I think five minutes at the track or a sale would probably adjust your viewpoint.
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Um, yeah, no. BTDT, checked it off.
NO horse’s life is worth more than the human handling it. Not one. Not a single one.
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Where do they get those skills? By getting injured on their way “up” the ranks. Survivors only!
I am not mean, nor nasty. I have seen some really awful things because of this stupid “horses are more valuable, don’t let go” mindset.
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I don’t know about the show world, but in the racehorse world, if it comes to it, you let go. The only time I saw a handler get yelled at for it, the handler did something foolish to cause the situation to happen. But a legitimate freak out by the horse? No, even if it is a Kentucky Derby winner, you let go.
Most of the more fractious horses get handled by the more experienced workers/grooms because they do have more skill to not allow a situation to escalate to the point where they would need to make that decision but that doesn’t mean letting go is a fire-able offense across the board.
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Just as a note on this - the higher end barns at Fairhill do offer health benefits, time off, and shift work. It isn’t quite the same as the rest of the world but every other Sunday off, health benefits, and they trade off who does the night feeding so one person or one group is not doing it all the time. Everyone shows up bright and early to feed/clean stalls/train horses, potentially help set up dinner. Then one or two people come back in the evening to check and feed.
Not all barns offer health benefits but the high end trainers like Graham Motion offer (or have in the past) health benefits.
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Who installs the ground manners?
More importantly, who daily reinforces them so they aren’t unlearned?
.
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Exactly. Some people (g) have some skewed ethics if they think otherwise. (Worker’s comp rules - WSIB here - would also not agree) Plus, a 1000lbs+ animal is going to win over even a large man. Most people won’t be able to hang onto a horse who is in complete blind panic mode. I’m not talking about a normal spook/silly behaviour. Maybe another example of how the horse business thinks they are above everything in terms of usual business regulations and ethics?
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Or/additionally; determining who that criminal is, to remove them, has no nationality or skin color.
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Seriously? Up to a point yes but I would never expect anyone groom or otherwise to hang onto the end of a rope and be seriously injured or worse. I dont care if it’s Secretariat on the other end. Sometimes you have to let go.
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Most of it you’re supposed to have a license to operate it. My husband has a forklift license, and there are others for various grades.
Of course a lot of times at farms etc people just get on and go and don’t have the appropriate testing to operate it correctly.
But just because they don’t have the training or skills to do that doesn’t make it unskilled…
Much different from cleaning stalls etc , “even a caveman could do it”’
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Restaurants, landscaping, picking vegetables, shrimping, concrete work, roofing, barns, etc … anywhere there’s a largely unseen, unacknowledged labor force we collectively pretend isn’t there.
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Human beings are irreplaceable too
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Apparently, a human life is worth less than whatever price tag we hang on glorified farm animals.
Can’t say I agree.
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Certainly you can see their point?
Mothers didn’t have to pluck their kids after dunking them
*CAVEAT Trying to not get this shutdown but:
A friend sent me a Rachel Madow broadcast where BRICS was scorned because Spain was involved & would suffer “100% tariffs” as a result.
BRICS is composed of:
Brazil
Russia
India
China
South Africa
If this sort of ignorance is allowed to be spewed & stand uncorrected, why trust that this latest ICE action is being managed in an effective manner?
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I’ve personally known of, or been involved in 2 instances where Let Go would have been the better option.
#1-woman leading her horse, on her property, with one hand - lead wrapped on that hand - her 2yo kid on the other.
Horse bolted, dragged her down her driveway, resulting in a head injury that killed her on the spot.
#2-Me
Leading a mini stud while wearing fuzzy gloves.
Stud bolts, I try to let go, but nylon lead & fuzzy gloves are velcroed together 
So I’m dragged, across a gravel parking lot, until I can get the glove off.
Aside from glasses damaged & a pocket in the barncoat shredded, we both survive.
Stud ran back to the sale barn… Where he was recaptured while mounting one of the mini mares in the lot he came with 
I suffered the notoriety of being recognized at the local feedstore as “the woman who got drug” 
I’ll repeat:
NO HORSE IS WORTH MORE THAN A HUMAN LIFE
Worth in millions included.
Period.
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Amen. But the attitude that “the barn worker’s life (and health, even though they have no insurance) is worth less than the expensive horse” is a very common one I’ve seen at many barns, especially fancy show barns. And that’s yet another reason why people often don’t want to work with horses as barn workers if they have other options. Hell, if you drop a tray of fries at McDonald’s, you might get yelled at, but you won’t get fired, and even the worst manager isn’t going to tell you to risk your life to get the Big Mac to the customer on time.
I think I read on this forum (or someone told me) a long while back, that there was an older re-rider with a horse who bolted when she was leading him, and she refused to let go, damaging her hand pretty severely. What was shocking was that the entire barn area was fenced in, and the horse literally had nowhere to go (he dragged her to his stall where there was food). If she’d let go, she wouldn’t have had an injury and the horse would be fine.
I haven’t worked in the racing industry, but I’ve also (anecdotally) hear that racing barns tend to be much better than show barns about protecting barn workers, giving them breaks, making sure they have meals. The work is hard as hell and is early, for sure, but it’s treated like a job versus something you’re supposed to sacrifice your life for to “pay your dues.”
I didn’t listen to The Plaidcast, and I’m not disparaging any rider who started out as a groom, but even in those instances, individuals don’t come “from nothing.” At minimum, they must have parents or a spouse who can provide support for them to work as a groom, which does not pay a living wage, and they must have had parents or other means to pay for riding lessons and exposure to horses to get the necessary riding skills. Maybe long, long ago, the learn-by-the-seat-of-your-pants to ride and become a horseman model was possible, but not within the last 20-30 years, I’d wager.
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It’s worth a listen, if just to hear how little traditional help that person had to get where she is now.
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I kind of think at times we get into a fear mode and we just don’t function properly. I can’t count the numbers of times I’ve fallen off a horse over the years (sad statement now that I think about it!) where I hung on dearly to the reins when in hindsight I should have let go. Even in an enclosed arena. I feel like I just wasn’t thinking properly and held on for dear life. Now with leading a fractious horse, I’m pretty quick to release them. 
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Guilty of this, totally guilty of this. My shoulder finds my habit of not letting go to be quite annoying.
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