$500 just to look? WTF?

[JumpingPaints]

@Fox Wood Farm

This is my first COTH post. I have read with increasing amazement this entire 34 page thread. (Damn the friend who sent me the link on Friday.) It was so long ago that I originally registered for the COTH forums, I forgot both my user name and password. I had to re-register. Any of you remember the FIRST RULE you agreed to when you registered?

Rule #1: Be nice, be respectful, be polite.

I guess the rules really don’t matter, huh?

(No, Erin - I’m not trying to take your place as moderator, just making an observation.)

As an “outsider” reading this thread, I’ve come away with stronger opinions about this group than of VSH. I am stunned at the degree of invective that has been expressed toward VSH and toward the few people who have tried to restore a little sanity to the subject. (J. Swan and X, to name 2.)

I do not like to stereotype or generalize, but I think that 679 posts have provided way more information than necessary to do so.

I’m not going to quote specific comments from all the posts I have read. But I will stick my neck out and make some observations.

1. This is not a friendly group. Open hostility does not encourage me to make new friends here.
2. The whole thread has turned into an attack fueled by “mob mentality”.
3. If you have all been “nice, respectful and polite”, I would sure hate to see what you have to say when not constrained by this rule.
4. I was not aware that selling PMU babies was such a heinous act.
5. I was not aware that Draft crosses were so reviled as brumbies, trashy, grade horses. Guess I will have to tell my - very sweet and handsome - TBxPerch that he must lower his opinion of himself. (And, no, he did not come from Canada or VA, nor have I tried to pass him off as anything other than a “hillbilly warmblood” bred in the NC mountains.)

I kept trying to put a finger on what was so disturbing to me about this whole thread. Others had mentioned “mean-spirited”, slanderous, etc…

But I finally figured out what was getting to me - that people were ENJOYING the bashing of this business. A number of posters are having FUN with this. They may try to justify their complaints as protecting green, unsuspecting buyers, but the bottom line is that you’re having fun trashing this woman and her business. The word “GLEEFUL” comes to mind. As does BULLIES. And both are sickening.

Welcome to COTH, Fox Wood Farm.

I agree with you 100% about the first rule of COTH. And I wish we could all abide by it. However, if you take a peek at other threads (especially the slaughter and auction ones), you will see that those who you defend are much renowned on this forum for infractions of that very rule - frequently and consistently. This is one instance I can say, what comes around goes around.

[JSwan]

So do the same thing. If it’s inappropriate - call me on it. Are you asserting that since I violated a rule and you chose to ignore it - that somehow this means ganging up on this individual is ok??

I didn’t say anyone shouldn’t be discussing this topic at all. I take exception to what has occurred that is inappropriate - and you do know what I am talking about.

Regardless - I do hope the “tortilla interference” phrase is a good one. A bon mot. That’s right up there with kohlrabi stick and WTD. Indeed.

@Erin

:rolleyes:

J Swan, I’ve seen plenty of YOUR posts that violated Rule #1.

You don’t feel anyone should be discussing this topic. We get it. Unfortunately, you don’t get to make that call. Such is life… deal with it.

As I said previously, there was nothing wrong with you sending in an alert. I did take exception to your outright DEMAND that the thread be closed – as I said, not your call.

No one has violated your privacy, just like no one on this thread urged anyone to harrass anyone else, and just like no one made any unfounded allegations of illegal activity. But keep right up with those exaggerated claims if you think they’re workin’ for ya.

[Erin]

No, I never said it was OK – I said it happens. It has been the exception, rather than the rule, on this thread.

You did, in fact, say several times that this should not be a subject of discussion. That if people did not like the policies of a facility, they should simply not buy horses from said facility and keep their mouths shut.

As for this:

I take exception to what has occurred that is inappropriate - and you do know what I am talking about.

No, I don’t. All I know is that you have made numerous vague allegations and twisted around statements made here to make them seem much worse than they are.

[horse_poor]

@ExJumper

Just wanted to quote this, as no one commented and I think it got lost in the way side. I think we have identified Dagan, at least… A happy customer with a dirty mouth, perhaps?

Oops, summerhorse, you beat me to it by, apparently, less than a minute!

I noticed I noticed!!! Do I get a prize?

[seeyalou]

I STILL wanna know how a few pages on a bb mocking some very-mockworthy business practices published by the business owner is wreaking havoc, ruining lives and laying waste to a lifetime of good works, causing homelessness, unemployment and catastrophic economic consequences for the innocent and the undeserving.

[arabhorse2]

Yes horse poor, you do get a prize!!!

However, you must pay me a $500.00 non-refundable deposit for it, sight unseen, and if you don’t like it, tough cookies.

[LSM1212]

@findeight

But we do have a new COTH vocabulary word/phrase:

Tortilla Interference…or is that Interfence. Seen it both ways. We need to clarify that.

Goes well with a dead cactus dontcha think?

ROFLMAO

[KristiKGC]

@arabhorse2

Yes horse poor, you do get a prize!!!

However, you must pay me a $500.00 non-refundable deposit for it, sight unseen, and if you don’t like it, tough cookies.

Don’t forget that she’ll have to pay you another $100 if she wants to get it off your property!

[arabhorse2]

Oooh, that’s right Kristi!

And she’s not allowed to bring a regular pickup truck to get it. It must be a station wagon, with all the windows open.

Oh, and if she wants it polished beforehand, that’s another $35.00. Cha-ching!!!

[LessIsMore17]

@KristiKGC

Don’t forget that she’ll have to pay you another $100 if she wants to get it off your property!

OH yeah, and you can use one man hour out of me to help load it, I need the extra cash:lol:

[arabhorse2]

Yes, LessIsMore, but only if you’re from Argentina, and are a “trainer”.

[Fox_Wood_Farm]

Erin, I think you and I agree in principle. I stated that I was not defending VSH or anybody else. I simply made observations about how this whole thread made me feel, especially as an outsider.

Someone else already made the comment about “never getting a chance to make a second first impression”. That comment was directed to the VSH website - and I totally agree. It’s too late now to undo people’s perception of that site no matter what they do to clean it up. Anybody who read the original version is going to have a bad taste about VSH. (And I’m including myself in that group.) I’m just applying the same “first impression” logic to how I felt about this thread. Everything I have posted has been about my perceptions - my interpretation/my opinion - and worth exactly what you paid for them.

I was reluctant to even join the fray and probably would have said nothing if I weren’t suffering insomnia last night. I suspect most of the people who got so worked up over this are really nice, decent horse people. But as this was my first exposure, well - like we said - first impressions are hard to erase.

Other comments interspersed below in bold red are mine.

@Erin

Fox Wood Farm, I’d be the first to agree that not every post here was nice, respectful and polite – although by FAR the worst in that regard was a particular VSH supporter.

I checked this thread on Thursday, I believe, when someone sent in an alert on it – it was 7 or 8 pages, mostly of people saying some variation of :eek: in regard to the $500-to-go-look policy posted on the website.

When I next looked at the thread on Saturday, it was 20+ pages. People found the rest of the website… and a lot more material to :eek: over.

There is no disputing that the vast majority of the stated policies are way out of the norm for the sport horse world, and the tone was a bit… umm… odd. Thus there is no reason to expect that it would NOT generate a lot of discussion on a sport horse board. It is a legitimate topic of discussion, even if some of the posts have come close to crossing the line.

I agree with you. Bizarre policies and they are a legitimate discussion topic. However, this business model - high volume, low cost, internet sales - is a legitimate model used in selling many other things. Just not what any of us are used to in the horse world. (And never with insults such as those comments about vets, dumb buyers, fat ladies, etc…)

There were also plenty of people, btw, who asked the supporters very nice, polite, and respectful questions – whether they had paid the deposit to go look, whether they supported such a policy – that went unanswered in favor of (rather rudely, in some cases) chastising others for discussion of the topic at all. Neither “side” is completely innocent here.

Again, I agree with you. I kept hoping for more first hand details - from either side. And for the record? I don’t have a side.

Have BBers been poking fun? Sure, as is their right. Have they been critical? Yes, as is their right.

But the thread was on its way to burning itself out (especially once most of the material was removed from the website). In much the same way as, say, the McDonalds coffee lady was the butt of all the late night comedy shows for a week or so and then disappeared from the radar, this thread was very active for a few days and would shortly have died a natural death.

This board does not have a policy against discussing individuals (although we do usually try to steer discussion back to issues once people have had their say about an individual). You are allowed to say that you think a particular rider or trainer or breeder is awful, even if that big-name R/T/B happens to be a COTH advertiser… or contributor. (Ever read a thread on here about GM?)

Rule #2: The primary purpose of this board is to discuss issues, not individuals.

Thanks for the clarification about Rule #2. I realize this is a gray area and must be difficult to moderate. Since this was my first exposure to such a controversial COTH thread, I did not have a good feel for how much leeway was allowed.

If you don’t think people should be discussing an individual, you’re welcome to say so and you’re welcome to alert the moderators. However, you have to be willing to accept that we make the call, not you, and if we decide the thread is OK to continue, well, you have choice not to read the thread.

You are absolutely right. I don’t think I questioned the topic itself, and I did not mean to suggest that you made the wrong call in allowing the thread to continue. The whole purpose of my post was intended to share my observations as an outsider. I just became more and more uncomfortable reading so many malicious posts that came from authors who were having so much fun with their cruelty.

Nobody has forced me to read this or to participate. This has been a most interesting - and perhaps unfortunate - way to meet a lot of COTH BBers.

The overall tone of this thread has not been to make ad hominem attacks on a person. (Despite Dagan’s attempts.) No one, that I have seen, has made assertions equivalent to “Hey, you’re fat and ugly and can’t ride!” (Which is my standard definition of a personal attack. :winkgrin: )

People have been commenting on the stated policies of a business that advertises those policies to the public. That’s fair game for discussion.

Again - I agree as I made basically the same comment in my earlier post.

(Although since people are pretty much done discussing the business and the policies, and have instead moved on to discussing WHETHER they should be discussing the business or the policies, it leads one to wonder whether the discussion would stop altogether if people stopped posting what others shouldn’t be discussing…)

[Critters_Everywhere]

oh man…

I cannot BELIEVE how much catching up I have to do… you guys were supposed to go slow over the weekend while I was computerless. Guess I know what I’m going to be doing on my lunch break now…

[Erin_Pittman]

Because I wasn’t familiar with the term…

Not being a lawyer, I wasn’t sure what it meant, so I thought I would post the definition of tortious interference…

Tortious interference

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Tortious interference, in the common law of tort, occurs when a person intentionally damages the plaintiff’s contractual or other business relationships. This tort is broadly divided into two categories, one specific to contractual relationships (irrespective of whether they involve business), and the other specific to business relationships or activities (irrespective of whether they involve a contract).
Tortious interference with contract rights can occur where the tortfeasor convinces a party to breach the contract against the plaintiff, or where the tortfeasor disrupts the ability of one party to perform his obligations under the contract, thereby preventing the plaintiff from receiving the performance promised.
Tortious interference with business relationships occurs where the tortfeasor acts to prevent the plaintiff from successfully establishing or maintaining business relationships.
The tort was first described in the case of Keeble v. Hickeringill, (1707) 103 Eng. Rep. 1127, styled as a “trespass on the case”. In that case, the defendant had used a shotgun to drive ducks away from a pond that the plaintiff had built for the purpose of capturing ducks. Although the ducks had not yet been captured, the Justice Holt wrote for the court that “where a violent or malicious act is done to a man’s occupation, profession, or way of getting a livelihood, there an action lies in all cases.” The court noted that the defendant would have the right to draw away ducks to a pond of his own, raising as a comparison a 1410 case in which the court deemed that no cause of action would lie where a schoolmaster opened a new school that drew students away from an old school.
Tortious interference is a major plot device in the 1999 film The Insider[1].
[edit]

Elements

Although the specific elements required to prove a claim of tortious interference vary from one jursidiction to another, they typically include the following:
[LIST=1]

The existence of a contractual relationship or beneficial business relationship between two parties.

Knowledge of that relationship by a third party.

Intent of the third party to induce a party to the relationship to breach the relationship.

Lack of any privilege on the part of the third party to induce such a breach.

Damage to the party against whom the breach occurs.[/LIST][edit]

Source

• Jesse Dukeminier and James E. Krier, [I]Property, Fifth Edition[/I], Aspen Law & Business (New York, 2002), p. 31-36. ISBN 0735524378

Edited to add: I hope someone more imaginitive than me can come up with a good solid definition of "tortilla interference"

[LessIsMore17]

@Critters Everywhere

I cannot BELIEVE how much catching up I have to do… you guys were supposed to go slow over the weekend while I was computerless. Guess I know what I’m going to be doing on my lunch break now…

It’s kind of a tWainWeck now;)

[JumpingPaints]

Extended derailment until further notice…

We need a trainwreck icon!

[BelladonnaLily]

Doesn’t “tortilla interfence” have something to do with illegal Mexicans and border crossings?

[furlong47]

@BelladonnaLily

Doesn’t “tortilla interfence” have something to do with illegal Mexicans and border crossings?

Not to be confused with tortilla inference, where we logically derive the existence of mexican food.

[Duffy]

Fox Wood Farm - welcome to the BB! Sorry your introduction was on such a tumultuous thread! We’re really not such a bad bunch - overall. (I’ve been here forever, even if my screen name doesn’t indicate - note the “again”. :lol: )

[Goodyfourshoes]

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