Will The Queens Arms Pub Swap the Grand National for Hobby Horse Racing?
As the Grand National horse racing festival approaches, we sent a letter to Aintree’s most popular pub, The Queens Arms, urging it to host a hobby horse race instead of showing a cruel and antiquated event that killed two horses last year.
Pub-goers can still enjoy a drink and socialise with friends, knowing that their day of fun did not cause suffering or death for any other sentient beings. If the pub is game, we will even supply the hobby horses.
Hobby horse racing is already a big deal in some parts of Europe: in 2019, 2,500 spectators flocked to Finland for the Finnish Hobbyhorse Championships, in which participants show-jumped, barrel-raced, and pranced in a dressage competition.
Grand National Disgrace
In the Grand National, 29 horses have died from race-related causes since 2010.
Horses used for racing often die of fatal injuries such as broken backs or are killed after sustaining broken legs. Those who survive end the race sweating, exhausted, and sometimes bleeding from the lungs or injured.
No one would be raising a glass if cats or dogs were the ones being whipped and forced to jump dangerous obstacles, shattering their ankles, snapping their necks, and being shot in the head right on the track. Horses deserve no less sympathy.
Last year, “The Dark Side of Horse Racing” on BBC One’s Panorama revealed that thousands of horses formerly used for racing in the UK and Ireland are sent to the abattoir every year.
A PETA exposé showed that horses from around the world who are sold to the South Korean racing industry – and their offspring – are often violently killed and sold for meat when they’re deemed no longer useful.
What You Can Do
Stop fuelling this cruelty by refusing to attend horse races, bet on them, or watch them on TV. Encourage your friends and family to shun the Grand National and other horse races, too.
Please also help spare the lives of horses by urging companies to stop sponsoring the Grand National:
