I am not going to link to it, because the images are, well. It involved a bull literally shoving its horn… do I need to finish that sentence? No, I suspect that I do not.
[pause]
Look, I’m fine with eating meat. And hunting. And even sports hunting, although if you really want to be impressive, go hunt your big game with a knife. But bullfighting? It’s just a bit… lopsided normally, isn’t it? I don’t want to say that the matador had it coming, because it was a horrible injury, but honesty requires me to admit that if I saw the bull trying to make a getaway afterward it might be a while before I reported in to the police.
Moe Lane
No. Bullfighting is decidedly not lopsided. That matador is not the first, nor will he be the last, to die. I bet you would ban the “Running Of The Bull” event too.
Well sure, but suppose the whole drawn out blood-sport is a bit much? Hunt for sport even, but by golly be quick about it. There is no slow torment foundational to Pamplona et al., save that of foolish youths, who honestly have it coming. May God have mercy on them, for Darwin shall not.
I wouldn’t ban either. But I reserve the right to disapprove of things.
It is lopsided, and that’s the point.
It’s a brutal passion play of the Spanish view of life, with the Matador in the role of fate, and the bull in the role of man.
The bull reliably dies bravely. Catharsis is achieved, the bravery of the bull is honored, and the poor get some vittles.
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And sometimes, albeit rarely, the bull wins.
That’s a load of horse shit. Man, as the highest order animal, incurs certain responsibilities in dealing with lower order animals, one of which is the avoidance of deliberate cruelty. Bullfighting is the deliberate infliction of cruelty on a lower order animal, an action which instantly neutralizes man’s claim to be a higher order animal. I hope the bull fighter suffers and dies HORRIBLY. And then I hope he burns in HELL, if there is one. Not because of what it does to a brute of an animal, without enough awareness to understand the depth of the depravity inflicted upon him, but because of what it does to the people who revel in it. Passion play my ass, bullfighting is some vile, vicious, depraved, COWARDLY shit. You wanna prove your cajones? Join the army and go fight ISIS or some shit. Fight another human with a mind and will and a viciousness to match your own.
I assure you, facing down an enraged bull is in nowise cowardly. I’ve been a cowboy for a number of years, and have done it more times than I can count. I know of a I speak. (I’ve also done my time in the infantry, and that’s really an entirety different ball of wax.)
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As to tormenting the animal, you can certainly argue that the piccadores do that, but the matador does not. One sword thrust, sure, and through the heart. That is his goal, and if he does not achieve it, the crowd will hold him in contempt.
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The practice is barbaric. (Shrug) I never implied that the Spanish are civilized.
But their culture is worth understanding. They do what they do for reasons that make sense to them, not because they’re somehow less than fully human.
Worse, I’m forced to acknowledge that much of our nation has become too civilized, too divorced from the bloody realities of life to even understand the implications of what they casually speak about. It seems to me that a bit of savagery is important for a culture to stay grounded. But of course, this invokes a difficult discussion of where and how to draw the line, as opposed to simply condemning others to Hell.