During the Rio Olympics I was astounded by the amount of Sofa Experts criticising the professionals. It seemed to be a near daily occurrence and this combined with a few other horrifically uneducated posts led me to write my post Social Media Sofa Experts, where I vented my anger at what I was reading, shared some of the ridiculous comments I had seen and explained why they were wrong!
Social Media Trolls
Horse & Hound have done a few posts recently about social media trolls and self proclaimed social media experts, but their most recent post this week really rang true with me. During the article they used the quote “a little knowledge is a dangerous thing” and I really couldn’t agree more!
The majority of these trolls and ‘experts’ have very little knowledge or experience outside of their little bubble. They are small minded and ignorant and seem to fail to understand that horses are individuals and have different needs. This seems to lead them to believe that if someone does something differently to them, the other person is in the wrong.
Unfortunately it doesn’t tend to end there. Many of these ‘experts’ use their blinkered and distorted view of the equine industry to create an argument that the other person is somehow abusing their horse for doing something wrong and they quickly make the decision to publicly shame this person.
Bigger Welfare Issues
However, back to the quote which really stuck with me from this article, “a little knowledge is a dangerous thing”. I truly believe that one of the key factors to horses suffering here in the UK is due to the owner’s lack of knowledge. The vast majority of horse owners adore their horses and are doing what they think is best for their horse. However, they either lack the needed knowledge or have a rather misguided idea of what it best in this situation. Just look at the obesity crisis we are having.
Educational Posts
One of my favourite types of post to write on EquiPepper are factual posts to help explain different conditions or ideas to horse owners. I find it very rewarding when these posts are found on search engines and I hope that they are helping horse owners making more informed decisions when it comes to looking after their horses.
This is especially true when it comes to ex racehorses and why they have such a terrible reputation in the industry. They tend to be cheap to buy so can be a tempting prospect for a beginner. But for someone who doesn’t understand what these horses are used to or how they may have different exercise and nutritional needs, they can quickly become difficult to handle and be labelled as dangerous.
I take pride in writing factual posts on EquiPepper and I truly understand the importance of knowledge in horse ownership. In writing these posts I do aim to help horse owners make informed decisions about how they manage their horses. Because as I have already said, the majority of horse owners do want to do best by their horse, and many of them are always open to new ideas which might be beneficial to their horse.
Last Updated on 08/05/2019
This is something I have been thinking about recently. I can’t quite put my finger on why some people are very defensive over their own horses, or even hearing/reading advice, or gaining new knowledge. I think a lot of it is their own insecurities. I think people that are not willing to carry on learning can’t be helped, so are best avoided. I also touched on this recently, that no-one can ever tell me they know everything, or that their education is complete. Only ignorant people say things like that. My articles, your articles, they are wasted on people with closed minds. But in truth, I’m not trying to help people like that anyway, because it’s useless. Great article.