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Bullfighting is a form of art which ought to perdure

Con states he believes I cannot be right by any definition of the word "ought" as bullfighting is exploitative, cruel and brings harm unto others. I recognize I will be asking our readers, as well as my opponent, to make a judgment contra cultura, against their culture's common perceptions. My argument will hinge upon convincing you of two things: first, that tauromachy is an ethical form of expression and second, that it is not a bloodsport but rather a form of art that transmits something valuable. In this first round I will merely outline the argument, in hopes we can go into further detail as the debate goes on. I will also leave sourcing to the later arguments as here I will only give a general case. Bullfighting as an ethically sound activity The statement that we "ought not to do harm unto others for personal pleasure" both confuses the respect due a human with that due an animal and reduces art to pleasure, when it is a valuable tool for the transmission of cultural values and complex philosophical concepts. One of these is precisely that although animals deserve respect they are not humans, and therefore to respect them is to treat them according to their nature, and not our own. I noted, when looking through my opponent's previous debates, that he is a defender of vegansm. I am glad to say that this is not a concept extraneous even to his own tradition, as vegans also engage in some degree of phylogenetic discrimination every time they eat a fruit salad. All life does not require from us the same treatment, vegetable life does not have the same capacities as insects who do not have the same capacity as reptiles who do not have the same capacity as mammals etc. Even amongst mammals there are different degrees of intelligence, and different modes of interaction are required. One must not, for instance, treat a wild animal as one treats a domesticated one, or ignore their physical capacities and natural instincts in making a value judgment as to their treatment. In the case of tauromachy, the specific animal used is not a common bull. The toro de lidia (fighting bull) does not follow the same evolution as the common bull, but rather descends directly from wild aurochs and lives in a state of only semi domestication. They are domesticated in the sense that they live in private dehesas (vast areas of grassland in Spain) and are bred by livestock farmers, but in every other way they live wild. Bullfighting exists because of their temperament and territorial nature, and is structured around the bull's bravía (roughly, aggressive courage). Con then must show not that it is generally undesirable to harm animals, but that it is specifically unethical to fight the toro de lidia. Although I do not have space to extend myself here, I will also note that there is a difference between being an ecologist and being an animalist, and that these tendencies are often opposed to each other. Animalists often conflate humans and animals and regard each individual animal as an object of protection, whereas ecologists consider that our duty of stewardship is towards groups and not individuals. The elimination of bullfights would be destructive to the biodiversity of those areas in which it is practiced. Not only would the toro bravo disappear as a species uniquely linked with bullfighting, but as tauromachy is a millennial (or, in places such a Mexico or South America, secular) activity around which much wildlife has evolved to live in the habitat of the dehesas, which would disappear along with the activity. Bullfighting as an art There are those who try to portray tauromachy as a mere bloodsport, which exists for the viewers to derive pleasure from the bull's pain and death. This is fine as a slogan or political tactic, but anyone with a love of truth, howevermuch they oppose bullfighting, must oppose that tactic. To reject something one must understand it, and one cannot understand bullfighting if one does not see its artistic dimension. In the course of its history bullfighting has attracted a great number of artists, not as bloodsport but as an art. From Goya to Mario Vargas Llosa or Gabriel García Marquez passing through Dalí, Picasso, Miró, Valle Inclán and Federico García Lorca, the greatest defender of bullfighting as an art form. Even foreign artists such as Ernest Hemingway and Orson Welles were captured by the aesthetics and the transmission of values of tauromachy. Welles so loved bullfighting, and had such an intense friendship with the torero Antonio Ordoñez, that he asked his ashes to be placed in his friend's estate in Ronda. This list is not an improper appeal to authority, but rather a challenge. If these people, poets with souls as sensitive as García Lorca or Picasso (who would often say "el toro soy yo", I am the bull) could see the value and beauty of bullfighting, we must at least attempt to see what it is that tauromachy truly represents in the broader culture before condemning it. 1. Man's relationship to nature: respect and dominion The first time I went to a bullfight I went believing the propagandized view of it as a gladiatory bloodsport. I had assumed the people would cheer every wound inflicted, and would especially cheer the bull's death. Nothing could be further from the truth. From the beginning, the comments of those around me were centered upon the bull, and the torero's capacity to understand him. The incessant comments about the bull's personality, tendencies, physical characteristics and family line were all tinged with a note of respect I had never expected to find. The moment of the bull's death in particular was met with a complete silence, and when I later asked why I was told by an old man with a cigar in his hand: "Hay un torero que va a arriesgar su vida por el arte, y un toro que ha luchado con nobleza. Si no se respeta eso no se respeta nada" [There is a torero who will risk his life for art, and a bull who has fought nobly. If one doesn't respect that one doesn't respect anything"]. The worldview bullfighting advances, then, is one in which man is certainly above nature. It is the bullfighter who marks the different steps of their dance, and it is generally the case that the bull dies at his hands. He knows himself, however, to be nature's custodian and not its master. One must respect the bull as an opponent, and in facing him, the bullfighter must risk his own life. This parallels what man's behavior towards nature must be generally. Yes, we must exercise dominion over it, as we till the land, build our houses from wood and stone and mine the earth. We must never be fooled into believing ourselves the master of it, however, and always treat it with the respect it deserves. 2. Facing death «temple» [/tem-pleh/] The bull, as a symbol of nature, is also a symbol of death. Tauromachy has its roots in pagan times, but it comes to us through Catholic Spain, and we cannot expect that to have happened without affecting its meaning. We must always face the possibility of death, and yet the message of the bullfight is twofold: first, that a man must face death with what we call temple, or calm assertiveness in the face of danger, and that death is, while formidable, defeated in the end by putting oneself in the position of suffering it. It is in the final stage of the fight, when the torero reveals his chest and heart to the bull's horns, when the bull is finally defeated. 3. Victory of civilization over barbarism Bullfighting shows the intelligence of a patently weaker being defeat the brute force of a stronger one. It is, in that sense, the triumph of civilization. A man facing an animal who weighs over 1,000 pounds must use his faculties and inventiveness to the utmost in order to avoid death. This runs parallel to the triumph of Civilization against barbarism. At first glance civilized values such as cooperation, respect for the weak, the rule of law run contrary and are inferior in a pinch to the simple law of the jungle, by which it is the strongest who succeed. By the bull's defeat at the hands of the torero, what is shown is that civilization has a quiet power which, although challenged seriously by barbarism, finally triumphs. Conclusion: In an aesthetic display of shapes, movement, color and music; bullfighting represents the transmission of cultural values which enrich those who understand it. In this introduction I have shown some of these values, along with a prima facie justification from an ethical point of view. Sadly, most arguments against bullfighting ignore its cultural dimension and are based more on sensibility than reason. I am sure that will not be the case in this debate.