I'd just like to say how much I would regret it if the few members interested in the working side of the breed left this site 'cause they felt their input is not welcome.
IMHO our setters have so many wonderful qualities and it is worth hearing about all of them. It would be to the detriment of this site were membership limited to only the one interest. For myself, I greatly enjoy reading about both the work and the show side. And what makes this site extra special is the possibility of sharing photographs from both spheres.
Yes, we have had the discussion english/american and then there is show/working. But I must say that a site without discussions and different points of view would not hold any interest for me.
How boring it would be if we only congatulated each other!
And how much would we learn?
Absolutly nothing at all.
Perhaps during some of these (at times heated) discussions, we can at least see the other sides point of view.
And no, we will not agree.
But then the great side to this site is the fact that we all have a different approach to our dogs and what we want from them. So let the discussions be heated at times!
I see that this discussion is international. I'll just want to say that my husband and me have a lot of pleasure to participate in shows and in the same time in field-trials with the same dogs. As we have essentially show origins, it's more easy for them to win shows that to win field-trials. In any case, we are very proud of them and over all love them so much. I think we all deserve respect from the moment when we love our dogs. Have a look to France! This disagreement is destroying the breed. It's really not necessary. There is place for everyone !
I'm afraid some people anjoy being rude just to enfuriate others. Some people seem rude due to language and/or culture differences. I prefer to give someone the benefit of doubt and assume the latter.
Ever tried one of those translation-pages on the internet?
Quite an eye-opener if you speak several languages. You can just about end up with a text meaning the oposite to what you intended.
Same with words that are the same (and mean the same) but have very different values in different countrys.
For instance SHIT.
Now we can use the word SHIT in Sweden and put it in front of for instance pretty. It then ends up meaning = VERY PRETTY.
I am quite certain that "Ugly" in this case did not refer to peoples looks. In fact I thought the wording was quite funny...:-)