A horse is a horse....just a friggin' horse

It’s just a horse. How a farm animal turned novelty act merits a special reporter dispatched to its side in light of said farm animal’s illness is a ridiculous yet necessary question. Honestly, this isn’t Watergate, it isn’t the President or Martin Luther King being shot by an assassin, and it isn't a nuclear missile crisis. To bring it back to the world of sports, it’s not even on par with an athlete being arrested, indicted or being involved in a serious motorcycle crash. No, it’s a friggin’ horse, a four-legged animal who can't talk or write, has no opposable thumbs and would be just as at home pulling a plow as he would on the race track.

So what if Barbaro dies? Is it any more pertinent than the thousands of animals who do the same on a daily basis? The animal rights nuts can choke on it here, because in no way is a horse’s medical condition or impending demise relevant or at all important in the grand scheme of things. The horse’s living or dying makes no difference in the world, no one will be cured of a disease, no relationships will be fixed, murders averted, wars prevented or global warming stopped either way.

Sports occupy a certain niche in our society, and as important as they can seem at times, every so often we get reminded that in reality, they aren’t what really matters. Well, within that knowledge and the realm of relevancy that sports have, the health of a racehorse, albeit a successful one, matters so much less. It’s a waste of time and energy for a sports show, any sports show, to devote an entire segment to interviewing a reporter stationed at Barbaro’s side. Equally ludicrous is televising a new conference where the veterinarian caring for the horse updates his condition.

No one outside of gambling degenerates really pays attention to horse racing, and the sports world and those controlling coverage of it need to understand how idiotic they look fawning over a freaking horse. There are some laughable items on sports TV - poker, darts, spelling bees - but medical coverage for a horse trumps them all.