Letter: Pony Club players are eccentric, not sexually deviant

WE ARE writing to comment on your article "Hot to Trot at the Pony Club" (Review, 19 November). While, as people who know The Other Pony-Club, we feel that the facts have been fairly and accurately stated, we do feel that the subject could have been reported in a more sensitive manner. Melanie McFadyean is clearly keen to impose her own preconceptions on a subject of which she has little or no comprehension. Given her attitude, it is hardly surprising that she put the members of the club firmly on the defensive and had difficulty in drawing them out.

In presenting The Other Pony Club as a squalid hive of sexual deviance and insecurity, justice has not been done to what is essentially a lighthearted and harmless erotic pastime. In comparison, the piece that Rapido TV did for their Eurotrash programme managed to portray the atmosphere of playful eroticism that is characteristic of pony-carting fantasy at its best without losing sight of its highly eccentric nature. They also used a broader (eight people, including a piggy-girl and a zebra-girl) and more representative (males and females in both submissive and dominant roles) selection of club members, allowing the viewer better information on which to judge.

Lastly, the secrecy evident in the club's behaviour is hardly typical. To give just one example, we recently drove a three-seater four-in-hand from Whitehall to Gower Street in support of SM Pride.

Alexandria Lovitt and

Peter Birch

BB&L Pony-Girl Club

London WC1