[Blarg]

All domesticated animals are bred at least partly for temperament. Usually, the temperament bred for is docility first and foremost, because an animal that attacks you is no good to you.

But there are other things bred for, too. Sometimes they can be very odd and far from the behavior of the dog's ancestor, the wolf. Things like jumping into the water and pulling people ashore, like it can be very hard to get Newfoundlands NOT to do, do not depend on the owner of the dog whatsoever. Neither does the bred-for instinct to point, or retrieve, or herd.

These things can be increased by training, but a great deal of selective breeding has gone into making those traits inherent.

This goes for fighting dogs, too. Even short term-breeding choices can have a strong effect. A dog that dies fighting before breeding is automatically excluded from passing along his genes. But dogs who are simply not winners but still live on, or who don't have vicious or determined enough temperaments, are also consciously left out of breeding decisions as a matter of course by those trying to breed winning fighters. Multiplied over multiple generations, these decisions can result in a very high and peculiar amount of genetic selection. That's the whole point of selective breeding.

So regardless of what anyone feels about a breed or how pretty one thinks it is, whatever, the fact remains that genetics are very much at play. Just because you can make a dog better or worse doesn't mean it doesn't already have inherent tendencies. You can't "train" genes. Even if you thought you knew how.

Anyone who doesn't realize this is not the best owner for this kind of dog. This kind of dog requires people who are thinking and responsible.