Oops! Mark Todd cruelty

[endlessclimb]

If it’s a rider problem then he should have put that horse on a lunge line and had him go round and round until the horse was on autopilot about the drop, then added the rider back in.

There’s no. Read it, NO. Excuse to whip the tarnation out of a horse, let alone one you don’t know with a rider you don’t know aboard.

[Bluey]

@subk

This was regrettable and unfortunate. A display of poor horsemanship. But it wasn’t abuse. It you think it was then lucky you that you haven’t seen real abuse up close and personal. If you say it was then you are doing a real disservice to horses that have truly been abused by minimizing their experience with your hyperbolic word choices. The cancel mob always exaggerates.

I regularly see horses in eventing warm-up rings that will suffer more “abuse” by the time the day is over from bad riding and worse equipment choices than what I saw in the few seconds here. And that ends up being consistent on-going abuse that has terrible long term affects. I don’t see the branch being anywhere near as brutal as a dressage whip and it seemed to be breaking up—not a very effective tool. I didn’t see real fear here either. Real fear would not have resulted in a pop into the water a couple canter strides then trotting out. Fear equal flight for horses.

I’ve been involved in eventing now for over 40 years and I have some bad news. The whole “oh you can’t train a horse to jump with pain and fear—it will never truly be effective” trope is false. People do things like this precisely because it works. Full stop. In fact I’ve seen it be quite effective with no lasting problems. Are there better ways? Of course, they take longer.

I don’t and never have trained my horses this way nor do I condone it, but if you were to ask me what kind of situation would this type of “training” be effective—no question it’s dropping into water. It’s on a horse that is capable to the level, knows the job, but just quits as if there is a mental block or a “pony-tune.” There is usually a less than effective rider in the mix.

It’s pressure and release on steroids and it works. The advantages of it are that the horse tends to understand that it isn’t the rider creating the chaos and drama, so it doesn’t necessarily create trust issues. It also is effective because the ground person can keep the horse’s feet moving which goes a long way in preventing the horse from getting stuck or frozen at the top of the drop. With one that is highly resistant to dropping in water often times if you can just get them through the process a few times successfully it can be enough to break the cycle.

A caveat here is that it won’t work for every horse and it does come with risk, but people like Mark Todd can learn more about a horse in a 10 minute warm up than most of us learn in a year. But stop fooling yourself that it doesn’t work.

I despise cancel culture. And I’m sick that this man’s life work over the course of a half a century is being wholly judge by a few seconds on a video clip. Unless the second coming is on COTH none of us here don’t have 15 seconds of behavior in our past that could destroy us if it had been caught on video. The utter lack of grace in our communities is just disgusting. And yes, some of you here who early in the thread posted your same opinions over and over constantly bringing the thread back to the top until it had a life of its own?…Yeah, you’re complicit.

Guess I was lucky in my over half a century, many different riding centers in two continents not to have trained with those that use beating on a horse to train.
Which tells me, if that is not common with this trainer either, it was a bad judgment moment from him, to take his problems and maybe frustration on the situation out on the horse and think , not just a bit of encouragement shaking that limb behind it, poor training as that would have been, but escalating into hitting the horse repeatedly as he did.
That BNT trainer knows the problem there was not when the horse stopped, it was way before they got there that needed addressing, so the horse was not thinking of stopping anywhere.

Guess that, as Grandma used to say, everyone has their moments and he sure did at that time, if that is not how he generally trains, as has been reported, that just a moment of questionable judgment, which most anyone in the horse business recognizes, why this thread.

Reminds me of a teacher that, if we didn’t respond quickly and accurately to his questions, he would pick offending kid out of it’s seat by the ear and drag it to the corner to stand there until told to go back to it’s desk.
Kind of useless to try to teach anything when fear becomes involved, everyone loses focus.

Are there situations with egregious abuse worse than this?
Why does that matter? How much hitting and how forcefully is ok?
How about not going there at all?
When it comes to teaching we have way better ways than forcing the issue with direct punishment if not obeyed, as in that situation.

[Annie_Burton]

@subk

The utter lack of grace in our communities is just disgusting.

Not sure where this community lacks grace? It’s actually been a long thread of many thoughtful, well-written posts, all of which show the care and concern riders feel for their sport.

That the sport includes differing voices is a sign of health and vibrancy. Exchanging those voices is not canceling anything, but… discussing.

The rider Chloe was interviewed on YouTube and comes across as a very level-headed type of person, reflecting on what happened and is happening. She says she never gave consent to have her horse whipped or beaten.

The thing to realize is that if the video were showing NOT Mark Todd, but a random nobody, it would elicit unanimous rejection and disgust. ONLY because it is a person of name and prestige does it split the responses into a wide range of reactions.

Mark is not being canceled. He will continue and be fine. But the ‘normalization’ of forceful methods is being retired, and he has done his share to help with that retirement.

[Jealoushe]

@subk

This was regrettable and unfortunate. A display of poor horsemanship. But it wasn’t abuse. It you think it was then lucky you that you haven’t seen real abuse up close and personal. If you say it was then you are doing a real disservice to horses that have truly been abused by minimizing their experience with your hyperbolic word choices. The cancel mob always exaggerates.

I regularly see horses in eventing warm-up rings that will suffer more “abuse” by the time the day is over from bad riding and worse equipment choices than what I saw in the few seconds here. And that ends up being consistent on-going abuse that has terrible long term affects. I don’t see the branch being anywhere near as brutal as a dressage whip and it seemed to be breaking up—not a very effective tool. I didn’t see real fear here either. Real fear would not have resulted in a pop into the water a couple canter strides then trotting out. Fear equal flight for horses.

I’ve been involved in eventing now for over 40 years and I have some bad news. The whole “oh you can’t train a horse to jump with pain and fear—it will never truly be effective” trope is false. People do things like this precisely because it works. Full stop. In fact I’ve seen it be quite effective with no lasting problems. Are there better ways? Of course, they take longer.

I don’t and never have trained my horses this way nor do I condone it, but if you were to ask me what kind of situation would this type of “training” be effective—no question it’s dropping into water. It’s on a horse that is capable to the level, knows the job, but just quits as if there is a mental block or a “pony-tune.” There is usually a less than effective rider in the mix.

It’s pressure and release on steroids and it works. The advantages of it are that the horse tends to understand that it isn’t the rider creating the chaos and drama, so it doesn’t necessarily create trust issues. It also is effective because the ground person can keep the horse’s feet moving which goes a long way in preventing the horse from getting stuck or frozen at the top of the drop. With one that is highly resistant to dropping in water often times if you can just get them through the process a few times successfully it can be enough to break the cycle.

A caveat here is that it won’t work for every horse and it does come with risk, but people like Mark Todd can learn more about a horse in a 10 minute warm up than most of us learn in a year. But stop fooling yourself that it doesn’t work.

I despise cancel culture. And I’m sick that this man’s life work over the course of a half a century is being wholly judge by a few seconds on a video clip. Unless the second coming is on COTH none of us here don’t have 15 seconds of behavior in our past that could destroy us if it had been caught on video. The utter lack of grace in our communities is just disgusting. And yes, some of you here who early in the thread posted your same opinions over and over constantly bringing the thread back to the top until it had a life of its own?…Yeah, you’re complicit.

Are you reading this thread or reading Facebook comments then coming here to shame us all?

Not one single person in this thread has called for the cancellation of Mark Todd. In fact, many of us have stated how much we loved and admired the man. No one is bashing Toddy. We have been discussing the incident and why it is wrong and how we can prevent these things again in the future and become better horse owners, riders, and trainers because of it.

You may think you are better than all of us because you have sided with Mark Todd and seem to think whipping a horse is an OK method of training, in reality you are showing that you don’t understand horse training, or horsemanship that deeply if you find this incident no big deal.

You can choose to stay in the archaic ways of using force and fear to train your horse or you can educate yourself and grow and realize sometimes its OK to say yeah I admire that person but wow, that was the wrong thing to do and actually, it was abuse. (Hitting an animal to get it to do what you want is abuse. Plain and simple)

[Jealoushe]

@Annie_Burton

The thing to realize is that if the video were showing NOT Mark Todd, but a random nobody, it would elicit unanimous rejection and disgust. ONLY because it is a person of name and prestige does it split the responses into a wide range of reactions.

Mark is not being canceled. He will continue and be fine. But the ‘normalization’ of forceful methods is being retired, and he has done his share to help with that retirement.

[Djones]

I’ve told this story before, but I’m damn glad it’s not on video.

Long bodied QH gelding with a known propensity for going marbles-out when confused (as in 2 riders go that way and 3 go this way, he would go UP and think about it), is loaded into the back stall in a smallish 2H BP Bee slant load and returned to his boarding barn where I also boarded and helped out. This was back in the 90s, when they were undersized (more than they are now).

He would not back out. He couldn’t cypher how to bend his middle just a smidge and get started. I could see him getting more and more worried. and his next option was going to be full blown panic and try to come through the window.

I popped him between the eyes with the flat of my bare hand and he scrambled backwards and off the trailer. Many rubs and pats ensued. I asked him to step his fores back into the trailer with me ahead of him, and he got lots of goodies and pats. I knew this horse inside and out, and he was fine- I told his owners that while they got lucky today, he really was too big for the borrowed trailer. He was at ‘home’ at his boarding barn- and wasn’t hauled again for some time. Next trip was a spacious 3H slant- he went in the middle stall like an angel, and I backed him off a couple of times with lots of love and pats and he was 100% fine. his owners were super nice people but he was the wrong first horse for them- they were lucky he didn’t hurt anyone.

This is not an apples to apples with MT and the stick, but neither is Rosie riding on her baby grey horse. Had anyone captured that time with me on video though, in these days, all of the ‘rest’ around that good horse would have been obliterated by me popping him harmlessly to knock him into gear.

Am I wrong about that?

[pegasusmom]

Was waiting for you to post!

[endlessclimb]

Your story made my blood curdle, not from what you did but the potential for injury. God I hate loony horses and trailers, when you popped him he just as easily could have come forward. I don’t think you were “wrong” but what a risk taken with a screw-loose horse without critical thinking skills.

[Jealoushe]

I don’t think what happens in an emergency situation to save yourself or a horse is at all comparable to what happens in a riding lesson.

[pony_grandma]

Rosie’s schooling youngster. Lovely TY that made my day watching that.

You can see him thinking about it! I used to love this phase of the sport, starting youngsters. Rewarding them and they start enjoying life! Their whole character and personality comes out and the confidence.

[sascha]

@endlessclimb

he just as easily could have come forward

Nope, very unlikely not to have come forward. This is a livestock handling technique that is reasonably basic and very effective. Bulls will back the hell down if you do it just right. And it doesn’t necessarily even need to be a hand, a pop with a cowboy hat or a paper calendar (my favourite device since I always had it at hand for hoof trimming days) will get all 4 feet on the ground and the animal backing up. Now, go and press that hand or hat or calendar into an animal’s forehead and anything could happen and backing up is not likely to be high on the list. A pop will get pretty reliable results of backing up.

@Djones your instinct was good. Don’t beat yourself up and don’t let anyone else beat you up. You were in an emergency situation and instinct helped you get both you and the horse out safely

[endlessclimb]

Can you show me where she’s being beat up?

[stargzng386]

I really think social culture makes a situation like this hard. I am 100% the weenie adult who takes my time with everything. I am very risk averse. My first cross country schooling my horse hadn’t seen any of it and he really wasn’t sure about the tiny tiny bank. Initially he didn’t even want to get near it. I spent my entire ride walking around slowly getting closer and closer. Then over the bank at a walk a bunch of times. Then walking in trotting out…then trotting in…then ending in a canter. It was my entire schooling session and I didn’t jump anything or gallop around a ton but it was SUCH a good ride. I had spurs and a crop and I’m sure could have used them to to get him through both a lot faster…but guess what he’s not afraid of them or me.

The social part is hard because you feel like a dummy walking around while everyone is cantering and having so much fun and going over all the things they can. In a lesson you’re certainly expected to do a lot more but I push back on my trainer. I say sorry no we/I am not ready for that yet…put the height back down or I am just jumping these two not that over there. It’s definitely the longer slower road and it’s hard to feel “left our” or like you’re a “wimp” but ultimately I do this for fun and if it’s not fun it’s not worth it.

I can 100% see this happening in a clinic and was at a clinic with no whipping of the horse by the clinician but the clinician created a stop in a horse that was previously completely fine. The kid was in tears, the horse was terrified and I have no idea if it’ll ever go over a ditch again. The clinician couldn’t fix it and basically said it was a bad horse and dismissed them after literally ruining them. This was a HUGE BNT. The kid did what they were told, the other trainers and moms didn’t say anything and I didn’t say anything because I’m the weenie adult paying to try and learn something as an auditer. It’s HARD to speak up in a group. How many times in this forum do we say mind your own business? What I learned was nothing and I don’t respect that person anymore. No abuse just really poor horsemanship. I don’t agree with this video but 100% can see no one speaking up even though they should have and probably regretted it later.

[Djones]

@endlessclimb

Your story made my blood curdle, not from what you did but the potential for injury. God I hate loony horses and trailers, when you popped him he just as easily could have come forward. I don’t think you were “wrong” but what a risk taken with a screw-loose horse without critical thinking skills.

No, a well-placed surprise POP in his face is going to reliably send one backward. Horses don’t plow forward into plastic bags attacking them on a windy day they scramble away. He was going to ‘sit back’ and in doing so got himself unstuck (Left fore pushing his right hip into the corner). Break that log jam and he’s loose.

I am going to assume MT has observed this horse and rider long enough to think oh FFS, go forward.

[Djones]

@endlessclimb

Can you show me where she’s being beat up?

Whom are you addressing?

[Jealoushe]

@Djones

I am going to assume MT has observed this horse and rider long enough to think oh FFS, go forward.

Yes, but the appropriate response is not, let me get a branch off a tree and proceed the whip the hell out of the horses legs. That’s the entire basis of this thread. Frustration and violence shouldn’t be part of regular training.

I do understand that sometimes in an emergency you might need to do things differently, for good reason.

[Djones]

well, again - I don’t see the level of ‘violence’ and ‘whipping’ that YOU see. We are quite literally interpreting the same situation through different lenses of experience. Is this his best day and an ideal day? of course it isn’t. Is it any given Monday? of course not.

Should he be losing his license and positions over this event?

[endlessclimb]

I must have worked with some strange ones because both aggressive and screwy horses do NOT respond the way you’d think when pressure is applied. Just my experience.

[Djones]

Maybe so. My background is in stock horses of all stripes, this was an Impressive-bred gelding I’d known for a number of years- I knew him well. I have little cumulative experience with TBs, WBs, etc -

Would I do it with an unknown variable? No- for a couple of reasons- at my age now I don’t put myself in harm’s way to the same degree I did as a younger person and secondly, I’m not stepping into stranger’s business. I knew this horse and these people- I was the least likely to get hurt. Left to their own devices, I don’t know what would have happened (other than I’m sure those legs were coming through that tiny ass window).

[fargaloo1]

Thanks for the great discussion.

I’ve lost the post I wanted to quote, but I think the flip side of “riders need to stand up to trainers” is “trainers need to stand up to riders”. The rider in this video was not ready to do the bigger bank ON THIS HORSE. Not all of us can ride like Rosie Napravnik (I wish!!) but you can see how her rock-solid, quiet ride allows her green horse to build confidence with every single fence.

I really respect a clinician who is willing to tell a frustrated rider, “You aren’t ready to tackle this question. I know this was your goal for the clinic, but you need to be realistic about your goals. Let’s break this down into something doable and call it a day.” They run the risk of negative reviews (“I paid all this money and learned NOTHING!!”), which of course, can have negative consequences for them, but I respect that attitude.