Print
E-mail
Rate
Well-run rodeos can entertain without cruelty
The phrase "Friday Night Lights" has a different meaning just down the road from my house.
There, the blazing floodlights that greet me as I arrive home on dark evenings belong to the local saddle club, which practices once a week or so at the small rodeo arena next to the nearby baseball fields.
The sight is always a welcome one for this Texas native. Horse trailers small and large are parked in rows on the packed red clay. Some have horses - from bays to buckskins - tethered to the outside, munching hay and waiting to be saddled.
Inside the arena, kids on horseback wait their turn to weave through barrels, and adults call out instructions or watch from the single set of aluminum bleachers outside the fence.
It might just be practice, but all the elements of a rodeo are present: dust, jeans, boots and bridles all reflect the Western culture that the events represent.
Rodeos were just a part of life in Athens, the small Texas town I grew up in. The city is the county seat of Henderson County and thus the site of the county fairgrounds, which are booked up to a year in advance with Professional Bull Riders (PBR) events, American Quarter Horse Association (AQHA) shows and local fairs, to name a few.
As a kid, I would go to rodeos often to see friends compete, pet the animals or simply as something to do on the weekends. I never participated in any of the horseback events, though there was one memorable competition I took part in when I was younger involving a crowd of children chasing a pair of greased piglets.
Still, the occasional trips to the rodeo - before one of which I told my dad that we absolutely had to wear jeans and boots or they wouldn't let us in - instilled in me a love of the Western culture and a more than passing interest in bull riding, barrel racing and calf cutting.
Today, some will argue that these events, which have their roots in the days when real-life cowboys would climb onto bad-tempered mustangs, are nothing more than people exploiting and hurting animals for entertainment.
The truth is that a well-run rodeo can entertain and still keep the animals' best interests in mind. Today, stock contractors breed horses and bulls specifically for bucking, and the animals are well fed and cared for. In fact, some bulls become legendary for their ability to unseat rider after rider and are retired to breeding programs in their later years.
Every profession has its villains, however, rodeo included. Like baseball players who dope up, cops who sell drugs or journalists who make stuff up, rodeo has some contractors who care only for profit and nothing for the animals.
It is the responsibility of the rodeo organizers to make sure that the animals that are used are treated humanely. In addition, public scrutiny can help keep the contractors and organizers on their toes.
A well-run, professional rodeo is an opportunity to witness the awesome physical ability of these animals and the dedication of those who train them - many of whom probably started out in a saddle club.
Of course, rodeos are good for other things, too. Like giving parents a chance to videotape their kids repeatedly falling face first into the dirt while pursuing greased swine.
This I know from personal experience.
(Emily Goodson is the assistant editor of the Tribune & Georgian and a regular Friday columnist. She did not win the greased pig competition.)
There, the blazing floodlights that greet me as I arrive home on dark evenings belong to the local saddle club, which practices once a week or so at the small rodeo arena next to the nearby baseball fields.
The sight is always a welcome one for this Texas native. Horse trailers small and large are parked in rows on the packed red clay. Some have horses - from bays to buckskins - tethered to the outside, munching hay and waiting to be saddled.
Inside the arena, kids on horseback wait their turn to weave through barrels, and adults call out instructions or watch from the single set of aluminum bleachers outside the fence.
It might just be practice, but all the elements of a rodeo are present: dust, jeans, boots and bridles all reflect the Western culture that the events represent.
Rodeos were just a part of life in Athens, the small Texas town I grew up in. The city is the county seat of Henderson County and thus the site of the county fairgrounds, which are booked up to a year in advance with Professional Bull Riders (PBR) events, American Quarter Horse Association (AQHA) shows and local fairs, to name a few.
As a kid, I would go to rodeos often to see friends compete, pet the animals or simply as something to do on the weekends. I never participated in any of the horseback events, though there was one memorable competition I took part in when I was younger involving a crowd of children chasing a pair of greased piglets.
Still, the occasional trips to the rodeo - before one of which I told my dad that we absolutely had to wear jeans and boots or they wouldn't let us in - instilled in me a love of the Western culture and a more than passing interest in bull riding, barrel racing and calf cutting.
Today, some will argue that these events, which have their roots in the days when real-life cowboys would climb onto bad-tempered mustangs, are nothing more than people exploiting and hurting animals for entertainment.
The truth is that a well-run rodeo can entertain and still keep the animals' best interests in mind. Today, stock contractors breed horses and bulls specifically for bucking, and the animals are well fed and cared for. In fact, some bulls become legendary for their ability to unseat rider after rider and are retired to breeding programs in their later years.
Every profession has its villains, however, rodeo included. Like baseball players who dope up, cops who sell drugs or journalists who make stuff up, rodeo has some contractors who care only for profit and nothing for the animals.
It is the responsibility of the rodeo organizers to make sure that the animals that are used are treated humanely. In addition, public scrutiny can help keep the contractors and organizers on their toes.
A well-run, professional rodeo is an opportunity to witness the awesome physical ability of these animals and the dedication of those who train them - many of whom probably started out in a saddle club.
Of course, rodeos are good for other things, too. Like giving parents a chance to videotape their kids repeatedly falling face first into the dirt while pursuing greased swine.
This I know from personal experience.
(Emily Goodson is the assistant editor of the Tribune & Georgian and a regular Friday columnist. She did not win the greased pig competition.)
 |
 |
|
| Give war a chance | The sheriff soap opera continues |
