What in the world was she wanting the horse to do? The clip I saw was just a few seconds along the wall and it was obviously the mildest portion. I am also wondering why the rider allowed this to happen while she was riding?
I have accidentally whipped myself a time or two over the years and it is extremely unpleasant…
It means drugging them and torturing them and being allowed to compete like that! Truly disgusting, at least cowgirl up if you want to torture them don’t drug them that’s an unfair fight.
How about a boxer throwing a punch at a drugged out boxer??
Sorry for the late response.
Some of those whose horses go to killbuyers do so for economical reasons.
Sale brings money, euth costs.
In theory, I agree with your point & would move Heaven & Earth to euth any of mine I couldn’t sell, re-home or keep.
But I couldn’t fault a friend who sent her 5yo homebred mare to auction when a lameness made her unusable. She had mare’s sire at home, gelded & retired & was in financial need at the time.
Would I have done the same?
I’d hope not, but having not walked in her shoes…
Well, I agree - as I said, if this is a typical training incident, it’s not good at all.
But, judging how hard horses bite and kick each other, or even how hard they bite themselves when they have a fly bite - I don’t think this is probably very painful. I think it’s stressful, though, and that is a form of abuse as well.
I’m curious as well. I have no idea what the goal was, although the videographer was laughing so she thought it was funny.
Whips are an incredibly powerful tool. I’m actually only comfortable using them as a way of creating ‘MY’ space when the horses are loose (as mentioned above I fed them loose, but need them to respect me, the old pony, and just in general understand the command ‘go to your tub’). Once the halter is on, that is a different form of communication.
A whip is a driving command, the horse has to be able to move away from it. Otherwise, yes it is abuse or at least a serious failure of communication: all pressure and no release.
Interestingly, my older one I have to be very, very careful with. At some point, he got the ‘crank and spank’ treatment (or its equivalent for a working draft). I can not drive him in harness and touch him with a whip. He explodes with deadly accuracy with the hind feet. (I have permanent hip damage from him). I also tried lunging him. Once. Oddly enough, 2000 lbs of horse charging me when I touched him with a whip has cured me of ever trying that. I actually dropped the line and jumped the fence. Some horses are not looking for saint hood by tolerating humans!
But, I can use the whip as a pointer/space creator. I just have to ask first. And he must be able to move away freely. Interesting horse. I always say he has an understanding of ‘justice’. He has taught me alot!
On the dressage thread,and elsewhere, it’s claimed that the horse was chrnoically not forward and needed more “jump” at the collected canter preparation for canter piourettes. So CDJ was really pushing it.
Problem is, the rider had a death grip on the horse so he was being told FORWARD!!! and STOP!!! at the same time. The horse, understandably, became upset.
ETA in my own experience, I usually carried a dressage whip when riding Feronia, and did use it occasionally. And at least once, my trainer trailed a longe whip behind Feronia to get some “forward” when I was trying to figure something out and needed to not have to worry about “forward” .
Lola is very sensitive and basically never needed a whip when longeing. If another horse was being lunged while I was riding her, and the longe whip was cracked, she’d scoot a little and get very nervous. Her show barn longe training was “get out on that circle and TROT FAST NOW!” She did not know how to walk on the longe at all, and it took a while to detune her so longeing was not stressful to her.
I always had a whip at hand when I was driving my ponies, but I hardly used it in its intended purpose. I’d flick a fly off a butt, scratch my back, scratch the horse’s back, and wave it at charging dogs. Occasionally I’d use it to enforce a forward command, but that was a tap on the barrel. When I started driving trainers’ minis, I was constantly told I wasn’t heavy handed enough with the whip. I’d certainly rather be too light than too heavy.
My daughter and I went whip shopping together when she was about ten. This resulted in us running all around the store, whipping each other. We were hitting on clothing and just having fun, but we got some stares.
Rebecca
One day long ago I went into my local rather good tack shop to buy a jumping whip. I stood there and hit my shins with each and every whip there and bought the one that hurt the least and made the loudest noise.
Now when I ride with a regular crop I find I get a MUCH BETTER response to the whip if I use it to hit my own lower leg. I do occasionally hit the horse as a reminder that yes, I DO have a whip, but the horses always suck back instead of increasing the drive from their hind ends. If I want the horse to go forward with more impulse I hit my half chap on the correct side and at the correct time in the horse’s stride.
If the horse does not respond to me hitting my half chap with the whip then I reach back and TAP lightly (not hit) the top of the horse’s croup on the side that needs more drive when the croup is at its highest, just before the horse starts pushing with that leg. I repeat as needed, and usually by the third repetition my leg aids are enough to keep the horse’s impulse going.
My first reaction was that this video did not show anything more extreme than a rider/trainer losing their patience. Then, I thought about the context and felt that it actually was abuse. This horse is under an incredible amount of pressure. He is in top form, working at the top level of his sport. He is extremely vulnerable to ulcers, injury, frustration, and stress. His life is controlled by people under a lot of performance stress. Under that context, harassing, aggravating, or confusing a top equine athlete is abuse. The training method to get him to refine how he’s moving his legs is not standard. The possible repercussions could be enough to cause physical stress to a horse that already being asked to perform complicated movements precisely and in such a way that his weight is being carried in an unnatural way (more weight shifted to his hind end). Only a top athlete can perform at this level and sustain it without injury. Dressage is based on war horses but the physicality of the actual movements at his level are more akin to a ballet dancer.
I agree. Emotional abuse can be just as damaging and I imagined this being my coach - or imagine a gymnast, swimmer, etc. How would it feel then?
Honestly though - I would not be surprised if other top coaches employed punitive methods like this in their top athletes - especially young athletes. It was easy for me to imagine a coach (again let’s use gymnastics) asking for one athlete to perform while the others watched and give correction after correction as a lesson.
(I hope this doesn’t happen, but come on - haven’t we always known a coach that might do something like that )
In a human athlete situation we would call it abuse - but more emotional than physical. And we would probably think that minor physical abuse (eg snapping someone with a towel once) is less damaging than sustained emotional abuse like this. (Of course both are wrong.)
It’s not because the whip is painful but the request and use of whip in the lesson is too much pressure.
You’ve got to be kidding. Come over and I’ll show you, if you sign a release. Lunge whips HURT. Dressage whips HURT.
Want to know what that “crack of the whip” sound is? It’s the end of the whip breaking the sound barrier. That’s over 700 mph. You could get pegged by a pebble at that speed and be jumping around in pain.
This is a really good topic and thank you for starting it. I’m in absolute shock and appalled at anyone who could think Charlotte using the whip like that is only annoying/irritating and not abusive. And someone mentioned that it’s like the irritation of a fly?
No wonder there is SO MUCH abuse.
And for the person saying you were doing it to each other and it didn’t hurt please put up video and let’s see for ourselves how hard you are using it.
Long whips aren’t made of shoestring material. They wouldn’t even work if they were. Here’s two of mine:
I get so disgusted anymore. It’s just all too much.
I said that, and also said it was playing around with my child when I was whip shopping. Of course I would never really hit her, and she wasn’t big enough to hurt me. Still, my rule was to hit on clothing only. I’m sure it would have felt very different on skin.
Because I was careful and she was little, we ended up mostly tapping each other. Which is how I used my driving whips on my horses. I tapped to reinforce a command.
Rebecca
And to the OP and your first post, I too don’t stall since building and bringing my horses home. Growing up, our horses weren’t stalled and still had a fabulous coat and we showed and were successful. As an adult I developed a strong opinion about the downside of stalling. Now I realize it’s SO much more than just physical health like avoiding soft tissue injuries. It’s mental health, relaxation, movement, friends, etc. Being under the stars at night. There’s something about the vastness of the night sky and health IMO.
My latest deep thought when training is “Am I helping this horse?” And I can feel and see their bright expression when we are done together. And they are happy to be with me. Imagine if every horse trainer/owner approached training this way. It’s a welfare issue otherwise.
I see horses like children and no one would say it’s acceptable to strike a child unless it’s life or death. It’s no different with horses. Children who get physical punishment as a matter of how they are raised end up often unhappy and angry. It’s no different with horses. It’s trauma.
Everyone has an obligation to learn about saddle/bridle fitting, feeding correctly, educated on feet, and what is a healthy posture? Do I ride well and getting coaching to ride even better. What is a happy horse? When I pull the saddle on my young horse, I want that back to look as GOOD or better than before I rode. Again, welfare issues that matter.
There is no excuse anymore with all the quality information available thanks to all that is available online.
Most showing has become abusive and the life of the horses is a welfare issue. At the hunter paces many of the horses look sore and unhappy. Don’t get me started on racing. I can’t go over to QH Congress -serious abuse of some of the riding.
I’m just glad we are talking about all this . There will be some change. Some people will change their minds and improve.
I didn’t mean you Rebecca. Someone else here said they were using the lunge whips on each other to see if it hurt and it didn’t.
No worries! I did say my daughter and I caused some strange looks at the tack shop when we were chasing each other all over the store with whips.
Rebecca
Also remember with all animals, that is quite recent (in the past 20 yrs) that scientific research even began to consider animals feeling pain or having emotions.
A good read is Beyond Words by Carl Safina. He says in his book that you could lose tenure at a university for implying animals felt anything. And it’s not long ago.
That is crazy. Abusive crazy.
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