【567期 英語時間】Does the colour red make bulls angry?
發佈時間：00:00 2021-04-08
Bullfighting is a famous national sport in Spain （西班牙）. If you have ever watched it on TV or on YouTube, you may have noticed that the bullfighter – called a matador – would use a red cape to make the bull angry, causing it to attack him. We have therefore been told often that the colour red makes bulls angry. People are even told not to stand near a bull while wearing red; otherwise, they will be attacked by it. However, this is simply wrong!
First of all, bulls, like any kind of cattle, are redgreen colour blind, which means that they cannot tell the difference between red and green. In other words, they would not get angry when seeing the colour red, simply because they do not know that it is red!
Why then do the bulls get angry when matadors wave their red capes? The reason is simple – it is not because of the red colour, but the action of waving! When the bulls see something moving, they will get angry and then attack. You may also ask why the bulls get angry so easily at waving capes? The reason is that they are a special kind of bull trained to get angry and excited when something is moving or being waved.
One last question you may ask: why then are the capes red in colour? The answer is: tradition. Many years ago, people used red capes, and the colour has not been changed ever since.
Vocabulary
bullfighting (n) 鬥牛
matador (n) 鬥牛士
cape (n) 披風
colour blind (adj phr)色盲的
wave (v) 揮動
tradition (n) 傳統
