I feel like that’d be a reasonable compromise. Bulls stuck around because bulls, as these things go, aren’t that dangerous. Let’s legislate it so that they have to go back to fighting lions or something, give them a solid 50/50 shot.
To quote my what my World Civ professor once told me;
“Tradition is either the dead belief of living people, or the living belief of dead people.”
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bullfighting is the last large scale remnant we have of the activities leading in a line from the Colosseum to contemporary society.
But it is horrific.
Don’t worry, we’ve got plenty more.
There are also less bloody forms of bull fighting. Recortes which is more of an acrobatic show where performers try do dodge the bulls in impressive ways or course libre where the goal is to catch a rosette tied between the horns of a bull. I don’t know if the bulls enjoy it, but barring accidents they aren’t hurt.
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It took me a bit to see that the idea is to get you to watch through to the end with the bull, as otherwise you might turn away.
Still, I’m not sure of the effect on people without an existing aversion, as it’s only the editing and audio keeping this from being “Bullfighting: The closest we have to fighting dinosaurs because fighting emus would look stupid. It’s awesome! Not as awesome as fighting dinosaurs, but until we can clone them this is as good as it gets (outside of cock fighting). Get your tickets now!”
Their torture probably isn’t that ‘short’…think bullfighting bulls live the high life up until that point? Unlikely. Think they don’t get pumped up on antibiotics, steroids, and who knows what else? Of course they do. They probably live nearly identical lives to other captive livestock, and then their lives are ended this way instead of at a slaughterhouse, as a final indignity.
I think from the position of the animals, all the ways we enslave and exploit them are pretty similar. Don’t like it? Fantastic: don’t contribute to it. There is zero need for any animal product for human health (I’m over 26yrs vegan), and it’s never been easier with all the great alternatives available now. The more people that change their own behaviours, the sooner this will all come to an end.
Uh, dude chill out on the ad hominem, I’ve been vegan for two decades. Animals that are raised for sport must be kept in conditions that permit them muscular development. Cage-raised animals are more or less disabled with respect to movement.
Militant arguments that reduce complex systems (like animal husbandry) to simplistic “it’s all the same” terms strike me much the same way religious fundamentalism (including atheist fundamentalism) strikes me. Diabetics are unlikely to thrive under vegan diets. Arctic dwellers are likely to contribute profoundly to CO2 (and other) emissions by eating vegan. Food choices are deeply dependent on economics, family history, culture, political ecology, health, life stage, and the like: there is no one true diet that compasses all that.
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Bullfighting enthusiasts seem to prefer the term “cultural patrimony”. I’m not sure if that’s a translation artifact; or related to the fact that people who enjoy torture killing animals in rigged contests don’t see their machismo problem as a problem.
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Hi Lexicat,
Err…what did I say that was ad hominem? Or is simply asking people to ‘do something’ considered a personal attack now?
I don’t believe you know very much about bullfighting - they don’t actually want ‘strong’ bulls, they may actually harm their abusers. A ‘cage raised’ sow (nearly all are) is still extremely strong and very capable of injuring someone severely. The spectacle with the bull isn’t very long (~20mins), and again, steroids and other ‘treatments’ will ensure they’re vigorous (not to mention days of literal torture to rile the bull up beforehand. Bulls are generally pretty docile. While you’re researching bullfighting, also look into the strap on their hindquarters to further antagonize them. It’s horrific on so many levels.) I’m pretty sure if you actually inform yourself on bullfighting practices, you’ll agree that it’s not what you currently believe.
Veganism and diabetes? Are you serious? There’s a whole series of documentaries and a movement of people going vegan and not just relieving symptoms, but completely reversing diabetes, able to stop taking insulin and related drugs: https://www.vegansociety.com/whats-new/news/type-2-diabetes-could-be-reversed-vegan-diet-say-leading-experts
Diabetics are indeed thriving on whole food vegan diets, unlike SAD diets which causes diabetes and leads to these drug dependencies. This (Type 2) is a completely preventable and unnecessary disease, and Type 1 can experience a lot of relief as well. I don’t think anyone’s ever uttered the phrase ‘the increase in diabetes is due to vegans eating whole food diets’. It’s the opposite.
Presumably non-Arctic dwellers would go vegan first, which itself has a pretty significant positive effect on climate change, and the small number of Arctic-dwellers, if they hopefully switch, will help compensate for the extra transport. Not to mention that currently, there are already plenty of fruit and veggies sent north, and sadly meat and junk food are often their top choices (not as many as you think eat seal, that’s for the dogs chained on the ice). So not only are they eating climate-harmful meat, they’re shipping it anyway - please explain why sending veggies is worse? (And yes, I know this for a fact, my ex’s sister has lived on Baffin Island for the last decade.)
Didn’t claim veganism is a cure-all, but it surely helps a lot. In the case of bullfighting, if the majority of people were vegan, it sure as hell wouldn’t be tolerated. And this carries over to most animal exploitation. Sometimes ‘simplistic’ is effective too.
I’ll do an analogy too: sometimes I’ll meet a ‘vegan’ who’s much like your typical ‘deeply religious’ person – who are actually deeply ignorant about their religion, couldn’t quote a single line from their holy book, yet claim a level of authority on the matter. I appreciate when people inform themselves on issues before commenting. It’s not like it’s hard to look things up in 2017.
At the risk of suggesting the creation of yet another weapon for Skynet to eventually torture humans with, are we not yet at the point where we can replace the bull for a custom designed BigDog? We could program it with the intent to kill or maim and be as unpredictable as the real thing.
Then we could end up with real sport fueled by competition between the matadors and the engineers.
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