Saying that horses love racing is as stupid as people who think that their dogs are children. Horses do not know what racing is, it?s a human pass time. Horses are not humans, they have no concept of competitive sport, no concept of dangerous sport and no choice in the matter either. Comparing them to athletes is facile. Olympic athletes CHOOSE to compete. Olympic athletes UNDERSTAND the concept of competitive sport.
Horse owners who condone racing are either :
a/ well aware that it is cruel but have such a sense of entitlement that they think it is acceptable, because they enjoy it.
b/ willfully deluded
c/ very very thick.
It really has to be one of those, because I don?t rational people could not see what we see every year and think that its just dandy.
Last years winner, wasn?t exhausted and distressed, he was"overheated". In which case, why the hell wasnt he pulled up? Getting vets to him quickly is not the same has preventing the animal getting into that state in the first place. Whether or not it was medical attention he received or whether he had long term affects is irrelevant.
What would we expect Catgirl? We would expect that he should not have been allowed to get into that state in the first place.
The BBC is hugely to blaim for this too. Its shocking that so many people on this thread were genuinely not even aware of the cruelty of this race. References to "obstacles" and panning away from fallers sanitises it all nicely. Perhaps some close ups of animals with horrible injuries thrashing on the ground until they are shot would drive home the reality of this great British tradition. But that wont happen whilst its such a money earner for TV.
Ivanapoo, the horrors of intensive farming are countless and awful. But they are not the subject of the thread. The existence of one cruelty does not jusfify another.
In addition, there is something particularly revolting about a cruelty perpretated in the name of entertainment.