Jan, who is this that owns a bad pet?
Is not what these professors say part and parcel of an over due reappraisal of 'mans' relationship with beasts of all sorts?
Is not the attitude of 'ownership' rather than 'companionship' also partly responsible for much that is wrong with the human and animal relationship?
People that treat animals badly, train them to be aggressive and allow them to befoul the neighbourhood do so, partly or in the main, because the animal is their property and "Who are you to tell me how to behave vis-a-vis MY property..." .
"A dog is for life, not just for Christmas" may simply be not good enough to rectify the all too common ills that the current attitude 'we' have to those creatures with whom we share our lives.
If, for instance, dogs were seen and appreciated as living things with a socialising behaviour all of their own and not treated as mere extensions of the human ego;snoochums and/or Tyson. Would not much improvement be seen all round, in health and behavioural terms?
Ignorance is bliss, bliss is happiness, I am happy...to draw your attention to the possible connectivity in the foregoing.