# Degrees of Gameness by Tom Garner



## Padlock (Nov 19, 2010)

If we are to agree that dogs can have different degrees of gameness (or curness, if you will) on different days and under different circumstances (and I believe that most of us have witnessed this fact), then we can't even be certain of the absolute gameness of a dog that we see die with his tail wagging, because we can only speculate about how he might have performed on a different day, at a different age, with a different opponent We must bear in mind that a living thing, dog or man, is a biochemical dynamic entity that is in a constant state of flux They and we are different now than we were even one minute ago. The conditions and tendencies that existed yesterday may be long gone tomorrow. So perhaps we should only say about a dog that he was game or cur on a particular day, under specific circumstances?

Also, we should ask ourselves what the objective of a match is? Is it to determine gameness? If it is, it is often a miserable failure. Most often we see one dog quit and the winner is most often still of undetermined gameness. How often does the winner die in the pit? If he doesnt, then he wasn't truly tested, was he? If there is only one degree of gameness and that degree is dead-gameness and we have game testing as our objective, then the irony is that just as we are proving the worth of our dog, we are proving our own stupidity as we are destroying our own worthy dog.

Maybe the objective of a match is simply to see which dog can scratch longer than the other dog, which relegates gameness to a rote as being but one of several significant ingredients.

Now if we are truly intending to be gameness fanatics, then matching is a relatively useless forum for us. The best method for breeding "game" dogs is to breed our prospects all we intend to, then test them to their death (with video camera rolling) and if they die right, raise their pups. If they are not, then euthanize their pups. Even better, let's have a team of medical experts present who can "revive" our clinicaly dead dogs so that they can be tested for "dead gameness" on another day, under other circumstances. One would think that a double-dead-game dog would be better than a dog that only died right once. In this way we can determine if a dead game performance by a dog was truly indicative of his genetic make-up and to ensure that he didn't just have a day in which he rose above his true worth, much like Buster Douglas when he fought Tyson.

I think, as have indicated at length elsewhere, that gameness (defined as the willingness to persevere against adversity) is a state (affected by numerous traits) that may vary to a significant degree within a dog from day to day, and certainly is present in different amounts from animal to animal. The fact that it is variable is amply demonstrated by the great degree of variability of time that matches last. Gameness is defined by a continuum that ranges from none to complete, from a willingness to endure only a little adversity to an acceptance of the worst kind of adversity.

The human mind attempts to reduce complex reality from infinite shades of gray to black and white simply because it gives us the illusion that we have a complete grasp of it However it is a false comfort one that changes not one iota the reality of a multitude of gray shades.

Now it may be that we can say "I will not settle for anything short of dead game in my breeding stock", and that is an admirable objective. But to deny the accomplishment of a 3-hour dog that quits, by saying he is no different than a two minute cur is illogical and perhaps immoral as it cheats him of his credit We might instead say. "I am so committed to breeding only dead game dogs that for my purposes, a three hour cur is no better than a two minute cur". I can accept that statement but to simply, unequivocally say they are the same is unacceptable.

Also, folks are fond of saying, The only dead game dog is a dead dog". The reality is that the dog was a dead game dog before he fought but his gameness was not proven to human satisfaction. The act of fighting does not create gameness. Gameness is a response potential, which is demonstrated in the fight not created in the fight Therefore there are in fact dead game dogs waking around as we speak, we just can't be sure which ones they are.


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## mamas boy (Dec 5, 2010)

good read padlock real interesting and true.


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## Saint Francis (Jun 2, 2010)

Lauren (pitbullmamanatl) posted this awhile back and it is definitely food for thought, or at the very least, a circular argument in it's truest sense


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## MISSAPBT (May 10, 2009)

Good write up, thanks for posting Padlock.

Gameness is pretty much f'd up theres so many perspectives of 'game' i have my thoughts about the term but others have all sorts of other views


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## Sadie (Jun 18, 2008)

I posted it too LOL


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## Saint Francis (Jun 2, 2010)

...and Tara posted it too


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