The ABC, our national broadcaster, on whom Australians have relied for generations for quality journalism, is failing rodeo animals in a big way.
ABC News, 7.30 and Landline have all in the last week run an eight and a half minute segment featuring a couple who breed bucking bulls. The segment is seriously misleading and fails to meet the most fundamental requirement of good journalism: research and balance.
Firstly, the reporter never asks the basic question: why are these animals bucking? They only do it when they have a person or other weight on their back, and, because they perceive the weight as a threat, they try everything they can to remove it. Cattle are prey animals, and the behaviour they demonstrate in riding events is a stress response to what they see as a serious threat to their safety.
Other claims, such as those about the rodeo industry being "heavily scrutinised" and that owners and riders would do nothing to hurt their animals, border on the farcical.
In NSW, the Code of Practice referred to in the program has never been updated in its 36 years of existence. Recommendations to try and mandate the presence of a vet at each rodeo event have been repeatedly resisted by the industry, and to this day no vet is required to be present, unlike the situation with horse racing.
The ABC program gave one minute and 35 seconds to Dr Di Evans, RSPCA Australia's Senior Scientific Officer; the rest was effectively a promotional piece designed to imply that bull riding is not cruel and that no harm is being done to the animals involved. Science has demonstrated that the opposite is the case.
You can protest to the ABC here: ABC Contact Details
You can also help the animals subject to this abuse by contacting the relevant NSW Minister and telling her that the special exemption from animal cruelty laws that currently applies to rodeos must end. You can contact the Minister here:
The photo above is courtesy of dedicated volunteers at Animal Liberation Queensland. Hands up everyone who thinks that poor bull is enjoying being ridden.
Only the voice of the people, loudly and repeatedly heard by politicians, will end this cruelty. Please make sure your voice is among them.
Thank you.