Honoring the Horse, Rather than Presuming

I am fond of saying that the last “-ism” yet to fall (after, say racism and agism) will be “species-ism”: the prejudiced assumption of lesser intelligence, value, and identity of our fellow creatures. “The Tao of Equus” discusses of kinder, wiser approaches to horses, but also cautionary tales of how even best intentions go awry with human presumption and ignorance. “Completely inexperienced  riders will spend several hundred dollars to attend a two-day workshop with a famous equestrian…. Yet when these people try to follow the methods demonstrated at the clinic, they haven’t developed the coordination, balance, understanding or equine conformation and body language, intuition, or level of sociosensual awareness needed to put these techniques effectively to use…. If I wanted to run a nonprofit horse-rescue mission, I could make an entire career out of taking horses off the hands of disillusioned owners too stubborn [or ignorant, or arrogant] to get help….”  [brackets mine]  www.surfyoursoul.com

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