[QUOTE=Guilherme;7908947]
All my horses get to say, “Hey!!! Look at that!!!” I look and then I get to say “aye” or “nay.”
G.[/QUOTE]
^^This
I’m in the “depends on the situation” camp. I’ve sent my horse through some stuff he was iffy about, he’s never flat out said no though. If he truly flat out told me no, I’d have second thoughts. This was one of the times he asked if I was sure… we made it 
http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b277/kasjordan/b2_zps1ea1738c.jpg
[QUOTE=sorrelfilly721;7948523]
^^This[/QUOTE]
My horses get to look at things, but they don’t get to stall out of forward motion, head up, ready to bolt.
Sure, if i’m riding along in bear country, and my horse gets on the alert, I take my horse’s judgement that they might be danger that he has sensed
On the other hand, we (hubby and I ) , have suddenly come upon herd of elk, which I know are no threat, yet where an in experienced horse might decide to ‘leave the country’ In that case, now ay does that horse get to say no.
Yes, horses sometimes know when a bog is too deep, but I have also ridden horses that tried to say, ;no’ to me, when I knew the best way to cross that bog, and tried to blindly plunge in their chosen direction, thus getting into deeper bog
Okay to give your horse the benefit of the doubt, if you are not sure that the route ahead is safe, but not okay for the horse to try and say ‘no’, when you know something is safe and the best option, thus dictating where he will and will not ride.
There has to be a leader, and if you don’t lead, then the horse will.
At the same time, like any good leader, you have to recognize when to defer to the better judgement/knowledge of a sub subordinate
I WISH Izzy would sometimes say no. For a spooky, non-brave equine, she has let me get her into some tough spots…like past her elbow in heavy snow (I dug her out with my helmet), and in thick brush with fallen logs neither of us could see very well.
Dani on the other hand hasn’t earned the privilege of saying NO, but nor do I put her in positions where she might know better than I.
I had one horse who’s favorite thing to do was trail ride. If he said no and I insisted we go forward, he’d go a on. If he said no again, I’d listen and change course. And that’d be the end of it and he wouldn’t give me more trouble.
But I had an instance with my last horse where we both saw something we didn’t like and I turned him around promptly to get away from it. That horse was the super dominant type and even though we rode for over 2 hrs after turning around and never got near home, he fought me on every decision on every ride for weeks after that.
