Yet another delightful rider..... not..... when will this end?

Old saying that I was told as a kid.....

'Two wrongs don't make a right'

Just because there are worse abusers than CDJ doesn't mitigate in any way what she did.

I did notice and specifically watch shots of the crowd at the LIHS for the freestyle. Yes there were people clapping but there were - in comparison to her previous appearances there - quite a lot of people that weren't.

I also noticed the 'fawning' of the organisers of the show by putting her last to go. The running order was 'seeded' so that the best combinations from the GP the previous day were in the last group to go. IMO it should have been done in reverse order of finishing in the GP which would have put Becky and Lottie the last 2 to go.

A&K, as has been already mentioned, didn't look happy to me right from the start of the test - almost as if she didn't want to be there at all. She was also poor for the last halt as if she couldn't wait to get out of the arena.

The whipping done by CDJ 27 times with intent to hurt/cause pain, in contrast to the video of Mark Todd's abuse using a soft branch a couple of times merit comparison as both were similarly prominent in national press/media. I doubt that the horse in MT's video suffered long term stress unlike the poor horse from the CDJ video.

Yet Mark Todd was suspended both as an eventer and as a racehorse trainer and his career virtually ended for both in a short while afterwards.

CDJ did, IMO, far worse and yet is being welcomed back, sponsors returning, owners returning and crowds back worshipping her every appearance as if nothing happened at all. It upsets me to see it.
 
eahotson said:
You have read something?That is not proof.I truly don't understand your obsession with Charlotte, I really don't.
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So all those comments from you about that book you read and referenced repeatedly, what was that about? That did come across like it was leaning towards obsession a little, but given whats come out it looks like th e book may in fact be correct. So the book you like = riders absusing horses, need to be stopped/punished but when CDJ = absuing horses she needs to be forgiven after minimal if any punishment?

Please dont take this as a personal attack, I am gnuinely mind boggled by it and its something I see playing out all over social media and I'm trying to get my head around why people think like this.
 
reynold said:
I also noticed the 'fawning' of the organisers of the show by putting her last to go. The running order was 'seeded' so that the best combinations from the GP the previous day were in the last group to go. IMO it should have been done in reverse order of finishing in the GP which would have put Becky and Lottie the last 2 to go.
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That isn’t fawning, it’s how it works- they’re seeded and then it’s drawn order so it's random within that grouping. That’s how it works across the board at all World Cup shows and championships
 
Ceifer said:
I would hope it is a contractual thing.

The thing is people always knew she was a ‘hard rider’. Definitely not in the league Helgestrand but she is disciplined and having watched her in warm up arenas she is driven to win and you get out of her way.
Carl cannot have been naive to her training and teaching methods and has been lucky to come out of this unscathed.
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I've watched her numerous times for many, many years in warm up rings. Yes she was ruthless in terms of owning her space (she's a world class athlete...being ruthless is in their dna) but I genuinely never once saw her put a toe out of line. Never. Never a sock in the teeth, never the use of a spur, never a smack, never overworking them, nothing. Her horses were always relaxed with no signs of stress and I've scrutinised her at very close quarters. I think it's why it's all come as such a huge shock. Coupled with her charity work and much made about the horses welfare. I can't reconcile what I've seen with my own eyes versus what she was doing behind closed doors. It's that cognitive dissonance that's mind bending.
None of us are all good and there's many an abusive man who's a well respected pillar of the community but I remain shocked and saddened by her actions and just wish she hadn't let herself and everyone else down and most importantly, the horses.
 
Overstone stud said:
We all get up next day and say I wished i had not done that but when dealing with a difficult horse you make mistakes and you just have to move on. people who deal with horses on a day to day have to be firm and make decisions that the bunny huggers do not like or getting killed. I was not there so I have no idear if this was a horse or rider problem or a pushy parent.
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This is just awful apologist stuff. You didn't need to be there or have any context to know what you saw. People who care about the welfare of horses don't need your patronising label of bunny huggers, like you're somehow superior because you're tougher. If you're consistently getting up in a morning regretting what you did to horses the day before, you shouldn't be anywhere near them.
 
Not watched racing for ages, sat . It came on TV, sat there watched
for 10 mins, general medrano fell early in the race, commentator says not looking good

Just seen he's pts, probably on course

10 sodding minutes in 6 months, it's just the shocking horsemanship half the time, then these videos

But then I'm just bunny hugger
 
I wouldn’t class myself as a bunny hugger but don’t feel able to watch racing now, it seems to me that more and more horses are dying on the track both jumping and flat. I always expected the occasional one put down during jump racing but the flat seems to have many more than previously . Wonder if the breeding is partly to blame for them being more fragile..
what CDJ did was wrong and I don’t condone it at all but I can’t believe that no one on here has ever done something that they now know was not in the best interests of the horse , her behaviour was a few years ago and maybe she is now behaving in a better way, perhaps we give her the benefit of the doubt and ban her permanently if ever she does similar …. I wasn’t happy to see her competing in London but I was very pleased that she didn’t get placed highly in the freestyle., her grand prix test was better ridden than her riding of Mount St John Freestyle and it’s nice to see the mare doing so well with Catherine
 
reynold said:
Old saying that I was told as a kid.....

'Two wrongs don't make a right'

Just because there are worse abusers than CDJ doesn't mitigate in any way what she did.

I did notice and specifically watch shots of the crowd at the LIHS for the freestyle. Yes there were people clapping but there were - in comparison to her previous appearances there - quite a lot of people that weren't.

I also noticed the 'fawning' of the organisers of the show by putting her last to go. The running order was 'seeded' so that the best combinations from the GP the previous day were in the last group to go. IMO it should have been done in reverse order of finishing in the GP which would have put Becky and Lottie the last 2 to go.

A&K, as has been already mentioned, didn't look happy to me right from the start of the test - almost as if she didn't want to be there at all. She was also poor for the last halt as if she couldn't wait to get out of the arena.

The whipping done by CDJ 27 times with intent to hurt/cause pain, in contrast to the video of Mark Todd's abuse using a soft branch a couple of times merit comparison as both were similarly prominent in national press/media. I doubt that the horse in MT's video suffered long term stress unlike the poor horse from the CDJ video.

Yet Mark Todd was suspended both as an eventer and as a racehorse trainer and his career virtually ended for both in a short while afterwards.

CDJ did, IMO, far worse and yet is being welcomed back, sponsors returning, owners returning and crowds back worshipping her every appearance as if nothing happened at all. It upsets me to see it.
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The thing with Mark Todd, I don't think he set out to hit the horse with the branch, it looked to me that he'd hoped that simply shaking it behind the horse would be enough to encourage it forward. It wasn't until this didn't work that he hit it. CDJ set out with the intention of not just hitting the horse but hurting it
 
marmalade76 said:
The thing with Mark Todd, I don't think he set out to hit the horse with the branch, it looked to me that he'd hoped that simply shaking it behind the horse would be enough to encourage it forward. It wasn't until this didn't work that he hit it. CDJ set out with the intention of not just hitting the horse but hurting it
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I don't think the 2 incidents are particularly different. Mark gets the horse into the water a couple of times by shaking the branch, then when it refuses again he whips it deliberately and repeatedly several times with the branch until it goes in. It wasn't a "hit it once and see if that gives it a shock" - it is a raised arm thrashing until the horse goes in. Charlotte starts off flicking the lunge whip at the horse - yes she makes contact, but no more so than many of us have probably flicked a lunge whip at a horse that is ignoring the whip and refusing to go forward on the lunge, then when that doesn't work she starts to hit it hard and repeatedly.

I think both incidents are appalling by the way, I just don't think they are any different.
 
splashgirl45 said:
what CDJ did was wrong and I don’t condone it at all but I can’t believe that no one on here has ever done something that they now know was not in the best interests of the horse.
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I can honestly say I've never whipped a horse in anger and I've definitely never whipped one 20+ times. I'm very sad if I'm a minority :(
 
I’m not talking about whipping 20 times , that’s excessive , but using the whip to get a horse to load for instance . I wouldn’t do that now but admit I have done in the past and many people would have done the same if they are honest
 
KikiDee said:
I don't think the 2 incidents are particularly different. Mark gets the horse into the water a couple of times by shaking the branch, then when it refuses again he whips it deliberately and repeatedly several times with the branch until it goes in. It wasn't a "hit it once and see if that gives it a shock" - it is a raised arm thrashing until the horse goes in. Charlotte starts off flicking the lunge whip at the horse - yes she makes contact, but no more so than many of us have probably flicked a lunge whip at a horse that is ignoring the whip and refusing to go forward on the lunge, then when that doesn't work she starts to hit it hard and repeatedly.

I think both incidents are appalling by the way, I just don't think they are any different.
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MT got a far greater punishment, and I guess in his case at least it was crystal clear to the horse what was wanted of it. With CDJ that poor horse had no idea.
 
I'm Dun said:
MT got a far greater punishment, and I guess in his case at least it was crystal clear to the horse what was wanted of it. With CDJ that poor horse had no idea.
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Totally agree, whilst both incidents were violent, I think MT was very clear to the horse, he wanted the horse to get in the water, the horse understood what he wanted it to do, and all punishment stopped once it complied. Whereas I dont think the horse had a clue what was asked of it in the CDJ video, and therefore no way to give the behaviour necessary to stop the punishment.
 
KikiDee said:
I don’t think whipping a horse to excess can ever be justified, regardless of whether the horse understands what it’s being asked - there are other ways to educate a horse and I’d have hoped we’ve moved beyond using brute force being normalised.
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Of course, I never said either was justified, both were awful, but I dont think they were both the same.
 
Are people just so desperate for dressage/equine sport to continue to the point of denying what they've seen with their own eyes? We've all seen the video, it was awful and unforgivable... thats supposed to be the best of the best in our sport! Why on earth is anyone justifying this being accepted? (Yes ignoring it and carrying on as normal is accepting it)

Equestrian sport at the moment is frankly embarrassing
 
PurpleSpots said:
I don't understand how people are commenting positively. I watched the BBC's coverage of the freestyle last night...

Could the commentator gush any more?
A&K showed significant expressions of stress and expectation of punishment, in my opinion, more than once in the test. Green at the level or not established enough does not look like that. I've competed horses outside of their comfort zones, sometimes at a level above where they should be (in error), and it looks different to what A&K showed if a horse is simply trying but not yet quite able. The test told me all I needed to know - that it is highly likely that there is still a significant degree of pressure and unpleasantness involved in the way the horses are being trained.
Yet the test was praised and rewarded. Utterly and completely mental in my opinion.
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daffy44 said:
Totally agree, whilst both incidents were violent, I think MT was very clear to the horse, he wanted the horse to get in the water, the horse understood what he wanted it to do, and all punishment stopped once it complied. Whereas I dont think the horse had a clue what was asked of it in the CDJ video, and therefore no way to give the behaviour necessary to stop the punishment.
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I was staggered he was banned to be honest. I've seen far, far worse normalised at riding schools and pony club growing up. I don't raise a hand to my ponies, and I'm not saying he was right to do what he did, but I definitely wasn't 'shocked' by the footage.
 
Babypony said:
I was staggered he was banned to be honest. I've seen far, far worse normalised at riding schools and pony club growing up. I don't raise a hand to my ponies, and I'm not saying he was right to do what he did, but I definitely wasn't 'shocked' by the footage.
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And isn’t that just the saddest part of it all :(

How many people watched the CJD video and retaliated that “far worse happens on yards across the country every day”. When I was in my late teens a had a very nappy horse, he was once napping with me badly on the yard driveway….nothing terrible just planting. The YO stormed out and absolutely thrashed my horse down the driveway with a schooling whip and waved me off on my hack. I didn’t agree with it, I loved my horse and I was upset and horrified, but I didn’t feel like I could stand up to him and I also thought in my naivety and inexperience ‘well technically he fixed my problem’, even though my horse completed the whole hack a sweaty jogging anxious mess. I remember it clear as day 30 years later.

And for me that’s the whole point, stuff like this does happen every day, and it needs calling out as wrong, it needs making a spectacle of, it needs to stop being defended and stop being normalised. Or it will never change.
 
daffy44 said:
Totally agree, whilst both incidents were violent, I think MT was very clear to the horse, he wanted the horse to get in the water, the horse understood what he wanted it to do, and all punishment stopped once it complied. Whereas I dont think the horse had a clue what was asked of it in the CDJ video, and therefore no way to give the behaviour necessary to stop the punishment.
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I understood exactly what MT wanted the horse to do , I know quite a bit about dressage and I wasn’t sure what she was trying to achieve so I’m sure the horse and rider had no idea …
 
KikiDee said:
And isn’t that just the saddest part of it all :(

How many people watched the CJD video and retaliated that “far worse happens on yards across the country every day”. When I was in my late teens a had a very nappy horse, he was once napping with me badly on the yard driveway….nothing terrible just planting. The YO stormed out and absolutely thrashed my horse down the driveway with a schooling whip and waved me off on my hack. I didn’t agree with it, I loved my horse and I was upset and horrified, but I didn’t feel like I could stand up to him and I also thought in my naivety and inexperience ‘well technically he fixed my problem’, even though my horse completed the whole hack a sweaty jogging anxious mess. I remember it clear as day 30 years later.

And for me that’s the whole point, stuff like this does happen every day, and it needs calling out as wrong, it needs making a spectacle of, it needs to stop being defended and stop being normalised. Or it will never change.
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It stems from when we thought of them as "dumb animals" and trained by force as we didnt know better. We do now. We know they use their own form of language, that they use tools, that they have deep social bonds and structures and that they feel pain. Things have changed and training has to change with that knowledge.
 
I'm Dun said:
It stems from when we thought of them as "dumb animals" and trained by force as we didnt know better. We do now. We know they use their own form of language, that they use tools, that they have deep social bonds and structures and that they feel pain. Things have changed and training has to change with that knowledge.
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I don't think it has anything to do with knowing better, maybe for non horsey people, maybe the young and those new to horses, but for the old guard, they do know better but money, short cuts, prestige, glory and ego come first and some just don't care and I don't think these people will ever change.
 
splashgirl45 said:
I’m not talking about whipping 20 times , that’s excessive , but using the whip to get a horse to load for instance . I wouldn’t do that now but admit I have done in the past and many people would have done the same if they are honest
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That's a totally difference scenario and not comparable at all. I don't know anyone who'd whip a horse 20+ times and even as a one off, I certainly wouldn't be friends with anyone who did, let alone applaud them.
 
tristars said:
Not watched racing for ages, sat . It came on TV, sat there watched
for 10 mins, general medrano fell early in the race, commentator says not looking good

Just seen he's pts, probably on course

10 sodding minutes in 6 months, it's just the shocking horsemanship half the time, then these videos

But then I'm just bunny hugger
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BurntontheoutsideTurkey said:
He reminds me of early Totilas - the 'look' and the hype, and lots of it being technically incorrect while looking very pleasing.
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Idiot question - I didn't watch all of it but as far as I can see he wasn't behind the vertical but the poll wasn't the highest point. Is that because he looks short in the neck or are these horses just bred that way?
 
BurntontheoutsideTurkey said:
He reminds me of early Totilas - the 'look' and the hype, and lots of it being technically incorrect while looking very pleasing.
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He may be similar to Totilas in looks but he doesn’t have spider front legs and the hinds are extending and not shuffling like Totilas did, and his chin isn’t forcefully held into his chest like Totilas. Can you point out where he is so incorrect as the marks seem to suggest he is doing well technically and although I can see he isn’t perfect he looks pretty good to me
 
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