He's got all the athletic talent in the world, but he's never shown any discipline or ability to learn an offense and execute it as pro football requires, and a lot of that was presumed to be due to his young coach being somewhat star struck, and the team's owner coddling Michael since he was a fan favorite. Fed up with mediocrity, the team fired the coach after last season and hired a supposed offensive genius from the college ranks, and fans such as myself were curious to see how his renowned system would work in the pros, if Vick had any chance of playing within it rather than just scrambling around and hoping for the best, etc.
I'm not really a fan of Atlanta, and I honestly find it more fun when they lose since then their fans and Vick's apologists in the media bemoan things and confuse flash for talent. However, I am disappointed that Vick's out for the season since I wanted to see how the new offense worked, and if Vick's actual game utility could ever approach the godlike status his physical gifts grant him in football video games. Not that I play those either.
What did not occur to me until weeks into the news coverage of the dog fighting scandal, probably because I never read any sports blogs or forums, is that people were really upset about the nature of the charges against Vick. Sure, PETA was protesting, but they protest everything, and they weren't doing it with topless models
painted with leopard spots, so no one cared. Real people though, were outraged that Vick had (allegedly) fought dogs, killed off dogs that lost fights, and conducted the whole thing as a business. Every news item I saw about it mentioned the alleged ways in which losing dogs were disposed of; drowning, choking, electrocution, and when one of the few sports writers I do read regularly
mentioned it in a recent column, I gave the whole thing some thought.
Vick: It's been strangely entertaining to see so many people express shock and outrage that he could have done something so horrible. Um, he has the same DNA as Marcus Vick! That's like being shocked in 2012 when Lindsay Lohan's little sister gets her first DUI. Plus, Vick could have been accused of murdering a stripper, blowing up a shopping mall or funneling his Nike money to Al Qaeda, and people wouldn't have been even 1% as outraged as they are about the dogfighting allegations. You can get away with just about anything these days; just don't tick off dog lovers.
(And by the way, I'm one of them. I wish we could pay Roy Williams to horse-collar Vick from behind 200 times in a row. How could anyone cause pain to a dog? How could anyone want to be affiliated with a "sport" where dogs are electrocuted and you have to buy items with names like "rape stands"? Hopefully, this leads to a real-life Longest Yard sequel where Vick gets jailed and eventually leads a team of convicts against the guards, who summarily kick the living crap out of him for four quarters and turn his ACLs into fusilli. The end.)
I guess I see his point, I mean if you care about dogs and think of them as quadrupedal teddy bears who wuv you and are part of the family, etc, it must be upsetting to know that other people are using them in a blood sport. I'd be upset if Vick had been feeding his animals cats, or puppies, or infant children, or if he'd been torturing the dogs for fun, but from the reports I've heard he was just training them to do what their genetics instruct.
They're fighting dogs, and he was letting them fight. It's what they've been bred (designer evolved) to do, and they love to do it. They're made for it. Look at that animal. Massive head and jaws, blunt face, broad chest, massive musculature. It's beautiful, but it's obviously designed to fight, and to kill.
Dog fighting's not like a rodeo, where the steers and horses are whipped and shot up with speed and strapped into ball-crushing leashes to make them jump and put on a better show. Pit bulls and other fighting dogs like to fight, and if trained to do so are quite eager to get it on. Video clips I've seen of pit bull fights in the past (the media dig some up every time enough owners/random small children get mauled in a week to make the dangerous pets issue news again) are primarily memorable for the effort it takes the handlers to pry the dogs apart once they lock up.
Vick was letting fighting dogs fight, and doing what he could to run a successful business. An illegal business, one he'll probably do some prison time over and one that's apparently ruined his life and ended his multimillion dollar apparel sponsorships, but he was handling fighting dogs as they must be handled. Of course he and his associates were culling the weak and the non-performing. If they weren't good at their purpose they were of no use to him, there was no point in feeding them and keeping them around. Besides, what would you have had him do with the dogs? These aren't greyhounds to be adopted after their brief running career ends. You can not take in a trained fighting dog as a family pet. The ones the FBI seized in their raid are all going to be euthanized anyway..
I don't support the existence of
dog fighting nor do I want to watch it, but I'm not particularly shocked that some people enjoy it. Humans have a strong appetite for cruelty and violence. Cock-fighting, mongoose vs. cobra fighting, bear baiting, and so on, down to dueling preying mantises, have been human institutions since we've had the cogitative abilities to dominate other animals and bend them to our will/amusement.
Honestly, I find the concept of pit bull fighting somewhat less appalling than the fetishization of absurd, useless little rat dogs. (As two useless celebrities are here seen engaged in, courtesy of pictures I grabbed from Perez Hilton since I was too lazy to dig them up elsewhere without his silly writing on them.)
At least a pit bull has some purpose; guarding your junk yard or whatever, and so long as you know what you're doing and handle them properly and keep them away from children and make sure the dogs understand their beta place in the pack, they can be owned safely. As they say, it's not the dog, it's the owner. Unfortunately, lots of owners suck, especially ones who are drawn to big, powerful, potentially dangerous dogs, and that's why we get a steady stream of news stories about two year olds having their noses bitten off. Or
forty year old personal assistants with their throats torn out. Ving's dogs of choice were not pit bulls, but they obviously had similar genetics and training. Happily, an anonymous Samaritan from Georgia has volunteered to take them in, and put them to good use, so that's nice. Besides, Ving's assistant should have known better than to give Mrs. Rhames a foot massage.
Update:
Reports are that the guy may have dropped dead of a heart attack while running from the dogs, and that they simply nibbled a bit on the cooling meat, as carnivores are wont. Malaya and I used to wonder how long the cats would wait before they started eating us, if we died in our sleep and they were running low on Friskies. I gave Jinx a week and said Dusty would just starve to death.
Update #2: This is the 666th post I've made via the Blogger script (give or take a couple of posts saved as notes that I never actually finished/put online). Pity I couldn't work in a mention of Satanism, or at least Atheism.
Labels: dogs, football
