Connemara inspections would not pass USEF’s Central Park test

Of all the posts I’ve written about Connemara inspections, this is the most important, because it looks at the practices of the American Connemara Pony Society against the backdrop of its national federation, the United States Equestrian Federation.

USEF has launched an initiative to evaluate the welfare of the horse in the 21st century.

In this spirit, USEF held a town hall meeting in June 2013, in which several top officials described the initiative and provided a more detailed look at its specifics. The meeting looked at inappropriate practices and urged horsemen to hold up a mirror and examine their conscience.

USEF President Chrystine Tauber said it was imperative that members have this dialogue before others begin it for them.

One underlying theme was nothing happens in private anymore, and the world is watching. With social media as the new public watchdog, judgment spreads quickly. Given this heightened scrutiny, USEF is cleaning up its act (my words, but that was the implication).

The town hall was three hours long, but I found watching it addictive because I was listening to the leaders of American horse sport talk about ethics and welfare and all the things that matter most to me. I’ve never heard the Connemara society discuss any of these topics. In fact, many Connemara owners have tried to silence me on these same topics.

Bill Moroney, USEF vice president of national affiliates, and David O’Connor, USEF past president, both made points about horse organizations examining their practices.

O’Connor said affiliates are going to have to look at their practices and ask: “Could I do this on television in the middle of Central Park and nobody minds it?” He embellished that image by saying horse owners should imagine that an NBC crew is following them around.

As he was talking, I pictured a TV screen showing Connemara inspectors clutching their clipboards, walking around horses with a cursory glance and deciding whether to approve a horse as a “premium Connemara” based on its outer shell without seeing the horse do anything meaningful. I also imagined a split screen, with “Rudolph the Red Nose Reindeer” displaying on the adjacent screen, fostering open-mindedness and the concept of not judging anyone by appearance.

If the public were allowed to weigh in on Connemara inspections, I feel strongly that inspections would not pass the sniff test. In fact, the inspections would be deemed nothing more than schoolyard bullying within seconds. Oh, I can just see the Twitter comments already. They would immediately turn on the inspectors and start evaluating the inspectors’ conformation.

The USEF town hall was broken into three segments, and in the final segment, Moroney said that organizations should ask themselves: “What is our sport? What should it look like that’s defendable, that’s realistic, and that’s reasonable and that cares for our horse No. 1?”

Using that as a bar, I ask: “Are Connemara inspections designed to care for the horse first and foremost?”

No. Not even close. They were designed to eliminate a line of more refined horses that were winning at shows. Period. There was never anything moral or ethical about them. The welfare of the horse was never a concern. This was all about revenge by one inspector, and several other inspectors followed her lead.

Moroney went on to say: “I think we have to put aside personal agenda about our businesses as professional horsemen, and we also have to reach out to our owners, reach out to our veterinarians, reach out to other professionals in the sport and create a culture that does the right thing for the horse first.”

Have Connemara inspectors put aside their personal agenda for inspections? Quite the opposite. Personal agenda is driving the inspections. The concept is to get rid of the competition.

Moroney said that, rather than horse groups being pushed to the tipping point and feeling like they need to have town hall conversations, these conversations should become “a normal part of our culture of how we look at ourselves every couple of years.” He said horse groups should analyze their practices and make little tweaks “to get us to stay with a philosophy that’s correct for our horses first and keeps us on track for the future.”

Since the Connemara society passed inspections in the early 2000s, how many times have officials allowed discussions on whether inspections are good for the breed? ZERO. The topic of inspections is off limits. The officials who wanted inspections rammed them through, and it’s a done deal.

Someone who was involved in the planning of inspections told me that the whole program changed midstream without many of those on the committee knowing it, and several of them complained about that secrecy to no avail.

As for these inspections keeping the society on track for the future, how does creating a country full of coarse horses help the breed in the future? Quite the contrary, it will derail the breed.

When you alter the makeup of the breed so that all the “premium” and “approved” ponies are coarse and many of those are dead-sided and sour (I’ve ridden many approved Connemaras that are both dead-sided and sour), you are creating an environment in which people have to resort to the inappropriate practices (abusing and drugging horses) that this town hall meeting was designed to eliminate. If Connemaras are not athletic, no amount of inappropriate behavior is going to get them to perform, but desperate people will resort to those tactics anyway.

If we want the Connemara breed to be on track for the future, inspections need to go away.