I’m serious.  After all, he has an ability to get right up people’s noses and more importantly, evoke a response (if that is what responses do).

His latest outburst in the Sunday Star Times attacks the horse racing industry, primary for the cruelty of whipping.

(As a digression, there are some poor sods who would pay for the aforementioned cruelty but this is outside the scope of this blog although I understand you can find out more about this particular topic by searching the interweb if you must!)

In Whip It Good, Boock makes a number of bald statements:

Take the racing industry’s defence of the practice of whipping horses. That people are still prepared to support the abuse in the name of entertainment says a lot about the strength of the propaganda campaign so far.

…

Under the present conditions, horse racing is no more a sport than bear-baiting or dog-fighting.

…

As it stands today, horse racing is a miserable, horribly exploitative pastime, designed to appeal to those with a prehistoric mentality and a cavalier disregard for animal rights. Whether it’s the racing of grossly immature two-year-olds, the cruelty of the steeplechase, or the fact that only a small percentage of those bred are fast enough to escape the knacker’s yard, it’s hard to even think about it without an accompanying sense of shame.

As I mentioned, there was a response over at Race Cafe (although ironically the thread’s title gives all the credit/blame to the Herald!).

Boock makes a number of wide ranging statements.

Yes, over use of the whip does need to be regulated.  That is currently the case although as noted on Race Cafe perhaps not as well as it could be.

There is undoubtedly some over use but again that can be improved.

Thus far I’m sounding like one of this justifying the “cruelty”.

Let’s assume that Boock is not a vegetarian – which is not unreasonable.  How does he then manage to rationalise the “cruelty” of whipping with the treatment of animals to provide his evening meal?

The steeplechase cruelty is another area where he has clearly let emotion get the better of his normally rational thoughts.

What you find more often and not is that horses after they have parted company with their riders in jumping races continue to run the race.

An understanding of the competitive nature of most race horses would have helped understand this.

Likewise, the cruelty inherent in our contact sports must be addressed if we are to be consistent.

I would hope that racing will do more to moderate the use of the whip.  Fair comment.

The rest is simply flogging a dead horse.

And good on him too.

Too much of the New Zealand sporting public acts like they’re been at the bottom of too many rucks or gone too many rounds with Mike Tyson.  Without head protection.  And without ear muffs.

Over recent weeks, there’s been a couple of issues that are inter-related.

First, the acknowledgement of property rights for “the” haka (Te Rauparaha’s Ka Mate haka).

Second, the possibility that South Africa may not allow the NZ Maori team to tour.

The property rights for the haka is so obvious – particularly given the way in which the NZRFU protects its own rights. As Boock has pointed out, try selling a black t shirt with a silver fern on it and see how long before the NZRFU sends in its legal bovver boys.

A few years back, I seem to recall the AB’s using the Rolling Stones “Paint It Black” as the basis for an advertising campaign. Rights were negotiated with the Stones (from memory it involved beer, tickets and signed jerseys). Point is – you have property rights, you protect them.

That does NOT mean you stop everyone from signing Paint It Black – you simply protect its exploitation. Same with the haka.

The second issue is interesting because those who’ve spent too much time at the bottom of the ruck will say that the NZ Maori team is discriminatory. So is the NZ Women’s team, the NZ University team, and the NZ Under 19’s. Each has different criteria for representation.

As noted by a former race relations conciliator, the NZ Maori team is NOT the NZ team. The team does not claim to be representative of ALL NZ, just Maori. I’d also argue that the Maori would argue it’s normally not representative of all Maori either as the AB selectors (plus the pillaging Northern Clubs) take care of that.

Sadly, as Boock points out, these episodes have brought out the worst of the NZ sporting mindset (if that isn’t an oxymoron).

Funny thing is, if the Maori were to play the Boks next weekend, the same meatheads would be pissed in the cheap seats supporting the Maori.

I blogged about the awards last week and even if i say so myself, I managed to pick 5 from 5 – or at least, picked the five award winners as seen by the judges.

To be francis, it was difficult given the clear bias of the judges.

Brendon Telfer on Radio Sport is normally worth avoiding on these issues.  Actually, he’s worth avoiding on most issues.  He’s opinionated and biased and he doesn’t even blog!!!

However, he called the awards a “delightful irrelevance” and there’s a lot to like about this phrase.

Telfer also made it quite clear that in his opinion if you win gold in an Olympic year you win the Halberg.  Lovely logic there although it didn’t actually do Tom Ashby any good did it!

Richard Boock – who isn’t a stranger to a bit of controversy himself, went straight for the jugular at the weekend in his Sunday Star Times column.

He made any number of points but perhaps at the heart of the matter is the fact that the makeup of the judges leads itself to the types of results we get.

Picking up on the view that rather than the awards being an objective exercise in comparing achievements, the judges have a pre-determined ranking of sporting endeavours, Boock writes:

Where has this superiority complex come from? It was hard to not agree with New Zealand Herald sportswriter Steve Deane last week, when he suggested the results were dictated by a judging panel seriously skewed in terms of its ethnic and socio-economic status. To these folk, league and motorsport clearly took a backseat to Olympic endeavour. That 1500m runner Nick Willis was shortlisted for the finals despite not even winning at Beijing only demonstrated the depth of their myopia.

It’s a great point that Willis gets third but makes the final of the Male Sportsman award while other world champions (eg bowling) don’t even make the finals.

While I was all for the Kiwis winning team of the Year, I’d happily admit it wasn’t a stellar year for the Kiwis.  They got flogged in the opening round of the RLWC and their achievement was in effect a one off (mind you, that’s the very nature of finals).

Strangely, that’s exactly the same criticism that could be levelled at the Golden Girls – they were crap leading up to the Olympics and the reality is that it was one great row that gained them their Second Gold.

If anything, the controversy over the awards shows the futility of trying to be objective.  At the same time, based on what we have seen, we may as well cancel other sports in an Olympic year at least as far as the judges are concerned.