08 May 2008

From Today's New York Times

To the Editor:

Re “Another Horse-Racing Horror” (editorial, May 6):

Thank you for adding your voice to the many who are demanding that the welfare of racehorses should come before profits. But let us also give thought to the thousands of horses that are bred every year for racing and don’t make the cut or outlive their usefulness to the investors and owners.

Most wind up auctioned off for a few dollars each and sent to the foreign slaughterhouses to be made into pet food or dinner for someone overseas. Even the 1986 Kentucky Derby winner Ferdinand ended up in a Japanese slaughterhouse because he wasn’t proving his monetary value as a stud.

It’s not just the injured horses that suffer. It’s the thousands of faceless colts and fillies we never see that suffer from this so-called sport.

Jane Shakman
Ossining, N.Y., May 6, 2008

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