The PACMA animal rights group (Partido Animalista contra el Maltrato Animal) has asked the European Union to “pressure” the Government of Spain to “put an end” to bullfighting, an activity against which “there is a majority rejection” and which is a national “shame”.
This was highlighted in the demonstration that the group held this Saturday afternoon in Madrid under the motto ‘Abolition Mission’. The march started around 6:00 p.m. from Plaza de Las Ventas to chants such as “bullfighting, national shame.”
The president of Pacma, Javier Luna, has indicated in statements that the “main” objective of the campaign is the abolition of all bullfighting celebrations in Spain, from bullfights to popular events such as the ‘bous’, among others.
“Spanish society condemns them (…). There is a majority rejection of bullfighting”, he has claimed, to insist that this activity “is neither art nor culture”.
Thus, he has called on the European Union to “pressure the Spanish Government to put an end” to these celebrations, so that Spain follows the example of other countries where these practices are being eliminated, and has opted to convert bullrings into “cultural spaces”.
On the other hand, the Portuguese deputy and spokesperson for the People, Animals and Nature party, Inés Sousa Rial, has described the abolition of bullfighting as a matter of “justice.” “It is time in the 21st century to put an end to this type of barbarity and torture that is neither culture nor spectacle,” she said.
“We must raise our humanitarian values and have compassion for animals,” she continued, to also point out the “emotional and psychological damage” that bullfighting events entail for children as they are “violent” activities.
Sousa has thus supported the idea of converting bullrings into buildings that host other types of activities and has pointed out the need to support workers in the sector so that they depend on other activities. “For example, we can bet on nature tourism: seeing the bull in the open field, without suffering, with all its beauty and natural splendour,” she highlighted.
For their part, the attendees, who have mostly carried posters, handkerchiefs and green flags with the motto of the demonstration, have demanded that the institutions not subsidise this “cruelty” and allocate the funds to animal shelters.
