Ginger Schmersal felt compelled to send me a comment, meant to be published here, in which she mistakenly accuses me of saying her husband, Craig Schmersal, is the person pushing to have warm ups at reining events closed to the public. You might remember Craig; he was the trainer caught at the FEI World Championships in Sweden hyper-flexing his horse. I have stated in this blog that I do not like what I saw in that video. While I was not referring to him in regards to the petition, how telling is it that she assumes that I am? Her message was full of insults, as well containing possible slander about someone I know, so as much as I would like to, I cannot publish those comments. Was this message an attempt to bully me into keeping my mouth shut? She also has tried on numerous occasions to convince me that I am nobody, nobody cares about what I have to say, and that everyone who reads me are nobodies - hurtful for me to hear, for sure, but not exactly unexpected. Who is she trying to convince?
What all her squalling tells me is that I am on the right track. If what a person says is truly unimportant, why would you go through so much trouble trying to quash them? Why would you go out of your way to tell strangers on FB lies, and make yourself out to be a victim? Fear? Guilt? I can only deduce that what I am writing about IS important. In everything that I have written, I approach my subjects with a fair and balanced approach, even while reporting on Craig's video. While many people have written about how Craig should be banned for life from being around horses, I haven't gone that route - not once. Yet, it seems Ginger doesn't like me because I have dared to say that Craig's methods have no place in reining horse training.
Feel free to make your own judgement; he was riding at a public event, and it is the responsibility of every horse person in the world to keep tabs on any type of abusive activities toward horses.
It wasn't that long ago that it was perfectly acceptable to sore a gaited horse beyond comprehension to get their action more exaggerated. Not long ago, it was perfectly acceptable to kill horses on movie sets. It is only when reasonable, compassionate people spoke up on behalf of the horse did anything begin to change. And it has become very evident to me in the past month of writing this blog that many are quite tired of seeing trainers ride their stock roughly and with the most important goal as winning. Some reining trainers have nothing to worry about when it comes to the public scrutinizing their methods. Others probably do, because adapting and getting better is a difficult thing to do.
So once again, I declare my dedication to the cause of bringing you the truth as I experience it, being humane to horses while training and competing with them, and being a voice for those that don't have one, whether it is the horse or the rider. The rules of competition, and of society, apply to everyone, from the million dollar riders to us little nobodies.
***This post has been edited and re-posted to clarify/explain certain facts related to my story.***
