Bullfighter sparks uproar in Spain over image with five-month-old daughter but responds: ‘There is no safer place for her’

There are everyday parenting dilemmas, and then there is this one: when fighting a large, wounded bull in a ring, is it appropriate to carry your five-month-old daughter in your arms?

That question is at the centre of a spirited debate in Spain, where one of the country’s most famous bullfighters has come under fire after posting a photograph of himself doing just that.

Francisco Rivera Ordóñez captioned the photo, posted on his Instagram feed, “Carmen’s debut”. But following widespread criticism from animal rights groups and public figures, the child protection agency in his native Andalucía has confirmed it is investigating whether he has broken any laws.

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“It isn’t right in any circumstances to put a child at risk,” said Alfonso Alonso, the acting minister of social security. Rivera was also criticised by María José Sánchez, the equality minister, who said: “A fireman wouldn’t dream of taking a child to put out a fire nor would a football player run around with a child in their arms during a match.”

Rivera insists he did not put his daughter at risk, saying: “There is no safer place for her to be than in my arms. This is Carmen’s debut, the fifth bullfighting generation in my family. My grandfather did the same with my father, my father with me and me with my daughter Cayetana, and now Carmen.”

But appealing to his own family history may not offer the most obvious proof of bullfighting’s safety. His father, the famous torero Francisco Rivera Pérez, known as “Paquirri”, was fatally gored by a bull in 1984 at the age of 36, while Rivera himself underwent life-saving surgery last year after he was gored in the stomach during a fight.

The animal rights group PACMA described his actions as shameful and said it was not the way to teach children respect for animals. There was also widespread criticism on social media in Spain and abroad.

“Beautiful image of Fran Rivera taking his daughter to ‘work’ with the torture of innocent animals,” wrote one Twitter user. “If I were your wife, I would kill you,” commented another.

The comedian and animal rights campaigner Ricky Gervais said the picture was “dangerous and cruel. With or without the baby”.

But Rivera was defended by his fellow bullfighters, who took to social media to post photographs of themselves also holding their children in the ring. “What’s the problem in showing our children a profession that we love and is filled with values?” wrote Manuel Díaz, known as “El Cordobés”, alongside a picture of him carrying his young daughter.

“With my nephew, in support of @Paquirri74 [Rivera] in respect of our life … our values …” wrote Alvaro Oliver.

A third, Andres Sanchez, posted an image of himself with a bull and a small boy in his arms, saying: “With the support of my partner Elisabet Piñero sending my support to @Paquirri74 with this photo taken three days ago with Rodrigo.”

Bullfighting remains an important cultural tradition for many Spaniards but it has attracted increasing criticism in recent years, with many seeing it as a cruel anachronism divorced from the country’s current economic reality.

In November, a petition signed by more than 430,000 people was delivered to Spain’s ministry of education protesting at plans by the conservative government to introduce a two-year bullfighting course in state schools for students aged 15-17.

“They want to perpetuate a tradition that is in decline … by teaching 15-year-old children to torture animals, making a mockery of the already damaged reputation of the Spanish education system,” wrote Carlos Moya Velázquez, the petition’s founder.

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The ruling People’s party has long been an ally to bullfighting, and in 2013 it took the first steps towards having it classified a key part of the country’s cultural heritage, as figures showed the pastime was undergoing a historic decline.

Rivera comes from a long line of bullfighters – aside from his father, his maternal grandfather, Antonio Ordóñez, was idolised by Hemingway and was the subject of his book The Dangerous Summer, while his great-grandfather, great uncle, brother and cousin were or are fighters.

His first wife, Eugenia Martínez de Irujo, with whom he has an older daughter, is Duchess of Montoro and the daughter of the late Duchess of Alba, a colourful figure who was the world’s most titled aristocrat, according to the Guinness Book of Records. Carmen, the baby in the photograph, is the daughter of his second wife, Lourdes Beatriz Montes Parejo.

There was an outcry among his fellow bullfighters when in 2009 Rivera was awarded a fine arts medal by the ministry of culture, which praised his “more aesthetic, poised and deep” technique. A number of his fellow fighters returned their medals to the ministry in protest, saying the ministry had “degraded the notion of bullfighting as an art”.

Speaking to the New York Times at the time, Vicente Zabala de la Serna, a bullfighting critic for the newspaper ABC, said: “Rivera’s faced a lot of bulls, and for that he deserves credit. But he’s boring to watch; he has no aesthetic merit.”







