Blood sport

Bloodsport or blood sport is any sport or entertainment that involves violence against animals.

Bloodsport includes coursing or beagling, combat sports such as cockfighting, or other activities. These usually involve blood being drawn, and sometimes result in the death of one or more animals.

Use of the term "blood sport"

According to the Oxford English Dictionary, the earliest use of the term is in reference to mounted hunting, where the quarry would be actively chased, as in fox hunting or hare coursing. Before firearms a hunter using arrows or a spear might also wound an animal, which would then be chased and perhaps killed at close range, as in medieval boar hunting. The term was popularised by author [http://www.henrysalt.co.uk/index_old.html Henry S. Salt] (1851–1939).

Later, the term seems to have been applied to various kinds of baiting and forced combat: bull-baiting, bear-baiting, cockfighting and later developments such as dog fighting and rat-baiting. The animals were specially bred, confined and forced to fight. In the Victorian era, social reformers began a vocal opposition to such activities, claiming grounds of ethics, morality and animal welfare.

Current issues

Changes in usage of the term "blood sport" illustrate the depth of the linguistic and social complexities of social evolution.

Hunting

Animal rights and some animal welfare activists have sought to extend the term "blood sport", especially as a pejorative, to a variety of activities not covered by the original use of the term [cite web
last = Greenwood
first = George
authorlink =
coauthors =
title = Bloodsports
work = Stag Hunting pp. 1–33, in Killing for Sport: Essays by Various Writers, edited by Henry S. Salt
publisher = George Bell and Sons, Ltd, London
year= 1914
url = http://www.henrysalt.co.uk/index_old.html
format =
doi =
accessdate = 2006-12-17 ] . Its usage to describe modern hunting is a matter of dispute. Modern hunters claim to be guided by the ethics of [http://www.boone-crockett.org/huntingEthics/ethics_fairchase.asp?area=huntingEthics fair chase] and claim not to impose needless animal suffering. Those who oppose hunting claim, however, that humans do not need to hunt in order to survive and that hunting, perforce, inflicts needless suffering.

Bull fighting and cock fighting

Today, under lobbying pressure, limitations on blood sports have been enacted in much of the world. Certain blood sports remain legal under varying degrees of control in certain locations ("e.g.," bull fighting and cockfighting) but have declined in popularity almost everywhere else. [cite book
last = Lewine
first = Edward
authorlink =
coauthors =
title = Death and the Sun: A Matador's Season in the Heart of Spain
publisher = Houghton Mifflin Company
month= July | year= 2005
location =
pages =
url = http://www.powells.com/biblio?show=061826325x#synopses_and_reviews
doi =
id = ISBN 061826325X ] [cite book
last = Mitchell
first = Timothy
authorlink =
coauthors =
title = Blood Sport: a social history of Spanish bullfighting
publisher = University of Pennsylvania Press
month= July | year= 1991
location =
pages = 244
url =
doi =
id = ISBN-10: 0812231295
ISBN-13: 978-0812231298 ] Proponents of blood sports are widely cited to believe that they are traditional within the culture. [http://www.puertorico-herald.org/issues2/2005/vol09n19/Cockfighting.html Cockfighting] , Puerto Rico Herald, 2005.] Bullfighting aficionados, for example, do not regard bullfighting as a sport but as a cultural activity. It is sometimes called a tragic spectacle, because the bull is invariably killed and the bullfighter is always at risk of death. Both Barnaby Conrad's "La Fiesta Brava" and Hemingway's "Death in the Afternoon" offer opinion on this matter.

YouTube Blood sport

The video sharing site YouTube has been criticized by the RSPCA, among others, for hosting videos of animal conflict staged specifically to be shown on YouTube, especially the feeding of one animal to another for the purposes of entertainment. [ Times online, [http://technology.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/tech_and_web/the_web/article2284380.ece] August 19, 2007, retrieved August 25, 2007.] [ Practical Fishkeeping, [http://www.practicalfishkeeping.co.uk/pfk/pages/item.php?news=1255] May 17, 2007, retrieved August 25, 2007.]

List of blood sports

* Badger-baiting
* Bear-baiting
* Betta-fighting
* Bull-baiting
* Bullfighting
* Cockfighting
* Cock throwing
* Cricket fighting
* Dog fighting
* Fox hunting
* Fox tossing
* Gladiatoral spectacles
* Hare coursing
* Hog dogging
* Human-baiting
* Hunting
* Insect fighting
* Rat baiting
* Rodeo
* Spider fighting
* Vaquejada
* Wolf hunting

Campaigning organizations

*Irish Council Against Blood Sports (Ireland)
*League Against Cruel Sports (UK)
*Hunt Saboteurs Association

ee also

* Animals in sport
* Baiting (animals)
* Illegal sports

External links

* [http://www.banbloodsports.com Irish Council Against Blood Sports]
* [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_4V9l4ChELo YouTube footage of a captive deer being pursued by hounds and horsemen]

References