It's Sunday afternoon, I've mowed the lawn, weeded the garden and I'm now relaxing by an open window reading some dKos. I slipped over to MyDD for a bit and read a diary by Alegre about using yesterday's Kentucky derby as an analogy for the Democratic primary. I would agree with her premise if the truth about horse racing and breeding were not so sordid. The death of one horse because of injury is merely a drop in the bucket of the thousands that are slaughtered each year because they were never fast enough for racing.
I tried to post what I wanted to say in a comment to her diary, but I realized there is much more I want to say, so here it is, my first diary. The point I hope to make by the end of this diary is that it is hypocritical to get upset about analogies to the Kentucky derby just because a horse died...UNLESS we are willing to acknowledge there is a far worse problem inherent in horse racing and breeding.
I want to first air my own dirty laundry. I am by no means a huge animal rights advocate. I do not align with PETA. In fact, I work in infectious disease research, and my research often relies on the use of lab animals. My only goal here is to make us aware of our own hypocrisies.
A Washington Post column from 2006 stated:
Last year, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, approximately 94,000 U.S. horses -- tens of thousands of them perfectly sound and fit -- were killed for food at three foreign-owned slaughterhouses (two are in Texas, one is in Illinois). The businesses get the horse from contractors who buy them dirt cheap at auction, inhumanely kill them through vivisection (the cutting into of a living animal), and then sell and ship the meat overseas to our horsemeat-eating friends, allies and trade partners.
And from ABC news:
About 15 percent of the slaughtered horses are thoroughbreds, and many end up as meat for human consumption in other countries, including France, Belgium, Holland, Japan and Italy.
Of course the news agencies choose to report on the activities that will upset Americans. Specifically, Americans can't stand the idea of their beloved horses being food. And this has inspired legislative action to curb the slaughter of horses for food.
Unfortunately, this congressional action ignores the real problem. In my opinion, the most atrocious behavior is the act of breeding the animals in hopes of making a multi-million dollar horse. This is like treating an animal's life as a lottery ticket, and if it is not a winner it is thrown away. The only thing the legislation does is ensure that absolutely no use will come of these animals. At least before they were ultimately used for food.
Finally, I want to discuss inbreeding a little bit. The huge caveat here is that all of the mice I work with are essentially inbred to the point of exact genetic identity. The only moral high ground I have to stand on is that I use mice to study tuberculosis, a disease which kills about 2 million people each year. In contrast, thoroughbred horses have one purpose, to make money for the breeder.
Here is a quote from NewScientist:
Virtually all 500,000 of the world’s thoroughbred racehorses are descended from 28 ancestors, born in the 18th and 19th centuries, according to a new genetic study. And up to 95% of male thoroughbreds can be traced back to just one stallion.
and
However, the analysis of thoroughbred genetics is also revealing the other side of the coin, notes Matthew Binns of the Royal Veterinary College in London, UK. Many negative traits are associated with inbreeding in the diminutive gene pool, he says. "The selections we've made for fantastic beasts have had some detrimental consequences."
One tenth of thoroughbreds suffer orthopaedic problems and fractures, 10% have low fertility, 5% have abnormally small hearts and the majority suffer bleeding in the lungs, says Binns.
Emphasis mine.
Bleeding lungs? Despite the appearance of magnificance, thoroughbreds horses are terribly inbred, and suffer healthwise because of it.
So, to come back to my original point, yesterday's Kentuckey derby provided us with some tantalizing material for political analogies, but because Eight Belles was euthanized on the track after finishing second those analogies are off limits, out of respect. Yet every day we turn a blind eye to the thousands of horses that are bred soley to race, then killed because they can't win. Hypocracy? I think so.
[Update]- Wow, I stirred up a bit more controversy than I was expecting. My statistics may be off, but I feel I took everything from a reliable source. For counterpoints, I direct readers to MissBlue's and moonbatlulu's comments below. I don't know how to link from the body to each comment, so you'll have to ctrl-F them.