A BloodHorse article Monday is noteworthy not for its focus – synthetic track surfaces, which as ever is but a distraction – rather for the growing realization among racing people that the proverbial clock is ticking. My favorite is this from Jeff Platt, president of the Horseplayers Association of North America:
“I have friends who are not horseplayers. A very close friend of mine told me, ‘How do you reconcile horse deaths at Churchill Downs? How are you any different than Michael Vick supporting dog fighting?’ … It stings a little bit, and how do you reconcile that? Look at what happened to dog racing. They got it on the ballot and it had no chance. In any state in the U.S., a guy like me would be vastly outnumbered by everybody else.”
There was also this from Bill Casner, former chairman of the Thoroughbred Owners and Breeders Association:
“Churchill is the pivot because of the Kentucky Derby. There has been a resistance by the traditionalists to change that surface because it’s always been dirt. (But) What does that matter if the Kentucky Derby goes away, which it very well could? There was a bill introduced in California to ban horse racing. It didn’t gain traction at that time, but that you even have that kind of dialogue is terrifying.”
One man’s terrifying is another’s encouraging. Unrelenting pressure, folks.
I love that comparison to Michael Vick. It’s very appropriate since animals are being exploited by human beings and the animals are injured and killed for “fun and profit” in both dog fighting and horseracing.
“Terrifying”… yes, something I would have agreed with a year ago. OMG! NO horse racing! How will the earth and the world’s population even survive without it! What can we, as horse racing fans, do to STOP this onslaught of the very real possibility that we may actually have to live in a world without horse racing!
Oh, the humanity!
Note above: sarcasm FULLY intended!
But the horse racing industry people brought this about all by themselves. When the mainstream media is finally reporting on the problems with horse racing, you know the issue is gaining traction. Problem is, the industry has no real viable defense – and they know it.
Note, too: I used to bemoan the fact that other than in Saratoga, you’d get almost no news at all about horse racing except on the biggest days; but this was not always so. Horse racing’s slow decline is finally picking up speed.
When you are so scared s*itless that you actually have to move your racing product from the world’s richest and most well known track, home of the Kentucky Derby, that is -Churchill Downs – to meager and lowly Ellis Park – you KNOW there are major problems that the industry is scrambling to try and avoid, and guess what – it’s all getting tougher and tougher for them to hide. .
Maybe if they weren’t such blatant cheaters, and such dishonorable people that run roughshod over the kind and magnificent animals in their ‘care’, then, maybe, they might have a chance to survive!
Oh, wait, that’s right – they can’t. I forgot. You’ve got the criminals running the prison.
I used to love this sport. I looked forward to Saratoga, the Breeder’s Cup, the Triple Crown, all of it.
Every year. Now, I hate it. Because, to me personally, liars and hypocrites are two of the absolute worst traits you can find in a person.
And you’ll find plenty of them in the horse racing business, that’s for sure..
-Joe
Banning horseracing is “terrifying” to someone who engages in an activity that literally causes painful and life-threatening injuries to horses. What does he think about what the horses feel? It sounds like he never gave it any thought as to what the horses feel.
A selfish, sadistic, indifferent human being who gets some sick, perverted thrill out of knowing horses suffer from ulcers and a long list of other types of injuries that are painful and cause so much suffering to the living, breathing sentient beings that are horses: Bill Casner…???!!!
What other “sport” has people on hand standing by to Euthanize you?!
It sure as hell is not terrifying to the horses.
EXACTLY,Rick. You know what terrifies me…horses doing massive face plants,and snapping off legs,and lying there in terror not being able to get up,and waiting for the needle to “Euthanize” them.
Rick, I think you mean it is terrifying to the horses.
Excuse me, I was thinking of racing being terrifying to the horses. Horses would have no idea of any human conversation to ban Horseracing.