Endurance.Net Ridecamp Archives

In a message dated 6/14/03 3:16:24 PM, Magnumsmom writes:

<< John, I know atleast one of the incidents listed in my email 
WAS witnessed and reported to the AERC just after the 
incident happened, yet nothing was ever done about it.  

*** That's why it came up on Ridecamp years later. ***

In the June issue there is a sanction against a rider for bouncing 
checks.  Why no sanction for a *reported* incident of horse abuse... 
especially one resulting in the horse's death?  Are we to expect the 
same non-response to reported horse abuse in the future?
> >
Kathy,

First of all, the AERC doesn't respond to single incidents except to handle 
them as protests if they are properly filed.  The Protest & Grievance handles 
each protest on its merits on the facts placed before by the parties to the 
protest.  The P&G Committee doesn't make policy; that's the Board's job.  The 
kinds of actions people have been talking about from the AERC Board on horse 
fatalities are more general things like better reporting, tightened up rules, 
and 
improved education and research.

Second, you are just plain wrong on your facts.  You referred to two horse 
death incidents at rides.  The horse death at the NASTR ride was filed, then 
withdrawn, then refiled and then withdrawn.  At least the lady who filed it 
originally had the courage to do something when nobody else did.  The protest 
of 
David Jenkins for abuse of his horse Dancer at the Oakland Hills ride was 
GRANTED by the Protest and Grievance Committee and the decision was published 
in 
Endurance News.  You may not like the way the decision was reasoned or how the 
punishment was meted out by the unanimous decision of the five members of the 
P&G Committee based on the evidence before them.  I don't re-argue P&G 
Committee 
decisions in public after the Committee has made them.  The decisions speak 
for themselves; they are not popularity contests. You certainly cannot honestly 
say that Dancer's death was reported to the AERC and no one did anything 
about it.

Actually, I remember the Jenkins decision very well, not only because I wrote 
it but because of the reaction of some people to it.  Several people sent in 
statements about how bad a guy David Jenkins was at other rides over the years 
without saying anything relevant about the particular ride and incident which 
was the subject of the protest.  In the decision, I pointed out that if any 
of those people had done something about the abuse they observed at other rides 
over the years maybe Dancer would still be alive today.  I got more hate mail 
after that decision than after any other except for one.  

Your reference to the Jenkins decision proves my point: people should have 
the guts to protest abuse when they see it in the here and now with specific 
factual testimony and not whine about it with hearsay generalities on ridecamp 
years later if they actually want to save horses.

John Parke
Solvang CA

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