Glastonbury Festival's Campo Pequeno: is it cruel to animals or a load of bull?

By glastopeep | Thursday, May 12, 2011, 21:01

Glastonbury Festival has found itself under fire from furious animal rights campaigners because of a new addition to this year’s festival: Campo Pequeno.

The Common and Campo Pequeno at Glastonbury Festival

As reported by Glastonbury People here earlier, Campo Pequeno (a copy of a Portuguese bullring) is a towering 26 metre bull-ring complete with a giant fire-breathing bull’s head! The bull-ring is being created using 70 old lock gates, each weighing two tonnes and measuring six feet high and 10 inches thick which were removed from the Kennet and Avon Canal and set on end to create the circle. The ring which will even have medieval doors cut into it for authenticity will seat 200, and during the Festival it will host a mock bull fight between a Portuguese bullfighter and an artificial bull.

Fight Against Animal Cruelty in Europe (FAACE), a UK based organisation that was set up in 1987 and fights to stop the torture and death of animals in the name of entertainment, as well as actively campaigning against bullfighting and blood fiestas has now launched a campaign to put an end to the bullring and mock bullfight at this year’s Glastonbury Festival after reading an article on our sister site “This is Somerset”. FAACE believes that whether intentional or not, featuring a bullring will only give credence to the barbaric activity as well as actually positively promoting it.

Tony Moore, chairman of FAACE, stated: “Glastonbury is about music and arts. It has nothing to do with animal cruelty.”

“The Glastonbury organisers’ timing is ridiculous. There is a strong opposition to bullfighting not only in this country but also in countries where bullfights still take place.”

“A ‘mock’ bullfight still advertises bullfighting and the festival goers won’t like that. Lots of them are veggies anyway and don't want anything to do with animal cruelty.”

In response to these assertions, Glastonbury Festival organiser Michael Eavis said “Some people have been in touch to ask about the new Campo Pequeno venue at Glastonbury Festival this year. We already have castles and pirate ships to entertain children and for some of our adults we've added a mock-up of a bullring as a venue for some avant-garde theatre-***-circus.

We don't condone any of the nasty connotations of castles, pirates and bullfighting. Our reputation of 41 years speaks volumes about respect and sanctity of all life on this planet”.

Of course, Glastonbury Festival sits on both sides of the (huge ringed) fence when it comes to animal welfare: on the one hand it gives campaign groups like the Vegan Society, Greenpeace and Veggies of Nottingham a chance to make their voice heard, while the food stalls booked offer things like ostrich meat, kangaroo meat and venison as well as plenty of vegan and vegetarian food options, while of course Worthy Farm itself, when not hosting Europe’s largest music festival is in fact a working dairy farm that produces thousands of litres of milk every single day.

What do you think of the arguments put forward by FAACE? And if you are attending the festival will you be checking out Campo Pequino, or do you think it should be pulled from the event? Let us know below.

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Comments

Duckes. How much respect did you previously have for FACCE ? More importantly how much did you contribute in time, effort and money to campaigning against animal abuse?
In short , I think that FACCE and the animal rights movement isn't going to miss you much!

By fillydean at 13:06 on 15/05/11
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Duckles . How much respect did you have previously for FAACE ? And more importantly , how much did you personally contribute in money , time and effort to fight animal abuse?
So is the animal rights movement going to lose much , by losing YOU???

By fillydean at 13:03 on 15/05/11
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Groups such as the League Against Cruel Sports have carried on actively campaigning against fox hunts even though they now follows scented socks so this is par for the course.

By GilesBradshaw at 23:47 on 13/05/11
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Reply to Duckles

FAACE feels strongly about animal cruelty both in the country and abroad and campaign tirelessly with their Spanish colleagues against bullfighting. Whilst it does still goes on, it has been banned in Catalonia and banned from prime-time national TV in Spain. Such bans would have been unthinkable a few years ago.

To say that the Glastonbury bullring is harmless rather misses the point. A bullring with a Portuguese matador giving demonstrations, is actively promoting the cruelty that is bullfighting. There is also a popular misconception that the bull is not killed in Portuguese bullfights. FAACE have investigated bullfights in Portugal. THeir pictures show horses being sliced open by the sharp spurs and bulls losing lots of blood because the weapons used on them are identical to those in a Spanish bullfight. The only difference is that the bull is killed outside, sometimes after hours or even days of suffering.

The bullring cannot be compared to harmless structure like a castle or pirate ships. Both of which hark back to a romanticised, bygone and largely fictional age (If anyone dresses as a pirate they dress as Robert Newton or Jack Sparrow, not the Somali pirates of today). But bullfighting is happening now. British tourists attend bullfights, thus bolstering the industry and Glastonbury's active promotion will arguably encourage further patronage.

I am sorry you think it is unimportant, which is your prerogative, but for animal lovers the world over bullfighting is a cruel anathema unworthy of such an important and inspiring event as Glastonbury.

By PRPhoto at 18:07 on 13/05/11
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The promotion of bullfighting is a despicable action, and this is what Mr. Eavis is doing. This is not just a mock bullring, but a mock bullfight will be staged in it with real professional bullfighters who live from torturing animals for entertainment. They make it a "mock" bullfight because otherwise it would be illegal in the UK. What they hope is to encourage people to go and see these atrocities when they go to places when still is legal, like the real Campo Pequeno in Lisbon. Following Mr. Eavis pirate analogy, would he allow to stage a mock kidnapping and rape with real Somali pirates?

By JayseeCosta at 11:39 on 13/05/11
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