Foot Bull
© iStockPhoto.com / zentilia
In case you haven’t heard (and if you haven’t, where have you been?), Spain is the new proud winner of the World Cup. Everyone at PETA UK has been going football crazy this season, but there is one sport still carried out in Spain that really drives us mad!
I’m talking about bullfighting – not that it can in any way actually be called a “sport” or even a “fight”, for that matter. From the moment a bull is selected to enter the bullfighting arena, his fate is sealed – he will die in a horrific display in which men goad and torment him until he is too weak to stand and then stab him to death. The bull doesn’t stand a chance.
Even before they put one hoof into the arena, the bulls’ torment begins. In order to tip the balance even further in favour of the matador (Spanish for “killer”), the bulls are intentionally debilitated by various means, including being drugged, maimed or beaten with heavy sacks. This is done to weaken and confuse the animals so that when the “fight” comes, they will be unable to defend themselves. The terrified bulls are stabbed repeatedly until they are so weak from blood loss that they collapse. The matadors sometimes cut the animals’ ears or tails off while they’re still conscious.
If the bulls survive the ordeal, they are killed afterwards, and if they lose the fight, they are killed too. What sort of “sport” gives you a 100 per cent fail rate?
Each year, more than 40,000 bulls are killed in Spain’s bullfighting industry, but now that Spain has proved itself to be the world leader in football, there is no excuse for the horrors of the bullfighting ring to continue.
Come on, Spain – stick with football and show the world you can be a progressive and civilised country.
I defenetely agree! How do we stop it?
Why is such barbarity allowed to continue just for the sake of ‘tradition’?!
What sort of “sport” gives you a 100% fail rate? Just ask the Clemson Tigers, who (as of 01/19/2011) are a perfect 0-55 against the North Carolina male Tar Heels in basketball games played in Chapel Hill dating back to 1926 (with only about zero close calls, if that)!