Ole? No Way, Say Chinese

“Foreign Bulls Head for the Middle Kingdom.”

“Spanish Matadors Pack Their Bags for Beijing.”

“Local Promoters Salivate Over the Prospect of Bloodthirsty Crowds.”

The headlines said it all: Bullfighting was coming to China.

But a funny thing happened on the way to the bullring. In a country known for its often-brutal treatment of animals and its anything-goes capitalism, a public outcry halted the project in its tracks. Chagrined promoters aren’t talking, while emboldened activists voice hope that their win will spur the passage of new laws to strengthen animal rights.

“This is a very significant victory,” said Zhang Luping, head of the Beijing Human and Animal Environmental Education Center. “It shows that ordinary people’s voices can be heard in China and that policies can be changed.”

The treatment of animals in China still leaves a lot to be desired. For-profit zoos often mistreat them, selling unwanted ones as exotic restaurant fare and feeding live animals to other beasts for visitors’ amusement. Tigers are drugged and tied to concrete slabs so tourists can have their pictures snapped on the felines’ backs.

There are still thriving markets in ivory, fur and various endangered-species parts for virility treatments. And live bears are constricted in tiny cages and “milked” of their bile, used for medicine, with permanently implanted metal catheters puncturing their gallbladders.

But animal rights groups say they’re impressed by how fast the attitudes of average Chinese are changing. A few years ago, there wasn’t even a good term in Chinese for “animal welfare,” said Jill Robinson, founder of Animals Asia. Now dongwufuli is in widespread use as public support for a broad range of environmental issues surges.

“In the past two years alone, you’ve seen enormous change,” she said.

Driving the shift, animal rights groups say, are economic, social and cultural factors that suggest how quickly China is adapting to global sensibilities.

A rapid improvement in living standards, particularly in big cities such as Beijing and Shanghai, has swelled the middle class. As this group has become more materially comfortable, its interest in quality-of-life issues such as the environment has increased dramatically.

“As people’s lifestyles have improved, they’ve become more and more sensitive toward animals,” said Wang Shi, secretary-general of the Chinese Culture Promotion Society, a government-linked civic group. “It’s becoming a universal value, like Western classical music.”

New social structures also have heightened respect for the birds and the beasts. As growing numbers of people move from the countryside into urban apartments, the average family size is declining and the number of people living alone is rising.

Animal Companions

This has spurred pet ownership as animals take on the role of companions. In China’s past, there were few exceptions to their function of providing food, wool, protection or something else of economic value. Beijing officials got a taste of the new attitude when they sought to discourage pet ownership through high license fees in 1995, a policy that was largely reversed under pressure from outspoken residents.

Activists and sociologists point out that harsh treatment of animals is not a Chinese tradition, at least not an old one. Rural culture has for centuries respected animals, which are seen as an important part of local life, the economy and people’s hopes for success.

During the tough years following China’s 1949 Communist revolution, however, when famines swept the country, and later, as the Cultural Revolution spread social upheaval, there was little scope for worrying about much beyond human survival.

“Because of the social problems, the people-to-people tensions and overpopulation, we lost our traditions,” said Mang Ping, associate professor of traditional culture at the Central Institute of Socialism, based in Beijing. “During the famines in Inner Mongolia, people started killing rare yellow goats in large numbers -- driving it onto the endangered species list -- to avoid starvation.”

Word of Beijing Wildlife Park’s plans to introduce bullfighting -- seen locally as a way to stimulate tourism and promote economic growth -- came in early March from Shen Baochang, the Communist Party secretary from Daxing, a district on the outskirts of the capital where the private zoo complex is located.

Media reports cited plans to bring Spanish bullfighters to China so the Chinese could learn the trade. European and American bulls would be imported with the option of replacing them with local animals later.

As word spread, however, animal rights groups kicked into gear. They wrote articles, pressured lawmakers and held seminars. They marshaled counter-arguments. They appealed to Chinese civility. They persuaded National People’s Congress representatives, who added their voices to the howls of protest coming from nongovernmental groups across China.

“I was really amazed at the depth of public feeling and anger this bullfighting proposal aroused,” said Zhang, the animal education center director. This sort of grass-roots challenge, once unthinkable, reflects the relative vibrancy of China’s environmental movement.

Chinese authorities have given nature-focused organizations far greater leeway in recent years than groups concerned with human rights, religious freedom, migrant worker conditions or AIDS because the subject is not as politically sensitive, said Zhao Liqing, a professor and civil society expert with the Central Party School of the Communist Party.

Those supporting bullfighting -- largely the wildlife company, local government officials and local National People’s Congress representatives -- tried to stem the public tide by arguing they were bringing a respected cultural tradition to the country. That has become a potent argument as China embraces the outside world.

“They argued that this was tied into the national essence of Spain,” said Zhang Li, Beijing director of the International Fund for Animal Welfare. “But that’s a bit disingenuous. We argued back that culture and tradition are not necessarily good. China, after all, has a culture of collecting ivory.”

The wildlife company, having invested a substantial, though undisclosed, sum in a 6,400-seat, Spanish-style ring, backed down last month. It quickly regrouped and came up with a new plan that involves offering American-style rodeos.

Company officials declined repeated requests for interviews. But Jiao Shenhai, a Daxing tourism official, said local planners shouldn’t be blamed.

‘A Mistake’

“We realized it was a mistake, and we changed,” he said. “All we knew at the beginning was that Spanish bullfighting was famous. But we learned that even in Spain, many oppose it.”

The Fight Against Animal Cruelty in Europe, or FAACE, part of a confederation of animal rights groups in Britain, Spain and Germany, said this wasn’t the first failed bid to export bullfighting, nor, probably, would it be the last. Past attempts in Macau, Russia, Greece and Egypt were either quashed before they started or shut down after a short period.

“They try to export it everywhere because it’s dying in their own country,” said Peter Moore, FAACE’s head. “We make the argument: Does China need Spain and Portugal’s culture to be imported? Don’t they have their own?”

But Ana Fernandez Graciani, a Spanish rancher and journalist who specializes in bullfighting, denied that the pastime was losing popularity in Spain. “Bullfighting rings are always crowded,” she said, adding that Spain has not actively sought to export the concept to China. Rather, the initiative came from China, she said.

Despite promoters’ cultural arguments to justify their plans, opponents say the real motive was the profit potential of treating audiences to the thrill of the blood sport.

In the past, China had aired Spanish bullfighting on television, helping to raise its profile. And dog and cock fighting have proved popular among China’s avid gambling population, another activity that animal rights groups have helped curb, except in remote areas far from the national spotlight.

Preventing Abuse

Although China has laws to prevent the killing of various endangered species, it has no legislation protecting animals from abuse, say activists, who see this as a goal.

And despite emerging sympathy for animal rights, there’s anecdotal evidence that Chinese bullfighting would have pulled in the crowds.

“I liked bullfighting when I saw it on TV,” said policeman Jin Song, 27. “Young people like thrilling things. I’m a bit sorry it was canceled.”

On a recent afternoon at the 600-acre Beijing Wildlife Park, construction crews raced to finish the stadium, complete with faux columns on the outer walls, before the opening date. Some plastered walls with white stucco, others welded animal pens together.

“I wonder if they planned to serve meat from the bulls they killed in here,” said one worker, putting last-minute touches on a cafeteria area.

“This is a wildlife park,” visitor Zhang Jie, 24, said as she ate potato chips near the monkey cage. “The animals here are meant to be protected, so this whole idea is a bit strange. It seems really cruel to even think of such a thing.”

Even as animal rights activists say they’re pleasantly surprised by rapid change in China in recent years, they quickly point to the work ahead educating people. In fact, the wildlife park dropped its bullfighting plans but continued to promote a more modest blood sport for the amusement of visitors in another corner of the park.

Just outside the scaffold-shrouded stadium, a billboard advertised rides on a “mobile feeding cage.” For $3.80 per bird, visitors can feed live chickens to lions and tigers from the chain-link-enclosed flatbed of a truck. Those interested in a volume discount can charter the vehicle for $24 per trip -- excluding “rush hour,” or peak holiday periods.

“Challenge!! Facing up to the beasts of prey in the feeder’s cage-mobile,” the billboard blared in English. “Do not throw in food self-bought.”