Yesterday, the Daily Racing Form reported that Free Like a Girl “recently had to be euthanized due to a severe hind-leg injury sustained in a trailer accident.” This poor girl was six and, according to the piece, had been “retired” after her last (and 55th) race in October – retired, that is, to more scheduled abuse and exploitation in the rape shed.
Two points on this. The only reason the Daily Racing Form reported Free’s death is, well, I’ll let them explain: “She earned $2,565,628 during her career and continues to lead all Louisiana-breds in earnings.” Only the “stars” get coverage in the morally-bankrupt racing press. Also, had the DRF not covered it, we would never have learned of Free’s death. For you see, the Louisiana Commission has only ever forwarded racing deaths in response to our FOIAs, claiming they do not track training and stall kills.
This is horseracing.
It is never enough is it? These horses never get to be retired. I see them also in low end auctions aka feed lot sales. It is sick. Please keep fighting the good fight.
This is exactly the kind of story that exposes the moral rot at the center of horseracing. “Free Like a Girl” wasn’t reported on because she was a living being who suffered and died; she was reported on because she was a high-earning asset. That alone says everything. Fifty-five races, a so-called “retirement” that still involved breeding exploitation, and then a violent, fatal end in a trailer accident. And we’re supposed to accept this as unfortunate but normal? What’s even more disturbing is the institutional secrecy. If the Louisiana Commission only acknowledges deaths when forced by FOIA requests, then the public is being deliberately kept in the dark about the true body count especially the countless “non-stars” who die in training, in stalls, or in transit and are never mentioned at all. This isn’t sport. It’s an industry built on disposability, where horses are used up, broken down, and quietly erased unless they happened to make enough money to be worth a footnote. Free Like a Girl isn’t an exception. She’s the rule.
Every once in awhile some of those lower class ex-racing mares show up on a Facebook post after having been run through a livestock auction, bought by a kill buyer, and made available for a higher-than-killer-price price. Some of them are in rough shape but not dead yet. It is extremely disturbing to see what condition they are in long after they were exploited for racing and gambling. It’s also disturbing to think about people in the industry saying they love their horses so much and then the horses are on the verge of being shipped to a slaughterhouse.