Are rodeos animal abuse?

[Andox88]

Are rodeos a form of animal cruelty? Do you even know what a rodeo is? Well most states in the U.S have frequent rodeos. A rodeo is a place where people compete by showing off their skills by riding bulls, wrestling steers, and roping skills. It's a normal western tradition. But PETA says that this tradition should stay in the past. PETA calls this animal abuse, calling it cruel to force animals to do acts against their will. The argument for this is that rodeos are put on for entertainment, and people love them. To add on to the argument rodeo supporters also talk about how the rodeo animals are actually treated better than most other farm animals. For example bulls get fed tons of delicious foods to keep them at their weight; barrel horses get tons of lovely attention, hours upon hours of it. “We have 60 rules that cover the care and handling of the animals,” said Cindy Schonholtz, director of industry outreach for the Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association (PRCA). Just that company alone host a little bit over 600 rodeos in the US and canada out of the outstanding number of 10 thousand rodeos that are put on every year! PRCA’s first list of rules was published in 1947 to the public. PETA makes pretty reasonable statements saying tools like bucking straps, and electric prods. Sure this makes sense as it is unpleasant for the animals but is it really that bad compared to alternatives that have been used years and years ago? Spain a country know for the sport of bullfighting, a tradition of a matador with a red cloth dodging a bulls angry, and ever so deadly charge over and over again, the bull was then put down via a sword through the heart by the matador ( if survived) for 2 reasons. Reason number one being, it would add to the entertainment for the crowd, reason number 2 was after the bullfight the bull would be far too angered to live a normal life thus having to be put down. Long story short Spain stopped doing bullfighting in 2011 because it was inhumane to the bulls to make them angry for entertainment then kill them for the same reason. So after hearing a little bit from both sides do you think rodeos are animal abuse?

 

[TopSilver]

RE: Are rodeos animal abuse?

I don't think rodeos are animal abuse. However bull fighting is in my own opinion. Showing a bull red to try and get it to charge and making it angry is just an example of how not to treat animals. A rodeo involves bull riding which in my opinion doesn't seem so bad and wouldn't really be a big deal to me personally but rodeo clowning is taking it a bit too far. It has been tradition for certain countries many years. They have the running of the bulls and other things like that.