Letter to the Editor: Adopt or Perish

[Wandering Eyes]

With respect to the question posed in Bill Finley’s, “The Week in Review: So, What Would It Take to Appease Animal Rights Activists?” in the Monday, June 3 TDN, a serious answer would be “it depends on the activist.” There are extremists on both sides. One the one hand, there are animal-rights extremists who think consuming honey is cruel to bees. On the other hand, there are horse racing enthusiasts who are shocked and chagrined that 26 horse racing deaths at Santa Anita has received so much “undeserved” attention and were miffed at NBC’s coverage of that during the Kentucky Derby. But the goal should not necessarily be to appease the most hardcore vegan, but potential consumers or voters.

I am what many in the animal-rights community might call an oxymoron–an animal rights activist who loves horse racing. I have been around animal rights activist, passed some local animal-rights legislation myself with respect to farm animals, and I know a bit how these people work and think. Some of their positions at first seem extreme, but upon further examination, have some merit; elephants really were being abused by circuses.

If anything should put the fear of God into those in the horse racing business, think of Ringling Brothers. Sure, there were factors afoot other than animal rights protesters and the mistreatment of elephants and big cats. Notice a similarity to horse racing–it also has some major business problems other than animal-rights perception problems, such as competition due to new forms of gambling that just didn’t legally exist a few decades back, save for two cities. There is no Massachusetts fair circuit anymore, and that isn’t due to any ban on horse racing. And while there was an occasional local municipality that banned animal circuses or banned elephants used in circuses, there wasn’t much in the way of outright bans. Yet Ringling Brothers is gone and heightened awareness about animal abuse had a lot to do with it.

Don’t misunderstand me: outright bans are possible, and I believe Mr. Finley’s piece provided too much comfort. Go to the Grey2K website and you’ll see that 41 states have outright banned dog racing. While the Finley opinion piece downplayed PETA’s willingness to place a question on the ballot, trust me: in a day when most ballot questions are placed on the ballot by companies being paid to gather signatures, many animal rights groups can do it on their own through volunteers only, and they have done just that in Massachusetts more than once. Want to know more? I recommend reading ballotpedia.org’s article of “Treatment of Animals on the Ballot” for a detailed history of the wins and losses of the animal-rights community.

If you think a statewide ban on horse racing cannot happen, you are naive. While many do not know it, not because of animal rights but because of opposition to gambling, New York once banned horse racing with the Hart-Agnew Law. In 1894, the New Jersey legislature banned parimutuel betting for a while. A ban is neither unimaginable nor unprecedented. Even though horse racing was eventually legalized again, the Brighton Beach Race Course, Gravesend Race Track, and the Sheepshead Bay Race Track were never able to reopen. This could happen to Santa Anita if there were substantial closures.

But the perception that horse racing is cruel to animals might lead to problems other than outright bans. First, like Ringling Brothers, people might simply stop patronizing horse tracks to such an extent that the doors cannot be left open. Second, with an industry that is becoming less and less capable of making it on its own, while there may not be outright bans, state legislatures will to subsidize the industry may wane. Sure, horse racing is an industry that preserves much-desired open green spaces that externalize a benefit which are not reflected in profits, creating “market inefficiencies” justifying state intervention. But this goodwill of preserved open spaces gets destroyed by the perception of animal cruelty.

Sometimes ignoring a problem actually works; it can be bad to “chase criticism,” and a public relations problem fades when starved of oxygen and fuel that a response provides. But those in the thoroughbred industry that think that this is one of those don’t-chase-criticism moments could not be more momentously wrong. This is a conflagration that requires really dealing with the problem and improving the situation, and not slick public relations.

Here’s the tough love: there are a lot of industry “experts” being paid a lot of money but making some big-league mistakes. These aren’t just PR people, but people entrenched in the industry who aren’t exactly Daniels capable of reading the writing on the wall. Sure, PETA flames the fans, but it is not just about them. It’s about Mr. Joe Six-Pack, Ms. Soccer Mom and Ms. Socially Conscious Millennial and whether they think that horse racing is just too cruel. This industry is losing that battle.

The public views these horses as pets or noble athletes. They do not want to see horses die in slaughter houses, so we must make sure they are not sent to Mexico or Canada for such purposes. And there is the whole issue of nurse foals and supposed “throw away horses” when the mare is used for orphaned thoroughbred race horses and the foal that caused them to produce milk is dispensed. The solution to these problems is to fix them as best you can and stop blaming PETA. Otherwise, it is over–and I mean that somewhat literally.

A June 23, 2017 Fortune Magazine article entitled “Why Animal Cruelty is Bad for Business, said, “The fact is, in today’s economy, businesses are under a microscope when it comes to how they interact with the world around them. Subjugating the treatment of animals beneath other commercial concerns may have made business sense in centuries past; but today, that doesn’t fly.” That’s spot on and the wave of the future.
SeaWorld has stopped using orcas at its theme parks. According to Fortune Magazine, “Walmart–along with Kroger, McDonald’s, Burger King, and hundreds more–have commanded the cage-free conversion [of hens], announcing policies to switch 100% of the eggs they sell to cage-free within the next few years.”

Voters and consumers want horse racing to be less cruel. Adopt or perish.

–Rinaldo Del Gallo, III, Attorney at Law

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