I've been to bull fights in Spain (when I was very young) and Mexico. Also cock fights in Mexico and Thailand, and water buffalo fighting in Thailand. Water buffalo fights are very different than bullfighting though: two buffalo bulls lock horns and push each other around to establish dominance until one tires out and runs away. Injuries / deaths to the "losing" buffalo are possible but pretty rare. Actually, it ends up being pretty similar to fights that males would do to establish dominance in nature without any human intervention.

Basically, I'm not strongly opposed to or in favor of any of those. Cruel and unnecessary? Sure. But nature itself is frequently pretty cruel also. I don't feel the need to support any of these activities by paying to watch or betting on outcomes, but I don't really begrudge those that do. Often a lot of cultural momentum to overcome if you want to put these things in the past (where they belong?).

Upvote because this video was well done in technical terms, and because it makes an argument against bullfighting (and arguably other similar practices) to those that support it without being too abrasive about it.

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To me a morally clarifying way to think about it is to ask, if all of the tradition were stripped away, would you still be okay with it.

Like, imagine a guy who likes to buy domestic pets and stab them to death over a few hours. He enjoys it, and cruelty exists in nature. But those arguments don't seem very convincing. Less cruelty is always better than more, and the joy of sadism isn't worth defending.

I think the hardest part of doing away with a tradition like this is having to realize that your parents and grandparents were kind of assholes. But we're all in that boat.

Can we please apply this logic to everything?
'We've been doing it that way for generations' is hardly an excuse for any inexcusable behavior or for ignoring the results of your behavior.

I don't believe just 'cause ideas are tenacious it means they're worthy

Amen.

Very good points.

My "cultural momentum" argument isn't so much an attempt to justify this stuff as a pragmatic take on who good counter arguments like yours (and the video itself) need to be directed at. "If all the tradition were stripped away" is easy for us "internet observers"; perhaps less so for the people that actually go to these events. But your approach is still a very good and persuasive one; much better than screaming PETA-like protests and confrontation that I think are more likely to just entrench the tendency to cling to tradition.


Your "having to realize that parents and grandparents were assholes" comment is apropos and truly is a very difficult thing to do. But I think the next step is ever harder -- realizing that our kids and grandkids will look back on things that we do and take for granted as normal behavior today, and come to the same conclusion about us that we have with regards to our parents and grandparents...

I think Milkman's angle on things is relevant in a different way.

We don't need to form our morality to coddle, consider or otherwise care in the least about cultural or other reasons for doing stuff. However, when it comes to affecting change in a groups behaviour, those cultural traditions are a factor, whether we agree with it or like it or not. Bull fighting is really pretty small in that picture. Women's rights in a country like Saudi Arabia is a much bigger deal.

When we want to help out those we believe are negatively affected by what we see as immoral, we can't ignore the weight of cultural momentum holding it in place. We can easily say women should have equality and that it is morally the right position. When it comes to lobbying for changes or protections for human rights in those places though, identifying how to be least disruptive to existing culture is helpful. No, it's not our job to adapt their culture for them. However, if we want to see the change, we might have put in some of that work anyway when those we see as behaving immorally show no interest in doing it.

Personally, I would root for the bull.

I do that watching rodeos.

The only people I feel sorry for are the clowns that get fucked up trying to save the testosterone junkie. They're like the S.A.R. teams searching for the idiot who hiked into the mountains with shorts, t-shirt, $500 sunglasses and a half bag of trail mix.

I asked my wife why she liked to watch rodeos on TV once. She told me she liked to see the riders get stomped on and kicked.