1st November, 2008 Mental abuse?

I have been thinking about horsemanship systems which use the same equipment, for example a rope or a stick in parallel, to de-sensitize and to sensitize. For example, using a long rope to whizz over the horse's head and body whilst requiring the horse to stand stock still and get used to it and then using the very same rope to flick the horse very hard if it doesn't move off as quickly as the handler would like. It's not a good analogy but imagine a small child sitting in the kitchen - sometimes mother gets out a plate to put a delicious meal on it and every so often she breaks the plate over the child's head. Isn't the child likely to become very wary of plates whenever they appear but at the same time be too frightened to move? I'll try and think of a better analogy.