Thread: [b]Charreada or Mexican Rodeo - Culture or Mistreatment?[/b]

The following is an aticle published in Sunday's Omaha World-Herald. I was wondering if anybody elsewhere have experienced this situation. There are two disturbing comments made by those involved.."It's my culture. We are Mexicans..and ..they didn't know horse tripping was illegal..! Illegal mexicans have been swarming to Omaha in recent years so things here are relatively new compared to Texas and California, for example. We have experienced twenty year olds being married to 13 yr. olds, taking guns to soccer matches and people being shot, cock fighting and on and on. In the example of the twenty year old marrying a 13 yrs. old, a liberal judge said...well, it's a cultural thing in their country....which is a liberal excuse for this cultural diversity bull-shit! In my opinion, it is gross disrespect for the law and thumbing their nose at us!

Anybody have any comments or know of someplace else where this was handled or mis-handled?

Published Sunday | December 2, 2007
Humane Society wants to ban Mexican rodeo events
BY ANDREW J. NELSON AND KAREN SLOAN
WORLD-HERALD STAFF WRITERS

The Nebraska Humane Society says there's nothing sporting about tripping a horse or twisting a steer's tail.

Armando Pliego of Omaha disagrees. He says those are time-honored rodeo events in Mexico.

Horse tripping is a practice in which a Mexican cowboy, known as a charro, chases a galloping horse and attempts to lasso its legs, sending the animal to the ground.

In steer tailing, a charro rides behind a steer and attempts to grabs its tail and wrap it around a stirrup, bringing the animal down.

The Humane Society says both actions can result in traumatic injuries to the animals. A horse's legs can be broken, and a steer's tail can be pulled off — an extremely painful injury since a steer's tail is connected to its spinal cord. The organization is seeking state and local prohibition of the activities.

Mexican-style rodeo
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The charreada or charro rodeo is the national sport of Mexico. A time-honored tradition dating to 16th-century Spain, it was brought to the Americas after the Spanish conquest of Mexico in 1520.

In the early 1700s, the sport moved to the Mexican ranch, where ranchers roped steer and bucking horses in a display of their skill, horsemanship and machismo.

In the 1950s and '60s, charro associations began to appear in the United States, eventually becoming established in six states: Arizona, California, Colorado, Illinois, New Mexico and Texas. Today, 84 charro federations oversee all U.S. charreada competitions.

Source: International Fund for HorsesPliego, 45, is a charro and treasurer of Charros La Amistad, an Omaha-based rodeo club that has performed in Iowa, Nebraska and Kansas. He is co-owner of a concrete flatwork company in Omaha.

Pliego said horse tripping and steer tailing are similar to practices performed in rodeos across the United States and no more harmful.

"If you grab the steer by the tail, that's more dangerous than grabbing the steer by the head and making it roll over? Of course not," Pliego said.

The charreada — or Mexican rodeo — practices caught the attention of the Humane Society in Omaha in July when someone contacted the organization about possible horse cruelty at a two-acre site with a barn and horse ring near 49th Street and Curtis Avenue.

Investigators found five horses with rope burns on their legs and ankles, and nine men who said they had participated in horse tripping, said Mark Langan, vice president of field operations at the Nebraska Humane Society.

"This is much more dangerous than recognized rodeo practices," Langan said. "They take it to a whole new level where the animals break bones and feel pain."

Langan said the men, including Pliego, were cited for suspected animal cruelty. The charros — all members of Charros La Amistad — said they didn't know horse tripping was illegal. They cooperated fully, Langan said.

The horses were confiscated and placed in the care of the Humane Society. Each man convicted in the case was fined $900 and ordered to pay $200 to the Humane Society for care of the horses. Two of the five horses now have new owners; the three others are still available for adoption.

Pliego denied that the horses had been mistreated. "For the charros, if you don't know how to take care of a horse, you can't call yourself a charro," he said. "It's my culture. We are Mexicans. And we are not blind in how to take care of a horse, how to keep the horse healthy."

Want to adopt?`
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Two of the five horses confiscated in Omaha in July have been adopted, but the Nebraska Humane Society is still looking for homes for the remaining three. Anyone interested in adopting the horses can call 444-7800.The Humane Society has contacted State Sen. Abbie Cornett of Bellevue and Omaha Councilman Chuck Sigerson about drafting legislation to specifically outlaw horse tripping and steer tailing.

Langan said legislation beyond existing statutes is needed to "combat this unique type of cruelty." He said the Humane Society sought out the legislation "in order to be proactive because reports (of horse tripping and steer tailing) are becoming more prevalent."

Cornett said her office was drafting a bill that would prohibit horse tripping. Steer tailing may be added to the measure, she said.

"I've ridden horses my entire life," she said. "I can't imagine the amount of damage you can do to a horse with that practice."

Sigerson said he didn't hesitate to introduce a proposed ordinance that would expand the city's definition of animal cruelty to specify the two activities.

"When they described it to me, it sounded very gruesome," Sigerson said. "I thought, 'Surely nobody is doing this.' But I was told people are."

Sigerson said that tradition is not an excuse for the practices and that he was confident the City Council will approve the proposal. A public hearing on the measure is scheduled for Dec. 11.

Pliego said he would speak against the measures.

"I'd be glad to be there," he said. "We don't try to hurt the horses or the animals. We are just trying to perform our sport."

This is example of the kind of culture that the government and activist groups are trying to force on us. I read somewhere, that a mexican goverment representative was explaining rape as a "cultural misunderstanding". I wonder if this practice falls under that category? These idiots need to know that in our country, animal abuse is illegal.

Culture or not, its against the law, since it is cruelity to animals. That they believe it is ok because of their culture, doesn't speak well for their culture. Culture is also used as the high number of hispanics that drink while driving, or drink underage. Neither of those are made 'ok' just by some idea of culture either.

Is this country going to accept 13-14 yr. olds getting married or 12 yrs as "age of consent?" Just more of the "enriching" that the diversityites talk so much about. It's not cultural differences, it's ethical differences. There is a reason some nations are referred to as "third world" and it's not all about economics.

Lets celebrate diversity! Thanks in part to the Mexican/Hispanic invasion we have cock fighting, dog fighting, and now horse tripping! Another issue for the horse community is Horse slaughter. The US plants have been closed down because the horses were slaughtered for export for human consumption. Now horses are sent to Mexico for slaughter and even if you have a strong stomach, their methods are brutal. They stab a horse in the neck repeatedly in hopes of severing its spine. The one video actually shows a horse being stabbed over 15 times in the neck as a bunch of workers laugh and cheer on the stabber each time the horse is stabbed. Finally after a good five minutes of being stabbed, the horse goes down, still isn't dead, but down. The crowd goes wild, it is really really sick IMHO.

Sorry but I want to live in a culture that has evolved and provides humane treatment to its animals.

The 3 events which include tripping are:

“Manganas a caballoâ€

Contrary to what you have been led to believe, multiculturalists do not believe diversity is real. This explains why they can so flippantly say we should "celebrate all cultures." The word "culturism" is offered as an alternative which explicitly takes culture seriously.

You are very right about early sexual activity being normal in Mexican culture. It is normal in lots of culture. This has HUGE reprocussions on our economy and educational system.

Our laws are based on cultural presuppositions. We have laws against statuatory rape, but it only gets prosecuted if adults press charges. If they do not see it as wrong, there is no law.

Welfare is another example. If people consider it a shame and want to get off of it as soon as possible it works. If not . . .

Our economic success requires first world values. We need to enforce them. Multiculturalism says we have no values, if we did they are all equal and we don't care. We have to even enforce horse tripping laws just to counter all of those very perceptions.

If you recognize that diversity is real, the potential depth of diversity, if you read the anthropology chapter in culturism, you'll realize that enjoying the torture deaths of small children could be next.

Because diversity is bpth real and significant, we need to counter the blindness of multiculturalism with culturism.

www.culturism.us

In our American culture we have people living in the rural part of the United States marrying cousins and marrying underage children. We also have Americans wearing fur coats and hunting down innocent animals for sport. Is that not the same? Other countries would look at us (esp European nations) and say, "Look how barbaric those American Yankees are. Them and their gun rights. They're stuck in the past."

flashman While I do know that we have people who do some very wrong things - such as underage marriage, etc. That, however, is an aberration, not part of our culture and I would hope no judge is going to excuse it as 'cultural'.

As for hunting, I am not a fan of sports hunting, but I don't see any difference in wearing a fur coat and wearing leather shoes. I have absolutely no problem with people hunting for food.

But whatever our gun habits, our hunting habits - it is our culture and it is legal -

I think fox hunting is pretty horrible, England has fairly recently gotten around to addressing that.

In an interview once, an Englishman was asked about some American customs that seem bizarre and he answered yes, he didn't understand some of them. He said, 'But we regularly send our children off to live at bording schools at a very early age, and I think that is cruel and inhuman.'

Originally Posted by casper324

Lets celebrate diversity! Thanks in part to the Mexican/Hispanic invasion we have cock fighting, dog fighting, and now horse tripping! Another issue for the horse community is Horse slaughter. The US plants have been closed down because the horses were slaughtered for export for human consumption. Now horses are sent to Mexico for slaughter and even if you have a strong stomach, their methods are brutal. They stab a horse in the neck repeatedly in hopes of severing its spine. The one video actually shows a horse being stabbed over 15 times in the neck as a bunch of workers laugh and cheer on the stabber each time the horse is stabbed. Finally after a good five minutes of being stabbed, the horse goes down, still isn't dead, but down. The crowd goes wild, it is really really sick IMHO.

Sorry but I want to live in a culture that has evolved and provides humane treatment to its animals.

Horse slaughter is a HUGE issue in the horse world. When people started screaming about it here in America, they decided to move it to Mex and Canada, and I thought, "great-at least when it was here we could regulate it somewhat, but down in a third world cesspool known as mexico those animals don't have a chance at an even remotely humane death.

I wish South America would detatch itself from the US and just float away.