Horror at a Spanish festival where live animals are set on fire: Protesters clash with the police in a bid to stop cruel tradition [Video]

by Terresa Monroe-Hamilton | November 17, 2014 11:18 am

I’m with the protesters on this one… this is barbaric and cruel in the extreme. It doesn’t matter whether you are a vegetarian or a carnivore… a hunter or an animal advocate, this treatment of the bull is horrific and stupid. All this to show how big a man you are? Setting a bull’s horns on fire, running him until fear and exhaustion overtake him and then dragging him out of the ring and butchering him… not exactly what I would call humane. This is a pointless rite of machismo, I don’t care if it has been going on for centuries. It’s one thing to kill an animal humanely as food, it’s another to torture that animal for fun[1].


Entertainment: This is not some apocalyptic vision of medieval folklore, but the Spanish festival
where live bulls are set on fire and sent to charge about a village’s streets for entertainment.

From the Daily Mail[2]:

The Joy of the Bull – or Toro Jubilo festival – is one of the ‘cultural’ highlights of the entertainment calendar for residents in the Medieval village of Medinaceli, in the province of Soria, north east of Madrid.

Every year, from around four centuries, people flock to watch a young bull be dragged into a makeshift ring before its body is covered with mud to protect it from burns.

Then it is pinned to the floor, while men strap wooden stakes doused in flammable chemicals to its horns, and set it on fire. Then local men show their bravery by tormenting the animal.

More than 1,500 people crowded behind barriers and strained for a view of the cruel spectacle.

A bullring is constructed in the main square and sand scattered on the floor before several bonfires are built in preparation for the arrival of the bull.

After nightfall, the fires were lit using paraffin and the three-year-old bull was dragged in on a rope held by many men dressed in grey uniforms.

It is tied to a post by its horns and a plank of wood attached to a metal bar doused in pitch – a highly combustible mixture of turpentine and sulphur.

Fiercely hot sparks and embers drip from the burning torches onto the bewildered animal.

The distressed bull is then released, thrashing around the ring to the cheers of the crowds.

Members of the public are seen jumping into the ring and taunting the bull – adding to its terror and confusion.

Gasping for air, the bull finally reaches a state of exhaustion after nearly 45 minutes of torment and is soon dragged out the ring by villagers to be butchered.

The men in the grey uniforms are awarded pieces of meat from the animal for their ‘bravery’.

Authorities in the Spanish regions of Leon and Castile have designated the festival a special cultural status.

There’s a fine line between the barbaric practice of Toro de Jubilo and what was felt by crowds as Christians were fed to the lions in the Colosseum. It is violent voyeurism and shows a depth of hunger for cruelty and depravity that is sobering and disturbing. This is not a passage of manhood, but a perceived warrior initiation that proves nothing. Nothing except getting your kicks through torture and slaughter, with a side of fear and blood.

Endnotes:
  1. it’s another to torture that animal for fun: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2837537/Horror-live-animals-set-fire-Spanish-festival-Protesters-clash-police-bid-stop-cruel-tradition.html#ixzz3JKvyeOvV
  2. Daily Mail: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2837537/Horror-live-animals-set-fire-Spanish-festival-Protesters-clash-police-bid-stop-cruel-tradition.html#ixzz3JKvyeOvV

Source URL: https://rightwingnews.com/culture/horror-at-a-spanish-festival-where-live-animals-are-set-on-fire-protesters-clash-with-the-police-in-a-bid-to-stop-cruel-tradition-video/