The Ebro Lands are a land of crossroads, a land of migration and transhumance, located on the final stretch of the Ebro River, the second longest river on the Iberian Peninsula. A river that unites a large group of autonomous communities and their people.
In Les Terres de l'Ebre, bullfighting is deeply rooted, as two identities coexist here: the Ebrenca and the Catalan. It is an ancestral festival, steeped in humanistic values based on close combat with the beast, and is, in fact, an inclusive festival that unites and strengthens societies.
It is the main economic activity of a sector, the bravo sector, of extensive cattle breeding, which contributes to the biodiversity of the ecosystem in addition to creating wealth and establishing population in rural and depopulated areas, as advocated by neighboring France in the Camargue and Landes regions.
At the antipodes of bullfighting is the animal rights movement, shouting loudly that torture is not culture and pursuing a vital project that is to end animal suffering in the world, more or less like when a Miss Universe was asked in the 1990s what her wish was and she said: to end world hunger.
But what happens when some of the movement's followers, encouraged by the government and the media, begin to denounce fishing rods as "weapons of mass destruction" or to enter rabbit and cow farms to save them?
It happens that you realize why these people have no parliamentary representation in Europe. You realize that their logic may not be so logical, or perhaps it's too logical in a world of gray.
We understand that, although there are coherent people within the animal rights movement, truly lovely people with immense hearts and a desire to do good, a movement of hatred toward people in which a minority wants to destroy the rights and freedoms of other minorities cannot have a voice or make decisions, especially when it affects the economic interests of families.
The day after the Vidreres accident, there was another equally unfortunate accident, or even much worse depending on who you ask. Animal rights activists have said that this one is much worse since those who were in the Vidreres bullring were bullfighting fans who were there of their own free will, and that it's enough for them to go see such an atrocity.
The accident in question involved a pig truck on the highway, wondering if it was supposed to be taken to the animal-friendly city of Olot to die in the slaughterhouse. The fact is that the pigs were held there against their will, and who knows, maybe the animal rights activists are right about this one being worse than the other.
I don't think anyone would even consider banning pig farms. These intensive breeding farms number in the thousands in Catalonia and, if not managed properly, contaminate our land's aquifers.
We bullfighting fans have been putting up with 30 years of nonsense in Catalonia regarding our festival because of the flags, because fans are just that, fans, as any good football fan understands. What we cannot tolerate as a society is a direct attack on our freedoms.
Why do you think the Catalan spelling corrector gives me an error when I write "natros"? Here in Les Terres de l'Ebre, we're as Catalan as we are Americans. How many times have we heard at home all that talk about how we have more in common with Aragon and Teruel than with the rest of Catalonia, that we're the fifth province, that from the Balaguer Pass up, it's a different country? That's why we Americans have the right and the duty to defend both identities equally.
Perhaps by attacking the festival as you do, you're unwittingly pushing us to consider holding a referendum to see which side of the former Crown we want to be on: whether we want to be part of Aragon or Catalonia. Whether we want to be Aragon's only outlet to the sea or the last remaining part of the Catalan coast, as we have been until now.
Paco Palmer Margalef
Association of Brau Breeders of the Terres de l'Ebre
