answer:One big reason is that there is no reliable reporting system linking dog bite incidents to breed. News reports jump all over any incident supposedly involving a pit bull (largely because it then has sensational value), while incidents that can’t be pinned on a pit bull hardly ever specify a breed (if it even gets reported at all). Which brings up another problem: people are terrible at identifying dogs. Most dogs out there are mixed breeds, and without doing DNA testing, even vets and shelter workers have a miserable record in accurately identifying ancestry. My dog, for instance, was listed by the shelter as a “lab/dalmation mix”. Many people look at him and immediately say he’s a pit bull. His DNA reveals that he’s 25% boxer, 25% pit bull, and the remaining 50% is too indistinct to identify (but definitely not lab or dalmation). But you can bet that if he were to bite someone, it would be reported as a “pit bull attack”. And so it goes: dogs get called pit bulls all the time whether or not they are, especially in bite incidents. Much of the reputation of pit bulls has more to do with social anxiety toward the social elements with which they’re associated in the popular imagination: the urban underclass and criminal elements. They have become a proxy for the fears of the dominant culture about the threat posed by “undesirab!es”. It’s interesting to me how my dog so often provokes a reaction of veiled aprehension among the “golden retreaver” set, whereas the black and hispanic people I encounter often exclaim about what a beautiful dog he is.