When a man wants to murder a tiger he calls it sport; when the tiger wants to murder him he calls it ferocity.
~George Bernard Shaw
A story out of northern Spain reported today exemplifies this perfectly. Spectators in the stands at a bullfight had the tables turned
when the bull jumped the barrier and used his power against them. Let me preface my remarks: My heart and prayers go out to the injured, especially the 10-year-old boy who is in intensive care as a result. Having said that, I can't help but question the senselessness of this situation.
I remember silent tears sliding down my cheeks when I attended a
bullfight in Spain more than a decade ago. The injustice of a system entirely stacked against this mighty creature; the indignity of a death wished for and cheered by hundreds who paid to see it (
i.e., to bring it about) sickened me.
I was an unwilling, albeit ignorant, accomplice. While I knew there would be a man teasing a bull, I had no idea there were two other men assigned to weaken the bull's neck muscles by stabbing it repeatedly (if acrobatically). The punctures are "gentle" enough for the paying public to be satisfied with a drawn-out dramatic event, in which the best case scenario would include the unscathed matador delivering the final blow to the bull and being awarded the animal's ears as a trophy. Not all "fights" unfold that way, as we saw this May
when a matador was gored in the throat.
French musician
Francis Cabrel wrote a song from the bull's perspective called "
La Corrida." Two favorite verses from that song roughly translate as such:
Ils ont frappés fort dans mon coup [They struck my neck hard]
pour que je m'incline [so that I would bow]
Ils sortent d'oú, ces acrobates? [They're coming from where, these acrobats?]
Avec leurs costumes de papier? [With their costumes of paper?]
J'ai jamais appris a me battre [I never learned to fight]
contre des poupées [against dolls]
...
Je les entends rire comme je rale [I hear them laugh as I groan]
Je les vois danser comme je succombe [I see them dance as I die]
Je ne pensais pas qu'on puisse autant s'amuser [I never thought one could have so much fun]
Autour d'une tombe [around a tomb]
The saddest part of today's story is that the bull was killed for acting on the instincts it was bred to have and for venting its rage at the indignity of its existence.
Who's ferocious now?
***
From beasts we scorn as soulless,
In forest, field and den,
The cry goes up to witness
The soullessness of men.
~M. Frida Hartley
