No you don’t. Just leave it.
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IIRC viney was obnoxious to Fred, who stood A Fine Romance prior to his death, because Fred sometimes bred her TB broodmares to WB stallions. For… reasons… apparently you can’t believe in the TB as a sport horse and also sometimes want to produce foals that are less than 100% TB.
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In his book, GM talks about having breakdowns and periods of crippling anxiety and depression since he was a child, where he would barely leave his room.
I don’t feel one bit of sympathy for him whatsoever - just pointing out that he may not be riding out the storm on some wealthy benefactor’s yacht.
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If he was born in the late thirties, they have a lot more in the way of pharmaceutical help for anxiety and depression than they did when he was a child.
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child marriage “not that bad”
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But…isn’t breeding WBs to TBs like…a thing that is done? I thought that was how you added more blood back into the lines. I know nothing about WBs, to be fair, but I just saw someone breed a TB mare to a WB stallion and take the colt to inspection…
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Apparently if you believe in TBs you only breed TBs. I dunno…
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Yeah, more inbreeding is what the thoroughbred really needs.
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It doesn’t matter how well someone is treated when a slave. What matters is that one is owned.
Honestly, I can’t believe this actually needs explained.
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You know, that things sucked in the past is not logically an argument for returning to things sucking, or even that they didn’t unconscionably suck.
I think you guys are tilting at a rather weak windmill, one you could just as easily go around.
Now the argument that “boys will be boys” (or perps will be perps)-- an argument of the inherent unstoppability of sex crimes, a veritable acceptance of people being victimized by them, AND an purportedly unimpeachable argument for one not having to try and stop this. Those are arguments worth exploding each and every time someone is dumb enough or immoral enough to trot it out.
-signed a professional historian
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Slavery still exists and will never go away sadly.
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Right…someone never watched Aladdin lol
Well, to be fair, AFR was breeding TB for sport, quite thoughtfully, and I don’t think her TBs would at all be fairly subject to the many of the criticisms you could level at race bred TBs.
Viney got pissed off because Fred had really quality TBs and knew what she was doing and Viney thought, therefore, that Fred should only breed TBs if she was also going to tout their quality for sport. As though Viney had any right to dictate Fred’s business or call her a hypocrite for both liking TBs and WB/TB crosses.
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I do, because I wonder what led him to become an ephebophile. A gay boy growing up in a time when the closet door was still very firmly closed… you have to wonder whether he was abused himself when he was a child or a young man. Child abuse (whether mental, physical, or sexual) is far too often the gift that keeps on giving; all too many victims grow up to become abusers themselves. And in that time and place, there would literally have been nowhere a gay boy could have turned to report what was being done to him. Plus, living long enough to see his reputation in the sport and his legacy going down in flames has got to be painful (even if the demotion is well-deserved).
But that doesn’t mean I think GM should be given free rein to abuse others. It’s too late to undo whatever may have been done to him as a child, but it’s not too late to protect today’s’ youths. Who knows how many future GMs we’re saving by getting abusers out of the sport?
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“Show me a hero, and I’ll write you a tragedy.”
”• F. Scott Fitzgerald, “Notebook E”
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and to go even further, because I totally agree there was likely abuse to GM to make him the way he was, who mentored him?
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It is one thing to express your opinion; it is quite another to make statements that (I hope) go against the values COTH itself should be supporting.
I mean, what’s next? Comments that the Nazis’ efforts to establish a superior Aryan race were okay, including those horrible experiments on children because, hey, it could have been worse?
This whole whole thread revolves around actions and statements that the majority of us find socially unacceptable and morally repugnant.
People like Vineyridge, who defend adults having sex with children and say that slavery was a better option for POC, contribute to the mindset that it’s okay to look the other way and let certain atrocities happen. They try to say, “Oh, it wasn’t or isn’t so bad…” providing an out for those who are happy to convince themselves that these issues are not their problems.
This is the time to draw a line and say “no more.” And thankfully, everyone here has basically said that in response to VR’s comments. It would be nice to see the moderators do the same thing.
If nothing else, VR’s ongoing, baseless attacks on Fred go against forum rules. This has been reported for years, and nothing has been done.
Or what about the former COTH forum member who is a POC? She left the COTH forums after the comments VR made about slaves were allowed to stand, along with other inappropriate and offensive comments made by (now banned) posters in support of VR’s comments.
While Safe Sport is focused on sexual abuse, which is the topic of this thread, this discussion is about making this sport safe and supportive for everyone. If we can’t even create this type of environment on the COTH discussion forums, how can we expect to do it elsewhere?
So I beg to differ when others say this particular discussion has nothing to do with George Morris. It has everything to do with that topic! It’s shown that forum members here will stand up for those who have been abused and marginalized even when the platform itself allows such despicable behavior, over and over again.
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George himself writes about having sex with various older people as a minor/young rider, correct me if I’m wrong.
As has been said repeatedly, victims often become abusers.
This isn’t about George, it’s about ending a cycle. George, and those like him, are part of the cycle, and must be removed from sanctioned engagement with the community, because that is all the organization can do. From there, individuals make their own choices with regards to whom they engage.
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Hey, I’m sure it’s not easy being an iconoclast!
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I don’t think that he has as many wealthy benefactors as people imagine. I remember watching (online) the annual USEF/George Morris clinic that was given in Florida and hearing him complain that he had spent the prior evening alone and was unhappy that no one had invited him to dinner.
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