Did I ever "get it" on my last post.
First, I got big time emails calling me names (again). Then this tongue lashing identifying my post on horse flesh as simple minded bluster from Julie, the cruelest cut of all.
I'll concede this much. I sometimes verbally kill ants with a sledge hammer. I think it's my North Dakota Farm Boy upbringing that causes me to see a clear difference between the animal and humans. Even advanced animals. I'm not a huge fan of anthropomorphism. (A big word for us simple minded blusterers.)
I believe Bambi as portrayed in the movie is a deer and that hunter did right by eating Bambi's mom. We even have movies anthropomorphizing ANTS. Now what? Will the ASPCA become the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to ANTS?
I don't make this stuff up. The psychology of Female Mastery and horses is not my invention or contention. Much has been written and studied about this. Girls and horses and dogs and yes even cats is a well studied syndrome which is not in and of itself bad if you are 13.
From the Horse Country Journal:
"The horse provides a kind of path to mastery, control and power, in addition to its beauty and all that other stuff. Women don't have many opportunities for that," Dr. LaFarge said. "It gives a girl something she's good at during a time when she's having a lot of identity problems."
But when a woman is 61 years old and has a house full of cats, dogs or even horses and treats them like humans, something is decidedly wrong with that picture. Worse are the cases of "Animal Rescue" where no rescue takes place. Were the animals in this story better off or worse off than if they had been humanely disposed of? We are now about to see this travesty on a huge scale in horses because of this dumb law. And it's driven by celebrities with good intentions lacking wisdom.
I'll admit to this. I have never been a "Horse Person". I watch the horse trainers on RFD TV. Seen the Horse Whisperer movie. Flicka, Blue Velvet. etc etc. Yawn.
I'm missing an X chromosome to make a connection I'm not making. It's OK, it's a genetic flaw, ON BOTH SIDES! I won't begin to deny or repent of my DNA.
I have had several dogs and cats. Skip was my last dog. I cried when he died. The movie Skip the Dog was very much like my Skip. I have pictures. Lots of pictures. He was a wonderful dog. But, he was a dog. Just a dog. Great dog. But a dog.
I don't see where people make the logical leap leading to a dis-equalization of Horse over all other animals. Horses seem to have become the Pigs of Animal Farm. More equal than others. Julie said quite accurately that there is a great difference between a worm and a dolphin. She's right.
Where she misses the point is the same difference on that continuum is between a horse and a human. We are way less horse and way more human than we give ourselves credit for. Next time you need a tooth cavity filled or your appendix taken out, go out to the barn and ask the pony. Where are the horse colleges or seminaries? I have been reading Julie's blog for nearly 4 years. No horse writes like that. No horse creates like that. No horse has emotions and reactions like that.
People are to horse as horse is to worm. HOWEVER, I won't even kill a spider if I don't have to. I drive around chipmunks and gophers who try to commit suicide on the highway. I respect life too much. The other day an errant vole (mouse like creature) happened into our domain. Peggy told me to get rid of it. I did, but I carried the little guy out into the woods across from our house. He may have become eagle bait but there were lots of seeds to eat and logs to hide under. I wish the little guy all the best. But I also hunt, eat meat and fully comprehend the animal's place in the kingdom. Dominion. That's us. Dominated, that's them. Look it up. That little Vole was dominated but saved and protected.
But what do I know, I just bluster away in my own simple minded fashion.
2 comments:
Oh, don't worry, no body gave you any credit for any original thinking. We all knew you got that from somewhere else. Just because you bolster your sexist attitudes with some body else's second hand psychobabble does not make it true. There are plenty of men who ride and care for horses and the crap you bring sideways into an issue makes it hard for any body to figure out what the issue was in the first place.
Gene:
1. There is no excuse to verbally kill ants with a sledge hammer. That's just poor writing. If you know you do it, work to become better.
2. My North Dakota Farm Girl upbringing has not made me any less aware of the difference between animals and humans. That's silliness and I don't know what you're trying to say. There is no point to what you're making since the blog you are linking to is mine...a North Dakota Farm Girl.
3. Bambi has nothing to do with my post or what I was trying to say. I say in my post more than once that I was not equating humans and animals.
4. Why is it a bad or weak or laughable thing, this connection between women and horses? Monty Roberts himself has acknowledged that men have a difficult time with seeing horses as anything but an animal to break. This says less about women and horses, and more about something about men that is not admirable. You may not have been mocking women, but you came off like it. Would you like me to mock you? I could do it...I don't think you'd like it.
5. Again, you use a 61 year-old woman with extreme issues as proof? False dichotomy, Gene, and you know it. You wrote a blog post about all the different argumentative tactics people use just a few months ago. Go back and read it.
6. What's the point of your whole "horses and seminaries" comment? Did I ever hint that horses could be dentists? Geez. Please read what I was trying to say. I never said horses were geniuses. I also said that the reaction to a horse said more about the person than the horse.
7. Then you end with trying to prove that you're a good guy. Why do you feel the need to do that? Why not prove that in your entire post, with your writing, instead of mocking and making fun of those who see differently than you?
I, incidently, smash spiders into oblivion. I also am not a dog person. I'm not going to mock you crying over your dog. Because, you know, men and dogs have this weird thing together...like women and horses.
If you don't like tongue lashings, quit dealing them out yourself.
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