L’Arlésienne

I am back in a city that whispers to my heart. Time has done its work and I am no longer the young woman who first fell in love with Arles. The southern French city has a unique energy and never fails to cast a spell on visitors.

Surrounded by Roman remains, the locals proudly tend to the Provençal heritage of the writer Frédéric Mistral. The city is also where Van Gogh painted some of his finest works and lost an ear in a moment of insanity.

I am back in a city that whispers to my heart.

There was nothing glamorous about my first time in Arles: what first led me to the city was a medical emergency.

I was almost thirty-five when the sudden onset of a serious auto-immune condition confined me to hospital for a month, followed by a period of convalescence in the city. I discovered Arles as I slowly got back on my feet, walking one step further every day.

There was nothing glamorous about my first time in Arles: what first led me to the city was a medical emergency.

My return to health gave me a new lust for life. No longer a Parisian too busy to see the world around her, I was overwhelmed by the beauty of the Camargue, with its flights of pink flamingos, white horses galloping across the marsh and refined Arlésiennes. I even gave in to the excitement of the feria and the colourful world of bullfighting.

I even gave in to the excitement of the feria and the colourful world of bullfighting.

The shock of that illness continued to haunt me for years. My condition, the result of my own immune system turning on me, started me on a long journey of soul-searching. How could this happen to me? Why did I have to pull the emergency brake while still in my prime? Why Arles?

And how could I stray so far from my natural sensibility as to attend bullfights instead of running away?

And how could I stray so far from my natural sensibility as to attend bullfights instead of running away?

Little by little, I found the answers that helped me move forward. In time, I came closer to what lay at the core of my being, learning to become more attuned with my deeper self. This self-listening is what lies behind the voice that speaks to you today in helle.blog.

A few weeks ago, I returned to the special city that played such a pivotal role in my journey. I was meeting with a brilliant Arlésienne. She looked the image of the elegance that had originally drawn me to Arles: a beautiful, talented young animal rights activist who had grown up taking in Arles’ special energy. She was the same age I was when I first came to this city. As we walked the streets, she told me about her youth. A photograph let me glimpse a glorious teenager in full Arlesian dress riding side-saddle behind a handsome Camargue gardian.

I was meeting with a brilliant Arlésienne. She looked the image of the elegance that had originally drawn me to Arles.

We were standing outside the amphitheatre when I asked the question burning my lips. What did she think of bullfighting? She told me that this colourful tradition had always been a part of her world. Even then, she had started to feel less cognitive dissonance when a few setbacks had led her to leave her native city and its bullfighting culture behind. I learned that there was a local school where children could learn the torero’s art from a very young age. She knew the weight of the bullfighting cape and muleta passes had no secret for her.

What did she think of bullfighting?

“The idea that there is a right to life even as we have the power to put these bulls to death makes this a complex issue that sits awkwardly with my activism and sensibility. I’ve known bull farmers closer to their animals than human beings. Whereas death foregrounded in the amphitheatre, the industrial killing of animals barely raises an eyebrow. The matador has genuine respect for the bull he kills – I doubt if the same is true in our slaughterhouses. All things considered, I suspect I would rather die in an amphitheatre if I were a bull.

All things considered, I suspect I would rather die in an amphitheatre if I were a bull.

This issue also has an economic dimension, of course. For young would-be toreros, bullfighting can be a powerful social lift, even if few are called, so to speak”.

My own sensibility meant that her position made me uneasy, even as I understood the power of cultural markers. French legislation makes an exception for bullfighting on the grounds that it is a cultural tradition, making it nigh on impossible to move the debate forward. I also had to remind myself that I was a lapsed bullfighting enthusiast myself. When violence and hypermasculinity are transmogrified into a magnificent spectacle, we seek to justify them. This illustrates the way our patriarchal culture teaches us to look at the world through the lens of domination.

This illustrates the way our patriarchal culture teaches us to look at the world through the lens of domination.

I am reminded of that great bullfighting aficionado, Ernest Hemingway. His unflinching prose and powerful sentences bring to life the confrontation between man and beast. His works feel as though we were sat in the amphitheatre – we can even hear the hush that falls over the crowd as the animal is put to death. I can absolutely see why his books were so successful. Yet the case for bullfighting is just as fallacious in books as it is in the amphitheatre: we mistakenly assume that our desire for dominance gives us licence to inflict suffering and death.

we mistakenly assume that our desire for dominance gives us licence to inflict suffering and death.

This belief robs us of a chance to become better human beings. It hardens us into power hungry thrill seekers who find pleasure in killing those that look different and have fewer rights. Everyone – save the bull – knows that a bullfight almost always has a foregone conclusion. For this is no fair fight: just look at the sharp sticks the banderillos and picadors have already stuck into the bull’s neck and shoulder area before he has even met the torero.

I realise that as many of my readers must be shaking their heads in disapproval as nodding in approval. My piece may even provoke as much ire from some bullfighting enthusiasts as the environmental activist Sandrine Rousseau does when she points out that the success of the green transition depends on us eating less meat. It is not easy for her to get her message across because it challenges powerful cultural markers – the gastronomic pride of the French, in this case, or gender when she gave the example of barbeques to make the point that men eat more meat than women.

Some people can become fixated on such arguments, much like the bull on the torero’s red cape. But let us try to consider the bigger picture.

Some people can become fixated on such arguments, much like the bull on the torero’s red cape.

In my view, bullfighting exemplifies the normalisation – or indeed, as in Arles, glorification – of violence. The idea that the world is a brutal place and that we must therefore strive to achieve domination at the expense of others. Notwithstanding Hemingway’s heroic tales of bullfighting and war, this rather sad and archaic worldview locks us into an adrenalin-fuelled cycle of fear and strife. A cycle that is emblematic of the bull’s predicament.

Introspection work has taught me to see that there is another way. That I must seek to unlock my capacity for compassion and set it free. That I must stop trying to legitimate bullfights on the grounds that we ultimately show the bull more respect than we do cows, calves, pigs, lambs, hens and fish. That amphitheatres are the only slaughterhouses whose windows we can still peer into today.

That I must seek to unlock my capacity for compassion and set it free.

Learning to abdicate those parts of our cultural identity that call for the killing of animals would be a giant step towards making the world a less violent place. The Indian philosophical concept of Ahimsa could not be more removed from the political expediency of binary choices – for or against bullfighting or barbeques. It advocates a culture of non-violence. The actions of Mahatma Gandhi showed how powerful it can be to change the way we look at the world. When we choose to save animals, we have a chance to save ourselves.

When we choose to save animals, we have a chance to save ourselves.

Watching a bull being put to death in an amphitheatre or eating the flesh of a butchered animal, can insidiously lead us to prop up a social system based on domination. A social order cut off from the heart and our capacity for compassion. From the natural sensibility that we are born with but learn to bury deep within ourselves as we grow up. Why else do we like to show our children Walt Disney’s adaptation of Ferdinand, the bull who would rather smell the flowers sitting in the shade of a tree than fight in an amphitheatre?

A social order cut off from the heart and our capacity for compassion.

To seek non-violence and compassion within oneself can be a very powerful act in the Anthropocene, when our capacity to destroy life, including our own, has reached new heights. While these objectives may seem out of reach as war rears its ugly face again on the front page of newspapers, daring to live according to the principle of Ahimsa can both bring solace and be a powerful force for collective change. The quiet refusal to join in with the bullfighting crowd’s “Olé” can be a first step towards overcoming the patriarchy and bringing peace in the world.

daring to live according to the principle of Ahimsa can both bring solace and be a powerful force for collective change.