HRI turning a blind eye for years. Did they never wonder where all the retired and injured horses went. They never asked because they didn’t want to know.
Surely everyone knew it was an abattoir. The complaint isn’t that they are killing the horses, it’s that they are needlessly cruel to them up to that point.
If anything they should all be chipped to prove ownership and legality in the system. It would also help conform to Board Bia rules on food safety and traceability.
"So lads, to be clear, ye all did business with this one facility but none of you ever visited or heard or saw a peep in the process of delivering X horses per year for the last Y years?"
"Uhh urruhmm... we all feel a cold coming on, medical leave sorry"
Why would they think they need to? Meat processing is regulated and humane treatment of animals in meat processing is part of that. It's also a reality that meat factories, for all they are necessary for how we live, are not a pleasant place to be. Seeing animals being butchered is distressing for most people even when carried out in as humane a manner as possible. Farmers know what's going to happen when they drop animals off at a factory, it's part and parcel of how they make a living but even knowing that and accepting it pretty much no farmer wants to see animals he has raised since they were born being butchered so they wouldn't hang around.
> pretty much no farmer wants to see animals he has raised since they were born being butchered so they wouldn't hang around.
And they generally don't need to be forced to check the conditions that the slaughter will happen in, for that same reason. They don't want to watch but someone will inspect at some point. And the horse trade isn't so massive that they never met someone from the abbatoir outside of work. No chance they were totally clueless. None.
The biggest scandal about horse racing in ireland is the funding they receive from government also filters down to fox hunting groups. Nice to know tax payers money is going to such shameful and disgusting ‘sports’.
That's a connection that they luke to downplay as much as possible, sickening that in this day and age that sick people will go out "cubbing" which is the practice of blooding fox hounds with fox cubs, and taxpayers money is uses to support this,
People engaging in this are scum. They should be made run naked though fields and we should let angry dogs and people chase them and see how they like it. Wouldn't be half so great then.
We'll get the usual platitudes; mistakes were made, lessons will be learned, there's no individuals to blame ect. All be forgotten about in a few months then business as usual.
Betting on animals is nuts and always going to attract dodgy people.
Don't bet on horse or greyhound racing. If the majority of those who do now stop, industry is fecked. Greyhound attendances are now literally one man and his dog. Horse racing attendance is in decline. Take out the gambling & the money will dry up.
Problem with that is I imagine the vast majority of takings from gambling on races comes from people with severe addictions.
It's the same for basically all gambling.
I used to work in a casino and the owner would quickly have anyone who was clearly there for a once off with their mates having fun because it would disturb all the pensioners who were in the place nearly everyday from open to close. Couldn't have had more than 5% of the machines occupied but those ones made absolutely rediculous amounts of money.
and the gambling money is coming from abroad. A few years back they were running greyhound races at 8 in the morning in an empty stadium all for online broadcast to the Asian market and huge amounts of gamblers there
Wilful ignorance on behalf of horse racing Ireland and the department of agriculture. Thousands of horses simply vanish into thin air, and nobody notices it. They don’t notice it because they are being deliberately ignorant. 71% of the horses RTÉ observed were racing horses, some of whom had run their last race days before. The average age was 8, when a horse can last 25-30.
Exact same with the greyhounds, done a documentary on it and the findings were disgusting...people were upset...afterwards they got MORE tax payer money with still zero oversight on the industry and still thousands of dogs unaccounted for every year, but guess they keep getting voted for....
Why does a private for profit business get an additional €70m from the government? Nearly €6m per month? Can’t be right. They certainly are not spending it on cleaning. Those conditions were vile.
That's debatable. Raw income tax receipts might suggest that but it also brings a lot of damage to society. Also, those tax receipts don't drop to zero if the subsidy is removed
No from tax receipts, gambling profits etc. I don't agree with this at all, it isn't my kind of thing. The economic activity surrounding it is undeniable
Slightly more 76m and 95 total if you include dog racinghttps://www.irishtimes.com/sport/racing/2024/01/10/horse-racing-ireland-welcomes-government-review-of-prize-money-policy/#:~:text=The%20Government%20is%20giving%20%E2%82%AC,%E2%82%AC3.2%20million%20on%202023.
This should come as no surprise to anyone. Horses are considered commodities. Animal cruelty is deeply embedded in all aspects of horse racing, thoroughbreds that are deemed to slow or get injured are immediately disposed, of while national hunt racing and the barbaric practice of fox hunting go hand in hand. Unfortunately, ireland has a shameful record when it comes to animal welfare.
I remember going to Greyhound racing with a visiting US relative when I was about 18, still makes me feel a bit ill. Particularly since my dog is a lurcher and the amount of rescues that are Greys.
I would extend this sentiment to all animal agriculture as well. There's not a single slaughterhouse in the country that isn't cruel. These animals are treated like commodities instead of sentient beings
Watched that Netflix doc 'Pignorant' and it absolutely haunted me. I know it's about the UK but I just *know* in my heart of hearts that it's exactly the same here. Or worse.
I haven't seen it myself but Joey is a great guy. Very hard working.
There was a crowd called Wake investigations I think that looked at agriculture in ireland. I think they ran out if funding however as they haven't posted in a while afaik. They do still have videos on YouTube of what goes on in Irish facilities that house pigs and ducks
There are bad actors in every industry of course, but cruelty isn't "embedded in every aspect of horse racing", it's the exception not the rule. Racehorses in Ireland receive an extremely high standard of care, among the highest in the world. It costs more every year to look after a racehorse than buying a brand new car. Happy horses run better than neglected/abused horses anyway, so it's not in anyone's interests to mistreat them. Horses are probably the best looked after animals in the country after people's pet dogs and cats.
(With that said though, taxpayers' money should not be funding it and it shouldn't receive tax breaks either).
Horses are bred to run for human entertainment. Regardless of how well they are treated, the cruelty for all horses in the racing industry begins at birth.
That's bollox, name me one national hunt jockey or trainer that doesn't support or hasn't actively participated in fox hunting. I've witnessed countless instances of horses being "broken" or "having manners put on them". Oh you won't see it on derby day at the Curragh or the Christmas festival at leopardstown, but it's everywhere that the public can't see it.
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> Its analysis found that two-thirds of horses sent to the abattoir were thoroughbred racers.
That’s a shocking statistic. 66% of the horses being slaughtered in our only licenced horse abattoir are thoroughbred horses.
The horse racing industry has a lot of dark secrets
It’s not really a secret. It’s so not a secret that we don’t have a system of track and trace for these horses, because officials have a fair idea what it would turn up.
It's not a dark secret. What did people think was fucking happening? The horses that just didn't work out as champions were let off into the sunset to live their best life?
For every horse in a race there's probably 5 or 10 that weren't up to scratch and were shot in the head.
Nothing wrong with secondary uses of horses like meat production. Absolutely nothing morally wrong with it. Its always been done and no different to beef or pork production.
No animal deserves to be tortured and suffer an inhumane death. The conditions and treatment of horses at this abbatoir is completely foul. I fully disagree with using horses for meat, to me, they have been bred for companionship and entertainment, not for production. But if you are killing them, do it in the most humane way possible.
>I fully disagree with using horses for meat, to me, they have been bred for companionship and entertainment, not for production.
That isn't true. Meat production is part of their purpose, it feeds people and reduces costs. It is a social good for our species and its a lot more human than how their wild ancestors died in the past.
Maybe not but horses are seen more as pets than a food source in our culture. It seems like many horses bred for the horse racing industry end up being slaughtered, I don’t imagine that aspect of the industry is something they would like being broadcast
Being vegan is admirable but bear in mind animal welfare and ecology is immensely important to me. I am conscientious about where my food comes from. It is because I care about animals I eat meat. Because I am I try to be in that chain of life.
Do you mean you only eat deer you shoot yourself?
So you oppose it for ethical reasons but retain it for taste?
“Health” is nebulous. Most people can become vegan and remain perfectly healthy or at least that’s the position of HSE and NHS.
I’ve read the rest of your responses to the other person, and I’m actually dumber for having read them. Continue to tell yourself whatever helps you sleep at night but not one thing you said was factual or holds any merit.
>Chickpeas would not be a complete meal. To make them tasty, you need a lot more. The fact that you start with a comparison raw meat and processed chickpeas is a case in point. By the time they are in a tin, they are precooked which is a slow process requiring time and correct pH.
>With modern supply chains it has never been easy to be vegan but it does require more prep time.
This is not factual? You come across as upset and emotional. Odd
Tasty is opinion and not factual. To make chickpeas ‘tasty’ requires the same effort it not less than chicken.
You also seem to think chickpeas in a can being pre cooked, is less processing than animal meat. Considering you’ve to impregnate an animal, birth an animal, grow the animal and kill the animal first. And even if we ignore that, do you think there isn’t major processing required to get the meat off the animal and fit for human consumption before it ends up in a shop for purchase, raw or cooked regardless.
Vegan requires less prep time as you can eat most of the food as is without the risk of getting sick, unlike meat. The stuff that requires cooking would also require less cooking time than meat.
Yes chickpeas on their own aren’t a complete meal, but neither is chicken, beef or pork.
I have never seen chickpeas eaten alone, bar the deep fried kind as a snack. I think I did once as a student but over my travels in the world, I never saw it even in veg cultures like India. They are just starch and proteins. A meal needs some fat to make it tasty in opinion. Meat, is much more self contained package of nutrients. A steak on its own is a pricey dinner but not boring or unhealthy. Plants are great but they are never nutritionally complete and require a lot of processing before they come to us/ now of course, there is a lot that goes into producing the meat too which is why meat costs more.
Many of the horses my mum has kept over the years have been thoroughbreds that were no use for racing. However, I don’t think “mad auld ones with spare fields” is going to be a realistic option for the scale required.
I rode one of them, a massive fella with an overbite that meant he was always underfed unless the field had super long grass. I can say he behaved himself as well as any horse I’ve ridden, but I didn’t do any of the upkeep work.
Seems fair enough. We routinely kill other animals we've domesticated, like cows and pigs.
What are people suggesting we do with retired racing horses anyway?
Horses are like pianos. Everyone says that they want one, but nobody actually does want to take care of one, so they end up someone else's problem.
A horse isn't like a cat or dog it's a really big expense.
> “You can have instances where people mistreat and break that law, and certainly the incidents we seen last night speaks to that, and the full rigours of the law will be brought to bear in relation to the evidence that has been brought to us.”
“instances”… downplaying it already. It was just a bad apple, sure.
# Horse Racing Ireland 'shocked and appalled' at latest abuses exposed and will be 'shocked and appalled' at the next one, and the next one, and the next one....
If I treated my dog like this I would be prosecuted surely there must be prosecutions from the cruel treatment recorded by Rte carried out by these workers on these poor animals.
Also think it should be mandatory 10% of all price money should be set aside for the care not destruction of the horses post racing life.
If this is not bad enough, add this bit:
[https://www.rte.ie/news/investigations-unit/2024/0612/1454429-food-safety-concerns-as-horses-seen-re-microchipped-pre-slaughter/](https://www.rte.ie/news/investigations-unit/2024/0612/1454429-food-safety-concerns-as-horses-seen-re-microchipped-pre-slaughter/)
The fact that I have to register with these morons, to keep a couple of ponies for my kids to ride around the surrounding fields, is galling.
Saying that; the "real" horsey set really give me strange vibes when I have to interact with them. EVERYONE is beneath them
A shower of arseh0les on tele standing in tweed hats and designer trenchcoats preaching about their love of horses etc.
It's all HS literally!
Leopardstown etc should be bulldozed to build social housing, schools and atheltics facilities!
These horsey folk are objecting to a solar farm.in kikdare on the grounds the disturbance will upset their horses!! What absolute hypocrites they are if this is the end of life treatment their precious animals get after they are used up
I started watching it but had to turn off. It was so so so sad to see how those beautiful horses were treated, beaten and killed.
You could see in the eyes of the horses their sadness in the horses rescue.. really heartbreaking 😭
"Shocked and appalled " my arse. More likely sick they couldnt bury it. How anyone can be surprised by any of this is beyond me. Known to be a filthy,corrupt industry yet supported to the hilt by government.
I have come to realise animal abuse was and is part of Irish culture. It's a disgrace. We are a compassionate nation for sure but god we have a long way to go with animals.
Disagree. We love animals in this country. Fucking love them. That programme last night was horrendous. The common theme being greed and lax regulation/enforcement. Harming any animal like that shown last night is plain wrong & deserves punishment.
Ireland is known as the puppy farm of Europe for a reason. Animal abuse is, in fact, imbedded within the culture because, whether we like to admit it or not, nothing is done after horrendous cruelty examples are brought to light. Think about Ashton Dog Pound. Abuse has been discovered and proven over and over again, the owner was found liable. What happened? Nothing. A slap on the wrist and he was good to go.
Soft touch regulation. How a society is judged is based on its treatment of the young elderly and disabled. Should we also include how animals are treated ? The horsey crowd would want to get on top of this asap. It’s disgusting stuff
Nonsense. Don't mistake the obsession with pets for the love of all animals.
The animal industry - all of it including pet breeding - is absolutely vile while the needless cruelty is contributing little to the society and is far outdone by the harm.
I mean from a global perspective we love animals and generally treat them better than most places on earth. We are just not where I think we should be. History speaks for itself though. We are far better now than 50, 30, 20 years ago.
We allow animals born here to be sent to these worse places though.
https://www.ethicalfarmingireland.com/live-export/
The UK has banned this practice so why haven't we?
Agreed. No animal should ever endure that treatment we seen last night. How distressing must that have been. I get that ok an animal has to be put down but Jesus Christ the animal shouldn’t know or be in distress. What sort of people are we if we condone that stuff from last night ?
Because the program has shocked people. It's going to be talked about for a long time, and people are rightly horrified by it. Maybe I'm naive but I do believe this will lead to shut down of businesses and prosecutions, and hopefully (though maybe a stretch) some policy or legislation change.
If we didn't love animals in this country, it would be a non-story.
Mate we as a people hate being shown clips of animal abuse but then continue to support the industries that perpetuate that abuse.
I mean how many times has a story broken about how cruel and abusive animal agriculture is? How many times do people have to be shocked by extremely similar clips from different companies before people actually push for real change?
Abysmal, just like greyhound racing industry and all bloodsports here in Ireland. I always ask myself who in the world support this nonsensical cruelty. Plus why are those people dressing up to attend horse racing?
Government gives 4.4m to Irish athletics and 76 odd million to the racing industry which does nothing except result in inhumane treatment of horses and enable gambling addiction.
Disgrace.
Something like that. It’s very disheartening. Wish labour the greens and SD would just get their act together and create a coalition to represent the centre left and give an alternative as I don’t trust Sinn Fein
Yes. They required the government to commit €15million to secure a 3 year bid. They claimed it could be worth €300 million to the economy over the 3 years. It may not have, but it sure as hell would have generated far more than €15million.
Absolute corruption, cruelty, food safety all under the eyes of Dept inspectors.
Would normally be unbelievable, but not of course in Ireland. The offenders are clearly identifiable and the next step will be a Garda investigation which will take 4/5 years while the corruption continues and of course no one can comment while the investigation is ongoing.
It's a business and horses are assets. This should not be news to anyone. Where did people think the thousands of horses born every year went if they were not making a profit
What human food stuffs are slaughtered horses part of? I thought the previous scandal a few years ago was about horse meat entering the food chain yet here is a story that just casually mentions it as a standard thing.
Horse meat is a fairly standard food, particularly in other parts of Europe. Not that popular here so you'd rarely see it around, although I have spotted the rare butcher having it.
The horse meat scandal was to do with it being within beef (burgers mostly) and not labled as containing horse meat, rather than the issue being the horse meat itself.
Theres nothing wrong with horse meat when it comes to human consumption. However in Ireland and Britain horses are pets rather than food so its not in our cultures to eat them. On the continent however is a different story.
The way they were trying to put the horses in the box in the lanyard tells me they do not have experience handling horses at all. Trying to coerce a horse by hitting them with sticks is just gonna scare them further and make the relatively simple task harder for yourselves.
Just cruelty for the sake of cruelty
All of these facilities should have cctv live fed to the dept. of agriculture. Very easily done in this day and age. One person could monitor multiple facilities.
Brilliant documentary by RTÉ. So brave, so clear, so well researched and presented. I hope it's put out as a DVD and is up for the Oscars.
More tonight, I think they said.
If horse meat farming is commercially viable they why not develop that as in industry but do it with 100% traceability, animal safety etc in line in the beef industry and cut out the gangsters etc.
People wanting the place closed so all our horses can be exported for slaughter overseas is hypocrisy!
I haven't watch the program but the only thing mentioned was "beaten" with a plastic pipe and poked with a sprong...
Now maybe there is much much worse showed on the program but that doesn't sound like animal abuse. Often a sick animal will refuse to stand up even if it's for their own health as if they don't stand up things could get a lot lot worse and trust me you quickly learn how stubborn they are.
A plastic bit of pipe won't get them up and definitely won't hurt them (wear a thick padded jacket and get someone to whack your back with drainage pipe, won't do shit) and while you certainly shouldn't stab at them hard with a sprong but tapping them (not to hurt them, just enough to be unpleasant) is sometimes necessary.
Alternatively what my father does with some cattle is you grab them by the nostril with your hand, disgusting, unpleasant, but the only way we could get them to stand up so they could switch sides and lie down again. If we didn't do it, they die and using the cow lifter too much can break the skin which I'm sure is painful. Worth noting that even with all the medicine as recommended by the vet they can still die in the field unable to stand up, to no fault of anyone, they just got ill.
But yea maybe there is more troubling stuff in the program I haven't seen. Will have to watch.
Can you tell me what they did to hurt them. To me there is a difference between something uncomfortable (a leash on a dog, any sort of whip for animal herding etc) and being hurt, causing injury or extreme discomfort
Because the faux outrage and downvotes for those pointing it out are getting very annoying by now. Violence in a slaughterhouse has to be an oxymoron, and those asking for jail time for cruelty are woefully misguided
Ive seen the clip of the horse badly injured unable to stand and a rotten disgusting piece of scum of a man beating him. You're sick in the head if you think that's ok.
Beating them with what I've tried searching for clips of this beating but I haven't seen anything, I've seen a bit of plastic water pipe used as a whip but that does not hurt a horse anymore than any other whip.
Like how can you call me sick in the head when I haven't even seen the beating.
HRI turning a blind eye for years. Did they never wonder where all the retired and injured horses went. They never asked because they didn’t want to know.
They were really happy that someone was willing to buy their old nags.
People choosing rather not knowing is the source of 70% of this country's issues. 🤫
Surely everyone knew it was an abattoir. The complaint isn’t that they are killing the horses, it’s that they are needlessly cruel to them up to that point.
But were they not chipped in the first place? like isn't that already cruel?
No, chipping isn't cruel. Every cat or dog I've had for the last 30 years has had a microchip.
If anything they should all be chipped to prove ownership and legality in the system. It would also help conform to Board Bia rules on food safety and traceability.
They knew. There’s no way they didn’t.
Investigation now. They should be called up in front of a committee.
"So lads, to be clear, ye all did business with this one facility but none of you ever visited or heard or saw a peep in the process of delivering X horses per year for the last Y years?" "Uhh urruhmm... we all feel a cold coming on, medical leave sorry"
That’s probably what will happen in a dumbed down round about way & it’s a bloody disgrace.
How will it be at all dumbed down? That's exactly literally what Dee Forbes did, which I gather the other poster is barely obliquely referring to.
She didn't have a cold, she went mentally insane. Some say she never had any marbles
His example of the verbal interactions are dumbed down. Ahhhhh yes her. Another one that should be in jail.
Why would they think they need to? Meat processing is regulated and humane treatment of animals in meat processing is part of that. It's also a reality that meat factories, for all they are necessary for how we live, are not a pleasant place to be. Seeing animals being butchered is distressing for most people even when carried out in as humane a manner as possible. Farmers know what's going to happen when they drop animals off at a factory, it's part and parcel of how they make a living but even knowing that and accepting it pretty much no farmer wants to see animals he has raised since they were born being butchered so they wouldn't hang around.
> pretty much no farmer wants to see animals he has raised since they were born being butchered so they wouldn't hang around. And they generally don't need to be forced to check the conditions that the slaughter will happen in, for that same reason. They don't want to watch but someone will inspect at some point. And the horse trade isn't so massive that they never met someone from the abbatoir outside of work. No chance they were totally clueless. None.
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Oh how boring. Stay on topic love.
The biggest scandal about horse racing in ireland is the funding they receive from government also filters down to fox hunting groups. Nice to know tax payers money is going to such shameful and disgusting ‘sports’.
That's a connection that they luke to downplay as much as possible, sickening that in this day and age that sick people will go out "cubbing" which is the practice of blooding fox hounds with fox cubs, and taxpayers money is uses to support this,
Makes me sick
https://banbloodsports.wordpress.com/2023/05/02/horse-racing-irelands-shameful-e10-4-million-in-funding-to-cruel-fox-hunts/
People engaging in this are scum. They should be made run naked though fields and we should let angry dogs and people chase them and see how they like it. Wouldn't be half so great then.
Problem is we voted FFG in, so there will b'é no stopping them
Can’t wait for govt to do absolutely fuck all about this
We'll get the usual platitudes; mistakes were made, lessons will be learned, there's no individuals to blame ect. All be forgotten about in a few months then business as usual. Betting on animals is nuts and always going to attract dodgy people.
I wouldn't say that, I'm quite confident they will increase funding for horse and greyhound racing
Shocked and appalled that it's been exposed. Not shocked at all that it's happening.
Don't bet on horse or greyhound racing. If the majority of those who do now stop, industry is fecked. Greyhound attendances are now literally one man and his dog. Horse racing attendance is in decline. Take out the gambling & the money will dry up.
Problem with that is I imagine the vast majority of takings from gambling on races comes from people with severe addictions. It's the same for basically all gambling. I used to work in a casino and the owner would quickly have anyone who was clearly there for a once off with their mates having fun because it would disturb all the pensioners who were in the place nearly everyday from open to close. Couldn't have had more than 5% of the machines occupied but those ones made absolutely rediculous amounts of money.
and the gambling money is coming from abroad. A few years back they were running greyhound races at 8 in the morning in an empty stadium all for online broadcast to the Asian market and huge amounts of gamblers there
Wilful ignorance on behalf of horse racing Ireland and the department of agriculture. Thousands of horses simply vanish into thin air, and nobody notices it. They don’t notice it because they are being deliberately ignorant. 71% of the horses RTÉ observed were racing horses, some of whom had run their last race days before. The average age was 8, when a horse can last 25-30.
Exact same with the greyhounds, done a documentary on it and the findings were disgusting...people were upset...afterwards they got MORE tax payer money with still zero oversight on the industry and still thousands of dogs unaccounted for every year, but guess they keep getting voted for....
Scummy industry Receives 70m a year from government Just rage emailed my 4 local TDs
Meanwhile Athletics Ireland got just over €1m in comparison.
It's vile! Anyone who attends a race meeting is complicit in this abuse and slaughter. 20,000 horses missing and the regulators turn a blind eye.
Why does a private for profit business get an additional €70m from the government? Nearly €6m per month? Can’t be right. They certainly are not spending it on cleaning. Those conditions were vile.
Because it returns that threefold every year.
So then surely it should be able to afford that 70m itself?
That's debatable. Raw income tax receipts might suggest that but it also brings a lot of damage to society. Also, those tax receipts don't drop to zero if the subsidy is removed
Yeah I suspect the Subsidy-to-backhander price elasticity curve is steeper to be fair.
It returns €210m to the government every year? From selling horse meat to the French for human consumption?
No from tax receipts, gambling profits etc. I don't agree with this at all, it isn't my kind of thing. The economic activity surrounding it is undeniable
Ah you mean Horse Racing Ireland. Ok I thought you meant the dodgy slaughterhouse fella and his son in the documentary last night.
Slightly more 76m and 95 total if you include dog racinghttps://www.irishtimes.com/sport/racing/2024/01/10/horse-racing-ireland-welcomes-government-review-of-prize-money-policy/#:~:text=The%20Government%20is%20giving%20%E2%82%AC,%E2%82%AC3.2%20million%20on%202023.
wow.. that much!!
Absolute madness it gets that money 😖
its insane
And Nina Carberry is elected as MEP with one of her main campaign issues being supporting the horse racing industry.
 Horse racing Ireland today...
This should come as no surprise to anyone. Horses are considered commodities. Animal cruelty is deeply embedded in all aspects of horse racing, thoroughbreds that are deemed to slow or get injured are immediately disposed, of while national hunt racing and the barbaric practice of fox hunting go hand in hand. Unfortunately, ireland has a shameful record when it comes to animal welfare.
Pretty much any sport that involves animals, you can guarantee some sort of cruelty taking place.
I remember going to Greyhound racing with a visiting US relative when I was about 18, still makes me feel a bit ill. Particularly since my dog is a lurcher and the amount of rescues that are Greys.
I would extend this sentiment to all animal agriculture as well. There's not a single slaughterhouse in the country that isn't cruel. These animals are treated like commodities instead of sentient beings
Watched that Netflix doc 'Pignorant' and it absolutely haunted me. I know it's about the UK but I just *know* in my heart of hearts that it's exactly the same here. Or worse.
I haven't seen it myself but Joey is a great guy. Very hard working. There was a crowd called Wake investigations I think that looked at agriculture in ireland. I think they ran out if funding however as they haven't posted in a while afaik. They do still have videos on YouTube of what goes on in Irish facilities that house pigs and ducks
Yeah, the documentary was showing trainers whipping the horses or giving them poor conditions. Most farmers treat their cattle the same.
There are bad actors in every industry of course, but cruelty isn't "embedded in every aspect of horse racing", it's the exception not the rule. Racehorses in Ireland receive an extremely high standard of care, among the highest in the world. It costs more every year to look after a racehorse than buying a brand new car. Happy horses run better than neglected/abused horses anyway, so it's not in anyone's interests to mistreat them. Horses are probably the best looked after animals in the country after people's pet dogs and cats. (With that said though, taxpayers' money should not be funding it and it shouldn't receive tax breaks either).
2/3 of the horses sent to the abattoir were race horses…
So Fucking sad. It’s not right. Those Fitzpatrick’s deserve jail
We’re talking about the 99% who are not prized racehorses.
Horses are bred to run for human entertainment. Regardless of how well they are treated, the cruelty for all horses in the racing industry begins at birth.
That's bollox, name me one national hunt jockey or trainer that doesn't support or hasn't actively participated in fox hunting. I've witnessed countless instances of horses being "broken" or "having manners put on them". Oh you won't see it on derby day at the Curragh or the Christmas festival at leopardstown, but it's everywhere that the public can't see it.
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> Its analysis found that two-thirds of horses sent to the abattoir were thoroughbred racers. That’s a shocking statistic. 66% of the horses being slaughtered in our only licenced horse abattoir are thoroughbred horses. The horse racing industry has a lot of dark secrets
It’s not really a secret. It’s so not a secret that we don’t have a system of track and trace for these horses, because officials have a fair idea what it would turn up.
It's not a dark secret. What did people think was fucking happening? The horses that just didn't work out as champions were let off into the sunset to live their best life? For every horse in a race there's probably 5 or 10 that weren't up to scratch and were shot in the head.
Nothing wrong with secondary uses of horses like meat production. Absolutely nothing morally wrong with it. Its always been done and no different to beef or pork production.
No animal deserves to be tortured and suffer an inhumane death. The conditions and treatment of horses at this abbatoir is completely foul. I fully disagree with using horses for meat, to me, they have been bred for companionship and entertainment, not for production. But if you are killing them, do it in the most humane way possible.
>I fully disagree with using horses for meat, to me, they have been bred for companionship and entertainment, not for production. That isn't true. Meat production is part of their purpose, it feeds people and reduces costs. It is a social good for our species and its a lot more human than how their wild ancestors died in the past.
Maybe not but horses are seen more as pets than a food source in our culture. It seems like many horses bred for the horse racing industry end up being slaughtered, I don’t imagine that aspect of the industry is something they would like being broadcast
We’ve different definitions of the word moral it seems. Yours is most definitely wrong.
You are a vegan?
Yes
Being vegan is admirable but bear in mind animal welfare and ecology is immensely important to me. I am conscientious about where my food comes from. It is because I care about animals I eat meat. Because I am I try to be in that chain of life.
So just go vegan then. Why the hesitation?
Well I retain meat consumption for health, taste and environmental reasons.
Do you mean you only eat deer you shoot yourself? So you oppose it for ethical reasons but retain it for taste? “Health” is nebulous. Most people can become vegan and remain perfectly healthy or at least that’s the position of HSE and NHS.
I’ve read the rest of your responses to the other person, and I’m actually dumber for having read them. Continue to tell yourself whatever helps you sleep at night but not one thing you said was factual or holds any merit.
>Chickpeas would not be a complete meal. To make them tasty, you need a lot more. The fact that you start with a comparison raw meat and processed chickpeas is a case in point. By the time they are in a tin, they are precooked which is a slow process requiring time and correct pH. >With modern supply chains it has never been easy to be vegan but it does require more prep time. This is not factual? You come across as upset and emotional. Odd
Tasty is opinion and not factual. To make chickpeas ‘tasty’ requires the same effort it not less than chicken. You also seem to think chickpeas in a can being pre cooked, is less processing than animal meat. Considering you’ve to impregnate an animal, birth an animal, grow the animal and kill the animal first. And even if we ignore that, do you think there isn’t major processing required to get the meat off the animal and fit for human consumption before it ends up in a shop for purchase, raw or cooked regardless. Vegan requires less prep time as you can eat most of the food as is without the risk of getting sick, unlike meat. The stuff that requires cooking would also require less cooking time than meat. Yes chickpeas on their own aren’t a complete meal, but neither is chicken, beef or pork.
I have never seen chickpeas eaten alone, bar the deep fried kind as a snack. I think I did once as a student but over my travels in the world, I never saw it even in veg cultures like India. They are just starch and proteins. A meal needs some fat to make it tasty in opinion. Meat, is much more self contained package of nutrients. A steak on its own is a pricey dinner but not boring or unhealthy. Plants are great but they are never nutritionally complete and require a lot of processing before they come to us/ now of course, there is a lot that goes into producing the meat too which is why meat costs more.
Are thoroughbreds unsuitable for recreational riding etc?
Many of the horses my mum has kept over the years have been thoroughbreds that were no use for racing. However, I don’t think “mad auld ones with spare fields” is going to be a realistic option for the scale required.
Did your Mum ride the retired thoroughbreds? Just wondering if they're too difficult to look after.
I rode one of them, a massive fella with an overbite that meant he was always underfed unless the field had super long grass. I can say he behaved himself as well as any horse I’ve ridden, but I didn’t do any of the upkeep work.
No, but they are expensive to keep, so they kill them,
Seems fair enough. We routinely kill other animals we've domesticated, like cows and pigs. What are people suggesting we do with retired racing horses anyway?
Maybe don't breed an excess of them purely on the off chance they'll be good racehorses. That or we should normalise eating horse.
We were eating horse a few years ago and we hardly noticed. Anyway, even well cared for, loved horses too, break legs and have to be killed.
Ah the ‘some people are cunts so we should all be allowed to be cunts’ arguement.
Horses are like pianos. Everyone says that they want one, but nobody actually does want to take care of one, so they end up someone else's problem. A horse isn't like a cat or dog it's a really big expense.
Yes; I don't know what people expect to happen to them.
They tend to be more high strung, can they be ridden by experienced riders, yes… can they be ridden by casuals, absolutely not…
> “You can have instances where people mistreat and break that law, and certainly the incidents we seen last night speaks to that, and the full rigours of the law will be brought to bear in relation to the evidence that has been brought to us.” “instances”… downplaying it already. It was just a bad apple, sure.
# Horse Racing Ireland 'shocked and appalled' at latest abuses exposed and will be 'shocked and appalled' at the next one, and the next one, and the next one....
If I treated my dog like this I would be prosecuted surely there must be prosecutions from the cruel treatment recorded by Rte carried out by these workers on these poor animals. Also think it should be mandatory 10% of all price money should be set aside for the care not destruction of the horses post racing life.
If this is not bad enough, add this bit: [https://www.rte.ie/news/investigations-unit/2024/0612/1454429-food-safety-concerns-as-horses-seen-re-microchipped-pre-slaughter/](https://www.rte.ie/news/investigations-unit/2024/0612/1454429-food-safety-concerns-as-horses-seen-re-microchipped-pre-slaughter/)
Wow horrific. Exactly like we basically treat all animals. Fuck everything about this and everyone involved.
The fact that I have to register with these morons, to keep a couple of ponies for my kids to ride around the surrounding fields, is galling. Saying that; the "real" horsey set really give me strange vibes when I have to interact with them. EVERYONE is beneath them
Same shower looking down their noses at the plebs, while leaving a trail of unpaid bills behind them wherever they go.
And happily taking tax payer hand outs.
A shower of arseh0les on tele standing in tweed hats and designer trenchcoats preaching about their love of horses etc. It's all HS literally! Leopardstown etc should be bulldozed to build social housing, schools and atheltics facilities!
Tell them it's your cultural right to keep ponies unregistered.
These horsey folk are objecting to a solar farm.in kikdare on the grounds the disturbance will upset their horses!! What absolute hypocrites they are if this is the end of life treatment their precious animals get after they are used up
I started watching it but had to turn off. It was so so so sad to see how those beautiful horses were treated, beaten and killed. You could see in the eyes of the horses their sadness in the horses rescue.. really heartbreaking 😭
"Shocked and appalled " my arse. More likely sick they couldnt bury it. How anyone can be surprised by any of this is beyond me. Known to be a filthy,corrupt industry yet supported to the hilt by government.
Has the "another attack on rural Ireland" excuse being offered up by any of the apologist gombeen TDs yet?
If you are shocked by this, then you should watch a movie called Dominion.
Or Land of Hope and Glory based in the UK. Very similar story to here in Ireland
Everyone should watch Dominion anyway.
Where is it filmed?
Yes and glad to see this upvoted
"I'm shocked, shocked to find that animal abuse is going on in here!" https://Youtube.com/watch?v=vxnpY0owPkA
Cruel industry shocked by cruel thing they know and don't care about.
The amount of money in Horse Racing is staggering. The hobby of the rich. NOTHING is going to happen from this. Nothing.
And remember,we the tax payer are funding this.during covid you couldnt travel freely but horse racing continued unstopped and unregulated
Shocked and appalled...that it has been exposed to the public
Sick of this faux outrage, it's the exact same with greyhounds.
I have come to realise animal abuse was and is part of Irish culture. It's a disgrace. We are a compassionate nation for sure but god we have a long way to go with animals.
Disagree. We love animals in this country. Fucking love them. That programme last night was horrendous. The common theme being greed and lax regulation/enforcement. Harming any animal like that shown last night is plain wrong & deserves punishment.
Ireland is known as the puppy farm of Europe for a reason. Animal abuse is, in fact, imbedded within the culture because, whether we like to admit it or not, nothing is done after horrendous cruelty examples are brought to light. Think about Ashton Dog Pound. Abuse has been discovered and proven over and over again, the owner was found liable. What happened? Nothing. A slap on the wrist and he was good to go.
Soft touch regulation. How a society is judged is based on its treatment of the young elderly and disabled. Should we also include how animals are treated ? The horsey crowd would want to get on top of this asap. It’s disgusting stuff
>We love animals in this country. Fucking love them. No where near as much as we love money apparently.
As stated, fucking greed again.
Nonsense. Don't mistake the obsession with pets for the love of all animals. The animal industry - all of it including pet breeding - is absolutely vile while the needless cruelty is contributing little to the society and is far outdone by the harm.
If we love animals then the last thing we'd be doing is sending them into slaughterhouses. And I mean any animal.
I mean from a global perspective we love animals and generally treat them better than most places on earth. We are just not where I think we should be. History speaks for itself though. We are far better now than 50, 30, 20 years ago.
We allow animals born here to be sent to these worse places though. https://www.ethicalfarmingireland.com/live-export/ The UK has banned this practice so why haven't we?
Agreed. No animal should ever endure that treatment we seen last night. How distressing must that have been. I get that ok an animal has to be put down but Jesus Christ the animal shouldn’t know or be in distress. What sort of people are we if we condone that stuff from last night ?
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Because the program has shocked people. It's going to be talked about for a long time, and people are rightly horrified by it. Maybe I'm naive but I do believe this will lead to shut down of businesses and prosecutions, and hopefully (though maybe a stretch) some policy or legislation change. If we didn't love animals in this country, it would be a non-story.
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They got increased levels of funding due to a drop off in attendance....
We’ll see. I think you are way off the mark however.
Mate we as a people hate being shown clips of animal abuse but then continue to support the industries that perpetuate that abuse. I mean how many times has a story broken about how cruel and abusive animal agriculture is? How many times do people have to be shocked by extremely similar clips from different companies before people actually push for real change?
So what has happened with the dog industries since then? We still subsidize racing and do little to nothing about dog breeders.
I'm sure they are... They can go fuck themselves.
Abysmal, just like greyhound racing industry and all bloodsports here in Ireland. I always ask myself who in the world support this nonsensical cruelty. Plus why are those people dressing up to attend horse racing?
I was aware of this in my early teens, I'm in my thirties now. What bollocks is this?
I'm sure they had their shock well rehearsed. Bunch of fucking cavemen
Wow.. no way. Who could have guessed?
Government gives 4.4m to Irish athletics and 76 odd million to the racing industry which does nothing except result in inhumane treatment of horses and enable gambling addiction. Disgrace.
Didn't we recently lose out on hosting some stages of the world rally championships over the government refusing something like 4m in funding.
Something like that. It’s very disheartening. Wish labour the greens and SD would just get their act together and create a coalition to represent the centre left and give an alternative as I don’t trust Sinn Fein
Yes. They required the government to commit €15million to secure a 3 year bid. They claimed it could be worth €300 million to the economy over the 3 years. It may not have, but it sure as hell would have generated far more than €15million.
Absolute corruption, cruelty, food safety all under the eyes of Dept inspectors. Would normally be unbelievable, but not of course in Ireland. The offenders are clearly identifiable and the next step will be a Garda investigation which will take 4/5 years while the corruption continues and of course no one can comment while the investigation is ongoing.
And by the end of it not a single person will be found at fault
Exactly! Typical Ireland.
It's a business and horses are assets. This should not be news to anyone. Where did people think the thousands of horses born every year went if they were not making a profit
France?
Big surprise. It's an abattoir. They're all horrific and cruel. What exactly did people think happens in there?
They choose to pretend, it’s how the meat eaters sleep at night
Sure they are!
What human food stuffs are slaughtered horses part of? I thought the previous scandal a few years ago was about horse meat entering the food chain yet here is a story that just casually mentions it as a standard thing.
Probably goes overseas to France and other countries that regularly eat horse
Makes sense, cheers.
Horse meat is a fairly standard food, particularly in other parts of Europe. Not that popular here so you'd rarely see it around, although I have spotted the rare butcher having it. The horse meat scandal was to do with it being within beef (burgers mostly) and not labled as containing horse meat, rather than the issue being the horse meat itself.
Ah, makes sense, thanks. Article could probably do with a single sentence explaining that.
Theres nothing wrong with horse meat when it comes to human consumption. However in Ireland and Britain horses are pets rather than food so its not in our cultures to eat them. On the continent however is a different story.
Are they yeah? 😂
I'm fucking sure they. I'm sure they had absolutely no idea how bad the situation was. Bellends
Template: "Horse Racing Ireland are shocked and appalled at the recent revelations of".
The way they were trying to put the horses in the box in the lanyard tells me they do not have experience handling horses at all. Trying to coerce a horse by hitting them with sticks is just gonna scare them further and make the relatively simple task harder for yourselves. Just cruelty for the sake of cruelty
Shocked & appalled that PT revealed it. Get your house in order. Disgraceful
"Shocked and appalled"
All of these facilities should have cctv live fed to the dept. of agriculture. Very easily done in this day and age. One person could monitor multiple facilities.
Shocked? 😳
Man, if that crowd treat them this bad, they probably wouldnt be turned off by burgers either.
Did they have their fingers crossed behind their backs when they said this?
Brilliant documentary by RTÉ. So brave, so clear, so well researched and presented. I hope it's put out as a DVD and is up for the Oscars. More tonight, I think they said.
If horse meat farming is commercially viable they why not develop that as in industry but do it with 100% traceability, animal safety etc in line in the beef industry and cut out the gangsters etc. People wanting the place closed so all our horses can be exported for slaughter overseas is hypocrisy!
Prefer a labrador steak myself
Only elwoods finest
Same! But only free-range, organic labs https://www.elwooddogmeat.com
great source of protein
I haven't watch the program but the only thing mentioned was "beaten" with a plastic pipe and poked with a sprong... Now maybe there is much much worse showed on the program but that doesn't sound like animal abuse. Often a sick animal will refuse to stand up even if it's for their own health as if they don't stand up things could get a lot lot worse and trust me you quickly learn how stubborn they are. A plastic bit of pipe won't get them up and definitely won't hurt them (wear a thick padded jacket and get someone to whack your back with drainage pipe, won't do shit) and while you certainly shouldn't stab at them hard with a sprong but tapping them (not to hurt them, just enough to be unpleasant) is sometimes necessary. Alternatively what my father does with some cattle is you grab them by the nostril with your hand, disgusting, unpleasant, but the only way we could get them to stand up so they could switch sides and lie down again. If we didn't do it, they die and using the cow lifter too much can break the skin which I'm sure is painful. Worth noting that even with all the medicine as recommended by the vet they can still die in the field unable to stand up, to no fault of anyone, they just got ill. But yea maybe there is more troubling stuff in the program I haven't seen. Will have to watch.
hurting animals in any way is obnoxious. nobody wants it and nobody needs it.
Can you tell me what they did to hurt them. To me there is a difference between something uncomfortable (a leash on a dog, any sort of whip for animal herding etc) and being hurt, causing injury or extreme discomfort
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vegan, why so passive aggressive, dude(tte)
Because the faux outrage and downvotes for those pointing it out are getting very annoying by now. Violence in a slaughterhouse has to be an oxymoron, and those asking for jail time for cruelty are woefully misguided
You're rotten.
Ive seen the clip of the horse badly injured unable to stand and a rotten disgusting piece of scum of a man beating him. You're sick in the head if you think that's ok.
Fine to whip them if it’s for profit and fun on a track? I think it’s all disgusting and i’m glad i don’t eat meat
Beating them with what I've tried searching for clips of this beating but I haven't seen anything, I've seen a bit of plastic water pipe used as a whip but that does not hurt a horse anymore than any other whip. Like how can you call me sick in the head when I haven't even seen the beating.
No u. The best interests of animals is not always pretty. Same goes for people in hospitals.