What in the world??? I thought they were professional horse trainers!!

[patandchickens]

I have not seen the video (dialup, plus disinclination to see people whacking horses with things) but am perfectly well willing to believe it.

Not in the Parellis' *defense* exactly (I am reaaaallly not a Parelli fan) but to be fair about the issue, I think that high-profile trainers who put themselves out there as gurus and celebrities experience a WHOLE lot of pressure -- from themselves more than from the world at large -- to make things work quickly in some fashion whenever they are handed a horse. In reality of course, no matter WHO you are, sometimes things take time.

(My very favorite NH type video that I've ever seen, in fact I own it, is one by I forget which of the Dorrances. In particular there is one long section on trying to get a horse to load. You know what I love about it? He gives the horse TIME, and LETS it 'relapse' and stop and think and try things that don't work, and you get the impression that he thinks it is genuinely FINE for things to take however long they take. In consequence the sequence is apparently-boring and unspectacular on video and not going to get people going ooh and aaah. Unlike this showoff business of "look how fast I can get things to happen" that most others get sucked into. But man, the Dorrances were *brilliant* horsemen.)

I have seen a similar thing happen with a guy here in Canada who for a shortish while was all promoting himself like crazy as the best NH thing since sliced bred. Got a lot of people believing it too. The one clinic of his I watched, he seemed like an okay horseman and all that but was in such a darned hurry to produce quick results that he did some REALLY stupid-ass things, including basically *manufacturing* a being-mounted problem because he was stuck on forcing the horse into putting up with him accidentally kneeing it every time he tried to mount. If there was no audience I truly think he would have recognized the problem and slowed down and been fine. Interestingly he seems to have pretty much disappeared off the radar after a coupla years. Coincidence, I think not

And I'm with welsummerchicks in suspecting that the recent outbreak of "ooooh, horrible Parellis!" is probably not random or spontaneous. The things people will do. Sheesh.

Pat

 

[welsummerchicks]

Yep. There's an awful lot of money in the Parelli empire, and it is an empire. A very lucrative one. I'm sure a lot of other celebrity trainers would like a piece of that.

Horse trainers is one area where people just are extremely, extremely gullible. They basically will suck up just about anything. A lot of it's about 'aura'. Parelli has that cowboy aura, so people basically suck up anything he says.

I saw part of the Dorrance loading video, it was better than most of the 'celebrity trainer' videos I've seen.

 

[patandchickens]

I wouldn't call either Dorrance a "celebrity trainer", personally.

I don't think the whole business is really any different than what "normal" trainers do, though. Basically what the industry boils down to is that a relatively few people are gifted with really unusual tact and judgement and skilled body use and experience interpreting what's going on with a horse. They can usually, a high proportion of the time, get a WHOLE lot better results out of Joe Horseowner's horse than Joe himself can. I don't care whether they're putting that horse in a roundpen and turning it from snarly and uninterested to eager to please, or getting on it in the dressage ring and turning an awkward crooked putzing-along horse into something with rhythm and some degree of carriage and able to suddenly do the basic features of movements the horse's owner had never imagined were possible. And I don't care whether there's a crew taping it for commercial video release, or a big ticket-buying audience, or just the horse's owner and the barn help there. Basically some people just DO have a real knack for getting things sorted out.

The problem with the High Profile Trainer Instructional Products Industry is that it makes it seem much more learnable than it is. Yeah, reading a book or going to a clinic or watching a video is helpful (although mainly to people who were pretty much on the right track to begin with) but the big things have to be learned by DOING not by watching. Like judgement and body language. Yet the instructional products industry depends on the premise that watching is super-helpful, and of course people want to *feel* that it's helpful. So you get people watching <whoever> and going home and copying some superficial aspects of their actions and not really getting great results, sometimes *bad* results, because it's not the stuff that really matters.

I do think that "celebrity trainers" are generally basically sincere in wanting to help people and believing they can. Even, bless his heart, GaWaNi Pony Boy

I think the main thing that separates them from "normal" trainers, even the very brilliant normal trainers who simply have not got sucked into the celebrity-instructional-products industry, is that the "normal" trainers are not in a position where they absolutely HAVE TO get particular results on a particular time schedule ALL OF THE TIME. (Mind you, the celebrity trainers have pretty much put *themselves* in that position, but, still, it must be extremely stressful)

Pat

 

[turney31]

Cowboy aura? .....Kind of insulting to a lot of great horse people.

 

[Barred Rocks forever]

 

[rodriguezpoultry]

Fun question...was that a chain she was using to hit his rump and his face?

 

[Hound]

Kind of insulting to actual cowboys also.

Cognitive dissonance is the feeling of discomfort caused by holding two opposing ideas at the same time; as a result a person will change their opinions accordingly to reduce the 'dissonance' or discomfort. The concept has little to do with a difference between products.

I can think of at least one so-called 'celebrity' trainer who does not feel obliged to be overly gentle either with horses or with people: Chris Cox. However unlike this example he knows how and when to use discipline and doesn't lose his temper, rather than the frustrated confused performance of Linda Parelli. Strange how a one-eyed prey animal bred with the sole purpose of running can act spooky and distracted and beating it about the head doesn't improve matters

 

[froggiesheins]

Quote:
You always have good points of view welsumer. I personally think some of this "natural Horsemanship" stuff has its place especially with the huge influx of "cityslickers" thinking its cool to own a horse and that they are like cars, just get on and go. I live in Southern California where we can ride pretty much 360 days a year (SO spoiled) and you can find decent stalls for as little as 250 a month.
We have an huge horse population with so many adoring fans of Parelli / Clint Anderson / and the like. Celebrities of any kind are a big deal here. People want fast eze get it to go now training. Good solid foundation training that might take a year to get the horse started but will stay with them their whole life....that takes too long--naw. I took a horse in training and spent 4 months on just walk and trot alone. But that horse will trot at a steady speed in a straight line from here to doomsday.
What the "wanna-be" person was doing was; getting that horse to detest her and that f***ing rattling rope in his face. Not all horses could tolerate that method of (cough-cough) training. I don't believe in that shaking the rope stuff, hand signals are a useful tool or pushing the horse away from you with your hands/arms pushing the air in front of them. Or a "come" signal. Body movement too. Some of the times she was looking at the ground while rattling that rope--whats that all about? I did not see her use the get behind the horses shoulder to get him to move forward or crouch down and use the trailing arm to push the horse forward, that is natural horsemanship. Another wanna-be person, yuck! I think my horse would stand there and say: "What is that fool human doing?"

 

[froggiesheins]

Quote:
You always have good points of view welsumer. I personally think some of this "natural Horsemanship" stuff has its place especially with the huge influx of "cityslickers" thinking its cool to own a horse and that they are like cars, just get on and go. I live in Southern California where we can ride pretty much 360 days a year (SO spoiled) and you can find decent stalls for as little as 250 a month.
We have an huge horse population with so many adoring fans of Parelli / Clint Anderson / and the like. Celebrities of any kind are a big deal here. People want fast eze get it to go now training. Good solid foundation training that might take a year to get the horse started but will stay with them their whole life....that takes too long--naw. I took a horse in training and spent 4 months on just walk and trot alone. But that horse will trot at a steady speed in a straight line from here to doomsday.
What the "wanna-be" person was doing was; getting that horse to detest her and that f***ing rattling rope in his face. Not all horses could tolerate that method of (cough-cough) training. I don't believe in that shaking the rope stuff, hand signals are a useful tool or pushing the horse away from you with your hands/arms pushing the air in front of them. Or a "come" signal. Body movement too. Some of the times she was looking at the ground while rattling that rope--whats that all about? I did not see her use the get behind the horses shoulder to get him to move forward or crouch down and use the trailing arm to push the horse forward, that is natural horsemanship. Another wanna-be person, yuck! I think my horse would stand there and say: "What is that fool human doing?"

 

[froggiesheins]

Ooops--posted A Duplicate--sorry Byc Guys.....