LETTER: Stop the rodeo

It is time to stop animal cruelty which goes hand in hand with rodeos. These terrified animals do not choose to be harmed nor do they choose to be there.

If this were your dog, you would not allow this abuse. Big money drives this egregious suffering and now you are endangering humans too by gathering in large crowds during Covid 19!

-Linda Middlesworth


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11 Comments

  • DRA July 20, 2020 at 12:06 pm Reply

    I love and understand Rodeo. I will be supporting this Rodeo!!!!!!!!!!!!!

    • Eric Mills July 23, 2020 at 3:11 pm Reply

      You may understand rodeo, but you clearly don’t understand either compassion or cruelty to animals. EVERY animal welfare organization in North America condemns rodeo due to its inherent cruelty. For the majority of the animals, the rodeo arena is merely a detour en route to the slaughterhouse. Most of rodeo is hype from the git-go. REAL working ranch hands never routinely rode bulls, or wrestled steers, or rode bareback, or barrel raced, or practiced calf roping (terrified babies) as a timed event. Some “sport”! Rodeo is a macho exercise in DOMINATION, and should be outlawed worldwide, as it was in the United Kingdom back i 1934. Can the U.S. be far behind? Lest we forget, COVID-19 was HUMAN-caused, a direct result of our gross mistreatment and abuse of animals, both wild and domestic. At the very least this godawful pandemic should teach us all a much-needed lesson in humility, with perhaps a dose of compassion for others, humans and non-humans alike. Are we up to the task?

  • S July 20, 2020 at 3:37 pm Reply

    AMEN

  • Jackie Greene July 20, 2020 at 10:14 pm Reply

    That terrified fly you swatted did not come into your house to do anything more than find something to eat—and you MURDERED it!

  • Jackie Wilson July 20, 2020 at 10:14 pm Reply

    That terrified fly you swatted did not come into your house to do anything more than find something to eat—and you MURDERED it!

  • Jackie Wilson July 20, 2020 at 10:17 pm Reply

    That terrified fly you swatted didn’t do anything to you! It was merely looking for something to eat, and you MURDERED it!

  • Bull lives matter July 21, 2020 at 4:27 pm Reply

    Linda, God bless you! I will be wearing a mask to the bull rides this year. I will make sure that if a bull starts stomping a rider to let the bull know that he needs to follow the golden rule. After all bull lives matter! Peace!

  • Eric Mills July 23, 2020 at 3:14 pm Reply

    THE RODEO COWBOYS SPEAK

    A WYOMING STEER WRESTLER
    “Women should not rodeo any more than men can have babies. Women were put
    on earth to reproduce, and are close to animals. Women’s liberation is on
    an equal to gay liberation–they are both ridiculous.” (–in the book,
    “RODEO: An Anthropologist Looks at the Wild and the Tame,” by Elizabeth
    Atwood Lawrence, University of Tennessee Press, 1982)

    A RODEO QUEEN
    “The eighteen-year-old rodeo queen and her princess told me that rodeo
    people, including themselves, ‘hated Democrats, environmentalists, and
    gays.’ I was astonished that their political and social outlook could be
    reduced to such simple platitudes of hate. And why?” (–“Rodeo Queens
    and the American Dream,” by Prof. Joan Burbick, Public Affairs, NYC, 2002)

    A TEXAS VETERINARIAN AND SOMETIME STEER ROPER
    “I keep 30 head of cattle around for practice, at $200 a head. You can
    cripple three or four in an afternoon. Then your horse costs around
    $5,000, so it gets to be a pretty expensive hobby.” (–Dr. T.K. Hardy,
    quoted in NEWSWEEK, 10/2/72)

    KEITH MARTIN, PRCA’S CHAIRMAN OF THE BOARD – ON CALF ROPING
    “Do I think it hurts the calf? Sure I do. I’m not stupid.” (–in the
    February 6, 2000 SAN ANTONIO EXPRESS-NEWS, “Choosing Champions”)

    A CALF ROPER
    “If PETA truly wanted the skinny on animal injuries, they’d have to post
    observers in the backyard practice lots of aspiring rodeo kids. As a
    calf roper once confided to me, ‘Yeah, I accidentally killed and
    injured lots of calves when I was learning. I mean, I plain roped their
    heads off till I really learned how to handle them and not hurt them.'”
    (–“The Mud, the Blood & the Poop: A Rodeo Insider Takes You Behind the
    Chutes of America’s Cowboy Sport,” in the COLORADO SPRINGS INDEPENDENT,
    August 19, 2004)

    STOCK CONTRACTOR/RODEO COMMITTEE PRESIDENT
    “Do animals feel fear? Nyaah, they don’t feel fear. They’re an ANIMAL!”
    (–Russ Fields, president Rowell Ranch Rodeo Committee, in a 5/19/18
    KGO-TV Channel 7 news segment, San Francisco)

    DR. TEMPLE GRANDIN, WORLD-RENOWNED ANIMAL BEHAVIORIST
    “The single worst thing you can do to an animal emotionally is to make it
    feel afraid. Fear is so bad for animal I think it’s worse than pain.”

    TOM HIRSIG, CEO, CHEYENNE FRONTIER DAYS RODEO
    “If it gets to the point where people think rodeo is inhumane or cruel,
    they quit coming, and then we’re out of business.” (–in the July 27,
    2018 WYOMING TRIBUNE EAGLE, “CFD, animal activists see two different
    rodeos”)

    NOTE: Animal injuries and deaths in the rodeo arena are routine, and
    likely only the tip of the iceberg. One can only imagine the
    injuries/deaths in the untold hours of unmonitored practice sessions,
    using the same animals repeatedly. There are an estimated 5,000 rodeos
    held annually in the U.S., only a small percentage of them sanctioned.
    The great majority don’t even require on-site veterinarians to care for
    injured animals. The PRCA has done so only since 1995, after FIVE animals
    were killed at the California Rodeo in Salinas that year. Some “sport”!

  • Eric Mills, coordinator, ACTION FOR ANIMALS, Oakland July 23, 2020 at 4:25 pm Reply

    See link below to new, prize-winning rodeo documentary short, “BUCKING TRADITION” – also available on YouTube:

    https://www.actionforanimals-oakland.com

  • Jennofur OConnor July 24, 2020 at 3:10 am Reply

    Covid or no Covid, tormenting animals for “fun” is condemned by anyone with a conscience.

  • Susan Segien August 17, 2022 at 8:57 am Reply

    It’s time for this Cruel SPORT to end!! We are better then this! All this Cruelty for a few to make a buck is pathetic!!

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