Is it true about Charlotte Dujardin withdrawing from the Olympics?

[Freakwave897]

Or is it fake news?

It’s so disappointing if true…

I am a huge fan and can’t quite believe what I am hearing.

Please don not think that all people who have horses behave like this . Our family have owned horses for 45+ years , any animal we buy stays with us until its death hopefully having enjoyed a long and happy retirement . There are lots of horse owners like us , that treat our horses as members of the family in the same way as the family dogs / cats are and make the same commitment to care for them come what may .

What...someone dressed up to look like CDJ lashing a whip around a horses' legs? -not buying that for an instant.

But they should have reported it years beforehand.

The place I used to ride, you could tell how the horses were treated from how they behaved. They loved to come out for lessons, even with idiots like me. My niece had a pony many years ago. When she outgrew it, it stayed with the family, cared for and taken for walks as there was no one small enough to ride him out. he had a goat for company that had been abandoned in the pony field but that's another story.

I have seen the entire video now, rather than the one shown on the thread earlier...this sounds like a load of foul schoolyard bullies with horse as victim.

the evil chuckle, the whip cracks, the harsh human voices, the horse high blowing and hating every minute...

Disgraceful.

@Floralnomad is lovely to hear, I suppose there is this element in every aspect of life where money and status is involved and hopefully a small minority.

at the high end of competitive sport as I understand it, its not a minority. If your stomach can stand it, go and google

just why is the person taking the video chuckling?
awful

That’s truly horrifying. I was a fan of Charlotte but I’m so disgusted and disappointed in her now.

It's really sickening but it sadly doesn't surprise me, I think hitting horses is normalised.

My dd went to riding lessons from ages 5-11yo and even as young kids they were taught to hit the pony's and tell them who's in charge 😕

I know nothing about horses but this made me very uncomfortable.

Using animals for our entertainment/sport is not in the animals best interest is it 🤷‍♀️

I think is not just animal sports either - the stories that you used to hear about how child gymnasts were treated - given medications to delay puberty etc. The abuse scandals in US gymnastics. The whole Olympic industry is probably pretty sketchy.

I had to turn that off, I absolutely cannot.

’An error judgement’ indeed. She clearly does this regularly, it’s obvious that it’s common practice amongst those people, it’s sickening.

I agree with a PP, I hope she’s ruined.

And I sincerely hope that her losses are a lesson to others using similar tactics - you will be found out in this technological day and age.

Where can we make our horror known? What pressure can we apply? To which governing bodies?

I {probably like many others on here} had a visceral reaction to that bullying mob -it sounds like a schoolyard bunch of mean women ganging up on a victim and actually getting off on it.

The ''giggler/cackler'' sounds like she was enjoying it.

Why wasn't this shown years ago?

I’d like to know this too.

Many questions definitely need to be asked further up the chain too!

Apparently the video is 2 years old not 4. Could it be that the young woman who brought this to attention, had to wait to become an adult so that she could do this as her parents endorsed it? Pure speculation of course.

It IS Sadism.

Some sort of sexual power trip, undoubtedly.

That was a human taking pleasure in thrashing that horse about the legs and probably belly- very tender areas.

The giggling woman behind the camera is just as complicit.

Who was the ''cackler''? {The woman giggling at the whipping} Was that the sponsor who paid for the lesson?

Were there four people there? CDJ , the 'rider', the cackler and one other by the sounds of it?

When she is whipping the horse, she complains 'this is so shit to hit them hard'. We all make mistakes but Charlotte will be ace at reading a horses' body language, anyone can see that this horse was scared and bewildered. She hit a scared animal. Ice cold.

Good question. As a start I’d write to this org: https://www.britishdressage.co.uk/news/new-advisory-group-puts-horse-welfare-at-the-top-of-the-agenda
plus British Dressage
plus the International Federation for Equestrian Sports (FEI) who are investigating CD.

Perhaps others have more names to add to the list?

Let them know how you feel and what changes you want to see.

Quite right @Floralnomad . I lost my last equine last year. She’d been retired for 15 years and had the life of a queen. Retired with us because she was such an amazing small child’s pony, really bonded with my other two and absolutely stunning with it. She deserved to be cosseted. So many of these ponies get passed from pillar to post and you don’t know where they’ll end up.

I’ve never sold a horse in my life, bought five, sold 0.

apparently there are two danish contestents banned so the owner of the video felt emboldened
she was just on the news on monday with the oppportunity of becoming the highest decorated GB olympian then Tuesday the video was released.
i wonder if there was insider knowledge before the monday's news article.
in any event, it has had the catastrophic effect on CD, which is Good

I think people who don't compete have never seen the special treatment that goes with being a "name" which is why this may have been so hard for the person involved to raise. With showing, it's open knowledge that certain producers have judges over for dinner and will pay for the top spots. Lots of horse owners pay for a "name" to ride their green horses and ponies to get that qualification they want. I'm sure eyes are averted to many things. It's one if the reasons so many people have packed in competition (especially showing which has declined enormously over the last five years). Along with that issue, welfare has been raised many times with certain people attending multiple qualifiers up and down the country over one weekend with little care about their animals stood on a box for hours. Sadly, a lot of competition riders are not necessarily horse lovers as well.

Yep, she's an abuser. Absolute cunt.

Charlotte was sadistic towards the horse, obviously, but I dare say she enjoyed intimidating and dominating the young rider as well.