Photos: ‘Running of the Dinosaurs’ Takes Over Pamplona

Photos: ‘Running of the Dinosaurs’ Takes Over Pamplona

Pamplona, Spain – PETA and AnimaNaturalis supporters in dinosaur costumes  ran along Pamplona’s streets – following the same route as the infamous Running of the Bulls – today, the day before the start of the Festival of San Fermín. Why? To make the point that bull runs, in which terrified young bulls are chased through the streets by a mob of people to the bullring, where they’re stabbed to death before a jeering crowd, are so cruel they belong to another age. The group is calling for the festival, in which 42 bulls will be killed, to reinvent itself by featuring fun, non-violent activities instead.

Photos from the action are available here. Video is available here.

Photos and video by Esa Ennelin.

“The Running of the Bulls and bullfights represent a less enlightened time when people didn’t understand that animals feel pain,” says PETA Vice President Mimi Bekhechi. “These cruel, archaic events should go the way of the dinosaurs, and PETA is calling on Pamplona’s mayor to take action and relegate this bloodbath to the history books, where it belongs.”

More than 125 Spanish towns and cities have rejected the torment and butchering of bulls for entertainment, and bullfighting has seen a 42% decrease in Spain since 2019. But at festivals like San Fermín, bulls are still subjected to confusion and terror and risk injury from crashing into barriers and walls, falling and breaking their legs, or colliding with each other. In 2021, PETA offered Pamplona’s mayor €298,000 to cancel the annual Running of the Bulls – an offer that still stands.

PETA – whose motto reads, in part, that “animals are not ours to use for entertainment” – opposes speciesism, a human-supremacist worldview. For more information, please visit PETA.org.uk or follow the group on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram.

Contact:

Sascha Camilli  +44 (0) 20 7923 6244; [email protected]

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