Stripping down the horse
Written by Hiddenhorse on 30/11/2009 – 3:25 pm -Imagine your horse lives at the center of three concentric circles or better yet, spheres and imagine if you can that your horse is imprisoned inside these two outer shells. These shells are curved and semi-opaque and therefore distort what is inside. You can travel inside them at will but your horse is trapped, this is because these two shells are human inventions and under the control of humans, only the human can create them or destroy them through choice.
In this little mental exercise we are going to break down these shells and discover what is really inside.
The first shell
The outer shell is the anthropomorphic shell it is the largest and therefore most distorting and oppressive shell of all, in your imagination see that shell begin to crack and soften so that it dissolves away and your horse becomes free of it. Now go inside and view the world from the horse’s perspective, what has been lost and what has been gained? What has gone is the idea that a horse is somehow human and experiences the world as humans do, take away all the housing that we provide, discard the clothing that we put on it and even the shoes on it’s feet, take away the anthropomorphic mealtimes and the human approved diet of cereal and sugar. Take away the constant and usually negative interpretation of its behavior as human vices. Stop seeing the horse as being willful, and cunning, lazy or stupid. It isn’t any of these things. In fact it would be well to promise yourself that in the future you will never again interpret the behavior of the horse as being somehow human-like. This may seem a strange thing to do for do we not love our horses? Surely the horse will suffer if we cease to ‘care’ for it? What does that mean? For many of us the supreme and deceitful irony of anthropomorphism is that the more human-like we can make the horse’s environment, the better we think we are caring for our horse. If we build a stable which is lined with Italian marble, and we provide it with hay racks made of sold gold we would see ourselves as lavish and caring -if not slightly eccentric, but why would we really do such a thing? The answer is simple and obvious – because it makes us feel good about ourselves.
That is all. It has nothing to do with the horse!
It certainly has nothing to do with the horse’s needs, it has nothing to do with what the horse wants. Anthropomorphism is a systematic and utterly overwhelming suppression of every thought, emotion and feeling natural to the horse in a way that makes us feel good.
Reject forever the distorting shell of anthropomorphism and you will reveal something wonderful. For the first time you will see the horse as a being worthy of respect in it’s own right as a horse. You will see it in a positive way and marvel at it for it’s power and athleticism, its supreme adaptability it’s true beauty and it’s skill as a survivor. These are gains for both you and the horse. In reality of course you are just discovering something that was there all along and now you realize; it was just something we took away in the first place and replaced with our invented anthropomorphism.
The second shell
Now let us tackle the inner shell, the utility shell. From the outside this shell gives us a single, focused perspective on the horse, within this the horse has no individuality, no thoughts or feelings other than those we can exploit to the advantage of our species, for within the restrictions of this shell the horse is nothing more than a machine. An organic machine whose very existence is defined by one thing, – its function. We bargain with the horse, we say to it, “we will give you every luxury we can afford as long as you perform it’s function for us”. But when the animal is no longer able to fulfill this utility we will either assign it to another purpose or more likely discard it, because we have no further use for it, – (whatever that may mean!). The world is full of formerly valuable horses discarded by the utility model as no longer ‘fit for purpose’. Let us decide therefore, that this model is outdated and no longer of use to us or the horse. This model is after all primarily a legacy of history and the traditions of the past. Horses no longer have to exist for a role we define for them, so let us take this shell away as well and search for some new beginning with our horses.
Let us realize the importance of the things we discard if we do this?
Firstly we discard many of the physical tools and lessons of the past, lessons learned by the horse through a thousand years of intimidation and suppression. We take away correction of behavior by the threat of an increase in physical pain. We take away the bits and the straps and the chains, we take away the spurs and the whips and the saddles that distort the back of a horse. We take away as well, the isolation in a cage for reasons of human practicality. We take away stress of separation that is the greatest crime against the nature of the horse, we take away the diets based on human convenience and function that are so damaging to the gut of the horse. We take away all of this and a thousand other injustices that we inflict on our friend ‘for his own good’. By which we mean, – for our benefit and what are we finally left with?
All that is left is the uncomplicated and gentle animal that is the horse. The prey animal, the herd animal, the travelling animal that protects himself through his natural instinct of flight, the browsing animal who does not hunt or track or kill to survive but instead only wants enough of the right food to eat, to live peacefully and to pass on it’s genes if it can.
This does not mean that the horse is now use-less, this does not mean the end of the long and complex relationship between our two species, On the contrary this is our new foundation. This should be the new starting point for all horsemen and women in the 21st century. We no longer need horses who’s only existence is defined as the ability to do our bidding and to make us feel good about our selfishness. We no longer need to own horses who have to perform in order to ensure the survival of our species, for the last sixty years we have increasingly owned horses simply for leisure and pleasure, isn’t it about time we allowed the horses themselves some leisure and pleasure also?
The the anthropomorphic and utility shells I am talking about are not fixed forever, they are in reality nothing more than human ideas, theories and hypothesis about the world – we call them beliefs, – but beliefs are not real. We constructed them originally to imprison horses and bend them to our ferocious will, but now we no longer need these beliefs, we should recognize them as the prisons that they are and reject them forever. It is it is only us, the predator that can set this prey animal free and if we do that we will find that what is left is simply, – the truth, and that truth should be the basis of the way forward for the future.
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Tags: Anthropomorphism, behavior, horses, human, Natural Horse, Principles, The Four models, Utility ModelPosted in Anthropmorphism, Four Models, Utility | No Comments »
