Spain's Catalonia bans bullfighting

Lawmakers in Catalonia outlawed bullfighting today, becoming Spain's first mainland region to ban the sport after a heated debate pitting animal rights against the preservation a pillar of traditional culture.

Cheers broke out in the local 135-seat legislature after the speaker announced the ban had passed 68-to-55 with nine abstentions. The ban in the northeastern coastal region including Barcelona will take effect in 2012.

The practical effect of the ban will be limited: Catalonia has only one functioning bullring, in Barcelona, while another disused one is being turned into a shopping mall. The Barcelona ring stages 15 fights a year, which are rarely sold out, out of a nationwide total of roughly 1,000 bouts per season.

Still, bullfighting buffs and Spanish conservatives have taken the drama very seriously, seeing a stinging anti-Spanish rebuke in the grassroots, anti-bullfighting drive that started last year.

"There are some traditions that can't remain frozen in time as society changes. We don't have to ban everything, but the most degrading things should be banned," said Jose Rull, member of parliament for the Catalonian nationalist party, or CiU, during the debate.

(Via MSNBC)

Comments

krobinson said…
I think they should have done this before, but anyway I am relieved by hearing this; finally people are considering to ban this inhuman sport.
Bullfighting in Spain
March 16, 2011 at 7:53 AM
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