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Animal Welfare Overseas
- 1. Brazil Battles Blood Sport (Farra do Boi)
- 2. Fighting to End Horse Slaughter in France
- 3. Educating India - Ghandi's School of Animal Welfare
- 4. Fighting to Survive in Sri Lanka
- 5. Saving the Wild Horses of the Bahamas
- 6. India Takes Sterilization to the Streets
- 7. Spay Day in Sayulita, Mexico
Brazil Battles Blood Sport (Farra do Boi)
iStockphoto
Elizabeth Mac Gregor
The violent ritual of “Farra do Boi,” which occurs in coastal communities throughout the southern state of Santa Catarina in Brazil, involves the torture and slaughter of dozens of animals annually. Loosely translated as “Ox Fun Days” or “Oxen Festival,” these cruel events take place primarily during Holy Week. The farra begins when an ox is driven from a pen or dropped off a truck, and is chased through the streets by crowds of villagers. The attackers pursue the ox as the animal attempts to flee. Oxen are tormented, beaten and stabbed. This may continue for a couple of days until the animal is finally slaughtered and the meat divided among the participants.
Some claim this event is a reenactment of the Passion of Jesus, in which the ox represents Judas. Others believe that the animal represents Satan and is tortured to wash away sins. Proponents of Farra do Boi—mostly descendants of immigrants from the Azores Islands, a Portugese colony in the North Atlantic, who began the ritual—defend these bloody practices by claiming they are part of their cultural heritage. Today, however, the symbolic religious roots have been lost, and, according to Brazilian psychiatrist Nise da Silveira, Ph.D., drunken farristas who participate in the farra simply engage in “blind torture for the pleasure of torturing.”
In 1989, using a tail that had just been ripped off a steer as evidence, the World Society for the Protection of Animals (WSPA), the only animal welfare organization to have consultative status at the United Nations, lodged a complaint at a local police station. This marked the start of an ongoing, now 12-year public campaign against the farras by WSPA, along with other Brazilian animal welfare groups such as the Friends of Petrópolis Association, the Catarinense Association of Animal Protection (ACAPRA) and the Educational Zoophilous Society.
Legal proceedings against Farra do Boi were undertaken in Santa Catarina in 1989 on the grounds that Brazil’s constitution prohibits ill-treatment of animals, but humane groups lost their case in the lower courts. This was not surprising, because oxen, who in Brazil are raised primarily for meat, are often donated to farristas by politicians as a low-cost electoral marketing tool. WSPA and these groups then got the voluntary support of a well-known Rio de Janeiro lawyer, José Nabuco Filho, Ph.D., who defended the case at the Supreme Court in Brasília, the nation’s capital.
Santa Catarina Resists Change
After eight years, the legal proceedings resulted in a landmark victory on June 3, 1997, when, after much debate, the ministers of the Supreme Court voted four to one in favor of banning the Farra do Boi as an intrinsically cruel practice in violation of the Brazilian constitution. Yet the court’s decision was not complied with by Santa Catarina’s state government.
News continued to emerge from Santa Catarina of the opposition of farristas to the new ban and the way authorities were dragging their feet in enforcing it. Local police forces—characterized by strong community ties—completely ignored the official decision of the Supreme Court.
A series of strategic activities were then planned by WSPA: press interviews; meetings with authorities; distribution of bumper stickers and leaflets; a public forum comprising local legislators, animal protection supporters, chiefs of military and civil police and representatives of the Public Security and Education departments; a display of large posters in the state capital of Florianópolis and on the roads to the coastal villages; and advertisements on television.
Local media coverage played a large role in curbing cruelty by swaying public opinion. In 1998, fewer people participated in farras, and there were fewer reported incidents than in previous years. How-ever, during Easter of 1999, the farras increased, as local police and the Public Security Department blatantly challenged the Supreme Court decision by declaring that the practice was permitted within mangueirões, or closed pens. To make matters worse, the governor of Santa Catarina, Esperidião Amin, re-mained silent about the problem of farras.
WSPA filed a suit in Santa Catarina demanding that the Federal Court’s decision be complied with. At the end of 1999, the organization won a favorable sentence that established a fine of R$ 500 (about U.S.$250) for each day in which a farra occurs. In reprisal, Santa Catarina’s Chamber of Deputies passed a law in favor of the Farra do Boi. WSPA thereupon campaigned for Governor Amin to veto this law, which he did after receiving hundreds of messages via the Internet. But in March 2000 this veto was overthrown by the Chamber of Deputies of Santa Catarina.
After a meeting with WSPA, Governor Amin finally made a public statement against the Farra do Boi in April 2000, declaring that he would file a suit against the new law. Amin was criticized for his stance, and protests were carried out by farristas following his successful suit.
Unholy Rage Unleashed
On Easter Friday of last year, the public was shocked by a barbaric act of defiance. In Palhoça, farristas protesting the prohibition of farra stole and tortured a thoroughbred horse worth R$ 10,000 (U.S.$5,100). The animal’s hamstrings were cut and his forehead fractured by beatings. In further acts of cruelty, a wooden stick was introduced into the horse’s anus, and he was doused in burning oil. The owner himself shot the horse to end the creature’s suffering. Together with a suit filed by the Public Prosecution Service, WSPA and ACAPRA filed a criminal petition to punish those responsible.
While there were considerably fewer farras last year, incidents still took place in areas holding fast to tradition. Farristas continue to allege that torturing animals does not constitute cruelty. The great challenge now is to ensure that local police forces effectively intervene during the farras and make arrests.
Due to WSPA’s persistence in putting pressure on authorities and conducting public campaigns in Santa Catarina, there has been a good measure of success. WSPA remains committed to continuing the struggle until this horrific torturing of animals comes to an end.
A native Brazilian, Elizabeth Mac Gregor is a representative of WSPA’s Rio de Janeiro office.
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WHAT YOU CAN DO Please write to the Governor of Santa Catarina, with a copy to the state’s Secretary of Public Defense. Respectfully request that they put a stop to the illegal practices of Farra do Boi that are still carried out in Santa Catarina’s coastal communities by ensuring effective local police enforcement, especially during this year’s upcoming Holy Week celebration in April. Mr. Esperidião Amin Mr. Antenor Ribeiro |
Courtesy of
ASPCA
424 East 92nd St.
New York, NY 10128-6804
(212) 876-7700
www.aspca.org
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