CDJ withdrawn from paris

scats said:
I imagine that in the aftermath of the CDJ scandal last year, a LOT of people in the dressage world were low key panicking…
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I hope they still are because cameras are everywhere these days. Unfortunately many people behind them seem happy to keep quiet until they have an axe to grind, which is less than impressive.

ETA if she is accepted back seamlessly it will tell us all we need to know about the state of competition dressage in the UK.
 
She has done her punishment. She has taken a bigger hit than most because of her status. Maybe, just maybe we should all sit back and at least give her the benefit of the doubt. I am sure she is aware that every phone camera on every showground and at every lesson will be trained on her in the hope that she errs and the cameraman can make their fortune.
 
sport horse said:
She has done her punishment. She has taken a bigger hit than most because of her status. Maybe, just maybe we should all sit back and at least give her the benefit of the doubt. I am sure she is aware that every phone camera on every showground and at every lesson will be trained on her in the hope that she errs and the cameraman can make their fortune.
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No one is making their fortune out of documenting abusive training techniques. I guess it might be easier to give her the benefit of the doubt if there was any sense that she had decided to pursue a more ethical method of training or we had any insight at all into what goes on at home, but actually we have none of those things and just have to hope (for horses' sake) that she now thinks walloping horses to get them to do what she wants is now too risky a pursuit. The fact that she's plunging straight back into the competition world doesn't really inspire confidence that that's the case, though (not unlike Helgstrand).
 
Crazy_cat_lady said:
How many positive reactions to the h&h story about her return??? And almost all gushing comments....

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The sad reality is that people witness abuse on a daily basis, on yards all over the country. A lot of people think nothing of giving their horses a boot/smack/gob them in the mouth. You only have to go to a local show and you’ll no doubt witness someone abusing an animal at some point.
People are desensitised to it to a certain extent and, sadly, a lot of people don’t see it as that wrong. We can still buy whips to use on horses, after all…

I must be going terribly soft but I’m struggling to have any time for top level dressage now. Humans just constantly disappoint me.
 
I cannot believe the unwillingness to at least accept that she has 'paid the price' not only in her ban but also in the total loss of her career, the respect of her peers and the public, and also a devastating toll on her mental health. Whatever happened to 'be kind'? It certainly missed most of the posters on this thread. She has apologised and accepted how wrong she was, now she must have a second chance. Absolutely never a third chance and I am sure she will be watched over by all the vultures out there who have seemingly never done anything wrong.
 
sport horse said:
I cannot believe the unwillingness to at least accept that she has 'paid the price' not only in her ban but also in the total loss of her career, the respect of her peers and the public, and also a devastating toll on her mental health. Whatever happened to 'be kind'? It certainly missed most of the posters on this thread. She has apologised and accepted how wrong she was, now she must have a second chance. Absolutely never a third chance and I am sure she will be watched over by all the vultures out there who have seemingly never done anything wrong.
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What a sensible and kind post….and I agree with every word…
 
sport horse said:
I cannot believe the unwillingness to at least accept that she has 'paid the price' not only in her ban but also in the total loss of her career, the respect of her peers and the public, and also a devastating toll on her mental health. Whatever happened to 'be kind'? It certainly missed most of the posters on this thread. She has apologised and accepted how wrong she was, now she must have a second chance. Absolutely never a third chance and I am sure she will be watched over by all the vultures out there who have seemingly never done anything wrong.
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From my point of view, I just felt terribly let down over the CDJ situation (though, if I’m honest, not totally surprised).

I appreciate that she has done her time and that she is absolutely entitled to be back out competing. She’s a very switched on woman, I’m fairly sure she won’t be daft enough to ever engage in such behaviour again.

But it’s ok for people to still not feel great about the whole thing. And I’m not just talking about CDJ now, more about the state of elite Dressage in general.
 
sport horse said:
I cannot believe the unwillingness to at least accept that she has 'paid the price' not only in her ban but also in the total loss of her career, the respect of her peers and the public, and also a devastating toll on her mental health. Whatever happened to 'be kind'? It certainly missed most of the posters on this thread. She has apologised and accepted how wrong she was, now she must have a second chance. Absolutely never a third chance and I am sure she will be watched over by all the vultures out there who have seemingly never done anything wrong.
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Actually I think she got off very lightly. There is no 'total loss' here. If for example she'd been a teacher (a real one) and it had been a child she'd walloped, she'd be looking for a new career. As it is, she had a baby (and might well have chosen to take a bit of time off anyway for that reason). Yes she missed an Olympics but she already has multiple medals from 3 of those and multiple other international championships. It's not as though she missed a potential breakthrough moment. She may have burned bridges with CH but she clearly has supporters, both influential and merely enthusiastic, and horses, and has just come out and won a couple of classes. Doubtless when she has the horsepower she will be back in team contention, just like Helgstrand. I don't for a moment think the disapproval of a few bunny huggers has given her pause for thought.
 
CDJ shouted from the rooftops about her humane training, the horses had turn out & went hacking.
I think we all felt like the carpet had been ripped out from under us to see a woman we looked up to with a whip, hitting a horse many, many times while commenting "This one's shit for hitting them with".
The above comment gives the clue that this was not an isolated incident.
 
scats said:
I understand that she’s had her punishment etc but I’d be mortified showing my face back in the competition world.

That said, I’m betting that she knows, and others know, that there’s a whole load of people competing around her that use or have used similar methods of training. She’s just one of the ‘unlucky’ ones who someone had a grudge against really. I imagine that in the aftermath of the CDJ scandal last year, a LOT of people in the dressage world were low key panicking…
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Much to my dismay, when it all came out a lot of people I know who are riding competitively at dressage, as well as general ‘professionals’ in the industry, openly admitted to seeing no issue at all with what she did. They even happily and actively defended her actions “I heard the horse was being a d*ck before the video” etc. etc.

Sigh.
 
If CDJ had done, said or written anything to suggest she felt true remorse and could see how she had gone down a very wrong path I would be the first to support her new way of doing things and accept that she was misguided in her earlier actions because of the influence of others in the industry, how judging inadvertently rewarded how she had been doing things, and because I accept we are all human and can get it so very wrong sometimes. Especially when others praise ways that shouldn't be praised.

But I've seen no evidence of any of that, just a statement which was clearly incorrect in places as it was clearly not a one-off thing, a year away from competitions and back to it. I would like to see her recent tests though, as there is a little glimmer of hope that perhaps the results she is getting and aiming for now are softer. But in all honesty that is more wishing to give the benefit of the doubt rather than actual hope.

On the other hand, Olivia Towers for example has been quite open about realising she was on a path she didn't like with her horses, and has also been open about what she has done to basically have a complete overhaul of how she works with her horses. I have only admiration for that, and she offers good influence in my opinion. If anyone kept dragging up how she used to do things then in that instance it would be completely wrong, and I would support posts which called out any unpleasantness towards her for the past.

But I cannot (yet) support posts which blindly insist that people should 'Be kind' just for the sake of it. Nobody's being unpleasant for the sake of it, nor inciting others to be horrid to CDJ, but we are expressing our regret that after the IMMENSE shockwaves it sent through our community at the time, the potential for change looks to have been lost, and that makes it so much harder to hope there will be significant improvement to the lives of all top level dressage horses any time soon. And we have every right to express our concern for the wellbeing of horses - louder and harder as long as nothing is changing.
 
Burnerbee said:
Just watched it again on the BBC site - still vile. She can go work in Tesco’s as far as I’m concerned, how could anyone bear to watch her ride?
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CDJ at Tescos? that has conjured a funny picture in my mind. Can you imagine? Her on the checkout till and you changing your mind about something and wanting to put it back?
 
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PurpleSpots said:
If CDJ had done, said or written anything to suggest she felt true remorse and could see how she had gone down a very wrong path I would be the first to support her new way of doing things and accept that she was misguided in her earlier actions because of the influence of others in the industry, how judging inadvertently rewarded how she had been doing things, and because I accept we are all human and can get it so very wrong sometimes. Especially when others praise ways that shouldn't be praised.

But I've seen no evidence of any of that, just a statement which was clearly incorrect in places as it was clearly not a one-off thing, a year away from competitions and back to it. I would like to see her recent tests though, as there is a little glimmer of hope that perhaps the results she is getting and aiming for now are softer. But in all honesty that is more wishing to give the benefit of the doubt rather than actual hope.

On the other hand, Olivia Towers for example has been quite open about realising she was on a path she didn't like with her horses, and has also been open about what she has done to basically have a complete overhaul of how she works with her horses. I have only admiration for that, and she offers good influence in my opinion. If anyone kept dragging up how she used to do things then in that instance it would be completely wrong, and I would support posts which called out any unpleasantness towards her for the past.

But I cannot (yet) support posts which blindly insist that people should 'Be kind' just for the sake of it. Nobody's being unpleasant for the sake of it, nor inciting others to be horrid to CDJ, but we are expressing our regret that after the IMMENSE shockwaves it sent through our community at the time, the potential for change looks to have been lost, and that makes it so much harder to hope there will be significant improvement to the lives of all top level dressage horses any time soon. And we have every right to express our concern for the wellbeing of horses - louder and harder as long as nothing is changing.
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Beautifully expressed.
 
scats said:
I understand that she’s had her punishment etc but I’d be mortified showing my face back in the competition world.
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If this is her livelihood she needs to be competing. She's done her punishment and hopefully she won't pull that sort of poop again. I'm sure there will be a lot of people keeping an eye on her training.
 
scats said:
People are desensitised to it to a certain extent and, sadly, a lot of people don’t see it as that wrong. We can still buy whips to use on horses, after all…
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Whips are like any other tool. They can be misused, certainly. But, they can also be used to back up a leg aid using the idea of pressure and release. A lunge whip can be popped or moved a little behind a horse to help them get the idea of lunging and transisitions, again, using pressure and release.
 
sport horse said:
I cannot believe the unwillingness to at least accept that she has 'paid the price' not only in her ban but also in the total loss of her career, the respect of her peers and the public, and also a devastating toll on her mental health. Whatever happened to 'be kind'? It certainly missed most of the posters on this thread. She has apologised and accepted how wrong she was, now she must have a second chance. Absolutely never a third chance and I am sure she will be watched over by all the vultures out there who have seemingly never done anything wrong.
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Didn’t see much ‘be kind’ to the horse - did you ?
 
GSD Woman said:
If this is her livelihood she needs to be competing. She's done her punishment and hopefully she won't pull that sort of poop again. I'm sure there will be a lot of people keeping an eye on her training.
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Who is going to be keeping an eye on her training that wasn't before when it was found completely acceptable? Will WHW or Collectif pour les Chevaux get a standing invite?
 
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Exasperated said:
A stallion that always grazes with his ladies is usually much more laid back, but don’t underestimate how enthusiastic they can be when a new bride turns up.
Generally, handler will always use the same bridle for covering, something different to what he might be ridden / driven / shown in, and a breeding stallion will know what to expect when that bridle goes on.
Stud chains can be fitted in a variety of ways, and like anything else, could be ‘abused’. Some entires are very tactful, almost timid with mares, most aren’t.
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Back in the 70's, I used to go to a big, busy riding school,with liveries, horses coming and going all the time. The Anglo Arab stallion was kept, when stabled, in a box right on the main yard. They treated him exactly like any other horse, and that's how he behaved. He sometimes led the hacks.
 
GSD Woman said:
Whips are like any other tool. They can be misused, certainly. But, they can also be used to back up a leg aid using the idea of pressure and release. A lunge whip can be popped or moved a little behind a horse to help them get the idea of lunging and transisitions, again, using pressure and release.
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I’m fully aware of that. But do you genuinely believe everybody uses a whip that way?

I find it interesting how people are more forgiving over things like whip use because it’s a horse. If someone had been videoed whipping a dog like that, nobody would be saying “be kind” when that person was first seen back out with a dog.
Horses are fair game though it seems.
 
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