“If we enjoy killing bulls, we enjoy killing human beings too”

It was said that bullfighting would be banned in Colombia, and that Gustavo Petro would lead the cattle unions to victory in their decades-long war.

He celebrated it with a speech in the Plaza de la Santamaría The Spaniards invadedI declare that Colombian bullfighters are the elite the heirs of the slaves who occupied these lands and whoAnyone who enjoys any work will also enjoy the death of people. Don’t forget to clarify your view that dog and bull breeds are human inventions.

Everything that revolved around the act of the President to approve the call “No More Hail” Lawsbears Petro’s unmistakable stamp. It started because he arrived three hours late, a punctuality that is already an indelible hallmark of his management.

Without going any further, on July 20, Independence Day, he appeared two hours late at the annual military parade, which only begins when the head of state presides. He heard chants and shouts of “Out with Petro!” by civilians who had been in the streets for hours. And to the surprise of the military leadership, he left before it was over.

The anti-bullfighting public, however, received him patiently, without rebuke, and shouted shouts of delight at many aspects of his irregular speech.

Standard bearer for animal welfare since he was mayor of Bogotá Between 2012 and 2016, he repeated one of his favorite principles: “If we enjoy killing animals, we will enjoy killing human beings, who are also animals”, a phrase that excited the people who gathered in Santamaría, one of the crossroads of the most beautiful and traditional American bulls.

Already during his mayoralty, he transformed it into the capital’s first ice rink, among other activities. He decided not to comply with the Constitutional Court’s ruling Defended bullfighting because it was a cultural tradition,

Remembering that verdict, Petro took the opportunity to criticize that magistrate and launch his own ideas, another tradition he has incorporated in his frequent interventions.

He rejected the argument of bullfighters that without the Festival the fighting bulls would become extinct, because he discovered that “race is only a human condition, it is not one of nature. Animals are not sexually separated by race. We could extend this to human beings and we would find ourselves facing Hitler. That is why I started to get excited about the thesis that race is not in dogs, nor in bulls, nor in the animals that are closest to us, they imposed it on nature and animals, there only bad ideas have arisen.”

Racism and classism persistto throw one of his more famous darts at the Spanish. “That’s why they killed the natives, that’s why Upon arriving here the Spaniards caused genocide among the civilizationsMany of them are more humane, more intelligent than the conquerors.”

He justified his support for the law, saying it took 30 years to obtain approval in legislative houses, in which “the majority of people, from boys and girls, did not want the bulls to be killed in the bullring”, nor did they want adults to have fun by clapping with white handkerchiefs, the blood of a living being.

As far as the social sector linked to the festival is concerned, he argued that only the businessmen who organized the bullfights “driven by greed” would suffer. They would look for job alternatives.

In his discursive cocktail, he talked about Gaza, education, world war, the possible extinction of humanity and other issues that he usually raises in his public appearances, whatever the reason for intervening.

Coincidentally that day, in Duitama Square, a city near Bogotá, the mayor of the Petro party led Demolition of a statue of Cesar Rincón. They have not yet revealed what they will do with the award-winning bullfighter and the rest of the bullfighting symbols in Santamaria.