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.

What did you find?

Tbh given the wide variances on this thread about what constitutes good horse welfare…

With the best will in the world I think it is going to be pretty impossible to write a template letter that will suit everyone’s objectives which is why my original version was a bit bland.

A There are people on here who want to ban dressage as a sport full stop.

B Others who want existing legislation applied better in training and comp plus a revisiting of the rules and judging at all levels.

C Others who want bit-less dressage or snaffles only.

D Others who don’t even want horses to be ridden or kept by humans at all (please note that wild horses sometimes have to endure horrible pain, starvation and injury so that is not a solution imho) but everyone is entitled to their opinion.

Personally I don’t know how you ban dressage at the top without adversely affecting very instructive and positive (in most cases) dressage at the grass roots level which helps children, young riders, and novices ride more lightly and in a balanced way and allows them to steer with their bodies and not their hands; which is important in terms of horse welfare. I’m going for B & C but I can’t speak for everyone?

Any suggestions pls?

Where have all the posters gone who said they'd written emails already?

have I shown any sign of bias? If I could be bothered to take you seriously, I'd be offended by that remark.

honestly, I get and appreciate your POV but I don't think template letters work as well as people expressing their own views no matter how briefly or badly. I've been involved in collating responses to other things and I know that template responses can be passed over unread because you get to the first sentence or two, recognise its a template and set it aside. It may get counted as a response in the number of responses (or maybe not, sometimes all copies of the same template are counted as one) Sometimes when email is used, template letters can even be dumped in the organisation's spam or junk folder and never even seen.

I'd also be really interested to see the wording of the emails. What are people asking for??

i haven't looked. A poster asked about welfare issues in 3 day eventing and I suggested it would be a starting point if she wanted to find out.

Agreed!

But some people are interested in sample emails

So there are different viewpoints even on that!

I agree. Hard on the rest of the team if they’re clean, but social pressure from peers would be extremely effective

Living a life away from social media at a guess...

You seem to be antagonistic towards people who care about horse welfare.

I'm not. But I don't want equestrian events banned. Also I'm interested to know what the posters insisting they'd sent emails actually said in them, and what else they expect to happen.

This is a hugely emotive subject but let’s try and keep it pleasant on here please.

Horse welfare gets a bit lost in the mix if we squabble between ourselves. We all want the same thing in the end, just disagree on how to achieve it.

godmum56
I love your approach!

Wendy Saturday and Sunday is when a lot of people ride the most. I suspect we may get sample emails tonight or tomorrow evening.

That’s what we are thing to debate and agree on Wendycoping

I’m pro-dressage for example but it’s evident that the rules aren’t working currently. We can’t just support the status quo.

I’m also interested in the monitoring of training methods too as a result of this latest debacle. It’s no use everything being hunky dory in the dressage arena when there’s abuse in the training yard back home. But I don’t know how you enforce that? On the spot yard visits?

Still here, had my reply this morning from British Dressage. You are definitely very antagonist. I'll screenshot my email in mo

Main body of my email

Thanks so much. What did they say?

the other time you see video's/pics of abuse is in the warm up area. It should be easy enough to observe that more closely, also not sure but it used to be only actions in the actual arena that were subject to scrutiny. I wouldn't call @Wendycoping aggressive or antagonistic but defintely defensive which is understandable. Its blooming hard to accept that something you love can be rotton at its core.

YY to all of that!

I feel the same way tbh 😢

I don't accept that all horse sport is rotten to its core at all. I think there are a lot of people who have an agenda to get rid of all horse sports. I also think what CJD did was awful - yes I was bitterly disappointed by it and felt really sorry for that poor horse. But I know for a fact that that isn't how all horses in all competitions are treated.

There was/is? an awful issue of coaches abusing young gymnasts, but we don't insist that gymnastics is banned.

I really enjoyed watching the eventing dressage today, no complicated movements and lots of happy looking horses.

Well I'm afraid people are going to have to accept it. And quickly.

I despise animals being used in any so-called sport. They don't consent in a way we can truly say is 100%.

From an outside-in perspective it is obvious that these assholes do something to get the animals to perform. Their patience ain't that of a Saint each time they go out to 'train'...

I despise animals being used in any so-called sport. They don't consent in a way we can truly say is 100%

You see, I do not agree with you on this, and this is why I am ambivalent about this thread. Too many posters with an extreme agenda - and before anyone twists my words to suit it, I don't mean the extreme agenda is to stop animal abuse in sport which I 100% agree with. I mean to get rid of horse sport altogether (and I know there are people who don't believe horses should be ridden at all although I'm not sure what they plan to do with horses going forward if they got their way - can't see many people paying the huge costs involved in horses just to have a large lawnmower)

I didn't say "to its core" I said "at its core" Different.

OK, well I don't agree that it's rotten at its core either.

I'll post when I get home with their reply

And I don't believe stopping animals being used in 'sport' is extreme. Labelling those of us who think this way as extreme is so overdone now that I don't care for the opinion; it used to hurt me a bit but people who peddle this aren't worth it.

I donate to an animal charity that continuously has to pick up the pieces of unwanted race horses so-say 'past their best'. No happy retirement for them unless an animal charity comes to their aid. All the bloody (and blood) money in gambling and people like them have to sort out the fallout.

And don't forget the horse meat scandal from a decade ago...