If the USEA didn’t agree they could have told EN to pound sand. They haven’t historically been in the habit of complying when they don’t want to, I don’t see why they would have rolled over and showed their belly when an internet blog sent them letters now. It seems all is not what it appeared, I’ll be interested to see the rest of the story.
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EN themselves said in one of their “articles” on this, that they were frustrated with the slow and bureaucratic response the USEA was giving them sometime mid summer. The USEA could also have just continued politely sending e-mails back and forth, and telling EN that they were looking into the concerns, gathering information, evaluating different ways of addressing these concerns, consulting lawyers about appropriate courses of action, etc etc.
That’s always an option in this sort of scenario.
EN might have gotten really upset, and decided to publish what they published anyways, and go to the broader media… and unflattering coverage would have trickled our to local outlets and the Philly Inquirer (like it did anyway)…
however…
Folks in Area II probably wouldn’t have lost this event.
Instead… according to some reports, someone at the USEA decided it might be most simple to address the concerns raised by EN by just referring to this venue as “P*** Field” going forward.
And thus… here we now are. Because just like words matter to the folks at EN… apparently words matter to the folks on the other side of this issue as well.
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They might have. But that’s total speculation. And we have already learned that there was a lot more going on behind the scenes than we realized. We have also learned that Denis and the USEA both have decided EN is their scapegoat to try to get out of this smelling like daisies when in reality both are covered in the smelly brown stuff just as much as EN. Like I said, I think this goes a lot deeper and is a lot more involved than what we’ve been shown. And in reality I think we need to ask ourselves this- is it time to turn the conversation from blaming EN for starting the conversation to asking ourselves how our national governing body so badly bungled communication with a landowner that they pulled the plug?
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How is “P*** Fields” different from “Plantation Fields”? It’s like the * used with “The F Word”. It reads the same, regardless of spelling it out or using *'s.
The *'s and other symbols were never intended to disguise the words. They were originally used to get around programmed censorship that automatically picks up on the word in social media posts.
Now the *'s seem to be used as a sort of ineffective fig leaf that isn’t supposed to actually cover up anything.
Who was in on this decision being made for an entire eventing community?
Obviously there were a lot more communications going back and forth between the parties than has yet been shared. It’s likely to all come out eventually, in bits and pieces. Maybe at some point someone can assemble a time line of actual communications, once more is known to the public.
I have a feeling that it is all coming out, sooner or later. It might be easier for all of the parties to just put it out there now and get through whatever next firestorm is coming, as soon as possible.
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I certainly agree EN has been made a scapegoat. But… they seem to have continued digging for multiple days now.
Many folks have unflattering things to say about Denis. And if you read the email from Mr. Walker to both he and Rob Burk on September 14… the tone towards Denis is very polite, but definitely not what I would call friendly.
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Yes, you’re right. Telling the landowner that his property will be referred to in that fashion is akin to saying, “the name of your family’s property is such a vile and offensive racist slur that decent people would not utter it aloud.”
And we wonder why he felt so hurt as to terminate the lease?
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From further down the comment string:
Amy Ruth Borun
After all the letters you wrote Lesley and this article you actually say you were just trying to start a discussion?!! That was not part of your letters to the USEA to the USEF or to Denis. You were very clear you wanted something and it wasn’t a discussion
(redacted)
Please publish the letters. I think that’s a fair response to this situation as EN are clearly trying to paint themselves as the good guys here.
Amy Ruth Borun
(redacted) can’t not allowed sadly
Ms. Borun is on the PFEE BOD - which I suspect 99% of you knew, but I had to go find because while I admire eventing greatly, but it’s not my jam.
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The swastika is also, historically a symbol used by many indigenous peoples.
Some of them were “woke” in 1940:
"the swastika design is actually what is usually called the Navajo “whirling log” symbol. It is in no way related to the Nazi swastika. In 1940, in response to Hitler’s regime, the Navajo, Papago, Apache and Hopi people signed a whirling log proclamation. It read, “Because the above ornament, which has been a symbol of friendship among our forefathers for many centuries, has been desecrated recently by another nation of peoples, therefore it is resolved that henceforth from this date on and forever more our tribes renounce the use of the emblem commonly known today as the swastika . . . on our blankets, baskets, art objects, sand paintings and clothing.” Reference: The Swastika Symbol in Navajo Textiles by Dennis J. Aigner.
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This may have been thrashed out in the early pages of this thread (which I have not read completely so I may be going back over old ground), but the connection between EN and USEA is probably a lot closer than many might expect given Jenni Autry’s former role at EN and current role at USEA. There’s a network of people “in charge” of the sport, and EN has worked hard over the years to have influence in that circle.
The way I see it, it should never have been EN’s role to identify a word in the name of an event as a problem and then take up the mantle of righting their perceived wrongness of that word. If a black eventer had a problem with the word, took it to the organizer, and was completely blown off, then it might have been an appropriate time for a psuedo-journalistic entity to get involved.
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[quote="“MorganSercu,post:469,topic:471592”]
From further down the comment string:
Amy Ruth Borun
After all the letters you wrote Lesley and this article you actually say you were just trying to start a discussion?!! That was not part of your letters to the USEA to the USEF or to Denis. You were very clear you wanted something and it wasn’t a discussion
(redacted)
Please publish the letters. I think that’s a fair response to this situation as EN are clearly trying to paint themselves as the good guys here.
Amy Ruth Borun
(redacted) can’t not allowed sadly
Ms. Borun is on the PFEE BOD - which I suspect 99% of you knew, but I had to go find because while I admire eventing greatly, but it’s not my jam.[/QUOTE]
Sorry. I went back to clarify something and it go caught up in spam limbo
I’m enjoying Ghazzu’s signature quote …
“It’s like a Russian nesting doll of train wrecks.”–CaitlinandTheBay
Never more true.
We probably have quite a few more nesting dolls to go.
Each time is like tossing a new handful of fuel on the fire.
I hope that someone, somewhere, has realized that this slow parade of nesting dolls is just keeping the audience glued to the show. It might be better to open them all, and let the audience do their gawking and ranting, tire themselves out over it, start disengaging as they inevitably do, and get it over with sooner.
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She’s now the Managing Director for Eventing with USEF actually. Apparently USEF was looped in on communications that came from EN and Leslie Wylie though, as well as Rob Burk with USEA.
It’s an interesting connection between EN and Jenni Autry for sure though.
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Good catch, thanks.
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Here is the EN article when she got the job.
https://eventingnation.com/jenni-autry-named-usef-managing-director-of-eventing/
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Nancy Jaffer just published this… it’s an interesting read.
Some pretty nice words from Jimmy Wofford about Denis Glaccum are included in it.
http://nancyjaffer.com/its-all-about-the-horses-for-denis-glaccum/
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I disagree that EN was made a scapegoat. They made themselves a “scapegoat” and continue to do so.
I don’t know Denis from Adam, but I doubt VERY much this was all a subtle maneuver/excuse from the landowner to get out from the lease. The landowner could (and did) revoke the lease when he felt like it, and he seems to have felt like it because of the implied insults to his family by EN. If there was bad blood with Denis, he could have done so at any point over the last 20 years. I don’t believe in that level of coincidence.
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Oh - I CERTAINLY agree with you that the landowner wasn’t looking for an out with respect to the lease with Plantation Field Equestrian Events (of which Denis is apparently President). Nope… this clearly seems to be directly a result of the approach taken by multiple folks when it came to concerns about the name of the venue.
I don’t know Denis either personally… but he is described as a quite outspoken personality. I only meant to concede the point that the combination of personalities involved on both sides of this situation was probably a significant contributing factor in terms of how ugly it got.
On a side note… Nancy Jaffer just put out a really nice article on Dennis Glaccum’s LONG history with respect to US Eventing for anyone who is curious. I thought it was a good read, and I would link if I could… but when I tried my post went to that sad unapproved place where posts go to die sometimes…
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https://eventingnation.com/helen-casteel-you-all-literally-cant-see-us/
I don’t want to invalidate any of Helen’s concerns but here is a link to her essay, it’s still there! The header contains links to all of the other essays as well 
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