Let’s start with this in regard to the cardiac arrest suffered by the Bills’ Damar Hamlin during an NFL game Monday: I wish nothing but the best for him, full return to health and resumption of his career. That said, what happened in Cincinnati further illustrates the utter obscenity of classifying horseracing as just another sport. Aside from the obvious – racehorses are enslaved; human athletes are not – the reactions of players/fans and, even more telling, the response by the NFL speaks volumes.
The game, as I’m sure many of you know, was postponed, and rightly so, as this was not a run-of-the-mill football injury. But. Racehorses are killed every day on American tracks. Every single day. With some of those dying in full public view – vet out, tarp up, pink in (sometimes this isn’t even necessary: the horse is dead on impact), body hauled away. And then the game resumes, with not even a perfunctory moment of silence. So please dispense forevermore with the lie of horseracing-as-sport, racehorses-as-athletes. It isn’t; they’re not.
(For a definitive comparison of in-game deaths between the four major U.S. sports and horseracing, see this. Here’s a preview: In the NFL’s entire 103-year history, exactly one – one – player has died during a game. On January 1 of last year, three horses died at Ohio’s Northfield Park – in the same race.)
The Jockey Club will always refer to the exploitation of horses for racing and wagering as the Sport of Kings. It’s a horrible thing that people find the hideous cruelty to horses and other animals as entertainment and sport.
Horseracing is an ongoing cesspool of animal cruelty and racketeering. It’s a cesspool of criminal minds passing off horseracing as acceptable. Horseracing is unacceptable cruelty to horses at all levels from the Grade One Kentucky Derby down to the claiming levels.
nobody gives a damn about ehe daily huge number of horses dying on the tracks, no attempt yto save anyu of their lives no attempt to even assuage the pain of dying
its just ugly as sin. stop all horseracing
Perfect. You’ve illustrated why the high-integrity journalism-super-stars of the racing press have remained silent throughout the events surrounding Damar Hamlin’s devastating collapse and its aftermath.
Every REAL sports columnist and sports reporter has at least referenced Mr. Hamlin’s injury — and teammates’ reactions to it — often delineating the obvious comparisons between the dangers of football and every other athletic competition. REAL sportswriters and broadcasters have expressed awareness of these dangers, and offered support.
But not the racing press. Oh no. They collectively understand that in horse racing — and only in horse racing — their priority, first and foremost, is to disregard (and even cover-up and hide) the carnage on the field of play.
I think the racing press emulates the jockeys in this way: carrying on with the all-important COMPETITION, even as their human and equine rivals lay, often paralyzed or worse, in their wake.
The Perth Cup in Australia was run New Years Day. Shortly after the start,there was a 2 horse collision. Chili is hot did not survive. The jockey who rode up on horse in front of her has been suspended for 6 weeks causing this nightmare. They stopped the horses in front and canceled the race. Spectators really complained the ambulance pulled off from the screen and took the euthanized horse off track in front of everyone. Also, there were protesters outside like we do here. And Australians were not happy about this outcome and not pro racing as of late. It was a horrible fall and so sad for the horses involved. I have read about this on line.
So it is not only us who call for an end.
Horse racing is the only sport in which the athletes are routinely killed on the field of competition. Horses used for racing deserve the same concern for their welfare as humans.
Yes, the horses deserve the same concern for their welfare as humans deserve! In REALITY, horses are NOT given the same status as human beings.
HORSES ARE treated as SLAVES and PRISONERS at the hands of selfish, sadistic, cruel human beings in this egregiously CRUEL horse-killing game. In racing, the horses are treated as expendable commodities.
Horses used for racing are not allowed to have freedom; freedom from being kept as PRISONERS. They’re kept [as PRISONERS] in stalls for 23 (twenty-three) HOURS A DAY/ SEVEN DAYS A WEEK for months and years, and forced to run on racetracks with cruel bits & tongue ties in their mouths, cavesson nosebands so they can’t open their mouths, their tongues hanging outside of their mouths (which is totally abnormal — not normal at all — sick — abusive to the horses) with WHIP-WIELDING JOCKEYS on their backs to force the horses to run faster (and for a longer distance) than they would ever run otherwise. The horses must endure the pain and agony of being used as racehorses, so their human connections can get their sick thrills and feel dominance over the horses.
The horses must tolerate and endure the pain of the whip. Whipping the horses into submission to perform for sadistic human beings causes MORE INJURIES than would ever happen otherwise.
Horses are forced to perform to the point of internal INJURIES, UNSOUNDNESS and DEATH.
Last, but not least, if the horses cannot perform to the satisfaction of their GREEDY, sadistic, heartless heathen owners and trainers, they are used to fill the contracts of the meat packers.
How many sports for human beings as athletes require that if you can no longer perform to the demands of heartless heathens, you must be executed?