South Korea Passes Bill to Ban Consumption of Dog Meat

[Debater Slayer]

The South Korean parliament has passed a bill to ban the consumption and trade of dog meat:

SEOUL, Jan 9 (Reuters) - South Korea's parliament passed a bill on Tuesday to ban the eating and selling of dog meat, a move that will end the controversial centuries-old practice amid growing support for animal welfare.

Eating dog meat was once seen as a way to improve stamina in the humid Korean summer. But the practise has become rare - largely limited to some older people and specific restaurants - as more Koreans consider dogs as family pets and as criticism of how the dogs are slaughtered has grown.

South Korea passes bill to ban consumption of dog meat

A great step, and the fact that it has largely been the result of popular rejection of the practice certainly challenges the anti-Asian stereotypes that allege that most or all Asians "eat dogs" or don't respect animals.

 

[Secret Chief]

Weird , I was only reading about this yesterday. It seems the 14% that still eat dog meat are mostly over 70.
It's great, but from my reading it's taken a hell of a long time to get here. There are still dog farms.

 

[Debater Slayer]

Weird , I was only reading about this yesterday. It seems the 14% that still eat dog meat are mostly over 70.
It's great, but from my reading it's taken a hell of a long time to get here. There are still dog farms.

Some cultural changes take decades, and the article mentions that the practice is centuries old. I'm not surprised that it has taken this long for a ban to be put into place, although of course it would have been better for it to happen earlier.

 

[Revoltingest]

A great step....

Why?
Is it wrong to eat one animal, but OK to eat
others, eg, cows, pigs, rabbits?
All I see is that cultures change, sometimes
for the better, sometimes for the worse, &
in this case, just for the neutral.

Sorry about the last one,
@Dan From Smithville.

 

[Debater Slayer]

Why?
Is it wrong to eat one animal,
but OK to eat others, eg, cows,
pigs, rabbits?

From a purely ethical perspective, I generally find vegetarianism more defensible than eating any of the above, and I'm saying this as someone who hasn't found it easy at all to try adopting vegetarianism. Still, dogs have evolved as companions of humans over thousands of years, so while I think industrial farms for those other animals are also riddled with terrible practices, I think keeping dogs in commercial farms is especially conducive to suffering.

 

[Revoltingest]

From a purely ethical perspective, I generally find vegetarianism more defensible than eating any of the above, and I'm saying this as someone who hasn't found it easy at all to try adopting vegetarianism. Still, dogs have evolved as companions of humans over thousands of years, so while I think industrial farms for those other animals are also riddled with terrible practices, I think keeping dogs in commercial farms is especially conducive to suffering.

That's how you feel.
But fundamentally, why spare dogs from
this suffering, but not other cute animals?

5 Farm Animals That Are Probably Smarter Than Your Dog

If you knew that farm animals were as intelligent as your children or pets, would you stop eating meat? If you answered "yes," - it might be time to do so.

www.onegreenplanet.org

I still see this as merely a culture changing
to spare one animal at the expense of others.
Hardly a positive development...just a development.

 

[Augustus]

An interesting ethical question:

Is it better to be bred as an animal for human consumption (assuming reasonably good treatment for lifespan) or to have never existed?

 

[Dan From Smithville]

Why?
Is it wrong to eat one animal, but OK to eat
others, eg, cows, pigs, rabbits?
All I see is that cultures change, sometimes
for the better, sometimes for the worse, &
in this case, just for the neutral.

Sorry about the last one,
@Dan From Smithville.

I can think of practical reasons for the eating an animal or not. Availability, accessibility, palatability, necessity and cultural practice.

Other carnivores and omnivores don't wrestle with ethics when they are hungry. That is why you don't keep your pet lion or boa constrictor in the nursery.

It is a personal and cultural practice to intentionally restrict a human diet to plants only. There are certainly benefits for that, but we are omnivores. We eat living things in order to continue living. Whether plants, animals or fungi. I personally find it interesting that plants and fungi are ok, when animals are not for some. What are they going to do if plants and mushrooms evolve into sentient forms?

That's OK @Revoltingest. We're delicious. Rabbits know the "baby" model and have evolved to be cute in defense. We know that doesn't stop everyone.

 

[Debater Slayer]

That's how you feel.
But fundamentally, why spare dogs from
this suffering, but not other cute animals?

5 Farm Animals That Are Probably Smarter Than Your Dog

If you knew that farm animals were as intelligent as your children or pets, would you stop eating meat? If you answered "yes," - it might be time to do so.

www.onegreenplanet.org

I still see this as merely a culture changing
to spare one animal at the expense of others.
Hardly a positive development...just a development.

It's a good question. Squids and octopi are extremely intelligent and capable of experiencing suffering, for example, but I suspect that cultural norms are the main reason eating them is not nearly as frowned upon as eating dogs.

I'm not denying that there's an inconsistent and cultural element to many perceptions of which animals should or shouldn't be okay to eat, but one fewer animal species suffering is one fewer animal species suffering. I won't complain about it.

 

[Revoltingest]

It's a good question. Squids and octopi are extremely intelligent and capable of experiencing suffering, for example, but I suspect that cultural norms are the main reason eating them is not nearly as frowned upon as eating dogs.

I'm not denying that there's an inconsistent and cultural element to many perceptions of which animals should or shouldn't be okay to eat, but one fewer animal species suffering is one fewer animal species suffering. I won't complain about it.

It's just neither good nor bad.
Merely what it is.

 

[Debater Slayer]

An interesting ethical question:

Is it better to be bred as an animal for human consumption (assuming reasonably good treatment for lifespan) or to have never existed?

I don't see any answer to this that wouldn't ultimately be a subjective judgment. That said, if a species would be extinct without human breeding, I think a solid case could be made for preferability of breeding it.

On the other hand, if a species isn't at risk of extinction and we can survive just fine without breeding it for our consumption, I don't see any purely ethical downside to not breeding more of it for human consumption. An individual animal that has never existed doesn't even have the capacity to regret or suffer due to its lack of existence, after all.

 

[Secret Chief]

From a purely ethical perspective, I generally find vegetarianism more defensible than eating any of the above, and I'm saying this as someone who hasn't found it easy at all to try adopting vegetarianism. Still, dogs have evolved as companions of humans over thousands of years, so while I think industrial farms for those other animals are also riddled with terrible practices, I think keeping dogs in commercial farms is especially conducive to suffering.

There has long been a practice in some (yes, Asian) countries of torturing dogs at their death because this is good for the manly consumer to become even more manly once he's eaten the more tasty flesh.

 

[Dan From Smithville]

An interesting ethical question:

Is it better to be bred as an animal for human consumption (assuming reasonably good treatment for lifespan) or to have never existed?

Based on population size and continued existence, some of the most successful species are animals and plants people like.

Edit: Or species that can thrive in co-existence that we don't pay much attention to. House sparrows for instance.

 

[Debater Slayer]

Based on population size and continued existence, some of the most successful species are animals and plants people like.

There are over 34 billion chickens in the world. Sometimes I wonder whether the species would survive if humans didn't have such a vested interest in breeding it.

 

[Debater Slayer]

There has long been a practice in some (yes, Asian) countries of torturing dogs at their death because this is good for the manly consumer to become even more manly once he's eaten the more tasty flesh.

I don't think most people would support torturing any animal, be it a dog or otherwise. I took @Revoltingest's point to merely be about eating different species of animals.

 

[Dan From Smithville]

Personally, I couldn't eat a dog. Cats maybe. No, not cats either. For purely irrational, emotional reasons, I couldn't eat an animal I got to know either. That anthropomorphs them right off my menu.

 

[Dan From Smithville]

There are over 34 billion chickens in the world. Sometimes I wonder whether the species would survive if humans didn't have such a vested interest in breeding it.

A still prevalent attitude is if it gets in the way of building a subdivision, well, that was it's problem. Not an attitude I carry or promote, but I know of a few highly localized species that were extirpated as a side effect of development. It can go both ways it seems. Running buffalo clover was considered extinct until it was discovered preserved in somebodies lawn.

I don't know if chickens wouldn't still be around, but it has certainly helped the species in many ways to be of interest to people. I can think of few ways that this husbandry could be practiced more ethically though.

 

[Subduction Zone]

A still prevalent attitude is if it gets in the way of building a subdivision, well, that was it's problem. Not an attitude I carry or promote, but I know of a few highly localized species that were extirpated as a side effect of development. It can go both ways it seems. Running buffalo clover was considered extinct until it was discovered preserved in somebodies lawn.

I don't know if chickens wouldn't still be around, but it has certainly helped the species in many ways to be of interest to people. I can think of few ways that this husbandry could be practiced more ethically though.

I am pretty sure that the wild precursors of chickens still exist. But if I remember correctly chickens are a hybrid of some sort. Or else they have been with humans so long that they would be considered their own species.

 

[Revoltingest]

I took @Revoltingest's point to merely be about eating different species of animals.

This is correct.

 

[Father Heathen]

That's how you feel.
But fundamentally, why spare dogs from
this suffering, but not other cute animals?

5 Farm Animals That Are Probably Smarter Than Your Dog

If you knew that farm animals were as intelligent as your children or pets, would you stop eating meat? If you answered "yes," - it might be time to do so.

www.onegreenplanet.org

I still see this as merely a culture changing
to spare one animal at the expense of others.
Hardly a positive development...just a development.

I think it partially has to do with dog's being loyal, and of course treating them cruelly is a betrayal of that. I doubt that chickens, cows, etc. have the same level of depth or awareness when it comes to bonding, expressing empathy, experiencing emotion, etc.