What?
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Ok, spill.
This is about transparency.
I find myself wondering about GMs childhood and any or none military background.
Fairfield County, Ct is the religious/WASP crossroads of the NE. Bedroom community, Country Club central. Horses, polo, fox hunting, golf, tennis, sailing
No, there’s never an excuse but a very young homosexual abused by an elder hero may see this as a Normal behavior and thus incorporate this as an accepted ongoing method of approach or lifestyle.
We live what we learn…
Yes I’m reeling from today’s news of Daniel Mullen, Secretariat’s Asst trainer .
Has produced and created a mass of child porn that filled his storage unit
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Friends at that page are receiving vile posts to their personal pages, which show on my newsfeed
Like what?
Whom is receiving these posts? Everyone on the page or just those whom have voiced opinions?
Putting a child molester in charge of children is like letting the alcoholic bar tend. Paraphilias are like being straight, gay, or bi… it’s just what they’re attracted to, and THAT isn’t going to change. I suppose they could go the chemical or physical castration route, but even then, it’s not guaranteed to work. Look up Wayne Drummond. He was released from prison after being attacked and castrated, he got out and raped 2 women.
Like BigMama1 said, if it’s about keeping kids safe, I don’t think SS should take chances.
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being attracted to children is like any other attraction.
some like breasts, some like legs, eyes, etc. Some like children. What turns you on, turns you on. You really can’t change that.
A drug or alcohol issue can be treated or overcome through counseling and yes, choice. Sexual attraction to children, not so much.
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OK, thanks everyone for your responses.
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“The kids they hurt are as important to our sport as they are.”
@poltroon I agree with your sentiment, but I would change this to “The kids they hurt are MORE important to our sport than they are”
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@Crashing Boar
“Doesn’t mean I project my experience onto everyone I meet, public or private. Maybe y’all ought to hang your own abuse on the people who DID it, instead of projecting it onto George?”
unless, of course, George was your abuser
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I can separate that he has contributed a lot to the sport from that of which he is accused. I can not understand allowing someone to berate, belittle and throw stuff at you because he is amazing at what he does (and pay for it).
Above is quote from Pennywell Bay. I once witnessed a fairly bnt yell and throw a coke can at a student in the schooling ring. The mom was standng right there. That trainer did many other things widely known, including verbally and physically abuse his then girlfriend who had bruises. I still don’t understand why that mom let her daughter continue riding with that trainer, but, it is indicative of a lot we are discussing on this important thread. Why, and why pay for it? [HR][/HR]
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You “personally know that one of the banned trainers is innocent”. Logically, personal knowledge of a violation having occurred would mean that is conceivable that you could personally know that someone was guilty, but on a purely logical basis, how could you know for certain that no violation ever occurred? Unless you are a conjoined twin, perhaps.
In the same vein, please explain how a video surveillance tape could could conceivably “exonerate” someone. If you have a video of a BNT not abusing a child, that does not prove he at no other time abused a child.
I don’t care if you need to make up a completely hypothetical scenario, just explain to me how the existence of a surveillance video could possibly “exonerate” a wrongly accused trainer.
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Motion detector installed in their penis at birth?
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It is entirely possible IF a person is banned by Safe Sport for past criminal behavior where guilt was found after a court trial. If there had been video surveillance cameras in the place where the abuse was supposed to have happened AND if that footage was not made available to the defense for use in the trial AND if the footage refuted a witness’s testimony about the time and place (not so much actual abuse), then there was a miscarriage of justice. They do happen, as the Innocence Project has shown. Since Safe Sport bans for criminal convictions, it would be the same miscarriage of justice now as it was then.
I find this statement abhorrent-- If you have a video of a BNT not abusing a child, that does not prove he at no other time abused a child.
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I have followed and occasionally commented on this and a couple of other threads related to Safesport. When I was a junior rider, I was taken advantage of by a much older male trainer. I don’t use the word victim because, luckily for me, I don’t feel like a victim today. However, there were a number of girls younger than I was who were very and truly victimized by this man at that same time and over a number of years. Back then I heard rumors but now, I know a number of them and have heard their stories first hand. When the investigation into this person began, I heard via text messages and phone calls from people I knew asking if I had been contacted by Safesport, a couple even suggesting I refuse to speak to them. My answer to them was, that while I have no need to go back there, I owe this individual nothing and would not lie to protect him. Safesport called and I told them the truth as I knew it but refused to be a witness. I was OK through all of that.
All was fine for me until the firestorm on social media following RG’s suicide. The backlash and victim blaming made me physically ill. My response was to call Safesport and agree to be a witness, not for me but for the others. The reason serial child molesters get away with it for decades is because of how very good they are at seeming like such a good person. Everyone thinks they are wonderful, sometimes even the parents of their victims. They are very good at what they do including grooming not just their victims but also their families. This despicable victim shaming combined with my finding out just how unbelievably vile the person I thought I knew turned out to be sent me spiraling downward. How could I not have seen how truly evil this man was? Why didn’t I accuse him of rape? I thought that because I was underage and didn’t give consent I should have said something, then maybe I might have prevented his abuse of these younger girls. I felt tremendously guilty and responsible for what happened to them. That’s a lot of responsibility for me as a middle aged woman to project backwards onto my teenage self back then. Fortunately for me, I was able to recognize that and let it go.
There are many victims out there and on this board who are victims of this man and others.
For those who want to characterize this thread or the others as an angry mob, either you haven’t read through the entire thread or you are willfully misrepresenting the conversations taking place here. Many different points of view have been expressed and many polite and informative exchanges have taken place. Not all have been perfectly polite, we are human and none of us is perfect. To those who have not bothered to educate themselves about how Safesport actually works and come on here with an ax to grind, don’t be surprised if you get an intense negative response. Educated and reasonable questions have been welcomed and engaged as long as those questions haven’t already been addressed multiple times on this thread already.
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People are not “exonerated” in criminal or civil
courts; they may be found “not guilty” or “not liable”, respectively, which means that the prosecution did not meet its burden of proof to establish that they were “guilty” or “liable”. In OJs case, he was found “not guilty” of criminal charges of murder but liable in civil charges of wrongful death. In criminal courts, you are “presumed” innocent ex ante, but that basically means that the prosecution has the burden of proof to establish you did it (as opposed to the accused having the burden of proof to establish that he did not do it). Ex post, you may be found not guilty, but that is not the same thing as the court proclaiming that you are innocent.
SafeSport does not have the power to ban based on their assessment of risk. They have the burden of proof to establish by a preponderance of the evidence that you actually committed a violation. They can give you an interim suspension based on their assessment of current risk, but that is not a ban.
Are you pretending ignorance to make your points, or are you genuinely that ill-informed about how SafeSport works?
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Of the 20 or so people banned in equestrian, about three-quarters are listed as “criminal disposition” which means a charge of sexual abuse in criminal court which resulted in something other than acquittal. Only about four of the bans are from SafeSport investigations.
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I can see that you might have video evidence that says he was wrongly convicted in court on the basis of a specific incident, but I still don’t see how a videotape could establish that he never abused a child, ever. It’s the difference between BNT being innocent wrt a specific incident vs, being innocent of any abuse, ever.
The poster did not identify the trainer she knows to be innocent, so how do we know if it was a ban by “criminal disposition” vs a SafeSport investigation? Yes, SafeSport issues bans based on criminal convictions, but if the miscarriage of justice was in the criminal courts, I don’t see why SafeSport should be blamed.
Are you saying that SafeSport should not ban people via criminal disposition because the criminsal justice system sometimes wrongly convicts?
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Are there any former ruler- wielding nuns who could address Figment’s question?
Way back in the day, circa 1959, I had some lessons while being ponied with my instructor right by my side ( I did have reins - two of them in fact). Whether from frustration or concern for the horse or both, whenever my hands assumed the piano hand position she would rap my knuckles with her crop - not all that very hard -just a bap-bap. Miss B didn’t call them piano hands. She called them “the course hands of a scrubbing woman using a washing board”. Then, I was a shy, timid child and certainly not accustomed to corrections of a physical nature, but I knew her actions stemmed from a deep concern that I got it right. Whether or not an other method would have been more effective? As an ingenue, how was I to know?
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I have wrestled with myself over the last three days over posting this because it is deeply personal, but if I can help even one person understand WHY someone didn’t report, didn’t come forward, defends the abuser or why someone in this situation isn’t capable of consent, regardless of the age, I guess it is worth it.
I grew up in a deeply dysfunctional, alcoholic, abusive home; the youngest child in a large family.
I survived because I had a wonderful “village” of older siblings, friends, teachers and neighbors who accepted me showing up on their doorsteps without invitation or notice, who gave me safe places to stay and who nurtured me.
Many years later, when asked why I didn’t tell them how bad things got; my answer was - I thought that was the deal.
Because everyone, even the wonderful people who supported me and sheltered me, asked the question in the same way: “Things aren’t too bad at home, right?” Making it clear that the expected and desired answer was “Yeah, it’s okay. I’m fine.” From that, I intuited (I still believe correctly) that the social contract was that they would provide help and comfort if they didn’t have to hear or be responsible for the gory details. NO ONE wanted to hear the details when I was a minor child, because then they would have had a duty to act and decisions to make.
The first time I told anyone exactly how bad it was was the first time someone asked who was actually open to hearing an answer other than “It’s fine, I’m coping, it’s a little crazy but I’m okay.” I was in my late 20s and seeing a good therapist when that happened.
So with that dynamic in mind, put yourself in the shoes of a teen aged working student, asked how things are going at _______barn, Hunterdon or dozens of others. Imagine that at the same time, you’re being told how lucky you are, what an incredible opportunity this is, and “Everything’s going great, RIGHT?” Even if you had the vocabulary to describe what’s happening, given that conversational opening, are you going to say “The riding’s great, but the trainer is creepy and I don’t know how to get out this situation?” Of course not. And every time someone tells you how great it is and how lucky you are, the less able you are to respond with anything other than what they want to hear.
My father was brilliant, charismatic and charming.
He was also angry, alcoholic,abusive and a master of casual, offhand cruelty. .
The entire household ran on keeping my father happy/not making him angry.
He didn’t like children.
So we all craved his attention and approval and clamored to get it; more so because it was exceedingly rare.
(I’m going to pause there for a moment and let you think how closely that parallels the situation of a working student with a BNT.)
My father played a game with us when we were small. It was called “teaching us to box.” It involved teaching us some punching techniques, and while you were focused on his hands, he would sweep his leg and knock you off your feet, after which he would pretend surprise and tell you that you had tripped.
We played this “game”, getting tripped over and over again; until he got tired of it. Not us, him. We never got tired of trying to win a moment of his approval.
No one called it abuse, we called it playing with Dad. No one said we didn’t want to play, because OMG, he was paying attention to us and we all wanted to bask in the glow of that paternal favor for a little while.
I kept playing long after I realized that he was tripping me, long after I learned to watch for the sweeping leg, because we were supposed to keep Dad happy. And getting tripped over and over again was so, so, so much better than Dad angry.
(Do you need another break to apply this to the abusive relationship between teenage working student and BNT?)
But here’s the real pathology. I was in my mid twenties, living on my own. I was home for a holiday. One of my siblings had small children, my eldest sister was pregnant with her first child.
My father was teaching his two grandsons “how to box.” And I could see the looks on their faces as they kept getting tripped, saw their confusion as they’d get up and try again. And I saw them look towards the other adults for guidance and they received only approval and encouragement to keep playing.
The pregnant sister asked where Dad was, and I reported that Dad was playing with the grand kids. Like that was happy news.
Pregnant sister watched the “game” for a few minutes then had a totally inexplicable meltdown, cursed my father and left the house. The rest of the family concluded she was overly emotional and that pregnancy hormones had gotten the best of her.
(No, of course not. She saw the situation clearly because she had been away from home the longest and was pregnant. So she called a spade a spade, child abuse child abuse, swore to never let her child be around our father and left.)
It was many years later, again with a gifted therapist, that I was able to recognize that it was child abuse, not “Dad being Dad” or “Dad playing with the grandkids.” and that it was not okay just because there wasn’t lasting physical harm.
Because when you are raised in a culture of that being normal, accepted and encouraged, it takes you a long time away from that culture to recognize it for what it is.
Now, think of that story in terms of a kid who went to be a working student for a BNT in the 70s, and stayed inside the tiny, incestuous, toxic culture that is horse sport at the upper levels. And never had a gifted therapist. Does that kid ever truly learn that abuse is NOT normal and accepted? That it’s not just “Dad being Dad” or “George being George” or “Dad playing with the grandkids?” Or that you shouldn’t just suck it up and accept it because it keeps the authority figure happy and nobody actually got, you know, hurt?
Any more questions on why people don’t report or don’t report for years afterward? Or why someone can defend an abuser? And why consent isn’t the issue?
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