The question still stands, in a broader sense. Saying (g) you never accepted him to begin with is dodging the premise of the question.
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Good! We don’t need people with your mindset in USEF. MOLESTATION IS NEVER EVER THE FAULT OF A CHILD.
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Parents need to take note of trainers and “professionals” on here and FB that do not support SS and move on to a trainer that does.
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THIS x 1000.
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del
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I know I’m preaching to the choir when I say the loud voceriforous minority will never ever reject these predators regardless.
I could care less about George specifically overturning his ban because many people know who and what he is, and have for more than my lifetime. It is sickening, but a known known.
My primary concern is what overturning his ban says to current victims and frankly to other sexual predators operating in sport today.
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You SAW GM molest an underage person at a clinic (with others present as well, I presume) and no one reported that molestation to the authorities?
Assuming this is true… if there is a fact scenario that demonstrates why the USEF needs safe sport, here it is.
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No, it’s not. You are insisting we ignore everything he’s done over the past 60 years and only consider the SafeSport opinion. No one exists in a vacuum. Everything a person does over his or her lifetime builds the reputation. People do stupid things, mean things, when they are young (and stupid and mean), but some of them grow up and accept responsibility for their behavior and apologize and make amends. George Morris is the epitome of arrogance.
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No she isn’t. She was asking, in general, not necessarily in this specific case, if (g) we would be willing to welcome someone back into respected society if a ban was lifted due to the accusations being false. As in, the sexual abuse did not actually occur and a mistake was made.
In regards to GM, a lot of people say they didn’t really like him much to begin with. For the ones that DID like him, but are now unsure because of this ban, would they be able to view him the same as they did before if by some chance the accusations turn out to be untrue? Obviously, that bit is not directed at anyone that never wanted anything to do with him to begin with.
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Fifty years ago (literally) my sister and I were showing our ponies at North Shore. We were schooling on the outside course the day before the show. Schooling was going on in a small jumper ring right next to us. George (who was just beginning to be George at the time) was working with a teenage girl I knew. She was 16. He repeatedly, and in a very loud voice, called her a c**t. My father who was there with us was shocked and outraged.
He marched over to the show office and demanded that GM be removed from the showgrounds. The officials told him that wasn’t possible. To try to placate him, they said they would make George come to the office and apologize to him. My father said, “I don’t want him to apologize to me. He needs to apologize to that poor girl.” Which GM was duly made to do.
Did anything about his behavior change after that? Nope. If anything it only got worse. Fifty years…
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I went to a clinic of his as a groom for a friend and he spent the entire time ridiculing the riders, making little nasty comments to the audience like “idiot,” and “no surprise there” when riders messed up. He set up a challenging combination and would not let one rider try it, saying loudly, “you’ll never make it through.” So I guess he was on his best behavior.
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Totally Agree! Back as far as the 80s when I started riding hunters I did not understand why anyone would pay this man, or any trainer, to verbally and emotionally abuse them. I went to the same shows in NJ he was at, watched a clinic he did, only once,yes before people videoed everyone’s every move, . The man was awful to some. He seemed to have a sense of which riders who could get away with abusing.
A trainer I rode with would travel with him on horse buying trip to Europe and watch him pick up Very young boys. Yes, here say but this trainer didn’t spread it all around.
I just don’t understand why we humans don’t want to believe our idols, as talented as they may be, can be just as lousy as human beings, horse trainer, celebrity , etc.
First hand experience, I lived with a very handsome, charming man in the 90s that everyone liked. Obviously, so did I. He turned out to be into child pornography! I found the most disgusting pictures on his computer totally by accident. For 2 years I asked a therapist, How did I not know??? I was told, because people like him a Very, Very good at hiding that part of themselves.
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I think the push back will cause details to come out and then those who are in support of GM are going to feel really stupid and awful when they see what the actual stories are. Careful what you wish for.
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I’m not because:
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Based on everything I’ve learned about the SafeSport process, plus the statistics showing the very small percentage of cases that actually lead to a significant sanction, I have faith in the process and confidence that any sanctions that are imposed are well deserved.
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Everything I’ve read about the appeals process makes me doubt the “justice” of an overturned sanction. For example, remember the guy whose appeal was granted because none of the witness would testify before the arbitrators? The witnesses were involved in a civil suit against the coach and their attorney advised them to not testify at the appeal. Several other cases were discussed on the Rob Gage thread where the individual may have won his appeal, but the appeal did nothing to convince me that the individual had not done what he was accused of doing.
Point 1: See above. I disagree that a successful appeal necessarily means that the claims weren’t justified.
Point 2: A SS suspension may cause embarrassment and lead some people to avoid the individual, but I think we have ample evidence that people can still have successful equestrian careers even with lifetime bans from USEF. So I doubt that a brief SS suspension that was subsequently overturned is going to have any lasting impacts on a person’s career.
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I think COTH should delete those posts personally.
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I’ve thought a great deal since this all came out, because I remember growing up as a horse-crazy girl reading George Morris’ Practical Horseman jumping clinic columns. I was a chubby, not very athletic horse lover at the time, and I remember simultaneously combing the columns for advice but also flinching every now and then about weight-related comments. Ditto in Morris’ books, which often had disparaging comments about women riders as well as weight-related comments.
I wasn’t able to ride at a very high level as a child, and didn’t ride again until I was in my late thirties. Like many adults learning to ride (and I don’t even consider myself a rerider, given my earlier experiences were so inconsistent), I struggled, and my early instruction wasn’t very good. I put up with a great deal of verbal abuse that I would never have accepted in other contexts, and I must admit that the widespread knowledge of Morris’ very harsh coaching style was part of this. I wanted to ride, and just assumed that was part of the deal. I didn’t progress until I found a coach who had a sense of humor about my mistakes, and could be critical without judging me as a human being.
I did watch Morris’ filmed clinics and admit I learned from them. But as others have commented, in those later incarnations of his training he was often much less harsh–I was assured by some people he’d mellowed, although in retrospect it may just have been the presence of a camera. I also read his autobiography, and between the interesting anecdotes about equestrian life in the past, there were all sorts of stories that sickened me (there was one about a girl in a sweater Morris thought she was too proud of, and forced her to roll in the dirt as punishment, as well as a thumbtacks-on-the-saddle incident that’s actually on video). When I discussed them with other horse people, though (I remember specifically saying that I would walk out of any clinic of someone who told me to roll in dirt), I was always told that I was being a weenie and that was “just George.”
I’d heard comments about Morris liking younger men, but I’d always assumed (naively, perhaps in retrospect) that meant he liked twentysomething and thirtysomething men.
Regardless, the fact that Morris has had such a revered place–even had his own action figure and countless memes circulating about, as well as clinics and various arenas and buildings with his name emblazoned upon him–despite all of these questionable behaviors says a great deal about the cult of personality that exists within our sport. And it isn’t a very pretty picture.
Horses have given so much to me as person, and I hope this isn’t too dramatic to say, but they’ve saved my life many times over, and it’s sickening that the industry has caused so many people such terrible physical and psychological damage when they were simply seeking the same kind of joy, or a decent profession doing what they’ve loved.
I’m so grateful for the sanity of the discussion on these forums.
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Or not. Plenty of studies show that people will just reject dissonant evidence rather than change their minds/admit they were wrong. They’ll just say “fake news” and continue on with their lives.
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maybe he isn’t thinking the best since he has been sick…
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Guessing “correcting” this young boys position at a clinic 40 years ago was seen by others as well and Danny Boy was a minor or at the very most older teen at the time following the example set by Adults. Society/culture at the time was guilty in preferring to ignore such things and not discussing such things with their children or teaching them what to do. Wouldn’t be so hard on DB. Who would they report it to back then? What would the consequences have been in DBs personal life even without social media? We didn’t ask our parents about such things let alone go public.
As a young 20 something I was groped by my trainer, told a few people and was blown off, told I was exaggerating and even told to take it as a compliment. Nobody cared to know.
Do agree this is very much why we need SS, to be better parents when it comes to unpleasant topics and not be afraid to involve SS.
Something that has bothered me is GMs alleged statement if he gets taken down, he’s taking others with him. Is that really a quote? Is so, it’s a threat.
Happened to notice on the AM news, on the headline crawl running on the bottom of the screen referenced the class action lawsuit against the Boy Scouts, accusations from every state over decades.
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