" viciousness in a dog is usually traceable back to its treatment by a vicious owner. Which begs the obvious question, why not shoot the owners as well?"

If you research the vicious owner's life, you will probably find that the owner was the child of a vicious parent. Was beaten, humiliated, perhaps thrown against walls or down stairs. And nobody ever noticed anything.

He grows up, and now we've got a person who is deeply angry and afraid, and also has little notion of logic or self-control. He thinks his formidable dog makes him formidable too. He's not, he's a coward.

What was it the Bible said about 'the third and fourth generation of them that hate me?" The prophet could have been talking about dysfunctional families.