As the summer approaches, so does the annual outcry against the infamous “Yulin Dog Meat Festival”, an annual celebration in Yulin, China, where festival goers try dog meat, lychees, and other foods. Year after year, animal welfare advocates lead the charge against the Festival, promoting petitions to try to ban it, citing the unethical treatment of animals and the consumption of dog meat as reasons for why the Festival should be banned. Despite the public condemnation of the Festival, however, preparations for the 2016 Festival are already underway, and so are the double standards at play.
Although the cruelty of the trade and the unethical treatment of the dogs at Yulin should be condemned, much of the public outcry in America is directed at the Chinese cultural consumption of dog meat. These Americans protesting are the same ones that consume millions of pounds of beef, pork, and chicken a year. Opposing the Chinese for eating dog when the vast majority of the protesters eat other meats as well is hypocrisy – eating dog is no different from eating pig or cow. Domestication of the dog means many people have developed emotional ties with dogs, but this connection is no grounds with which to consider the consumption of dog as a morally inferior act.
Those condemning the consumption of dog as worse than the consumption of pig or cow claim that since dogs are complex, social animals, they are more important animals and thus should be unfit for consumption. However, scientific evidence disproves this. Pigs and dogs are similar when it comes to loyalty and intelligence, traits by which dogs are prized. Many studies show that pigs demonstrate higher levels of intelligence than do dogs. Even chickens, which are seen as bird-brained creatures, display complex social connections and familial relations with other chickens that merit them as much grounds from human consumption as do dogs.
Biology aside, dog owners argue that since dogs are special “companions” and “pets” of people, they should be spared. Former FIFA President Sepp Blatter is one of these people, condemning South Korea for eating “the best friend of humankind” and pushing FIFA to ban the consumption of dogs in all its facilities. But this logic that the value of an animal depends on its relationship with humans is fundamentally flawed. Does that mean since mankind deigns one animal more suitable for domestication than another, its life is automatically worth more? That would mean the value of an animal’s life is determined by another species, a factor completely beyond its control. And why is eating a dog seen as “immoral” when eating other animals deprives them of their lives in the same way?
The American criticism of this Chinese festival is hypocritical on many other levels as well. In America, where dog owners spend upwards of $60 billion on their pets every year according to the American Pet Products Association, dogs are prized and pampered. Yet many ignore the other side of this industry - that, according to the ASPCA, 1.2 million dogs are euthanized in the United States alone, strays put out on the street, unable to find a place to live. Is putting dogs to death by euthanasia really any better than eating them? Both mean a quick death, with the Chinese situation providing more utility as well as being on a much smaller scale than the massive euthanizations conducted in the United States.
There also appears to be bias and cultural supremacy permeating the rhetoric of those opposing the festival. The online petition features some heavy rhetoric, claiming that the festival “increases the abduction of strays”. However, the capture of strays for consumption only changes their fate from euthanization to consumption. Neither is much better than the other, and there is no evidence to suggest the festival actually increases the abduction of strays. Furthermore, the petition also portrays the festival as one where dogs are “skinned alive and eaten”, a dubious claim unsupported by evidence. From a practical point of view, it would make much more sense for the cooks to kill the dogs before skinning them alive, given the difficulty of skinning a live animal. As Julian Baggini from the Guardian puts it best, “is there not a whiff of orientalism here: a too-quick readiness to believe that the Chinese behave barbarously?”
Nowadays, it is all too easy to jump on the latest trends without much forethought, and the outcry against the Yulin Dog Festival is no different. Celebrities from all over the globe have condemned the festival as well as the cultural consumption of dogs. But before you sign the petition too, consider the cultural differences as well as why eating dogs is really any worse than eating pigs, cows, or even chickens. Does simply practicing a different norm make a culture’s practices worse, or immoral? And does an animal’s life become worth more when humans domesticate it and deem it suitable for captivity? Answering these questions is no easy task, but addressing them is a crucial step in helping to decrease the blind bigotry evident in the protests against the Yulin Dog Festival, and the consumption of dogs in general.
