Dujardin Whistleblower News

[Alterration]

@Manni01

Well I tend to believe that in Dujardins and Sandbrinks cases they used the rearing argument as an excuse to do what they did….
I know many people still think these training methods are rare but I am not sure about that…

Oh - I wasn’t saying it was right.

I’ve just seen enough rearers from heavy hands and blocking riding that it could be that the “prepared” solution was to make the horse more afraid of the whip than it was of going forward into a heavy hand and blocking legs.

I remember when I was in my early 20s, I exercise rode for a few people who took lessons from the same trainer I did. One of the horses started objecting to his rider’s ride after I rode him. I was puzzled, and the trainer told me that I could not ride the horses as I would ride them if I were going to exercise the horses, I had to ride them the same way as their owner rode them. Their owner was very handsy. The trainer explained that by giving the horse a nicer ride, I was making them less tolerant of the poor ride that their owner was providing. It made me very uncomfortable, but the philosophy was that it was easier to change the horse than it was to change the rider.

I stopped riding for that trainer shortly thereafter, but it was a lesson that got burned into my brain.

[MinnesotanSoil]

I wasn’t surprised in the slightest when I read that article. Like, at all. Alicia is full of shit, pardon my language. She never had good intentions when releasing that video, something I suspected from the start. Questioning the whistleblower’s fishy actions was never taking away from holding Charlotte accountable. It has always been crucial that everyone involved be investigated.

[MinnesotanSoil]

Some bs about her not considering it abuse at the time. But she very conveniently had an epiphany right before the Olympics

[Djones]

The thing I don’t get is why CD didn’t make the rider grab some mane rather than the mouth so she could send the horse forward with a warning audible whip crack…but maybe she had tried that and the horse reared and sulked anyway.

The way she ham handedly whacked him all over seemed to me she was frustrated with the horse and the entire situation and lost her ability to think. Instead she just whacked at the horse ineffectively, the way I might bang on a keyboard if frustrated. She doesn’t look she does this all the time, she looks pretty bad at it.

It’s all awful, to be sure. The horse is in the wrong job, at least with this rider.

[SillyHorse]

@Djones

The horse is in the wrong job, at least with this rider.

CD’s actions aside, this is a salient point. If the horse won’t go forward with this rider or pick up his feet high enough, even when being beaten with a whip, and is [possibly] a rearer, what miracle did she expect with this abuse?

[Nous]

@Djones

The way she ham handedly whacked him all over seemed to me she was frustrated with the horse and the entire situation and lost her ability to think. Instead she just whacked at the horse ineffectively, the way I might bang on a keyboard if frustrated. She doesn’t look she does this all the time, she looks pretty bad at it.

This is probably a controversial opinion, but I think the way she ham handedly whacked him tells me that she’s never actually used a lunging whip directly on a horse before, ditto with her comment that “this is *#!% at hitting them hard”. She seemed to get sucked into the fascination of how poorly the whip worked when used directly on the horse and lost focus on what she was trying to achieve.

A commentator on another forum stated that it’s actually not physically possible to hit a horse hard with a lunge whip due to the way the lash flexes. I thought about it and possibly they are correct, perhaps the admonition never to use a lunge whip directly on a horse is because the horse will lose respect for it, not that they might be hurt.

[SillyHorse]

The excuses and justifications here and elsewhere are sickening.

[DownYonder]

@SillyHorse

@Djones

The horse is in the wrong job, at least with this rider.

CD’s actions aside, this is a salient point. If the horse won’t go forward with this rider or pick up his feet high enough, even when being beaten with a whip, and is [possibly] a rearer, what miracle did she expect with this abuse?

Let me guess. The owner had paid a boatload of money for the horse - which had likely been marketed as a top prospect for YR/U25. And by God, they were going to make it into a top prospect, even if they had to beat it into it. .

[endlessclimb]

@Nous

A commentator on another forum stated that it’s actually not physically possible to hit a horse hard with a lunge whip due to the way the lash flexes. I thought about it and possibly they are correct, perhaps the admonition never to use a lunge whip directly on a horse is because the horse will lose respect for it, not that they might be hurt.

Again. Please tell me you’re joking.

Tell that commenter to come over and I’ll show them.

[Djones]

Well, I’d rather choose a short club or axe handle than a lunge whip or a cane pole in a human to human fight. The former are shorter and pack a harder punch. Maybe that’s what was meant.

[SillyHorse]

@Nous

A commentator on another forum stated that it’s actually not physically possible to hit a horse hard with a lunge whip due to the way the lash flexes.

That “commentator” needs to be whipped with a longe whip. Maybe they would learn something.

[endlessclimb]

Gotta stay out of the kick range if you’re going to beat the fire out of something, so the lunge whip is the option that was chosen to prevent the horse from fighting back…

[fivestrideline]

Exactly! Anyone ever played with lunge whips as a kid and caught yourself on the backswing? That sh*t hurts! Sure, you can do more damage and pain with a club, but that doesn’t mean a whip doesn’t hurt.

Even if she never made contact with the horse, such “training” methods don’t work. You can cause a lot of distress to an animal by the threat of a whip alone if done improperly. Which is what was happening in that video.

Jeez. The mental hoop jumping is ridiculous.

[Warmblood1]

The mental leaps are pretty astounding.

Where has it been stated that the horse was a rearer?

[SillyHorse]

@Warmblood1

The mental leaps are pretty astounding.

Where has it been stated that the horse was a rearer?

Here:

@Old_Mac_Donald

The horse is a known rearer.

[Warmblood1]

Right, just wondering if this has been stated in media or from a legitimate source

[Alterration]

@SillyHorse

CD’s actions aside, this is a salient point. If the horse won’t go forward with this rider or pick up his feet high enough, even when being beaten with a whip, and is [possibly] a rearer, what miracle did she expect with this abuse?

Well, I do think that she thought the beating would fix whatever it was, whether it was the rearing or the sullying up that he was doing.

Again, I DO NOT BELIEVE IT IS A GOOD SOLUTION, for those who seem to be confused when anyone expresses anything about it, but it is DEFINITELY one that I have seen trainers employ when a horse will not tolerate a poor ride, but it has to because that’s the way it’s owner rides and it’s owner “needs to succeed” in some fashion (usually the fact that the owner has show goals and is a high $$ client).

[endlessclimb]

Quoting myself here -

Ever heard the old timers talk about being spanked with a switch as a kid? The switch was often off a willow, which is very very bendy/flexy.

I don’t remember hearing an old timer say that didn’t hurt - more about the welts it would leave.

[SillyHorse]

@Alterration

for those who seem to be confused

I don’t think anyone is confused. I know I’m not.

[Alterration]

@SillyHorse

I don’t think anyone is confused. I know I’m not.

I’ve been accused on the other thread of supporting CDJ, when really I was just trying to interpret what I saw on the video so that I could understand how she got there, even though MULTIPLE times, I did not say that it was excusable. So pardon my twitchiness about it.