Horses under going rider abuse - videos

Ifmpw

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When I have seen some horrid riding and blatant abuse of the animals, I have to wonder have these horses got to the stage of just shutting down, so they don't react as strongly as you would normally expect ? Is it that these horse abusers pick on the more compliant horses ? Is it that the riders have amazing riding ability, but just choose to abuse this ? or is it that by the time the video gets published the poor animal has already gone through so much already they are on the verge of shutting down.

I am getting more and more appalled at the world of the horse, and whilst we hear that their is starting to be a change in the world, thankfully due to the new technology, it still is not changing quick enough
 
I've not watched the video, but in answer to the original post, I think there are probably many reasons for what is going on.

The biggest cause is that many people are not able to/are too scared to/have been trained to believe that they shouldn't listen to the horse and allow them a say. There's a whole mindset that a good horseperson is one who is good at getting a horse to do what the human wants. Although there are alot of variations within mainstream training, alot of it is still about pressure - and hopefully release at some point. And because we are still putting horses into situations which can tend to overload them, people are still relying on restraint and control to manage them in those situations.

Most people are still so focused on human-based competitions for horses because our society is geared to us using horses to achieve human goals. This means we are still overlooking the most important thing, which is how the horse feels, because for the most part competitions are structured towards how much humans can get horses to do. So this is how training still tends to be approached - humans getting the horse to do something the human wants, which automatically is going to create conflict and resistance.

We are not yet, as a species, enlightened enough to see how much more horses have to offer, and how a truly willing rapport can look like and feel.

Humans have, by unnatural selection with breeding protocols, tended to breed horses who generally tend to be compliant - especially in the sport world. Therefore, many horses will sadly just accept it when people train them by whatever means they use because they are predisposed to do that. (I know some elite horses are 'hot', but compared to a feral-brained horse who can't tolerate being near a human, they're quite compliant by comparison.)

Of the horses who object, some will find themselves with people who are prepared to be more controlling of them so they begin to comply.

Some will still object, and so don't get ridden any more (or perhaps don't compete), so you don't see their objections.

Some (a minority I'd say) will find themselves with a sympathetic person who either finds out that the horse is in pain so the horse doesn't get ridden any more, or they are able to work sympathetically with the horse so the horse doesn't object any more. Either way, there are no objections to see.

I'm not sure if that's the sort of thing you were getting at OP, I seem to look at and interpret things quite differently to most!
 
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