i just want to preceed this post by saying that i am not at all interested in getting attacked about this or having me or my trainers being insulted, i just want to know what people would do in my situation.
so i submitted my membership application to the schutzhund club i train with so that i can be an official member and compete. everyone in the club is really supportive and excited to see a non-mal non-gsd in their club and someone young handling them as well. HOWEVER-the head trainer of the club believes that tre, only because he is a pitbull, is just gonna turn on another dog or person one day and he doesn't want a dog like that in his club. he has not expressed these concerns to me, but to my boss and the owner.
I'M FURIOUS! here is this guy with like 20 years training experience and he's still ignorant about this breed! the more i thought about it the more i realized that, although he has trained a lot of pet dogs and worked and titled several different breeds, he mostly works with working dogs in a sport atmosphere, so he doesn't have any real experience with pits. my boyfriend thinks i shouldn't train with him because he doesn't want tre getting sub-par training from a guy that doesn't want him around, but when i watch him work him i don't feel like he treats him any differently than the next dog-which is why i was shocked to hear this from my boss. my boss is going to bat for me, and has said that he will work with me outside of club to make sure tre is bigger and badder than any other dog in the club just to prove him wrong. should i not train there just because of this one guy? i should i expect judgement like this along the way and just push through it and try to change people like this' minds by having a really excellent dog?
i look at the dogs in my club, and while the vast of them wouldn't just up and bite someone, they aren't pets, they aren't having a ton of experience with other dogs and people outside of a working context, which imo makes them less safe, and then i look at tre and i think he's the safest dog there! any person, kid, cat, dog, whatever is safe to do whatever with him, he's SO well socialized, he's the safest dog there! and yet, because he's a pit, he's automatically being called unsafe? i mean, he can have his decoy pick him up and give him a kiss right after he's given him a bite, he only turns in on when he knows it's appropriate. it's b*llshit!
i don't want to leave the club, and i'm willing to talk to the guy about it, but what would you do? i want to just grab him and shake him and say "what the hell are you thinking?!" grrrrr....