Spanish Bullfighting: Animal Abuse or Cultural Heritage?

Indeed Googlez. But it isn't about how the animals are treated before slaughter, because that would be associating a human feeling to the animal of "feeling reprieved". It's in the same vane of "well, I gave someone an hour in the gardens before execution when I could've executed him immediately, doesn't he feel privileged?"

The important part is the circumstance of death. The manner of death involved in our steak can be considered torture (think it's beheading or bleeding to death). The manner of death in bullfighting can also be considered torture (chasing an animal that was likely scared out of it's wits.) Compare and contrast.

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Originally Posted by earthforge

Overall, I think the practice is long out of date. It's about the spectacle of seeing someone take on an animal that is stupefied. It's like a combo of deer hunting and American football. I understand it's a part of Spanish culture, but it's pretty brutal when you realize that the animal is just scared and enraged until it's slaughtered. You can respect the animal and honor it as much as you want, but the practice is just that.

Contrast factory animals that do not have the same ritualized torture (though I won't deny that there are some practices used to make the meat taste good that involve the prolonged death of the animal but this is another subject - overall I claim that the meat industry is incomparable to cultural animal sacrifices.)

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If we can't compare the bullfighting subject to other animal welfare related subjects, there is not much to discuss in my opinion.
Because I do agree that it's out of date, and personally I wish it would be stopped. But on "my list" of what needs hell of a lot more attention regarding animal welfare, bullfighting is not a top priority! Factory farming animals on the other hand is. Factory farming animals not only suffer a stressful death just like the bull, but if the bull has lived a life on a grass paddock and a factory farming animal had a utterly horrible life and maybe been transported to the slaughterhouse crammed together in a truck with other animals for -too- many hours, which subject deserves our attention more?????


It's not that we should forget about bullfighting. Or can't deal with several issues at a time. But I just think that animals suffering when they are alive needs more attention than a bull suffering the last hour or so of it's life.

I disagree, this is also how animals are treated before slaughter. A lot of animals raised for food live in condition which can be compared in term of cruelty to the corrida. And it's not hours that we speak here but months. Not so much for beef, but quite common for chicken and porc industry. In comparison the several years (not 1 hour) that the corrida bulls live before the fight are paradise.
As for the farm animal death, in developed countries they are laws and regulations concerning the way animal are slaughtered and it shall be done the less painful as possible. Most of the time animals are KO before they are killed. Even religious slaughterings such as Casher and Halal meat allow it (I know since it was a recent debate in France).

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Originally Posted by k-dom

I disagree, this is also how animals are treated before slaughter. A lot of animals raised for food live in condition which can be compared in term of cruelty to the corrida. And it's not hours that we speak here but months. Not so much for beef, but quite common for chicken and porc industry. In comparison the several years (not 1 hour) that the corrida bulls live before the fight are paradise.
As for the farm animal death, in developed countries they are laws and regulations concerning the way animal are slaughtered and it shall be done the less painful as possible. Most of the time animals are KO before they are killed. Even religious slaughterings such as Casher and Halal meat allow it (I know since it was a recent debate in France).

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Please read my post again, because this was exactly what I said (wrote) ;)

And as for the animal death, yeah, I too live in a developed country, but nonetheless animals are sometimes not slaughtered properly (cases where pigs have been slaughtered just with a captive bolt, and nothing else, -and I do not appreciate halal as the animal is not unconscious when it get killed)

your message wasn't there when I started writing hence the repetition.

Totilas, that was my claim. I'm not preventing you from discussing anything. It's not like I have power over what you discuss here.

But still, isn't it attributing a human sense of mercy to say that suffering a lifetime versus suffering before death is different to an animal?

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Originally Posted by k-dom

your message wasn't there when I started writing hence the repetition.

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Sorry k-dom, I really thought you were replying to me, sorry~

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Originally Posted by earthforge

Totilas, that was my claim. I'm not preventing you from discussing anything. It's not like I have power over what you discuss here.

But still, isn't it attributing a human sense of mercy to say that suffering a lifetime versus suffering before death is different to an animal?

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Yeah, absolutely. But since it's a philosophical question, we might never be able to answer properly ("how does the animal feel about it") - it's only natural to want to help those who suffer "more" (factory farming animals suffer both mentally and physical, and for a longer time vs. the bull suffering physically for a shorter amount of time) and if this is counted in years, months, days, minutes and seconds, then there would be animals needing our help more than the bulls in bullfightning. It might be self righteous reasons, but who would I save right here and now, and needs my attention the most? The bull grassing peacefully on a grass paddock for the next couple of years or so or e.g. the millions of factory farming animals suffering right now.

Imo, it's not about saving or who deserves more attention, this is a discussion place, it's about saying if bullfighting is abusive or cruel. Imo, it's abusive and cruel. In what proportion and if it's more or less abusive than other situations, then it would be another discussion (not saying you guys shouldn't have those other discussions here >< I'm trying to say that one topic doesn't mean that the other isn't a bad situation, and we don't need to pick wich one is the worst, or imply we shouldn't comment about one when there are others worse).

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Originally Posted by Farfalla

Imo, it's not about saving or who deserves more attention, this is a discussion place, it's about saying if bullfighting is abusive or cruel. Imo, it's abusive and cruel. In what proportion and if it's more or less abusive than other situations, then it would be another discussion (not saying you guys shouldn't have those other discussions here >< I'm trying to say that one topic doesn't mean that the other isn't a bad situation, and we don't need to pick wich one is the worst, or imply we shouldn't comment about one when there are others worse).

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But, there wouldn't be much to discuss then would there?
Of course it's cruel and abuse, I think (I HOPE) that's obvious to most people.
The question in my oppinion should rather be if one is against the cultural heritage or not, and why.

Yeah, thing is, since it's abusive and cruel to most people, we should be against its cultural heritage, even if there are worst cases ._. Again, one thing doesn't negate the other. But... that's IMO xD

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Originally Posted by Farfalla

Yeah, thing is, since it's abusive and cruel to most people, we should be against its cultural heritage, even if there are worst cases ._. Again, one thing doesn't negate the other. But... that's IMO xD

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Yeah, we SHOULD be against the cultural heritage, BECAUSE it is abuse and cruel, and both of us wish it could be stopped. BUT, I will honestly say that I'm a complete hypocrite while I say that, because do I eat meat for instance? Yeah. So is it alright for me to judge the spanish people for making bullfighting continue? Probably not... See that's the thing, I don't think it can be simplified like that and therefore I do not see the problem with discussing animal welfare as a whole.
Is it okay to judge bullfighting if you are a meat lover yourself?
Is it okay to judge the spanish people when we maybe in other developed countries are supporting something that is much worse? (for intance factory farming)
It's just not that simple IMO........

Well it is up to you to select the meat you choose to eat. There are some quality label that ensure that animals are treated correctly.

its an animal abusing cultural heritage : ) but i cant begin to critisize them when we have sacrifice feast ourselves (im against it too but its a much bigger taboo,its religion -_-)
and poeple made a good point about the animals in food industry . they are not even treated as living things
when i think about all of these together , i start to hate humanity very deeply to the point that i hope ice age comes soon and wipes us out and then the world can replenish itself
we are dangerous :yelling

back on the topic tho, bullfighting just sounds worse because they are doing it as a sports activity ,not for survival or anything ,they are doing it just for the fun of it and since its also internationally famous , attracts more attention than others

I kinda agree with k-dom, I don't think 'death' itself is a cruel thing.
And LOL Gumi, you're mad XD

im not mad ,im just too objective and trying not to look at things from only humankind's perspective . we are killing the planet the same way cancer kills a metabolism