Agreed.
It reminds me of the stories of girls and women in evangelical churches being pressured to forgive those who sexually assaulted them.
No one is owed forgiveness.
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Iāve heard stories of one our Olympians (not this current cycle) withholding feed from their horses days before dressage to keep them calm. Itās one of many dirty little secrets from that barn.
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The idea of forgiveness - not exclusive to Judeo-Christian values - but familiar to many at some level in our culture from that origin. And itās so misconstrued - there has to be repentance! And thatās not the same as regret for being caught. It has to be truly based on recognizing the wrong-ness and regretting it.
Absent repentance, Iām not extending forgiveness. Iām willing to forgive, but thatās step 2 in the process. And forgiveness doesnāt mean zero consequences, it means letting one move on, possibly after enduring consequences.
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Exactly. Iāve worked at only two international level barns, but LOTS of national level barns, LOTS of local show barns, and even more backyard barns. Iāve seen abuse where I work maybeā¦twice? Three times? Iāve reported it, and in two instances there were dire consequences for the abuser. Iām no where near the level of an ULR, but saying that this happens everywhere just makes me feel crazy.
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I too read Mattās piece on the subject. While well written, I feel there are a few glaring misconceptions between having lost your temper in the heat of the moment and having regret and remorse from your actions and learning to do better over time in these situations vs methodically tying your horse up to crossties with its head tied to its tail or legs for two hours or giving dex to horses to cover up the welts you inflicted. These are calculated thought out evil actions from a very disturbed person. There definitely is a difference between the two even though neither one is acceptable.
If you were hiking with a child and they were too slow, stumbled, went off course, or simply did not want to do it, would it be ok in your eyes to whip them, spur them, punch them in the face, with hold food and water, tie their hand to their feet for hours? Of course not! There is no question that would be considered abuse, so why is there even an inkling or grey area of what is being done to these poor souls that have no voice is abuse. Why because you pay their bills? Get them massaged and chiropractic? They owe you? Imagine being whipped and not being able to say I donāt feel good today, I hurt, or just simply because you want to do it I donāt have to. I think a lot of soul searching needs to be done. It is a privilege to work with these amazing animals not a right.
And just to add, unspeakable abuse has been going on for many years at the most elite level in our sport. Be careful who you idolize as my friend rode with someone at the very tip top of the sport many years ago who is idolized today. Her horse was a stopper, their response or tools in their toolbox to rectify the situation. They shot her horse with a BB gun when it would try to stop. You could feel the metal BBs under the horses skin. Talk about horrific.
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I made an updated list and put together the contact info for the remaining sponsors but everyone on the forum got upset and said it was doxxing and that it was not right. Is it not the responsibilities of these equestrian brands that make money off of our sport, and the horses being the heart of that sport, to be the voice and advocate for these horses who cannot speak for themselves? I havenāt been able to sleep all week thinking about the ātrainingā Wakita had to go through to get the Burghley, yes I know its not the same horse in the videos and Eventing Nation said its actually 2 separate horses, so his punching in the face is just normal behavior for this guy. If he refuses to be silent his sponsors should do something. I didnāt go out and ācancelā charlotte she took responsibility for her actions. Andrew said he would provide a statement and we are still waiting.
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Iām sorry, listing out sponsors and putting personal contact info for AM and other officials is not the same thing. And I struggle still to understand why on earth it would be appropriate in any circumstance to start your own GFM for this cause.
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Sorry, but your GFM account post? Blatant grifting. Itās impossible to take your comments seriously after that.
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Just got notice from Arro helmets, nicely written response, and they are not sponsoring him until resolved.
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You sound like you have a personal vendetta or axe to grind here. If thatās the case you should probably add your evidence to that being compiled by the FEI.
What you posted previously was quite literally the definition of doxxing. Providing personal contact info or PII with malicious intent. What do you want people to do with that? Send Andrew hate mail? I donāt think that helps Wakita 54 - which you claim to be trying to do.
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No witch hunt. Witches ride brooms not horses.
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I canāt find the GFM page, but please report it to the GFM customer service if you can.
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Yup. Itās one of the red flags for incipient family violence. In some states, hurting or threatening someoneās animal is part of the constellation of behavior judges consider when assigning protection orders.
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Fritt, I reported the GFM yesterday, fwiw. Have not received any update about it though.
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Thank you.
This again!
I saw the CDJ video, and while it think it was inappropriate, unfair, and abusive, we also spent hundreds of posts debating if she even made contact with the horse. Andrew McConnon is shown to be punching, kicking, and whipping his horses, tying their heads to their feet, and more. That is an entirely different level of abuse. There is no way to argue that it was a bad day, a poorly executed attempt to fix a rearer, or that the fists/whips/whatever didnāt make contact.
This is akin to your neighbor kicking the crap out of his dog for barking, duct taping its mouth shut, and tying it up bleeding in the yard. Would that be considered āa learning experienceā? No. Youād file a criminal complaint and hope the courts do their job and ban him from having animals in his care or influence.
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I feel the same. It seems a bit tone-deaf and has a ādonāt come at all us upper level ridersā feel.
Either this rider (Andrew) has worst luck and has been filmed 3 or more times in the heat of the momentā¦or this is routine enough that people feel the need to film/document it. 
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I personally will use a well timed CTJ moment but only for dangerous behavior ie biting, kicking etc. I canāt even imagine how it could help you win a ribbon.
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Hitting a horse in the face, or trying to crank its nose to your knee is a ābad dayā or a āmistakeā according to the Browns? Nope. Just like beating your spouse or child isnāt a mistake. Itās a choice, and there should be consequences.
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Because we are already discussing the long Matt & Cecily Brown post on this thread, and some of us have voiced that certain aspects of that post struck us as slightly missing the mark for one reason or anotherā¦
I think itās fair to share a follow up comment they made, clarifying their position. They do not want to condone abuse or apologize for it. They do seem concerned about the possibility of someone self harming when in the midst of a spiraling public professional meltdown like this one ā¦
Anyway - hereās a quote of their follow up & clarifying comments, in the interest of fairness.
As with the initial post, they strike me as very well intentioned. I personally am just a slightly cynical human being who has some personal experience with manipulation via suicide threats from someone in my pastā¦ and I tend to find this line of argument unpersuasive. But thatās definitely a āmeā thing. I just have less empathy and more cynicism on that issue. Sadly.
I truly hope we can put horse welfare first and hold people accountable for despicable actions and also still not be unkind in doing so. I agree with you and others that have posted that there is no room in the sport for horses to be treated the way theyāre being treated in the current Andrew videos and in the videos weāve seen from charlotte, Cesar and Andreas. I guess what I maybe didnāt make clear enough in my post is that I donāt want to apologize for the behavior, in fact, I want to eliminate the behavior, and I take advocating for proper treatment of horses very seriously, but I just donāt want us to be so mean and hateful on social media towards the human. Do I think horse abusers should be punished, fined, suspended, banned, etc?? Absolutely. But I hope we can do that without being cruel. Do I want those people out of the sport if thatās how theyāre going to behave? Yes, 100%. Do I want them to kill themselves because of whatās being said about them on social media? No, I do not want that, and I think we must consider that as a real possibility for those people. I personally do not believe in the death penalty. I do believe that criminals should serve time, sometimes entire lifetimes in jail, depending on the severity of the crime, but I want to allow room for the possibility that those people can become better people while serving their time and donāt want to see them killed by themselves or the system.
Iām sorry if my post came off as apologetic of bad behavior. Iām trying to find a balance here of advocating for the brave people who are calling out abuse, asking for the groups in power to do a better and more transparent job of dealing with these cases of abuse, asking for the general public to actually open their eyes to whatās going on around them because there is so much bad-ranging-to-cruel treatment of horses going on around ALL OF US, and also just trying to remind everyone that we can hold people accountable for their actions without being mean. And that some people who have made mistakes, and I emphasize the use of the word āsomeā, may have the ability to do better if they make the effort to become more educated and to change their ways, but if they kill themselves because of a social media pile on then we never get to see if they can make some kind of amends.
Maybe itās not possible to have all of that. Maybe Iām being naive. And I agree that I am a coward for not reporting all of the abuses I see or know are occurring on the regular. A lot of it I donāt have photographic or video evidence of, so wouldnāt hold up anyways. And the rest is honestly out there for all to see, if we just pay attention. FEI jogs happen in the public domain. Anyone can have a horse that doesnāt present quite right for one fair reason or another, but if someone is presenting the same lame horse and getting held or spun at almost every first or second jog for YEARS, then I think itās not fair to say to one person āyou should call that outā when literally everyone, including FEI officials and vets are not doing anything about it. Continuing to compete a clearly lame horse is abuse, in my opinion. I donāt have enough fingers and toes to count the amount of times Iāve told someone at a horseshow to stop whacking or jerking on their horse. Iāve been called a āmother fucking do gooderā to my face for speaking up to a professional who was mishandling his students horse in front of officials and everyone in warm up. Said officials told ME to not engage with him when he was getting in to my face calling me names. So while Iām not ready to put my own career on the line to just start naming names without photographic proof of the misdeeds Iāve witnessed or known about, I do take very seriously advocating for the horse in my every day life on the farm, at every horseshow I attend, as a volunteer member of many committees, and as someone in the social media domain. Iām sure I could do better than what Iām doing, but I guess thatās also my point. If we just label people as horrible and write them off without allowing for some nuance and grey area, considering each case individually, then no one has the chance to improve. When a lot of the examples of abuse that I site happened I was a different person (and again, didnāt have any of it on camera). Now, if I see something bad, I say something. Usually directly to the person, or alert an official (when I witnessed the top rider punching her horse in the face in warm up I turned around and marched up to the FEI steward in the ring and told him what happened. So I am trying to do better, as a horseman and also as an advocate, but also as an empathetic, imperfect human to other imperfect humans. As I said in my post, if someone is going to be a piece of shit and have no interest in rehabilitating, me being mean to them isnāt going to change them, but thereās a tiny chance maybe extending some grace to people could actually help them become better. Again, probably completely naive, and not saying we should rub them on the back and say donāt worry, I forgive you, but we can at least just be not mean, focus on the despicable action and not the person, and what we as a community are going to do going forward to do better. Thatās what Iād like to see the conversation shift to - how can we do better, how can we educate better, how can we improve the governing system so these things can be addressed more effectively, how can we protect whistleblowers better? How can we officiate our shows better?
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Agreedā¦ I was thinking about the CTJ moment, as sometimes described here on the forums, and itās almost always used with a horse that is acting dangerously on the ground, not a horse being ridden.
The closest Iāve come under saddle is a one-rein stop applied when Feronia just decided to take off one day at a place on the trail where I sometimes let her go fast. After that I gave the aids for āgo fastā at different points along that trail, or not at all, and she learned to wait for me to signal it.
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