An estimated 13,500 bulls are said to perish each year in bullfights all across Spain. Bullfights are an inherent part of Spanish culture and is considered to be in danger from modernisation of urban thought and the acts of various International Animal Rights organisations which have been trying unsuccessfully to bring about the demise of this cultural bloodsport.
Recently the local parliament of Catalonia (which boasts supplying half the football team and the complete style of gameplay that won the World Cup '10) has voted in favour of banning bullfighting within its territories from 2012 becoming the only county in Spain to have done so. This was officially in furtherance of an international petition signed by 140,000 people calling for a ban on the 'sport'. However, many local political analysts believe that the same petition was ratified as a reaction to a Spanish constitutional court turning down Catalonia's 2006 autonomy charter earlier this month declaring that Catalonia was not a sovereign nation. A detailed report is available here.
While most of Spain regards such aforesaid ban as an attack on Spanish culture, animal welfare activists from around the world have lauded Catalonia for the same.
In what is good news for Spanish bulls, it is also to be understood that there have been generations of Spanish families and bullfighters who have studied, trained and practised bullfighting for centuries and have innovated and mastered techniques vide such long and continuous practice. Further if being a non-vegetarian is not considered cruel (and it isn't, the goddamn food chain exists for a reason...besides we were meant to eat meat...just ask any dentist) then how can bullfights be construed so. Especially when it gives the bull a fighting chance, no matter what the odds. Besides humans are an inherently violent species, where the law is designed to minimise the occurrence of violence with respect to other humans. It must also be kept in mind that the law does not equate any other species to humanity. Even the most endangered ones maybe destroyed to preserve human life. In such aforesaid context of global intellectual hypocrisy, can a tradition where violence is directed at non-human living creatures (which are not in danger of extinction) and one that has existed and evolved over centuries, so much so that it forms an integral part of local identity, truly be considered worth banning or doing away with entirely?
2 comments:
There is obviously a lot of debate over this but it is through this process of tooing and froing that change occurs and I am confident that bullfighting will be banned within the next 20 years.
Should it be banned? I am going to stick my neck out and say yes. I am afraid that 13,500 bulls dying a year (compared to maybe single/double digit bullfighters dying) means that the odds are clearly asymmetric and the bulls hardly have a fighting chance. If this is agreed, the sport amounts to nothing more than the killing of an animal for entertainment. This is not much different from hunting, which too was an ingrained tradition in many western societies.
I am not especially fanatical about animal rights but I believe the the killing of animals should be either for food or in self defense (i.e. the only reason for which animals other than man kill). If we shift way from this principle we are on a slippery slope and risk a situation where even poaching can be justified.
thank you for the comment rahul-da. the difference between killing for food/self defense as opposed to entertainment, had not occurred to me. sorry me being ektu tubelight there.
you're right. and it IS this process of to-ing and fro-ing that brings forth change.
ps: on the brighter side the world has one more reason to cheer on the Catalonians!!
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