Sunday, May 04, 2008

Reality Check: Horse Racing = Dog Fighting



So there was another dumbass horse race today that I saw written up on ESPN and the 2nd place horse, Eight Belles, snapped both her ankles while racing against the boys and had to be put down.

Hillary somehow blamed Obama for it.

Sure this is sad in a very vague and fleeting way, until you think of all the real suffering in the world, but what really gets me is all the horse-racing apologists on the ESPN comment page who try to ignore the fact that horse racing is destructive and unnatural to horses.

Some of the fucktarded comments stated,

  • The horse was brave
  • The horse made a great sacrifice
  • This was a completely unexpected tragedy

Here are the facts,

  • "Cruelty is an inherent part of the horse racing industry. Thousands of horses are produced annually, from which a few racers are chosen, the rest blown away like chaff in the wind. The big money is in racing the 2 and 3 year olds, for whom training begins at 1½, before their bodies are fully developed and their growth plates have closed. Unnatural weight is put on their backs, concussive stress on their bones, and they are forced to submit to an overly strict training regimen. Nightmarish injuries like on-the-track fractures leave them finished by the age of 4–6, when they are barely mature. Decisions about their fate are made in the interest of the bottom line dollar, not their health. Injured animals are loaded up on drugs to run one more race.

    "The unnatural stresses inherent in competing so aggressively and at such a young age also engender problems such as gastric ulceration and pulmonary (lung field) bleeding, not observed in horses worked at reasonable levels. These health and injury problems once again necessitate — economically — the use of drugs to maintain the horse’s racing value (but not well-being).

More facts here.

So let's see, animals are breed to compete solely for the pleasure of humans and are killed if they can't perform. Sound familiar?

Let's be real here, horse racing is a glorified, upper-class white folk version of dog-fighting.

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6 comments:

  1. Horse Racing = Dog Fighting = I still dont give a shit when innocent people are still getting gunned down by cops who get off scott free.

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  2. Same as the "sports" are looked at differently so are the patrons...let me and my friends walk the streets drunk and see what happens. Now go to Preakness and watch all the drunk people walking back to their cars.

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  3. Co-motherfucking-Sign

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  4. I did say, who cares when real tragedy in happening in the world.

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  5. I agree with this completely. the same is true with fighting and sports. the lighter the skin of the athletes, the more people are "okay" with them fighting, even when it has nothing to do with the sport.

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  6. WTF?? Dog fighting=dogs trying to fucking kill eachother and people watch.
    Horse racing=a group of trained thoroughbreds with experienced jockeys race around a track and see who finishes first. The intent is for the horses to walk out of the race alive.

    Where the hell did you get the info? From PETA? Those fucking morons know nothing about horse racing, and neither do you.

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