I just read through the first third or so of the thread about Linda Parelli taking dressage lessons and teaching dressage and she really got slammed for things she and her husband have said about dressage. I am curious about the background here. I just think of the Parellis as entertainers at least Pat. I do not really know anything about his wife. I think he is probably a pretty good rider himself, I have no idea about her. What is the story?
This is going to be good.
Youâll find that there are probably as many answers to your question about Linda Parelli as there are members of this board. Basically, the answers will fall into two camps:
"I hate Linda Parelli, sheâs a terrible rider, she doesnât know anything, she doesnât know anything about dressage, I hate her husband Pat, I hate their marketing machine, I hate his mustache, I hate their ability to generate money from horses, I hate their training program, I hate the way they handle horses, etc"
or
âI think Natural Horsemanship has value for some horses & riders.â
It seems many folks get offended by Linda Parelliâs description of her introduction to dressage in Australia. Hereâs the story as I heard it (obviously, others have heard the same story differently):
Linda says she began riding as a kid, loved to ride fast, enjoyed jumping, liked to ride on the beach bareback. As an adult, when she got back into horses, she bought 2 ex-race horses, both of whom were very challenging. She found stopping one of the horses virtually impossible. She describes a number of very scary runaway experiences with this horse, leading her to confine her riding in small areas of the arena at a walk & maybe a trot. Her instructors (dressage-oriented) were at a loss to help her. Linda Parelli kept resorting to different bits & gadgets to help her gain control of her horse.
One day when Linda Parelli was at her local tack shop, she saw a video of Pat Parelli doing a sliding stop from a run, without a bridle. So she signed up for his clinic.
At the clinic, she discovered that she had been wrongly blaming her horse for his reactions, that she was the cause of her horseâs problems, and that she needed to learn the basics of horsemanship. She said that she needed to improve her relationship with her horse before she would be ready for dressage or any other competitive discipline. That realization led her down the path of Natural Horsemanship.
At her tour appearances, Linda Parelli has disparaged dressage (and other competitive disciplines or riding practices) when they rely on bigger bits for control, gadgets, or cruel practices. I personally interpret her statements to be directed toward rolkur and other abusive (in my opinion) practices; I personally donât interpret her statements to be directed at classical dressage as taught by Walter Zettl & other dressage masters.
Now, please, be aware that those in the âI HATE Linda Parelliâ camp strongly believe that Linda Parelli has totally disparaged all dressage & all dressage riders. Those in the âI HATE Linda Parelliâ camp are understandably offended by their interpretation of her statements.
At any rate, Linda & Pat Parelli have been taking dressage lessons with Walter Zettl for several years. Both have stated how much they have learned from WAZ. Linda has talked about how difficult & how intense she finds learning dressage. WAZ has been featured at their SAVVY Conference in Colorado as well as at their tour events.
WAZ has given Linda Parelli, and sometimes their students, lessons in front of audiences. These lessons are to show the new learnings & new directions of the Parellis. (Those in the âI HATE Linda Parelliâ camp would say the Parellis are just using WAZ to bring in a new audience & make more money, etc.)
My non-dressage friends who have gone to the tour events or SAVVY Conference have fallen in love with WAZ. They know nothing about dressage, but can see a huge improvement in Lindaâs horse Remmer & her riding. They are certainly much more interested in dressage than they ever were before.
I donât think Linda Parelli has ever said that she is a dressage instructor. What I have heard both Linda & Pat Parelli say is that: they teach the basics of horsemanship; their goal is to give riders a good foundation before they specialize or compete; that when a rider is ready to compete, they should go learn from an expert in their field.
Now many folks from the âI HATE Linda Parelliâ camp would say that their games are nonsense, their personalities stink, good horsemanship is good horsemanship is good horsemanship is good horsemanship & that there is no need for the term natural horsemanship.
It is obviously up to each person to form his/her opinion of the usefulness of any approach. sorry this has gotten so long-winded.
Short answer: a lot of us donât care for the Parellis because they have, in the past, bashed dressage over and over again. Lindaâs recent fascination with it seems to be more about money than genuine dedication to the sport.
I personally have never heard Linda Parelli bash dressage. I have heard her bash abusive practices, some of which are used by some dressage competitors. Here Iâm referring to rolkur, hyperflexion, draw reins, bigger bits, chambons, & other gadgets. While one might argue that such practices or gadgets are not abusive when used by skilled riders, I am personally concerned about the potential harm to horses, even by well-intentioned riders.
Some drink koolaid. The rest of us, not.
Hey, Nightlace, whatâs your story? Are you an advocate for Parelli Natural Horse-Man-Ship?
I have heard Linda bash dressage in person. As well as disparaging those who take riding lessons since they focused on position instead of âlearning to be one with the horse.â
I think the Parellis got into bashing dressage as good marketing. Parelli bashing dressage is just like Lowes making fun of Home Depot; going after their competitor. And if their competitor is still doing well, attempt a merger.
Yeah, and LPâs âriding with fluidityâ is a joke.
Nightlace is correct.
She doesnât bash ALL dressage, just âModernâ Dressage and Rolkur. That is IT. She has never bashed Classical, as thatâs what she prefers, but ONLY Rolkur, side reins, draw reins etc.
She use to use big bits and tie downs and they didnât work. Pat was HER LAST RESORT. She was very apprehensive about going to her clinic, but she did anyway.
And the âriding with fluidityâ concept is taken from Classical Dressage, and made easier.
They donât price their stuff, Mark somebody does, and they donât really get a say in it. It sucks, I know, but thereâs nothing that can be done.
And she use to compete, and she has competition experience, and she knows what itâs like in âthe real worldâ, and she doesnât want to be apart of it anymore.
Now, is there anything else you would like me to clear up?
That is completely and utterly a lie and a post-marketing-error-respin attempt to appeal to the people who are anti rollkur. They bashed ALL dressage, ALL dressage riders. Said they ride like crap AND made disparaging comments about the entire discipline. This new tactic is just complete bull and a last ditch effort to appeal to dressage riders by trying to rewrite what they said.
Plain and simple. Youâve drunk the koolaid.
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As I said earlier, there are basically two camps regarding the Parellis and Natural Horsemanship: the âI hate Linda Parelli becauseâŠâ camp versus the âthere may be some value in Natural Horsemanship for some riders & for some horsesâ camp.
Itâs pretty clear that even if members of the two camps were at the same event at the same time, they didnât hear the same thing. Not even close.
Itâs like being a marital counselor doing marital therapy with a dysfunctional couple. If the counselor first listens to the husband describe an emotionally charged event, and then listens to the wife describe the same emotionally charged event, the counselor may hear such different stories, such different viewpoints, that the counselor might not recognize the event being the same eventâexcept that the couple are married and say they are talking about the same event. 
Strange, isnât it???
Thereâs lots of psychological research that explores the influence of beliefs on perception & the difficulty of changing impressions & beliefs once formed. My best guess is that NOBODY is going to change membership from one Parelli camp to another based on this discussion. With or without koolaid. :rolleyes:
Does the psychological study cover lying, too?
there are basically two camps regarding the Parellis and Natural Horsemanship: the âI hate Linda Parelli becauseâŠâ camp versus the âthere may be some value in Natural Horsemanship for some riders & for some horsesâ camp
No, because that assumes that Parelli and NH are one and the same. You can dislike the Parelli Marketing Machine without thereby rejecting other incarnations of socalled NH, which covers a broad range of old training ideas including basic horsemanship skills that our grandfathers used without attaching any label.
The Marketing Machine is the offensive part
I also think the Modern Natural Horsemanship gimmick is dangerous because it implies that there is a substitute for the vast experience, trial-and-error, thousands of horses who kindly help us assemble a tool kit of things to try, time spent learning to interpret horses, develop the feel, timing and fitness to ride⊠the list of necessary and earned ingredients could go on and on.
After you get your horse playing the Perelli games on the ground, you are going to have a hard time when you finally get on his back if you think ground work will relieve you of the responsibility to learn how to become a thinking and physically capable rider.
So is WAZ getting in on the Franchise? One might assume that heâd like a piece of the Marketing Machineâs action too. When do all these people going on tours get time to stay home, ride train and improve themselves?
just take one look at that new saddle of theirs.
what is that about? not dressage certainly.
how many pies do they want to put their sticky fingers into?
master of one trade vs. jack of all trades?
are they trying to say they be master of all trades?
No, actually they are saying there is no trade but theirs.
Parelli is a marketing ploy, religion and cult, not a training method.
As for me donât like the Perelliâs, donât like Clinton Anderson, etc actually the only person who does NH that I have respect for is Monty Roberts. But then again his is all basic common sense on placing your body etc. Not the âbuy this $100 rope halter and this handy dandy carrot stick and you to can be like meâ. Now I am not a NH person by anymeans. I have just watched a few of his videos that were given to me to view before they were even released years ago as a âtest viewerâ.
The Pepperonis bashed ALL Dressage. In public, on TV, every chance they got. Of course that is easy to do, especially to the people who attend their âhappeningsâ and buy into their âstuffâ. Because the majority of those people are VERY inexperienced and havenât had much exposure to âreal horsemanshipâ.
What I find most offensive about the Pepperonis is that the really think they are the only people who have ever thought of these desensitization techniques. Their condescending attitude makes my skin crawl. Neither of them have any âreal credentialsâ. They found a niche and hung out a shingle. Neither of them are good riders and not a single one of their âgamesâ does anything to develop a horse as a RIDING horse. Linda couldnât âmasterâ basic Dressage so that means the discipline is bad? I doubt I could do pro basketball, but still basketball isnât BAD.
The Pepperonis are masters of taking money from people who just donât know. SAD but TRUE. There is nothing in their program that hasnât been done by others. Good trainers use what works and throw out the rest.
If any Pepperoni devoteâ invested as much time into becoming a better rider as they put into the games they would be so much better off!
actually the only person who does NH that I have respect for is Monty Roberts
hahahahahaplop. The man who claims he invented horse whispering? Who says that everyone else is abusive in their horse training methods, including other cowboys? Who previously claimed to have learned all he knows from perching on a hill above a herd of wild horses and apparently learned nothing from all those cowboys he grew up with?Who give no credit to his actual instructors? Who hunts down wild horses for 15 hours while wearing out 3 of his own saddle horses in the name of âjoining upâ? He made a TV show about it a few years ago where he shows you his abusive wearing down of a hapless mustang and says all these things and more. Watch any youtube video of him working a horse in the round pen and you will see more of his scaring horses into submission by throwing things at them, flicking ropes at them, and generally trying to get a flight response. His so-called âjoin upâ is nothing more than a weary horse tired of being pursued and giving in to what psychologists call âlearned helplessnessâ. Its the same basic principle as bucking a horse out. The horse runs away or bucks until it realizes there is no escape and then gives up. Read what his close and extended family has said about how he invented an entirely new childhood which bears little resemblance to how he actually was raised, in order to make him seem so much more miraculous.
A good cowboy wouldâve herded the poor thing into a corral or roped it within an hour and let the animal rest. MR has equal credibility to the born-into-dressage-again LP in most of our books.
Fans of LP may want to see some of LP/PPâs earlier videotapes where she thoroughly trashes the entire discipline of dressage whilst trying to sell her version of PPâs marketing. Perhaps you will stop with your revisionist history then. Apparently now, she thinks dressage ainât so badâŠthe way SHE rides it. Again, hahahahahahaplop. Iâve yet to see her ride dressage with any degree of competence.
I am not a person to divide the world into two camps. I do not hate LP or MR, but I think they are misguided and are leading others down some of the wrong paths. Run far away from anyone who says at anytime that theirs is the only true or correct way to do anything and that other schools of thought are wrong. Both MR and LP/PP have said such things. If indeed, LP thought âshe discovered that she had been wrongly blaming her horse for his reactionsâ, then she would do well to acknowledge that this type of thinking is the mark of a rank beginner in any discipline and is not characteristic of a good rider, especially not classical dressage. Thanks for the great example of how misguided she truly is-a really good case of her blaming something other than her own inexperience.
Donât think I am not a devotee of horse whispering and natural horsemanship. I learned an awful lot as a youngster from old style ânaturalâ horsemen long before there was a PP or an MR. There is a lot of good in the old knowledge, and much of it is shared with the training of the ODGâs of dressage. Read Podhajskyâs âMy horses, My teachersâ or his autobiography. Hereâs a random quote:
