# I pit NBC's coverage of the Kentucky Derby in the wake of Eight Belles' death **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [May 3, 2008, 10:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-nbcs-coverage-of-the-kentucky-derby-in-the-wake-of-eight-belles-death/447938 "2008-05-03T22:53:34Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Cubsfan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f4b2a3/32.png) [@Cubsfan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cubsfan)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2008, 1:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-nbcs-coverage-of-the-kentucky-derby-in-the-wake-of-eight-belles-death/447938/21 "2008-05-04T01:49:06Z")
I just read about that. I’m trying to figure out how a race horse can be in such bad shape that BOTH of its ankles during a race. Huh? That doesn’t seem strange to anyone? It sounds like they just exploded or something. Are these horses all hopped up on drugs and what not? Why would it be so fragile? Was the jockey running it too hard? I don’t know anything about horse racing so I’m asking those questions in all seriousness. ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Hyde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/47e85d/32.png) [@Martin\_Hyde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martin_Hyde)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2008, 1:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-nbcs-coverage-of-the-kentucky-derby-in-the-wake-of-eight-belles-death/447938/22 "2008-05-04T01:51:44Z")
[QUOTE=El Cid Viscoso] Enough. Give me one good reason why a horse race should be held or I will [be really mad]. Right fucking now. [/QUOTE] It’s entertainment. Period. Sure, some animals are hurt in it–but they’re animals. Some humans get hurt in horse racing–but, they have willingly decided to take that risk, and it isn’t other humans responsibility to tell them what risks are reasonable and what are not, when said risks don’t threaten any other persons. ---
**Author:** ![KarlGrenze](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/dbc845/32.png) [@KarlGrenze](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KarlGrenze)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2008, 2:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-nbcs-coverage-of-the-kentucky-derby-in-the-wake-of-eight-belles-death/447938/23 "2008-05-04T02:01:37Z")
[QUOTE=El Cid Viscoso] I’m not here to see how many fucking angels can dance on the head of a pin. Why was his goddamned fucking leg broken in the first fucking goddamned fucking place? Enough. Give me one good reason why a horse race should be held or I will [be really mad]. Right fucking now. [/QUOTE] Hey, don’t get mad at me, I’m trying to set something straight about your comment. Overall, I’m not a fan of horse races (or horses, for that matter). **Cubsfan** , there have been cases of drugged horses, an investigation about illegal drug administration to race horses was done last year at Louisiana State University, after they got some dead race horses. I’ll try to look it up. Also, there has been some speculation as to the use of steroids in cases of laminitis in race horses (this unpublished data, just speculation on the part of my horse vet profs as to why otherwise healthy race horses succumb to laminitis, which shouldn’t happen). ---
**Author:** ![Absolute](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/b2d939/32.png) [@Absolute](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Absolute)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2008, 2:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-nbcs-coverage-of-the-kentucky-derby-in-the-wake-of-eight-belles-death/447938/24 "2008-05-04T02:02:34Z")
[QUOTE=El Cid Viscoso] I’m not here to see how many fucking angels can dance on the head of a pin. Why was his goddamned fucking leg broken in the first fucking goddamned fucking place? Enough. Give me one good reason why a horse race should be held or I will [be really mad]. Right fucking now. [/QUOTE] What justified killing the cow that your last steak came from? That should be more than enough justification for horse racing. ---
**Author:** ![DigitalC](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ebca7d/32.png) [@DigitalC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DigitalC)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2008, 2:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-nbcs-coverage-of-the-kentucky-derby-in-the-wake-of-eight-belles-death/447938/25 "2008-05-04T02:04:23Z")
[QUOTE=Absolute] What justified killing the cow that your last steak came from? That should be more than enough justification for horse racing. [/QUOTE] How can you possibly compare substenance with entertainment, you can’t possibly be that fucking stupid. ---
**Author:** ![Wee\_Bairn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/90db22/32.png) [@Wee\_Bairn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wee_Bairn)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2008, 2:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-nbcs-coverage-of-the-kentucky-derby-in-the-wake-of-eight-belles-death/447938/26 "2008-05-04T02:12:22Z")
[QUOTE=Absolute] What justified killing the cow that your last steak came from? That should be more than enough justification for horse racing. [/QUOTE] You know the difference in the two, but my thing with racing is the grieving owners talking about how much they loved the dead horse- just be honest and say you’re crying over the lost income. If I sent my kid out once a month to play Russian Roulette to try and win a million bucks, I’d look awfully stupid and phony crying about how much I loved her after the time she blew her head off, right? ---
**Author:** ![Leaper](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/4bbf92/32.png) [@Leaper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leaper)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2008, 2:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-nbcs-coverage-of-the-kentucky-derby-in-the-wake-of-eight-belles-death/447938/27 "2008-05-04T02:14:11Z")
[QUOTE=DigitalC] How can you possibly compare substenance with entertainment, you can’t possibly be that fucking stupid. [/QUOTE] Devil’s advocate: in this world of artificial vitamins, supplements, and vegetables that have plenty of protein, there’s absolutely no justification for eating meat at all other than personal selfishness of liking the taste. (Hey, a lot of vegetarians/vegans say exactly that.) ---
**Author:** ![Absolute](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/b2d939/32.png) [@Absolute](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Absolute)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2008, 2:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-nbcs-coverage-of-the-kentucky-derby-in-the-wake-of-eight-belles-death/447938/28 "2008-05-04T02:18:12Z")
[QUOTE=DigitalC] How can you possibly compare substenance with entertainment, you can’t possibly be that fucking stupid. [/QUOTE] Meat is not necessary for sustenance - plenty of people go through life eating tofu and bean curd, or whatever the hell vegetarians eat. We systematically slaughter cows so that we can eat them. Every cow you see? We’re going to kill it and eat it, potentially after sucking milk out of it. As for horses, we make them do moderately risky things for our entertainment. We don’t intentionally kill them, but as you pointed out, entertainment isn’t as important as sustenance. Seems to be about the same to me. ---
**Author:** ![FoieGrasIsEvil](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/foiegrasisevil/32/16638_2.png) [@FoieGrasIsEvil](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FoieGrasIsEvil)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2008, 2:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-nbcs-coverage-of-the-kentucky-derby-in-the-wake-of-eight-belles-death/447938/29 "2008-05-04T02:19:29Z")
[QUOTE=Wee Bairn] You know the difference in the two, but my thing with racing is the grieving owners talking about how much they loved the dead horse- just be honest and say you’re crying over the lost income. If I sent my kid out once a month to play Russian Roulette to try and win a million bucks, I’d look awfully stupid and phony crying about how much I loved her after the time she blew her head off, right? [/QUOTE] I can understand the stance against horse racing, me, I’m generally apathetic about it. But your roulette analogy is a bad one. The chances of blowing your head off playing russian roulette are far greater than a horse suffering life-threatening injuries due to racing. Most of them end up gnawing grass for years after their brief racing life is over, siring ponies. ---
**Author:** ![MLS](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/919ad9/32.png) [@MLS](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MLS)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2008, 2:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-nbcs-coverage-of-the-kentucky-derby-in-the-wake-of-eight-belles-death/447938/30 "2008-05-04T02:25:54Z")
[QUOTE=El Cid Viscoso] Barbaro was put down ultimately for humane reasons. As in they’d gathered gallons of his goo and he’d suddenly outweighed his usefulness. [/QUOTE] Are you thinking of sperm for artificial insemination? Please note that in thoroughbred racing only natural “covers” are permitted, so that there is no doubt as to exactly which horse is the sire. ---
**Author:** ![Rilchiam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/2bfe46/32.png) [@Rilchiam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rilchiam)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2008, 2:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-nbcs-coverage-of-the-kentucky-derby-in-the-wake-of-eight-belles-death/447938/31 "2008-05-04T02:27:53Z")
[QUOTE=Absolute] We systematically slaughter cows so that we can eat them. Every cow you see? We’re going to kill it and eat it, potentially after sucking milk out of it. [/QUOTE] Beef comes from steer. Milk comes from cows. ---
**Author:** ![Gorsnak](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gorsnak/32/7587_2.png) [@Gorsnak](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gorsnak)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2008, 2:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-nbcs-coverage-of-the-kentucky-derby-in-the-wake-of-eight-belles-death/447938/32 "2008-05-04T02:33:57Z")
[QUOTE=Rilchiam] Beef comes from steer. Milk comes from cows. [/QUOTE] Are you under the illusion that culled heifers aren’t slaughtered for beef? Or that culled breeding cows aren’t slaughtered for beef (generally ground)? Aside from a few cases where they end up as pet food instead, every cow you ever see will end up on a supermarket shelf. ---
**Author:** ![What\_the](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/f4b2a3/32.png) [@What\_the](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/What_the)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2008, 2:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-nbcs-coverage-of-the-kentucky-derby-in-the-wake-of-eight-belles-death/447938/33 "2008-05-04T02:38:54Z")
[QUOTE=El Cid Viscoso] I’m not here to see how many fucking angels can dance on the head of a pin. Why was his goddamned fucking leg broken in the first fucking goddamned fucking place? Enough. Give me one good reason why a horse race should be held or I will [be really mad]. Right fucking now. [/QUOTE] Lemme guess … you’re really pissed because Hillary predicted that Eight Belles would win and you’re anticipating jokes about her campaign being euthanized? ---
**Author:** ![Airman\_Doors\_USAF](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e36b37/32.png) [@Airman\_Doors\_USAF](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Airman_Doors_USAF)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2008, 3:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-nbcs-coverage-of-the-kentucky-derby-in-the-wake-of-eight-belles-death/447938/34 "2008-05-04T03:18:24Z")
[QUOTE=DigitalC] What i think is going on is a horse just died for absolutely no fucking reason other than our amusement. Did i miss anything? no, ok then shut the fucking thing down. [/QUOTE] That horse would never have been alive were it not for our amusement. That is the only reason that thoroughbreds exist. Thoroughbreds are superadapted to do one thing well, and that is to run as fast as they can for a moderately short distance. I’m not making any value judgments about horse racing, but I will say that if you shut horse racing down you’ve just essentially destroyed thousands of animals who aren’t even valuable for food. ---
**Author:** ![KarlGrenze](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/dbc845/32.png) [@KarlGrenze](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KarlGrenze)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2008, 3:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-nbcs-coverage-of-the-kentucky-derby-in-the-wake-of-eight-belles-death/447938/35 "2008-05-04T03:20:40Z")
[QUOTE=Rilchiam] Beef comes from steer. Milk comes from cows. [/QUOTE] Good/high quality meat comes from beef cattle, either steer or heifer (but steer commands higher price). Culled beef and dairy cattle (old cows and bulls, and those that didn’t make it into breeding) end up in our meat supply too. As some of my profs say… They go into career change at the Golden Arches. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Rilchiam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/2bfe46/32.png) [@Rilchiam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rilchiam)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2008, 3:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-nbcs-coverage-of-the-kentucky-derby-in-the-wake-of-eight-belles-death/447938/36 "2008-05-04T03:24:46Z")
Well, phooey. ---
**Author:** ![NinetyWt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/cc9497/32.png) [@NinetyWt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NinetyWt)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2008, 3:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-nbcs-coverage-of-the-kentucky-derby-in-the-wake-of-eight-belles-death/447938/37 "2008-05-04T03:44:21Z")
[QUOTE=FoieGrasIsEvil] Most of them end up gnawing grass for years after their brief racing life is over, siring ponies. [/QUOTE] Not ponies, other thoroughbreds. ---
**Author:** ![El\_Cid\_Viscoso](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/41988e/32.png) [@El\_Cid\_Viscoso](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/El_Cid_Viscoso)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2008, 5:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-nbcs-coverage-of-the-kentucky-derby-in-the-wake-of-eight-belles-death/447938/38 "2008-05-04T05:05:04Z")
[QUOTE=Airman Doors, USAF] I’m not making any value judgments about horse racing, but I will say that if you shut horse racing down you’ve just essentially destroyed thousands of animals who aren’t even valuable for food. [/QUOTE] If we hadn’t destroyed the natural environment horses would still be eating and fucking and roaming, and not running unless absolutely necessary. > [@Absolute](#): > > What justified killing the cow that your last steak came from? That should be more than enough justification for horse racing. I don’t eat meat. Sorry. ---
**Author:** ![Soapbox\_Monkey](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ed655f/32.png) [@Soapbox\_Monkey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Soapbox_Monkey)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2008, 8:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-nbcs-coverage-of-the-kentucky-derby-in-the-wake-of-eight-belles-death/447938/39 "2008-05-04T08:37:22Z")
[QUOTE=Martin Hyde] Sure, some animals are hurt in it–but they’re animals. [/QUOTE] If it’s really that simple…then why is Michael Vick in jail? I mean, they’re just animals, right? ---
**Author:** ![tnetennba](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7993a0/32.png) [@tnetennba](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tnetennba)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2008, 12:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-nbcs-coverage-of-the-kentucky-derby-in-the-wake-of-eight-belles-death/447938/40 "2008-05-04T12:58:29Z")
I’ve never understood the “well, they’re animals,” argument to justify cruelty and inhumane treatment of animals. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-nbcs-coverage-of-the-kentucky-derby-in-the-wake-of-eight-belles-death/447938.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-nbcs-coverage-of-the-kentucky-derby-in-the-wake-of-eight-belles-death/447938.md?page=3)