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SYSK Selects: How Bullfighting Works · Stuff You Should Know

0:00
Speaker 1: Hey, everybody, chuck here. I'm a little sleepy because it's
0:03
Speaker 1: Saturday morning. You know what that means. It's time for
0:07
Speaker 1: another classic episode. Stuff you Should Know selects this one.
0:10
Speaker 1: It's from a third two thousand two, How Bullfighting Works,
0:14
Speaker 1: And you know what, Honestly, I picked this one because
0:17
Speaker 1: I just wanted to, uh, to go to people further.
0:21
Speaker 1: I came out. We usually try and keep things fairly neutral,
0:24
Speaker 1: but I came out hard against bull fighting on this
0:27
Speaker 1: because it is barbaric and awful, and uh, I don't
0:31
Speaker 1: apologize for that. So I'm gonna puff my chest up
0:34
Speaker 1: and republish this one right now. I don't care about
0:38
Speaker 1: the tradition. I don't care about any of that. I
0:40
Speaker 1: just want people to stop bull fighting. So we get
0:44
Speaker 1: into the history of it and all that. And I
0:46
Speaker 1: think Josh was a little more neutral than I was,
0:49
Speaker 1: if I remember correctly, But uh yeah, I'm not into it.
0:52
Speaker 1: So go ahead and send your hate emails now if
0:55
Speaker 1: you want, or emails of support. Here we go How
0:58
Speaker 1: Bull Fighting Works all over again. Welcome to Stuff you
1:10
Speaker 1: Should Know from House Stuff Works dot com. Hi, and
1:19
Speaker 1: welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark with me as
1:21
Speaker 1: always is Charles W. Chuck Bryant, hol A, Chuck Hola,
1:26
Speaker 1: hola right back at you. Um, how are you doing?
1:30
Speaker 1: I'm great? How are you? I'm doing pretty good? Yeah. Yeah,
1:34
Speaker 1: I've been learning a lot about bull volume lately. I
1:36
Speaker 1: don't know if you know you mean bull killing. Bull
1:39
Speaker 1: fighting is what it's cultured. It's not what I call it.
1:43
Speaker 1: Or you could also call it a cardido corda boy,
1:48
Speaker 1: Here we go, Corrida. Have you ever been to Spain? No?
1:52
Speaker 1: Have you? Yeah? Where I've been to? Uh and in
2:00
Speaker 1: um Tulsa de Mar, which is uh little coastal town
2:05
Speaker 1: near Barcelona there on the coastal Brava very nice. Have
2:08
Speaker 1: you been to Okay? Yeah, very Have you seen a
2:12
Speaker 1: bull fight? No, I would not I would not do that, sir,
2:16
Speaker 1: I have seen a bull fight. And um, to offend
2:19
Speaker 1: you even further, not only was it a bullfight, it
2:23
Speaker 1: started off with a cock fight. It was in Cancoon.
2:27
Speaker 1: I saw it with my sister and my dad, and um,
2:30
Speaker 1: it was crazy because we were we were there and
2:33
Speaker 1: it was a bullfight like it wasn't like you could
2:35
Speaker 1: have accidentally walked into this thing like it was a bullfight. Um,
2:41
Speaker 1: and I would say of the people, there were um, white,
2:47
Speaker 1: probably American tourists, who booed and yelled and shouted things
2:53
Speaker 1: the whole time. And I remember thinking of that one
2:57
Speaker 1: Simpsons where UM Lisa was having a nightmare about being
3:01
Speaker 1: second chairs for saxophone in the school band, and um,
3:06
Speaker 1: at the concert, everybody was booing and she wakes up
3:08
Speaker 1: and thinks, like, why would everybody come just to boo?
3:12
Speaker 1: It was exactly like that. People came just to boo
3:15
Speaker 1: to bullfight. Well, that is one h people who who
3:19
Speaker 1: say bullfighting is not good, of which I'm one of them,
3:22
Speaker 1: say that that's one of the only reasons bull fights
3:25
Speaker 1: are still even going on is because of tourists. That
3:29
Speaker 1: they're the ones buying the tickets. And many times those
3:32
Speaker 1: tourists get there and they're horrified and they leave early
3:36
Speaker 1: and think, Wow, what to spend? Yeah, no, no refunds,
3:40
Speaker 1: No exactly, So you just funded bullfighting, yeah exactly, sucker. Um.
3:46
Speaker 1: A couple of quick stats, oh, roughly to between two
3:50
Speaker 1: hundred and two hundred and fifty thousand bulls are killed
3:52
Speaker 1: each year from bull fights from bull fights, and UM,
3:58
Speaker 1: I'm not sure if this is accurate, but the number
4:00
Speaker 1: I got was it? Fifty two matadors have been killed since.
4:06
Speaker 1: I'm surprised it's that few. Have you heard of Julio Aparchio?
4:12
Speaker 1: I know if you have a very strong constitution, Uncle
4:17
Speaker 1: Josh warns you against this one. Yeah, yeah, I saw it.
4:22
Speaker 1: Holy cow. It was almost like, how is that not photoshop?
4:26
Speaker 1: It was perfect? The horns so Julio Apariccio was he
4:32
Speaker 1: fell down and bull got the best of him, gored
4:36
Speaker 1: him with his with its horns, with his horns because
4:39
Speaker 1: bulls of boy, um and what a boy huh, and
4:44
Speaker 1: gord him under his chin and it threw his through
4:48
Speaker 1: his neck and then the horn came out of his
4:50
Speaker 1: mouth perfectly, and um a guy from getting him. It
4:55
Speaker 1: just got a close up of it, like like fifty
4:59
Speaker 1: of them. There video of it. It's it's amazing. I
5:02
Speaker 1: haven't seen the video. It's on the YouTube and it's
5:04
Speaker 1: one of those that's so awful that you have to
5:06
Speaker 1: like sign in and verify your age before you watch it.
5:10
Speaker 1: And I would do not advise people to watch this.
5:12
Speaker 1: I don't even advise you to see the too. Look
5:14
Speaker 1: at the Daily Mail article that has it, but it's
5:16
Speaker 1: pretty crazy. But yes, it happens, and I'm surprised that
5:19
Speaker 1: only how many fifties seven? The stat I got was
5:22
Speaker 1: fifty two in the last you know, three hundred plus years. Um.
5:27
Speaker 1: So there's not much of a fight going on. And
5:29
Speaker 1: matador is actually Spanish for killer, so is it really um, yes,
5:35
Speaker 1: they're killer bulls for sure. It's the whole point, Like
5:37
Speaker 1: there's really no gray area here, like bullfighting is the
5:41
Speaker 1: the purpose of it is to kill the bull. Yeah,
5:44
Speaker 1: under certain conditions or um, within a certain framework. But
5:48
Speaker 1: that's the point of bullfighting. It's not anything but that.
5:52
Speaker 1: And if the matador fails to kill the bull, that's
5:54
Speaker 1: on him and it is a huge disgrace, like that's
5:58
Speaker 1: a that's a loss, and it's not very good right. Um,
6:03
Speaker 1: But I I start I'm starting to suspect that you
6:06
Speaker 1: are a post bullfighting. Um. There are a lot of
6:09
Speaker 1: people and apparently Spain's um. I mean in Spain, it's
6:14
Speaker 1: like a natural cultural thing. It's been around for a while,
6:20
Speaker 1: and even people who feel the same way you do
6:22
Speaker 1: still say I still don't think it should be illegal.
6:24
Speaker 1: It's just too much a part of our tradition. Not
6:27
Speaker 1: everyone feels that way though, No, definitely not. They did
6:30
Speaker 1: a gallop pole in two thousand ten, and seventy of
6:33
Speaker 1: Spaniards said that they were ready to do away with it.
6:35
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, that's a lot of Spaniards. And that's up
6:39
Speaker 1: from like fifteen years earlier. So in this modern day
6:44
Speaker 1: people are starting to think twice about it. Well, let's
6:46
Speaker 1: let's talk about this, Chuck, let's talk about how how
6:49
Speaker 1: long people have been fighting bulls on the Iberian Peninsula.
6:53
Speaker 1: We don't know, Fox show, but um, there is evidence
6:57
Speaker 1: of bull ritual dating back all the way to b C. Yeah.
7:03
Speaker 1: The Mycenaeans apparently used to leap over bulls that were charging.
7:07
Speaker 1: It was like a thing, and they were always revered,
7:10
Speaker 1: you know, as like these godlike creatures, which is why
7:13
Speaker 1: I guess they want to kill him. What. Yeah, what's
7:15
Speaker 1: the taurus? One? Taurus? Is that the Is that an
7:18
Speaker 1: astrological sign? Yeah? Okay, yeah, of course, pretty ancient. Yeah. Uh.
7:24
Speaker 1: The article points out that the Visigoth rule Um of
7:28
Speaker 1: the Iberian Peninsula from fourteen fifteen to seven eleven UM No.
7:34
Speaker 1: Four fifteen four fifteen to seven eleven UM had men
7:39
Speaker 1: on horseback fighting bulls um, which evolved into mounted bullfighting,
7:44
Speaker 1: which uh jonnel, which still exists in Portugal horseback bullfighting,
7:50
Speaker 1: where they kill the bull outside the ring. Later on, right,
7:53
Speaker 1: they weaken it to a certain point, which is the
7:56
Speaker 1: equivalent of killing the bull is far. I guess there's
7:59
Speaker 1: some point of no return that the Portuguese understand and
8:03
Speaker 1: they're like, okay, well we're done, come outside, and then
8:07
Speaker 1: that's that. But as anybody who's opposed bullfighting will tell you,
8:11
Speaker 1: that's not any more humane. Of course not. It's just
8:14
Speaker 1: out of sight of the spectators. Um. So yeah, you've
8:18
Speaker 1: got what is it? Ray hoo ray jono jo um.
8:24
Speaker 1: And then uh. Bull fighting itself as we understand it today,
8:28
Speaker 1: was firmly established in Spain by the eleventh century UM,
8:33
Speaker 1: and it came about during festivals, specifically one festival called
8:37
Speaker 1: the Fiesta descind Ferminton and anybody's been to Pampalona will
8:42
Speaker 1: recognize that because that's where the running of the bulls
8:44
Speaker 1: takes place. And when in July now so I seven
8:49
Speaker 1: when it used to be September, and then in the
8:52
Speaker 1: sixteenth century they moved it to July, and ever since
8:56
Speaker 1: then the running of the bulls has been held. But
8:58
Speaker 1: it's been going on since long before that, And it
9:00
Speaker 1: actually started with a bunch of um ranchers and their
9:03
Speaker 1: kids moving the bulls from like their pens to about
9:07
Speaker 1: a half a mile to the arena. UM. And then
9:10
Speaker 1: people started running alongside him, and counting evolved into the
9:14
Speaker 1: running of the bulls. Now interesting else, said the Spanish
9:18
Speaker 1: military leader uh midd eleventh century. He was one of
9:23
Speaker 1: the first to actually bring it into the arena and
9:26
Speaker 1: make it the sanctioned corrida, which was government sanctioned is
9:31
Speaker 1: today at least what was back then imagined financially supported
9:35
Speaker 1: by governments to fifteenth century. It was a big part
9:39
Speaker 1: of the aristocracy until Queen Isabella came along and said
9:43
Speaker 1: this is not cool. I don't know why she was
9:47
Speaker 1: against it, probably because she was an animal lover. I
9:49
Speaker 1: would say that's probably a good idea. And Pope Pious
9:53
Speaker 1: UM five almost said v uh. He banned it, but
10:00
Speaker 1: didn't last very long, um only about eight years, because
10:03
Speaker 1: people were into it pretty pretty big time, right um.
10:07
Speaker 1: And then in about the I guess in the six
10:09
Speaker 1: hundred is when that that whole divergence between horseback and
10:14
Speaker 1: foot bull foot bull fighting took place, and it remained. Um.
10:18
Speaker 1: The sport of the aristocracy until Philip the came along
10:25
Speaker 1: and he said, you know what, this is barbaric. You
10:28
Speaker 1: would have to be a low class barbarian to engage
10:31
Speaker 1: in bullfighting. So if you remember my court and you
10:34
Speaker 1: get caught doing this, I'll shoot you in the knee.
10:38
Speaker 1: And the aristocracy said, well, we want our knees intact,
10:42
Speaker 1: so we're gonna stop doing this. And at this point
10:45
Speaker 1: bullfighting transferred from a kind of high flutant, snooty pastime
10:50
Speaker 1: to the the um, the pastime of the people, the
10:53
Speaker 1: national sport of the Spanish people, and from that point
10:58
Speaker 1: on it's it's stayed that way. Yeah, but they they
11:02
Speaker 1: The author does point out that there are arenas in
11:04
Speaker 1: Spain that still have the royal boxes for the royal
11:07
Speaker 1: family right to attend these things, so it hasn't gone
11:10
Speaker 1: away completely as far as that goes. So Spain is
11:14
Speaker 1: the heart and life center of um bull fighting, but
11:19
Speaker 1: there's other places that it's held. Obviously, I saw him
11:22
Speaker 1: in cancun Um, and if you're a bullfighter, you can
11:25
Speaker 1: follow the season pretty much year round and get work
11:30
Speaker 1: if you're good. They have in France. Did you know that?
11:32
Speaker 1: I didn't, But I saw that it's been It was
11:35
Speaker 1: banned in the UK. Had no idea anybody was fighting
11:39
Speaker 1: bulls and going on in Germany was going on all
11:41
Speaker 1: over the place. It's crazy. But that doesn't make sense
11:44
Speaker 1: that it would happen in Germany if the Visigoths are
11:46
Speaker 1: the ones who introduced it to the Iberian Peninsula because
11:49
Speaker 1: they were Germanic people from south of the south Norway
11:53
Speaker 1: will call you south Way. I don't think the Goths. Uh.
11:59
Speaker 1: So we'll walk you through what happens in a in
12:01
Speaker 1: a corrida um in this whitewashed article version. But um,
12:07
Speaker 1: before this ever happens, we'll walk you through the couple
12:11
Speaker 1: of days before the bull even gets to the ring. Oh,
12:16
Speaker 1: this is a special treat for me. It is the
12:18
Speaker 1: bull Um is not an aggressive animal at all. Bull
12:21
Speaker 1: likes to hang around and chew grass and uh smell flowers.
12:26
Speaker 1: That sounds like bullfighting propaganda to me. No, Ferdinand, the
12:30
Speaker 1: bull it's like a sweet creature. But they actually are
12:32
Speaker 1: not aggressive. They're only um going to charge somebody if
12:35
Speaker 1: they're threatened and angry, which is what bullfighting is all about. Um. So,
12:41
Speaker 1: in the two days prior to the bull showing up
12:44
Speaker 1: at the arena. They are abused. Um, they are uh
12:50
Speaker 1: basically mentally destroyed versions of what a bull should be.
12:54
Speaker 1: But there you're fat bull. While they do fatten him
12:57
Speaker 1: up to make them slow. Well, that's problem, and you
13:01
Speaker 1: can call somebody out for that. Okay. Um. They have
13:06
Speaker 1: wet newspaper stuffed in their ears so they can't hear anything.
13:10
Speaker 1: They have vasoline rubbed on their eyes so their visions blurred.
13:13
Speaker 1: They have their eyes taped open so they can't sleep. Uh.
13:17
Speaker 1: They stuff cotton up their nostrils so they can't breathe
13:20
Speaker 1: very well, and they stick and needle through their genitals. That'll,
13:24
Speaker 1: that'll take anybody off. They rubbed this caustic solution on
13:27
Speaker 1: their legs, which makes the bull not be able to
13:29
Speaker 1: balance and uh keeps the bull from lying down. Ever.
13:34
Speaker 1: They strap their horns to the ceiling of their transport
13:37
Speaker 1: truck ah to take them on their long hot journey
13:43
Speaker 1: to wherever they're going. And for the two days before
13:46
Speaker 1: they keep them in a in a box. Oh wait,
13:48
Speaker 1: I'm sorry, that's not all. They give them drugs to
13:51
Speaker 1: either pep them up or slow them down, just to
13:54
Speaker 1: keep them in whatever state they want them in. And
13:56
Speaker 1: give them laxatives, uh to just sleep make things even
14:01
Speaker 1: more uncomfortable. Um. Then they put the bull in the
14:05
Speaker 1: in this dark box for two days, uh to disorient
14:08
Speaker 1: the bull. Finally, when they opened the box, there's a
14:12
Speaker 1: light at the end of the tunnel that the bull thinks,
14:14
Speaker 1: my god, I'm finally getting out of here. Runs to
14:16
Speaker 1: the light and all of a sudden they're in a
14:18
Speaker 1: bull ring, right, And there's trumpets and fanfare and people cheering, um,
14:24
Speaker 1: and the bulls like, oh cool, how's how's it? Hey?
14:27
Speaker 1: How are you all doing? I've been through some rough
14:30
Speaker 1: times lately. Um. Some of that stuff, I think if
14:33
Speaker 1: you were found out, you would be disqualified immediately, especially
14:39
Speaker 1: doing stuff that slowed the bull down or made it
14:43
Speaker 1: less dangerous. Yes, the bull ring is a ring for
14:47
Speaker 1: a reason. Um. Bulls would want to go try and
14:50
Speaker 1: hide in a corner, but the ring, the circular ring,
14:52
Speaker 1: will confuse in a bull to where it can't hide anywhere.
14:56
Speaker 1: Have you ever seen that footage of that bull that
14:58
Speaker 1: like makes it up into the hands, like jumps up
15:01
Speaker 1: and then is into the stands like on top of people.
15:04
Speaker 1: It was crazy? Was that bull run our test? No?
15:08
Speaker 1: Do you get that joke. Okay. So the different acts
15:12
Speaker 1: I believe are called tercios, Yes, I believe so. And
15:16
Speaker 1: there's three of them, right, Yes, there's three of them,
15:18
Speaker 1: and the that's three acts in a fight in a cardido, yes,
15:25
Speaker 1: in a bull fight. Yeah, and um there's no suspense
15:29
Speaker 1: going on either by the way they all go down
15:31
Speaker 1: the same way. I bet it's suspenseful for the bull. Um.
15:35
Speaker 1: So the bull comes out the first act or what? Uh? Yeah?
15:41
Speaker 1: Act one? Okay. In act one there are um guys
15:46
Speaker 1: called peka doors and they're mounted on horseback and they
15:50
Speaker 1: are basically, um, I guess, low level torreros or bullfighters
15:57
Speaker 1: because both. A matador is not the only kind of bullfighter.
15:59
Speaker 1: He is cream of the crop, pinnacle of bullfighters, the
16:03
Speaker 1: well paid rock star. Yes, um, but he works with
16:06
Speaker 1: a crew of pika doors who show up in the
16:09
Speaker 1: first act and bandilli aros who show up in the
16:13
Speaker 1: second act. But the pika doors what they do is
16:16
Speaker 1: they lance the bowl between his shoulder blades around his
16:20
Speaker 1: neck muscles. And the whole point of this chuck You'll
16:22
Speaker 1: love this one is to weaken the neck muscles so
16:26
Speaker 1: that the bull's head hangs so that the matador can
16:30
Speaker 1: get to its heart more easily. Yeah. It also hits
16:33
Speaker 1: a gland in the neck that releases adrenaline. Apparently. Um
16:38
Speaker 1: So they lanced the bull three times and twist the
16:41
Speaker 1: blade around to ensure maximum blood loss. Um. Three matadors
16:47
Speaker 1: will now come in. They will fight individually later on,
16:50
Speaker 1: but they all come in at first in the first
16:52
Speaker 1: act with their capes. And this is and for the
16:55
Speaker 1: for the bull fight, it's an afternoon of them. There's
16:57
Speaker 1: six bulls and three matadors in each mattador fights two
17:01
Speaker 1: bulls and each bull fight takes about fifteen and twenty minutes,
17:03
Speaker 1: yes roughly. Um So they come in with their little
17:07
Speaker 1: capes and uh do their little maneuvers to draw attention
17:11
Speaker 1: away from the pika doors. And the pika doors go
17:14
Speaker 1: and hide behind their little walls. They have these interior
17:17
Speaker 1: walls that they can hide behind. Whenever the bull starts
17:21
Speaker 1: to get too dangerous, they run and high behind these walls. Yes,
17:25
Speaker 1: or if this or America, the Pika doors would be
17:28
Speaker 1: dressed as clowns and would hide in barrels. Look at rodeo. Yeah,
17:32
Speaker 1: it will do a rodeo podcast at some point. Do
17:34
Speaker 1: we have to not sure, okay, they don't. I don't
17:37
Speaker 1: think they kill the cows and rodeos. No, okay. Um,
17:42
Speaker 1: So the pika doors leave the ring. The matadors leave
17:46
Speaker 1: the ring at two begins in the bandel yarros. I
17:50
Speaker 1: know that's a tough one. Yeah, they come in. They're
17:53
Speaker 1: they're basically bullfighters, assistant bullfighters, but they're on foot. Yes,
17:58
Speaker 1: and if you've ever seen a bullfighter picture of a
18:00
Speaker 1: bull fight, bulls seem to have some um crepe barbed
18:05
Speaker 1: sticking out of him. That's the bandelierros work. Yes, and
18:10
Speaker 1: that is called a bandias and it's a barbed dart.
18:16
Speaker 1: It's adorned colorfully. The bulls aren't the only things dying
18:19
Speaker 1: in this episode, so was the Spanish language, because we
18:22
Speaker 1: are butchering it. I'm trying uh this of course, further
18:26
Speaker 1: weekends the bull um so the mighty Matador doesn't have
18:30
Speaker 1: much work to do. So the bull is still dangerous.
18:35
Speaker 1: Um are They run in circles at this point to
18:37
Speaker 1: to get it nice and dizzy and confused. The manador
18:40
Speaker 1: comes out for the final act and he has ten
18:43
Speaker 1: ten official minutes to kill the bull. Well to do
18:47
Speaker 1: a little showing off first and then kill the bull.
18:50
Speaker 1: Um after the ten minute warring. After the ten minutes,
18:53
Speaker 1: he gets in a viso, which is a warning first warning.
18:57
Speaker 1: After three minutes he gets another one, and then he
18:59
Speaker 1: gets a third one, so he has a total of
19:01
Speaker 1: in actuality fifteen minutes to kill the bull or else
19:04
Speaker 1: the bull is let out alive and the metadors disgraced.
19:08
Speaker 1: But for the most part, the matador is going to
19:10
Speaker 1: dispatch the bull, and um, he does it if he
19:14
Speaker 1: first starts using the cape and the cape is always
19:16
Speaker 1: held in the left hand. Is it? That's all right handed? Dudes?
19:19
Speaker 1: I did not. I was looking, and I could even
19:22
Speaker 1: tell that they were. Um there, the cape was kind
19:24
Speaker 1: of clumsy held in the left hand. They were still
19:27
Speaker 1: holding it in the left hand. Well, the guys I
19:29
Speaker 1: saw were practicing, so maybe I don't know, but I
19:31
Speaker 1: don't see why they would practice with their right hand.
19:33
Speaker 1: I don't either. Okay, But you have a cape in
19:36
Speaker 1: one hand, you have a sword in the other. Yes,
19:39
Speaker 1: and the point of the cape. By the way, we
19:41
Speaker 1: should probably get to this now. Um, cape is always
19:45
Speaker 1: red because red Anger's bulls right true balls are color blind,
19:50
Speaker 1: so they're not angered by red or any other color.
19:53
Speaker 1: What does get them going is the movement of the
19:55
Speaker 1: cape and sticking uh swords in their neck. That's another
19:59
Speaker 1: thing that gets them going. Um. And actually that's not
20:02
Speaker 1: necessarily true. By the time the manador comes out, sometimes
20:05
Speaker 1: the um the bowl is really tired from blood loss
20:10
Speaker 1: and being tortured for a couple of days apparently, um.
20:13
Speaker 1: And so the manador really kind of has to work
20:15
Speaker 1: to get it riled up again. And even though the
20:17
Speaker 1: bulls just like, just kill me, manador is like, not yet,
20:20
Speaker 1: we have a crowd to please first, So um the
20:25
Speaker 1: the manador eventually after the cape work is done. Um.
20:29
Speaker 1: Oh the cape is read by the way to high bloodstains. Um.
20:33
Speaker 1: Once the cape work is done, the manador will um
20:37
Speaker 1: as the bull runs past him, will plunge the sword
20:40
Speaker 1: in between his shoulder blades and what's called a estoccata,
20:45
Speaker 1: which is the death blow and uh it properly delivered
20:49
Speaker 1: estocata will sever the bulls a order and that will
20:52
Speaker 1: be that almost immediately for the bull. If it's not
20:55
Speaker 1: done correctly, then the bull can be in even more
20:59
Speaker 1: tremendous pain as it bleeds out. But to protect against this,
21:03
Speaker 1: a bandeliero will come out and uh immediately deliver any
21:09
Speaker 1: any another thrust of a blade to make sure the
21:13
Speaker 1: bull is dead with a puntilla a smaller knife. UM.
21:18
Speaker 1: Ideally they killed them with one blow. That rarely happens
21:22
Speaker 1: because apparently matadors aren't so great at doing that anymore.
21:26
Speaker 1: I don't know if they ever were. And uh, a
21:29
Speaker 1: lot of times the bull lives even through the smaller
21:31
Speaker 1: knife plunge and is still alive when the ears and
21:35
Speaker 1: tail or hoof or cut off and presented to the matador.
21:39
Speaker 1: Usually there's a there's another fail safe um where they
21:43
Speaker 1: just bring out a tractor and run the bull over
21:45
Speaker 1: a bunch of times to make sure that it's it's
21:49
Speaker 1: so nice. And if that doesn't work, then they the
21:52
Speaker 1: people come down from the stands and just start shooting it.
21:55
Speaker 1: That's not true, and it's not funny. It's not funny
21:58
Speaker 1: because it's not true. And oftentimes do survive hanging on
22:02
Speaker 1: by a thread. Their lungs are punctured, so they're bleeding,
22:06
Speaker 1: like drowning in their own blood and like vomiting up
22:10
Speaker 1: blood through their nose and mouth like a whale dying
22:13
Speaker 1: and flurry. Uh. And sometimes they will take it outside
22:17
Speaker 1: and skin it while it's even still alive. Yeah, that's
22:19
Speaker 1: a kind of a tradition. Um. I saw the bull
22:22
Speaker 1: after the bullfight. It was pretty sad. Um. They take
22:26
Speaker 1: the bull right outside and um they'll dress it and
22:30
Speaker 1: then sell the meat at the stadium. Um, which is
22:34
Speaker 1: customary and very strange, but that's one of the aspects
22:38
Speaker 1: of bullfighting. If you've ever wanted a bull burger and
22:41
Speaker 1: you wanted to eat it right after you saw a die,
22:44
Speaker 1: go to a bullfight in Spain. Uh, they will drag
22:49
Speaker 1: the bull out with some mules attached to chains. And UM.
22:54
Speaker 1: I don't know if the booing booing you heard, because
22:56
Speaker 1: apparently the people will boo and throw beer cans at
22:59
Speaker 1: the bull at the end. I don't know if that's
23:01
Speaker 1: what you were. It depends, So it depends. Um no, no, no, no,
23:04
Speaker 1: that's this was. They were booing the matador, the banliros,
23:09
Speaker 1: the doors, everybody. They were booing the whole country of
23:13
Speaker 1: Mexico for this. Um. Yeah they're booing everybody. No. Um,
23:17
Speaker 1: it depends on the bull. If the bull was um
23:19
Speaker 1: a woss, then I could see the fans throwing beer
23:23
Speaker 1: cans at it. There's also um that an aspect of
23:27
Speaker 1: this that cannot be denying that a bull that shows
23:30
Speaker 1: great bravery, anger, um, spirit, spunk really tries to kill
23:36
Speaker 1: the matador or the bandili arros will be very much
23:39
Speaker 1: revered by the people in the stands and gruesomely UM.
23:43
Speaker 1: They'll bring it out for a victory lap, being dragged
23:46
Speaker 1: by the mules in a circle around the arena. After
23:48
Speaker 1: it's dead, or apparently while it's still dying, people will
23:52
Speaker 1: cheer it, throw roses for it. Um. And there's a
23:56
Speaker 1: there's a a UM. There's a rule where the crowd
24:01
Speaker 1: or the manador can ask for an uh indolito, which
24:05
Speaker 1: is a reprieve for a particularly courageous bull, and the
24:09
Speaker 1: president of the of the bullfight, the referee can say, yes,
24:14
Speaker 1: I give this bull of reprieve because it's such an
24:16
Speaker 1: awesome bowl. We're gonna let it live. And the manador
24:19
Speaker 1: proceeds to um with an empty hand simulate the death blow,
24:23
Speaker 1: saying I could have killed the bull, but I like
24:25
Speaker 1: the bull so much I lobbied to get it released.
24:29
Speaker 1: That bull is taken away and UM put out the
24:32
Speaker 1: stud for the rest of its life. And there was one.
24:35
Speaker 1: It's very rare to get an indulto. Um. And there
24:39
Speaker 1: was one one bull called Manzanito in seven he got
24:45
Speaker 1: an indulto because he gored all three manadors in the
24:49
Speaker 1: plaza that day. Wow. That that that will get you
24:53
Speaker 1: off right there. You get to go stud for the
24:55
Speaker 1: rest of your life. Mr. Bull. Horses are also abused.
24:58
Speaker 1: The ones that participate, uh, their ears are stuffed with newspaper,
25:02
Speaker 1: wet newspaper. They're blindfolded, and they sever their vocal cords
25:05
Speaker 1: so they can't scream out in pain because people don't
25:08
Speaker 1: want to hear that. They don't want to scream. Yeah,
25:11
Speaker 1: people don't like that, So they sever the vocal cords.
25:13
Speaker 1: So the horses that are, you know, trembling in fear
25:18
Speaker 1: inside this ring at this bowl, don't bark out and
25:21
Speaker 1: let people know that. And if the horses are hurt,
25:24
Speaker 1: they take them out of the ring and patch them
25:26
Speaker 1: up and send them right back in there. Where are
25:28
Speaker 1: you getting this activist info all over the place? Yeah?
25:31
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, okay, I mean it's not activist info, it's
25:36
Speaker 1: how it goes down. No, it all just kind of
25:38
Speaker 1: has a certain ring to it. I'm not disputing it.
25:41
Speaker 1: I'm just saying like, yeah, well I mean coming out
25:44
Speaker 1: of my mouth, it probably sounds activist because I think
25:46
Speaker 1: it's an awful thing to do something like this. But
25:48
Speaker 1: this is the these is the facts. UM. Okay, Well
26:05
Speaker 1: in check you will love the next part wherein we
26:07
Speaker 1: talk about famous manadors. Yeah, I feel free. So uh.
26:13
Speaker 1: People have been doing this since what we said, like
26:15
Speaker 1: the eleventh century, right, Elsid was supposedly the first guy
26:19
Speaker 1: to fight a bull in a arena, UM, and since
26:24
Speaker 1: then it's it's just become huge, big business. UM. But
26:29
Speaker 1: the first real and probably only real Golden age if
26:33
Speaker 1: you call it that, bullfighting happened UM from nineteen fourteen
26:38
Speaker 1: and nine, and there were two matadors, Juan belmonte Garcia
26:44
Speaker 1: and Jose Gomez, who fought bulls under the name Joslite.
26:48
Speaker 1: Though UM had a rivalry and Um. Belmonte Garcia was
26:54
Speaker 1: actually the first guy apparently to stand still or stand
26:58
Speaker 1: his ground when he was in cape work with a bull,
27:01
Speaker 1: rather than try to run away from the bull using
27:04
Speaker 1: fancy footwork that erect style. Jsalito was his rival, and
27:10
Speaker 1: the rivalry was really going swimmingly, I guess for everybody
27:15
Speaker 1: but the bulls, until Hosalito was fatally gored Um at
27:20
Speaker 1: a match that both of them were at Garcia and
27:23
Speaker 1: Hosalito were fighting at um In and that end of
27:27
Speaker 1: the Golden age of bullfighting. You'll be happy to hear.
27:30
Speaker 1: He must have been small. Hosalito. Yeah, his name is Jose,
27:34
Speaker 1: and I think if you're Jose and they call you Hosalito,
27:36
Speaker 1: that means you're small, like add that eto to anything
27:38
Speaker 1: alito or young because he started very young. Oh yeah,
27:42
Speaker 1: maybe that's true. He started at age thirteen, um and
27:45
Speaker 1: he was only I think twenty twenty five when he
27:49
Speaker 1: died when he was gored So. Uh. Another guy who's
27:54
Speaker 1: gorgeous named Manuel Rodriguez E Sanchez. Do you think that's
27:58
Speaker 1: like the mothers and the father's names when it's two
28:01
Speaker 1: last names and there's an e in and in the middle.
28:04
Speaker 1: I don't know. I would think so. And well, Rodriguez
28:08
Speaker 1: in Sanchez. You put the Rodriguez together and the Sanchez
28:11
Speaker 1: is together and you get Manuel also known as Menolette.
28:15
Speaker 1: Maybe so. And he was gordon In. He was the
28:20
Speaker 1: top matador from nineteen forty to ninety seven, and I
28:23
Speaker 1: think is goring In the end of his being the
28:26
Speaker 1: top matador was not coincidental. I think you're probably right. Uh,
28:30
Speaker 1: should we talk about the bulls because it's very specific
28:34
Speaker 1: what kind of bulls are fighting. They're all four years old,
28:38
Speaker 1: which I didn't know. I didn't either, Um, and they
28:41
Speaker 1: are specifically bred to bull fight, and they way about
28:46
Speaker 1: thirteen hundred pounds. You want to translate that niquilos for
28:50
Speaker 1: our friends, it's five ninety kilograms, right, And um, they
28:54
Speaker 1: are bread and ranches. And this article says that they
28:57
Speaker 1: are tested for bravery and ferocity and that if you
29:01
Speaker 1: pass that test, you would become a fighting bull. Um.
29:05
Speaker 1: And that may be true sometimes, but uh, matadors like
29:09
Speaker 1: to make their money and they don't want to be gored,
29:12
Speaker 1: So the high falutin matadors will request very placid, docile
29:16
Speaker 1: bulls just to keep the show going. Is that true?
29:20
Speaker 1: Well that's what that's what I read. Okay, So have
29:24
Speaker 1: they just want to put on the show? You know,
29:26
Speaker 1: they don't want to die? Well, I'm sure they don't
29:28
Speaker 1: w want to make They want to make a few
29:30
Speaker 1: million bucks a year. Ye doing it easy too, because
29:33
Speaker 1: they get paid about a hundred grand a bullfight and
29:36
Speaker 1: they can do maybe thirty to forty or more. Yeah,
29:39
Speaker 1: I know the um oh the guy Bell monteh he
29:45
Speaker 1: had a record hundred and nine bullfights in It's a lot.
29:49
Speaker 1: It's like in Rocky three when he was fighting all
29:51
Speaker 1: the chumps just for a pay day. Oh yeah, he
29:53
Speaker 1: didn't want any real challenge. But ultimately he did want
29:56
Speaker 1: a real challenge because he fights. He fought Draco, well,
30:00
Speaker 1: he fought cluver Lang and three and three it was
30:03
Speaker 1: the Russian. Oh no, no, ye. Three was clever Lane. No. Yeah.
30:08
Speaker 1: The first two were Apollo, the third was cluver Lane,
30:11
Speaker 1: the fourth was the Russian. I thought that he was uh,
30:15
Speaker 1: Tommy Morrison. And then the sixth was when he came
30:18
Speaker 1: back as a trainer, huh. And the seventh was him
30:23
Speaker 1: enjoying a nice sandwich for two hours. No, Rocky three
30:26
Speaker 1: was definitely clever Lane, because that was my favorite one
30:29
Speaker 1: until I got older and I realized that the first
30:31
Speaker 1: one was actually the better one. You know. I thought
30:34
Speaker 1: that I would think that too, and then I went
30:37
Speaker 1: back and watched it as an adult, and I'm like,
30:39
Speaker 1: I mean, it's pretty good, but oh man, I loved it.
30:41
Speaker 1: There's just too much character development in it for a
30:44
Speaker 1: Rocky movie. Well, it was a love story it wasn't
30:46
Speaker 1: even a boxing movie. Wrong with you, I understand, but
30:49
Speaker 1: it was a love story starring and written and directed
30:51
Speaker 1: by Sylvester Stallone. That's right, all right. Back to the bulls.
30:57
Speaker 1: Bulls are never exposed to more than one fight. Yes,
31:00
Speaker 1: apparently they have very good memories, so they learn how
31:03
Speaker 1: to out dual the the matador in their in their cape.
31:08
Speaker 1: So that's why they don't bite them twice. And the
31:09
Speaker 1: guys who test their ferocity for I guess the ones
31:12
Speaker 1: that are tested, those are done on horseback, so that
31:15
Speaker 1: the bull is not like, oh I remember those capes.
31:18
Speaker 1: I'm gonna get you. I associate you with laxatives. Well,
31:23
Speaker 1: even this article says that they they alter bulls to
31:26
Speaker 1: make them easier to fight. But this is what I'm saying.
31:29
Speaker 1: It's so um it's a very participatory sport for spectators. Um. So,
31:35
Speaker 1: like you can ask for an indolito, you can also
31:38
Speaker 1: challenge or charge uh somebody with fighting an altered bull,
31:43
Speaker 1: one that's overfed and too fat and slow, one whose
31:46
Speaker 1: horns have been altered, because apparently the tips of the
31:49
Speaker 1: horns of a bull are very much like a cat's whiskers,
31:52
Speaker 1: and if you remove that the bull is not going
31:55
Speaker 1: to have a very good sense of kinetics and Willever
31:57
Speaker 1: hit the matador. If the crowd thinks that your career
32:02
Speaker 1: is like over pal, that's why I don't think it's
32:04
Speaker 1: quite as widespread either that or else. Um, bullfighting crowds
32:09
Speaker 1: have become complacent. Well, I think that's definitely true. Yeah. Well,
32:12
Speaker 1: because it's tourists they don't know how to spot a
32:16
Speaker 1: fat bull. Well, then that very well may be the case.
32:19
Speaker 1: And they also apparently the way they stabbed them and
32:21
Speaker 1: where they stabbed them, they do so in order to
32:25
Speaker 1: make sure they charge straight instead of like I've got
32:29
Speaker 1: a bad left leg, all of a sudden, I'm gonna
32:31
Speaker 1: be going left all day or right all day. Yeah. So, Chuck,
32:37
Speaker 1: we mentioned that you can make a pretty decent living
32:39
Speaker 1: doing bull fights, but you also mentioned, um that there's
32:45
Speaker 1: there may be the death of bull fighting as it were.
32:49
Speaker 1: Do you think that's really true. I mean, seriously, people
32:51
Speaker 1: have been doing this since the fourth century, and now
32:53
Speaker 1: all of a sudden, just because of a bad economy
32:57
Speaker 1: and animal activism, bull fight is going down. It's starting
33:01
Speaker 1: to where's the evidence. Well, the polls that the popular
33:06
Speaker 1: sentiment is changing in Spain over the past fifteen years
33:09
Speaker 1: is one. UM. Catalonia is the first region in mainland
33:14
Speaker 1: Spain to actually ban it in Barcelonas in Catalonia. Yeah,
33:18
Speaker 1: which is big because Barcelona had not one, not two,
33:21
Speaker 1: but three bullfighting arenas, that's right, and that took effects.
33:26
Speaker 1: That took effect. Actually just this year, on January one,
33:29
Speaker 1: they said, like, let's finish out the two thousand eleven
33:31
Speaker 1: season and then we'll ban it shouting from that point.
33:34
Speaker 1: They had the last one at UH in September. I
33:37
Speaker 1: think September two thousand eleven was the last one ever
33:40
Speaker 1: was UM. But that's a huge deal. But even in
33:45
Speaker 1: Spain they're kind of like the snooty Catalans, like they
33:49
Speaker 1: don't they don't enjoy bullfighting. I think that's made some
33:52
Speaker 1: quarters of Spain even more fiercely proud of it. Yeah,
33:55
Speaker 1: probably so, like Madrid apparently is still very proud of
33:58
Speaker 1: their bullfighting it UH. In two thousand ten, one of
34:02
Speaker 1: the state television stations said, we are going to ban
34:06
Speaker 1: coverage live coverage of it because kids can watch this
34:09
Speaker 1: on tv UM. They happen in the hours, in the
34:12
Speaker 1: early afternoon hours, in early evening, so they won't broadcast
34:15
Speaker 1: until after ten pm. Now right, well, there's a there's
34:18
Speaker 1: a law that says you can't show animal cruelty on
34:22
Speaker 1: Spanish television until after ten pm because of children, And
34:27
Speaker 1: so that's effectively banned, right, showing bullfighting in Spain. Um,
34:31
Speaker 1: which is a huge blow to it. Um, I guess
34:34
Speaker 1: economically or financially, because I mean think about how many
34:38
Speaker 1: how much money comes from television deals and sponsorships, if
34:41
Speaker 1: you can get rid of it on TV, like, that's that. Yeah,
34:44
Speaker 1: that's true. And then there's also, Um, they've shown that
34:48
Speaker 1: there's evidence that government, that the federal government of Spain
34:52
Speaker 1: is pretty much what's propping up bull fighting these days,
34:55
Speaker 1: because um, there were what it went from a thousand
34:58
Speaker 1: bull fights in two thousand eight to eight hundred and
35:01
Speaker 1: two in Spain, and um, that two hundred was almost exclusively, um,
35:07
Speaker 1: the result of cuts and government subsidies to small towns
35:10
Speaker 1: that can't afford to put on a bullfight. And so
35:13
Speaker 1: that means that, yeah, the government's holding the whole thing up. Yeah.
35:16
Speaker 1: I read a couple of interesting articles today. One of
35:18
Speaker 1: them was from a veterinarian. Uh, and they have vets
35:22
Speaker 1: at the bullfight. Um on staff, I guess uh. And
35:28
Speaker 1: this vet went on record as saying they did all
35:31
Speaker 1: this testing of like adrenaline and or adrenaline and all
35:34
Speaker 1: these different uh chemicals in the body on these bulls
35:39
Speaker 1: that had just survived, ones that were dead ones before
35:42
Speaker 1: they went in and basically to prove that the bull
35:45
Speaker 1: suffers a great deal because there's this misguided notion that
35:50
Speaker 1: the bull doesn't suffer because they're this magical creature. I
35:54
Speaker 1: saw this one interview with a Bandaliro and he said
35:58
Speaker 1: that a vetinary in this translate obviously, but he said,
36:01
Speaker 1: a veterinarian told me that the bulls have a special
36:04
Speaker 1: cell in their body that prevents it from suffering and
36:07
Speaker 1: feeling pain. It's not true. Oh are you sure? Yeah,
36:13
Speaker 1: there's no special cell that that keeps them from feeling pain.
36:16
Speaker 1: Well that's a that's a larger debate too. I mean, like,
36:18
Speaker 1: I believe bulls can suffer. But you know, um, if
36:22
Speaker 1: you've read David Foster, Wallace is considered the lobster. Can
36:25
Speaker 1: a lobster suffer is no susception is the perception, the
36:29
Speaker 1: physical feeling of pain is that the same thing is suffering.
36:33
Speaker 1: Now we've shown it's not remembering our happiness audiobook. We
36:36
Speaker 1: talked about the difference between experiencing physical pain and experiencing suffering.
36:40
Speaker 1: Right now, they actually utilize different parts of the brain.
36:43
Speaker 1: So if there's no suffering, is inflicting pain on something
36:47
Speaker 1: e g. Cooking it um? Is that cruel? It's a
36:52
Speaker 1: good point, it is, But I think bulls experienced suffering.
36:55
Speaker 1: It's especially if they go through what you describe. Yeah,
36:58
Speaker 1: and if you're against bull fighting and you want to
37:01
Speaker 1: do something, you can email the or mail the embassies
37:05
Speaker 1: of these countries that still participate and tell them that, hey,
37:09
Speaker 1: I'm not going to visit your country. I'm not gonna
37:10
Speaker 1: spend my money there. If you're still going to endorse this,
37:14
Speaker 1: it's a small thing you can do. Can you mail
37:16
Speaker 1: me some wine because I can't make it over there?
37:19
Speaker 1: Some temper and neo uh And I just I'm gonna
37:24
Speaker 1: go on record as saying this whole thing that it's
37:26
Speaker 1: a it's part of the culture is just crap. Well,
37:29
Speaker 1: the the Spanish federal government would disagree with you because
37:33
Speaker 1: in two doesn't tend. And what a lot of people
37:34
Speaker 1: see as a response to um, the Catalonia ban Um
37:38
Speaker 1: the Spanish government transferred jurisdiction over bullfighting from the Interior
37:43
Speaker 1: Ministry to the Cultural Ministry, so as an attempt to
37:47
Speaker 1: keep it from being banned. It's gonna be uh, it'll
37:50
Speaker 1: be a tough fault one. But yeah, apparently even Mexico
37:53
Speaker 1: now is entertaining the idea of banning it. You know
37:56
Speaker 1: some other things that were defended as culture, genital mutilation
38:01
Speaker 1: on females, witch burning, bear baiting. You ever heard of that? Um? No.
38:08
Speaker 1: Bear baiting was popular in England up until the eighteenth century.
38:11
Speaker 1: That is, when you take a bear like a you know,
38:15
Speaker 1: grizzly bear or brown bear, like a clown well not
38:18
Speaker 1: far off, You put it in a pit and chain
38:21
Speaker 1: it to a steak and release dogs on it, and
38:24
Speaker 1: the dogs kill the bear, or the bear kills some
38:27
Speaker 1: of the dogs, so they release more dogs, and people
38:29
Speaker 1: sit around and gamble on is the bear gonna get
38:32
Speaker 1: eaten first or the dog's gonna get killed first? And uh,
38:37
Speaker 1: it's blood sport. And I think this is the same thing.
38:39
Speaker 1: You know. Um, that's where bulldogs came from, and that's
38:41
Speaker 1: where they got their name from. It's called bull baiting,
38:44
Speaker 1: and bulldogs used to not even come close to resembling
38:47
Speaker 1: what they do now. They were actually bred to be
38:51
Speaker 1: less vicious um by making them slower and dumber and
38:55
Speaker 1: more cuddly and dumber but more cuddly um. And that's
38:59
Speaker 1: how we have the modern budocks now. But they evolved
39:01
Speaker 1: from basically uh, in the nineteenth century bulldogs. Where we're
39:06
Speaker 1: where um pitple breed is now where there are a
39:09
Speaker 1: lot of people being like, we just need to wipe
39:11
Speaker 1: this breed off the face of the planet. It's gone
39:13
Speaker 1: out of control. They're crazy. Everybody scared them. They're killing people. Um.
39:18
Speaker 1: And then they managed to breed the meanness out of them.
39:21
Speaker 1: But bull bull baiting too. Bull baiting bulls just have
39:24
Speaker 1: been taken it well. Embarbating actually still happens in Pakistan
39:31
Speaker 1: and it's uh, it's horrific. So two from me to
39:35
Speaker 1: you people of Spain, Mexico, France, Uh, ritualized killing of
39:41
Speaker 1: animals for people to pay for and watch is a
39:44
Speaker 1: little outdated and just silly and cruel, and I say
39:49
Speaker 1: please stop, from from Chuck to you, from me to you.
39:53
Speaker 1: And one more thing. The whole notion of culture isn't
39:57
Speaker 1: that supposedly to advance your civilization. And isn't that supposed
40:02
Speaker 1: to mean like positive things like culture? I mean, what
40:06
Speaker 1: brings people together more than the ritual is killing down
40:09
Speaker 1: here and watching watching bull fight. All right, I'm done,
40:22
Speaker 1: um off soapbox. So how do you feel about bullfighting personally?
40:38
Speaker 1: I think it's great. If you want to learn more
40:41
Speaker 1: about bull fighting UM or Chuck's views on it, you
40:45
Speaker 1: can type in Chuck or bull fighting in the search
40:50
Speaker 1: bar at how stuff works dot com. Uh, And I
40:52
Speaker 1: said search bar, which means it is time for listener mail.
40:57
Speaker 1: We're very riled up listener mail. That's right, this is calm.
41:00
Speaker 1: I'm gonna call this. Uh. Illustrator wrote us about the
41:04
Speaker 1: comics episode Guys, I'm in currently an illustrator. Uh. Does
41:09
Speaker 1: he not have much hope for his future in that field? No?
41:12
Speaker 1: I think he does, Um, I felt because he does
41:14
Speaker 1: like a digital illustration team. UM. I found your podcast
41:18
Speaker 1: when I was hip deep in art school at the
41:20
Speaker 1: Art Institute of Boston. But there are only so many
41:23
Speaker 1: times I could listen to the same old Our Lady
41:25
Speaker 1: Peace songs on repeat from that group. No, he had
41:28
Speaker 1: like one song, Oh I can't remember I dug it.
41:34
Speaker 1: This song actually I got the CD because of that song. Man,
41:37
Speaker 1: I used to fall for that. When I was like,
41:39
Speaker 1: well fourteen, you just be like, that's the only good
41:42
Speaker 1: song on the whole CD before the Kiss single. Yeah. Um.
41:47
Speaker 1: I'm now a professional illustrator, but I also teach art
41:50
Speaker 1: at A I B. And I was able to live
41:52
Speaker 1: a mini dream when my higher ups approached me about
41:55
Speaker 1: teaching a comic book class. So he was pretty stoked
41:58
Speaker 1: about this um on the comics. And this is just
42:01
Speaker 1: some things he pointed out on the comics code of
42:03
Speaker 1: authority you guys talked about. World War Two was long
42:05
Speaker 1: over and the new round of superheroes Spiderman, Fantastic Four
42:09
Speaker 1: had yet to emerge from the minds of Lee Kirbean Ditko.
42:13
Speaker 1: As a result, comics were merely treading water and chasing
42:17
Speaker 1: from fad to fad, westerns to romance to eventually horror
42:21
Speaker 1: horror comics or what really started to worry everyone, so
42:24
Speaker 1: they began to put pressure on companies like EC, who
42:27
Speaker 1: had made their names in over the top horror. In turn,
42:30
Speaker 1: EC basically jettison at Steak in horror comics and latched
42:34
Speaker 1: onto a little humor comic uh Mad, which we talked about.
42:38
Speaker 1: It was like UM Stories Guaranteed to Drive you Mad,
42:42
Speaker 1: exactly the original but to this point, Mad was published
42:45
Speaker 1: basically as a comic book. In essence, EC was looking
42:48
Speaker 1: to hedge its bets, so it relaunched Mad as a
42:51
Speaker 1: magazine UM, which is very different distinction because it all
42:54
Speaker 1: of a sudden wasn't under the code of authority. Uh In,
42:59
Speaker 1: we were blessed with a very first MAD magazine, a
43:01
Speaker 1: very calculated move since they were not heavily scrutinized like
43:04
Speaker 1: comics and they didn't have to worry about the comics code,
43:07
Speaker 1: and it's very smart. It is UM. I hope to
43:10
Speaker 1: make it big as a comics illustrator in children's book
43:13
Speaker 1: illustrator who says I can't do both. I also thought
43:16
Speaker 1: you might like to know that you're keeping me company
43:18
Speaker 1: during these long hours chasing the dream and this dude
43:21
Speaker 1: stuff is awesome And if you want to hire Greg Marathus,
43:27
Speaker 1: you can get in touch with him at the Greg
43:29
Speaker 1: Marathas Studio, which is g R E G M A
43:34
Speaker 1: R A T h A s dot com or Rita's
43:37
Speaker 1: blog Greg Marathus dot blog spot dot com. Stuff is
43:42
Speaker 1: very cool. I told him I'd keep them in mind
43:43
Speaker 1: if we ever needed drawings. We could use some drawings.
43:46
Speaker 1: We need some Facebook timeline drawings. If he's holling to
43:50
Speaker 1: work for free, can it? Did we remember? We um
43:53
Speaker 1: we got chastise biographic designer for holding that T shirt contest. Yeah,
43:59
Speaker 1: I emailed him back act it dissas calm them down.
44:02
Speaker 1: Uh yeah, I was like, you know, most of these
44:05
Speaker 1: were amateur designers. There was some pros in there, but
44:08
Speaker 1: there was something in mind. And it's not like we've
44:10
Speaker 1: forced anybody to do with but there's a whole there's
44:13
Speaker 1: a whole movement um from designers about design contests being awful.
44:18
Speaker 1: Like what other industry basically asked for free work as
44:21
Speaker 1: a contest quote unquote there's like fiction contests. Yeah, there's
44:25
Speaker 1: all kinds of box Derby's. Yeah, there's a lot of
44:28
Speaker 1: stuff that people do for free as part of a contest,
44:31
Speaker 1: bake offs or bakes off. I'm sorry. And I saw
44:35
Speaker 1: some designers that say I don't agree with that contests
44:38
Speaker 1: make me better. And if you don't, that's a ridiculous idea.
44:42
Speaker 1: Architecture as a field has been in contest mode for
44:48
Speaker 1: a century more and like, yeah, that's there's a lot
44:52
Speaker 1: of work put into it, and there's a lot of
44:54
Speaker 1: work put into graphic design. Contests are everywhere. I think
44:56
Speaker 1: that's a ridiculous stance. Well, his point was, because he
44:59
Speaker 1: mailed me back in he was like, well, find the
45:01
Speaker 1: contest is fine, but you should give them a cut
45:04
Speaker 1: of the T shirt sales. I don't disagree with that. Well,
45:06
Speaker 1: I know, but we had no choice. Well, no, we're
45:08
Speaker 1: in no position whatsoever to share it. I told him, dude,
45:11
Speaker 1: if it was up to me, they would get of
45:12
Speaker 1: the T shirt sales. I don't know about that. Well,
45:15
Speaker 1: we don't get any well, I know, but still we could.
45:18
Speaker 1: If we couldn't negotiate on their behalf, we would work
45:21
Speaker 1: a little bit in for us to man, what a
45:23
Speaker 1: volatile episode right to the end. Yeah, so I guess
45:26
Speaker 1: if you want to express your volatility UM toward us,
45:29
Speaker 1: that's cool. We can handle it. We've been taken it
45:31
Speaker 1: for years. You can tweet to us at s Y
45:34
Speaker 1: s K podcast. You can send us stuff on Facebook,
45:38
Speaker 1: including Facebook art for the timeline UM at Facebook dot
45:43
Speaker 1: com slash stuff. You should know. You can also email
45:45
Speaker 1: us at Stuff podcast at Discovery dot com. Be sure
45:54
Speaker 1: to check out our new video podcast, Stuff from the Future.
45:57
Speaker 1: Join how Stuffwork staff as we explore them A promising
46:00
Speaker 1: and perplexing possibilities of tomorrow