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Yeats, I would agree with your sentiments but in the real world, there is a battle going on over racing and refusing to talk to the media is to opt out of that battle.
It may only be the early stages but there are committed, dedicated and intelligent people out there who are campaigning hard for a ban on racing, starting with national hunt racing. We shouldn’t kid ourselves that these are a few loony extremists, nor should we underestimate how little the voting public cares about racing, Cheltenham or Paul Nicholls.
Racing should not miss any opportunity to put the alternative view in public or in private and should be fighting back with a strong media campaign as well as lobbying MPs intensively. Alex Ferguson’s refusal to talk to the BBC/Sky or whoever it is at the moment doesn’t help his media image but football is not an endangered sport. In a few years, racing could be, unless prominent people in the sport start wising up to the threat and fighting back.
Whilst I agree with your sentiments Aranalde (Racing should work harder to promote it’s image), I find it difficult to imagine that National Hunt racing will be banned. The economic impact would be significant and I don’t believe the government would be willing to let that happen. How many people in the racing industry have the skills to work in other industries?
I’m not sure who you’re thinking about Aragorn, the issue is probably the number of jobs rather than the skills.
I’m certain most people in yards could get jobs in other areas of the equestrian industry.
The economic impact wouldn’t be all that significant, I wouldn’t have thought. Not sure a Labour government would have any more trouble banning NHunt racing than a Tory government had closing coal mines.
This thread is a legend.
All the contributors have done a great job in discussing a subject I have great interests in.
A credit to internet forums, keep it up lads!
I detest the sensationalism that Animal Aid uses, "As he ran past the stands, the roaring crowd jeered the loose horses on, in a terrifying wall of sound of screams and shouts." and "the brief lament to a brave but scared horse who was raced to death."
For goodness’ sake. If they have a point to make, I wish they would make it truthfully and without melodrama.
I can understand why people do not like the sport and feel uncomfortable about the fact that horses do die in the course of racing. Most of these people have limited knowledge about racing and the way that horses are looked after. However they are entitled to their opinions.
Personally I get upset when horses are killed – of course I do, I’m human and I love the animals. And most people I have met when I have been racing also love the horses and care about their fate. Most racing fans, owners and trainers are genuine animal lovers and of course it’s a terrible thing to all these people when a horse loses its life. That’s why I run my website, racehorsememories.co.uk and why I get so many hits.
I still follow racing because I know that without the sport, these amazing animals would not exist. And they live pampered lives, better than many humans!
By all means, have differing opinions about the sport. But an opinion is not a statement of fact. And some of what Animal Aid says is pure lies. They paint those who do follow the sport as inhumane or cruel – that is simply factually untrue. And to say that horses are terrified to race – that’s something I have never yet seen and I bet I have seen much more racing than they have.
Oooh extremists make me so angry, and what makes me angrier still is that they get given air time to express their ignorant and false views.
Lots of good comments in your post Purr and I agree with a lot of what you have said. I also dislike the sensationalism that Animal Aid use to try and grab the headlines. The notion that horses are terrified to race is ridiculous – almost laughable if it were not for the seriousness of the subject of animal cruelty.
There are lots of reasons that I think horse racing is not cruel and the main one is that I believe horses LOVE running and jumping – it is in their nature and anybody with common sense can look at horses at the end of a race and see that they have enjoyed themselves. If I didn’t believe this then I wouldn’t support horse racing. ÂÂÂ
(Edited by SwallowCottage at 1:59 pm on Mar. 18, 2007)
Quote: from Irish Stamp on 9:47 pm on Mar. 15, 2007[br]I’m not sure who you’re thinking about Aragorn, the issue is probably the number of jobs rather than the skills.
I’m certain most people in yards could get jobs in other areas of the equestrian industry.<br>
Irish, not sure what your talking about, if the number of jobs is the issue how are they going to get jobs in the equestrian industry? There won’t be enough. The point is that you will not have enough jobs for the skills on offer therefore you have a deficit and subsequently people having to take sh!t work for sh!t money.. Supply and demand? The economic turnover generated by the industry is pretty significant and this is not comparable in any way to the mines. Completely different motives.. This is because some bunch of do-gooders with nothing better to do than ruin everyone elses fun are throwing in their two penny’s worth. Someone should organise a trip to some stables for them, perhaps then they’ll understand who really loves these animals..
The motives may be different (though I don’t think its accurate to portray them as do-gooders trying to spoil someone’s fun) but the effect is the same, the decimation of an industry/community. The question will be – how much electoral fall out would there be for a Labour government to ban NH racing. Most of the affected constituencies will be Conservative.
I’ll not give my opinion on animal-rights extremists, I don’t want banned on my first day! ;)
What I will say, though, is that there is a big reason that people are missing as to why a ban on racing will never go through: the betting industry. Companies like Hills and Ladbrokes, and nowadays the internet bookies and exchanges, have turnovers of billions of pounds a year. The aforementioned high-street giants have been known to appear in the FTSE100, and on top this they employ thousands. And as much as bookies aren’t exclusively about horse racing, a good two-thirds of all money I see at work (I work for Hill’s during my Uni vacations) goes on horses. A ban on racing would basically bring them to their knees, wiping out a very profitable industry.
And on a slightly more cynical note, the fact that these companies make so much money means that they probably have more than enough to ensure that no ban goes through.
4 equine deaths and one jockey airlifted to hospital marked a grim meeting at Wincanton today
Animal Aid seem to have adopted a stance similar to that employed by the ludicrously insane Fathers For Justice group – sensationalise every single detail until somebody begins to buy into what they’re saying.
Luckily for racing, I think people are intelligent enough to see through it all and those not intelligent enough don’t really care (take a look around your local bookies on any given afternoon, who there cares about the issues facing racing over their £2.50 each-way on the next at Steepledowns).
But Animal Aid’s argument is fundamentally flawed and the more they push to have racing banned, the more they’re going against the very thing they’re fighting for. Whether it is right or wrong, if people had no avenue to race the tens of thousands of horses in training, what do AA think will happen to them? Stuck in a field somewhere to graze peacefully? Allowed to frolick in the open air with the rest of their equine buddies?
I don’t think so. They’ll be killed, and killed in huge numbers. I don’t agree with that, and I’d expect many here feel the same, but I can guarantee it will happen.
Maybe they should come up with ways of making racing safer (though horses are fragile by nature and will invariably injure themselves from time to time, fatally or otherwise) rather than forcing everything into a bottle neck with only way to relieve the pressure.
I don’t understand the Animal Aid people at all, their supposed support for equine welfare seems just posturing to me.
NH racing should be given a lot of credit for improved safety over the last 30 years, not pilloried. More can be done, but problems are actually being addressed.
With the four fatalities at Wincanton today, will the media tomorrow be full of "racecourse of death" stories, with these once-a-year "animal lovers" calling for the course to be closed? Don’t hold your breath.
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