"Do Not Adopt a Pit Bull" is a campaign by Attorney Kenneth M. Phillips, the author of Dog Bite Law (dogbitelaw.com) which began in January 2018 and currently consists of the following:
- The Dog Bite Law Superbowl 2018 Video
- "Sudden Death" (video)
- "The Bad Call" (video)
- "Should Women Support Pit Bulls?" (video)
- "They're Not Vicious" (video)
- "And Thank You for Killing Him" (blog post)
The campaign is right in line with Mr. Phillips' reason for creating the Dog Bite Law website (dogbitelaw.com) in 1998. By that time, he had been doing dog bite cases for 7 years. His clients had been savagely mauled by pit bulls and other dangerous dogs, and he wanted people to realize that they needed to be mindful of the injuries which dogs could inflict, especially on children. Since 1998, he has represented the families of people killed by pit bulls and countless victims whose lives have been forever changed for the worse because of pit bull attacks. Although he has tirelessly fought for his clients and raised awareness through his many television appearances, radio interviews, newspaper articles (by him and about him), lectures and other means, he launched this campaign to draw attention specifically to the pit bull problem.
The latest entry: "They're Not Vicious"
There have been three recent incidents in which pit bulls killed a little girl, brutalized an elderly neighbor, and savagely injured the pit bull owner himself. The comments of the pit bull owners after these attacks were very striking although highly typical.
The first was the death case. "I did not realize that they would be doing this," Pierre Cleveland, 33, said. "They’re not vicious dogs, they’re really nice dogs, they’re gentle, I don’t know what came over them." He was charged with second degree murder after his pit bulls savagely mauled to death a 9-year-old girl who was playing in an alley.
In the second incident, bleeding heavily from a savage attack by his own dog, the pit bull owner told the policeman, "That dog, he's been good forever. And thank you for killing him."
The third involved the mauling of an elderly female who lived next door to the pit bull owner and was his friend. "Kill 'em! Right on the spot, man!" His three dogs chewed through his back door on May 27, 2019, got out and nearly killed the woman. "When they told me, I couldn't believe it, cause they were so good with people, you know? You think you know them, but you don't, you know," he said.
"Don't Breed Your Pit Bull"
In 2019 Mr. Phillips launched a second campaign called "Do Not Breed Your Pit Bull." The goals are to reduce the pit bull population by stemming the breeding of new, unwanted pit bulls. Almost half of the USA's pit bulls are up for sale or adoption at any one time, and one-third of the entire population of pit bulls is euthanized every year because they are defective animals that pose too much risk. Despite this, pit bull owners keep breeding unwanted dogs and do not spay or neuter them; the sterilization rate for pit bulls is 20% while the rate for other dog breeds is 70%. This campaign consists of one meme published in April 2019; an "explainer" video is in post-production as of November 2019.
