Allow me, gentle reader, to introduce to you the carriage horse's worst enemy - the "humaniac":
A humaniac is a person who identifies him/herself as an "animal rights" advocate. Now, a humaniac differs greatly from the average, normal person who is concerned with animal welfare - the everyday concern that most of us have in caring for and enjoying our pets, seeing that animals are not wantonly harmed, etc. No, the humaniac disdains the term "animal welfare" as a human condescension; the humaniac (to varying degrees depending on which organization they belong to) wants to outlaw all human interaction with animals. Their life's work is to harangue and lie and spread misinformation about any pursuit they deem not in line with their agenda (just why they feel compelled to do this is fascinating - we'll get to it in a future post, I promise ;-)
Unfortunately for us and our horses here in NYC, we are one of the humaniacs' primo targets, as we fit the bill perfectly: a small, high-profile industry with very limited resources. You can see what an excellent opportunity our industry is for these maniacal misfits. They would rather see a horse dead than have a job. To them, a carriage horse doing what it was bred to do, and living a comfortable, content existence alongside his driver, is no different from Michael Vick and a pile of mutilated fighting dogs or undercover horror videos revealing grotesque cruelties at factory farms. Indeed, humaniacs have made public statements comparing the carriage horse trade to the enslavement of people of African descent, and the Holocaust of the Jewish people during WWII.
What?! Surely it should be easy to defeat people who rave and spout such outrageous lunacy!
Yes, one would think.....
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13 comments:
Hmm, people are telling me they're having a hard time commenting....is this thing working?
Is Michaeleenflynn your real name and is that your real picture. are you using the alias from the movie Quiet man?
Ah, now, it seems to me ye have answered yer own question ;-) No flies on you!
Now, is Anonymous yer real name, or do ye need a tickle in the imagination department? ;-)
Yes, but if your industry in NYC does not wrong and is humane then why do you always anonymous peebra?
you are either ashame of all the cruelty or are afraid you will evenutally have to answer to the cruelty.
Cruelty? You are so wrong there, my friend! Or should I say Roxanne.(I can tell by the terrible grammer.) Box stalls, automatic waterers, round the clock care, vet care, ferrier care, dental care, vacations, love and companionship, retirement to farms all over the area....Hmmmmm. That sure doesnt sound like cruelty to me. And I wouldnt blame Michaleen Flyn for using an alias. You a.r. extremists are pretty dangerous people to deal with! I wouldnt want you showing up at my home, anonymous!
abigail, more men rode you than your carriage.
abigail, more men rode you than your carriage.
by the way, where are all those pictures of your horses retired in green pastures?? WE all know they don't exist. those poor NYC carriage horses ended up in a dog dish.
Just proves my point that they are sad, lonely, uneducated, and nutty people indeed.
Michaleen,
Thank you for your email. Please forgive me for not emailing you back, but I thought it best not to share my email address with someone so interested in remaining anonymous (and who obviously has such a hatred for "humaniacs").
I don't know if you view me as one of that group, but if you do then your characterizations are all wrong. I don't want to outlaw human interaction with animals. My horse is my best friend and I love him deeply. However, as such I would never hook him up to a carriage and expect him to walk on hard pavement for long shifts at a time, breathing exhaust fumes.
Furthermore, I find it offensive that you accuse those who oppose the industry as preferring "to see horses dead." Certainly pulling a carriage is better than being slaughtered and eaten, but I still feel it's a terrible thing to subject a horse to for the sake of our entertainment.
Horses did not evolve to walk on paved roads, breath carbon dioxide, climb stairs, or live in box stalls stories above the ground. As for your claim that "humanaics" are hurting your chances of caring for animals by depriving you of wages... The thing is, YOU have a choice in what job you choose. Your horse DOESN'T.
Thanks again for emailing me and introducing me to your "truth," but I can't say I agree with it.
Sincerely,
Katharine Swan
Well, I gave it my best shot, and gave you the benefit of the doubt. I always try to treat people the way I would like to be treated, included listening to their side of the story.
Unfortunately, it's apparent that you are not only drinking the humaniac Kool Aid, but you are defensive and closed-minded as well.
Bad combination.
You blithely blog about Panama being left out in the field to overheat and/or colic (and admit that the barn didn't even have a thermometer handy!), post pictures of the awful wound he got at turn out from a wire fence, lost so much weight that you could "feel his spine", and forced him over bridges, rode on residential streets filled with cars, lawnmowers, et al, while at the same constantly telling us about how many times you fell off him (should a novice who is constantly falling off really be riding her horse in a residential area?!).
Yikes.
And then you have the unmitigated gall to pass judgment on the carriage business?
It would be laughable if it weren't so absurd.
In 27 years driving a carriage, my horses have NEVER gotten any significant wounds of any kind, never dropped so much weight that I could "feel his spine", was never left to overheat, and I have never fallen off my carriage or lost control of it.
If the filmmaker from Blinders was so inclined, he could patch together a string of your words & pics, and do a hatchet job on you the same way he did on us.
As far as not being a "humaniac", you state quite clearly that you support PETA. I think it's time you read their mission statement - they propose a gradual phase out of ALL animal use by humans.
They DO NOT approve of the bit that you put in Panama's mouth, nor the fact that you ride on his back.
Speaking of which, saying that horses weren't made to pull carriages in the city....hmmm, says who? It could be said that they are also not made to have steel in their mouth & on their feet, and to have person riding on their back, forcing them with "a few pops to the belly" to cross a bridge.
You are a novice in every way - this is your first horse, yet you see fit to condemn people who have a lifetime of experience and love for their horses - people you have never even met! From race horses to carriage horses, anyone who does differently from YOU, new horse owner and crappy rider, must be wrong. WOW.
Your lack of critical thinking skills and inability and/or unwillingness to look for an objective truth of a given situation will certainly not bode well for you - either in your writing career or in horsemanship (you put your horse, yourself, and others in danger by not wanting to see the truth that your horse needed a more severe bit, for instance).
Folks like you find a comfortable spot in their worldview, and dig in, never allowing the ebb and flow of information and perspective to infiltrate.
It's a real pity.
Good luck with that.
Michaleen,
Your first email to me said, "Just a cursory glance around your website leads me to believe that you are interested in truth."
Now that I disagree with you, I am "defensive and closed-minded."
My supposed faults didn't stop you from trying to convince me to see things your way; only once I refused to was I suddenly a bad horse owner.
I was perfectly decent in my response to you, my only crime being that I disagreed. I'm sorry you couldn't pay me the same respect.
AWWWWW, Flynn, leave the nice Colorado woman alone. All she did was post an authentic and informed opinion, and then to point out your flawed "logic." Geez.
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