I’ve never been much of a fan of ole Chris. As an actor, I think he’s a hack, and I intrinsically dislike celebrity spokespeople.
It’s like now all of a sudden that he suddenly speaks for all people with spinal injuries.
Not to mention that he probably has a Viper. 
Seriously, the thing I dislike most about Christopher Reeves and a couple of other celebrities is their horseback riding. I own horses, I worked as a cowboy, I trained horses (including the two I own now.) When I was a kid, I got into trouble and had to go to this after school military thing run by ex-cavalry officers, and that’s where I learned to ride, and as a low-income kid I made it to the Junior Olympics on a donated horse.
I take horsemanship seriously.
Christopher Reeve, Bo Derek, and a couple of other celebs make a big deal about their recreational equestrian activities. What they do is spend huge amounts of money on superior, finely trained horses. They hire grooms to take care of them, and trainers to keep the edge on the horses and correct what damage they do when they ride.
Then, what they do is take their mediocre skills and these supremely trained, magnificent horses, and they enter competitions. A lot of times they end up winning, because they’ve purchased the victory through the horses and the training the horses have received. They win in spite of their shitty skills.
The fact is that they have no business being out there, at all. They don’t have the skills, and they don’t know their own horses well enough to ride them in a competition.
I’ve literally probably fallen off of horses a thousand times. I used to practice it. More importantly, I learned how to stay on. I had the muscle development, and the habits (which run counter to instinct,) to allow me to maintain my seat. I could handle a refusal, and knew how to ride and knew my horse well enough not to get left behind.
My understanding of Chris’s accident (From talking to somebody who saw it,) is that he got left behind in the first element of an in and out (this means that the horse jumped before the rider was ready, and the rider got thrown backwards.) He then made the classic mistake of rebalancing himself by pulling on the horses reins, and lifting his legs up. Pulling on the horse’s mouth like that confuses it, and gives it the signal to slow down which would be contrary to what the horse would be expecting as it prepared to jump the second half of the element. When he raised up his legs to pull his balance forward this raised his center of gravity. The horse refused the second element (this means it stopped suddenly right before the jump.) This threw Christopher forward and he pitched over the horse headfirst.
IIRC correctly, this is pretty close to the version reported in People magazine after the accident, so I have no reason to doubt the analysis.
Christopher Reeve was the victim of his own stupidity. He attempted a potentially dangerous competition for which he was personally woefully unprepared and it bit him on the ass.
I’ve been the starter at several three day eventing shows in my youth, and this is not an uncommon scenario.
Just because you’re a celebrity or you have the money doesn’t make you qualified for the competition.
I certainly wouldn’t risk such an injury on anybody, and in spite of his stupidity he does have my sympathy. But, there’s also a lesson to be learned here.
