To not understand what this parent was thinking?

[Frequency]

While out with my rottweiler x this afternoon, I noticed he was panting more than I was comfortable with, so I abandoned our walk and took a detour to the nearest shop to buy him a bottle of water.

I crouched down at the edge of a very wide path to give him a drink. I wasn't paying attention to what was around me because I was watching the dog, and no one had any reason to be near us anyway. The pavement is about 8 feet wide on that street, if not wider. We were right at the edge, by the shop window.

The second I stood up, there was a toddler, eye-to-eye with my dog. He must have run up behind me while I was kneeling. He was literally nose to nose with the dog, reaching his hands out to grab/stroke the dog's face.

My dog is friendly but a little wary of small children, so I tend to keep him away from them.

Luckily, DD was with me and had spotted the kid and managed to hold his hands before he grabbed the dog's face and loudly told him, "Sorry, he's scared of kids, and he's just trying to have a drink, can you leave him alone, please?" She had to say it loudly because his mum and her friend had continued walking and were now a good 10 feet away from us. At this point, the mother then shouted at her other small child (around 7 or 8) to "get the baby," so the dog now had 2 kids to contend with while the mother kept walking away, ranting about how the young girl was supposed to be "watching the baby."

DD has anxiety and was really shaken by it, and can't stop thinking about how much worse it could have been if our dog were not friendly, or if the kid had managed to grab the dog's face and spooked/hurt him.

I still just cannot fathom what the mother was thinking, allowing her toddler to run up to a strange dog who was obviously eating/drinking, get nose to nose with him to try to grab him, and then send a second child over after she's made aware he is not a friendly dog?

Surely it is common sense to know that nose-to-nose with a strange, large breed dog, who is eating/drinking, is not a safe place to be, no matter how friendly the dog is?

YABU for owning such a dangerous dog breed and expecting everyone else to fit around you because of your choice.

The risk of a bite sounds like it could be also properly managed by having a muzzle if your dog is "wary of children". Dogs are unfortunately another risk that parents have to contend with, but you should also be doing your bit.

YANBU It is insane behaviour to allow a toddler to go up to a strange dog's face while it's drinking/eating. I'm wondering if this needs to be a public service announcement for dim people.
This has nothing to do with breed, I don't know a single dog who would respond well to this.

Your dog should be muzzled. As if humans should have to tiptoe around an animal to stop it from attacking them.

People like you shouldn’t be dog owners

No, just don't go up to it's face while it's drinking. Common sense.

I cannot "fathom" the selfishness that are dog owners. It is bad enough that no where is free of dogs, they're literally bloody everywhere, but Mums are literally confronted with dogs everywhere they go, it is literally exhausting trying to dodge them all and toddlers don't know any better. The irony of your post when dogs literally pounce on anyone and everyone when at the park or the beach, and we all just have to smile and bare it, because Fido is just being "friendly" but the same courtesy is not extended to a literal human child is just mind boggling to me. Telling a toddler to go away is also not fine, that is bloody awful. Basically we all have to be tolerant of dogs, but children are not treated with the same respect, they're literally less than! Why does anyone need to own a rottweiler anyway? Children should be able to live in society without the fear of being attacke by someone's pet. That is what you are really saying OP that if your dog snapped it would be the childs fault and not the dogs. Your literally laying blame at that childs feet to cover the fact if your dogged snapped and attacked the child you would be exonerated of all blame. Well you are wrong, because you know what rottweilers are capable of, and if you must own such dangerously stupid dog for whatever ego trip you need, you could at least have the decency to muzzle the beast when your out in public so there would be no need for your horribly self righteous and self absorbed post.

I agree completely. Whilst we have always taught our children not to approach dogs unless we know them or ask the owner, sometimes unexpected things happen and owners shouldn’t have dogs that would hurt a child if they got a mild shock

You obviously haven’t seen the photos of her dog the Op posted. Nowhere near a Rottweiler

Kids should be taught to treat all dogs with respect, they are animals.

Yea, tell that to 2-year-old me who was bitten by one in a grocery shop while out with my mum.

I love dogs - hate corgis!

Some of the posts on here are absolutely ridiculous! I can’t underhand how anyone can be a dog hater, and think it wasn’t the parent’s fault here.

That was a perfect example of bad parenting! Well done to your daughter too. She sounds lovely and will grow to be a responsible dog owner. Unfortunately, there are stupid parents everywhere!

Can you imagine any other deadly animal being able to roam around where humans are? Muzzle your dogs. They’re killers

Totally agree. My children would either be old enough to know not to do that or young enough to have me watching them and stopping them. Same way you would stop them walking infront of traffic. The dog is on a lead and in owners control. I hate it when an uninvited dog comes into my personal space and it works both ways. Dogs on leads and children supervised.

Kids don’t have common sense. Not when they’re tiny. Doesn’t mean they should be at risk of a mauling.

Otherwise, put your kid in with a fucking gorillla at the zoo and demand the child knows how to safely interact. No? Because it’s not up to the child. You have to make the gorilla safe. Ditto the nervous vicious dog. Muzzle it

He's gorgeous. Not intimidating at all.

Exactly. So they should all be muzzled. I’m sick of being wary every time I go out because of some stupid persons’ mutt

What a ridiculous post!

Of course toddlers don’t know any better. That’s why it’s the parent’s responsibility to look after it! The OP was being a responsible dog owner. The dog did not approach the child at all. The parent allowed the child to approach the dog. You have completely missed the point of the OP.

Of course they don't. Ours doesn't. Our friends dogs don't
Children obviously should not approach dogs, as they my not have decent owners but if they do - properly trained dogs should not snap at them

I don’t understand what point you are trying to make here. So you took two dogs to a busy event, likely to have plenty of children/families around. You sat to have a picnic in a public area. A school group also sat down. And a child had the audacity to run around and fall over near your dogs? What is your point - groups of children should not attend public events if your dogs might be there? You want a child-free area for dogs only? Yes of course children should be aware of dogs but it sounds like the child didn’t approach your dogs, they were just running near them and fell, so unless you’re proposing banning kids from country shows this is a weird post.

So XL Bully dogs are really cuddly and gentle 🙄

Some of the replies on here are unhinged.

Op, I am sorry this happened but really glad no harm was caused. Well done to your Dd too. It is completely the Mum's fault. The toddler could have just as easily run across the road, fallen down a drain, touched some shiny glass on the floor, knocked an unstable OAP off their feet, been kidnapped by some weirdo, however unlikely, countless things could happen.

Your very gorgeous dog was on a lead. The toddler should have either been holding hands or just infront of Mum so that she could keep safe supervision. She is at fault as she left her toddler unsupervised and even worse that she then blamed and sent the poor sibling. She should have come and explained to both children and apologised to you.

If you don't bend down so you're eye level with him and try to grab his face while he's eating/drinking, my dog wants nothing more than to be your best friend forever. He won't introduce himself unless you reach out to him because he knows he's supposed to ignore all of the best friends he hasn't met yet while he's out of the house.

If you do bend down and get in his face while he is eating, it's me you need to worry about, not the dog. I was nice to the toddler because he was a toddler and didn't know any better. It's his mother I'm annoyed with for allowing it to happen.

She helped intervene yesterday when two off-leash, aggressive terriers ran around the corner (on the same road, actually, maybe we should start avoiding that street), barking and snapping at our dog. She body blocked them while I controlled our dog's head and shouted at their owner to get control of his dogs.

oh op. Surely this here tells you what you need to know. If your own child needs to body block other dogs so you can control your own then it needs to be muzzled. Dogs can and do kill.

You shouting at random owners of small non lethal dogs doesn’t solve this

I don’t think you understand dogs at all….

🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣

yeah those viscous killer beagles

🤣🤣🤣🤣

How fortunate that the unsupervised toddler threw himself at a dog that had two responsible adults nearby, instead of a passing car.

Otherwise the kid might be dead, and some of the posters here would be calling for cars to be banned 🙄