In March 2015, the Humane Society International rescued 57 dogs from their unsanitary, harsh home, a dog meat farm in South Korea.
The dogs which have lived their whole lives on the farm, were rescued from a farm with deplorable living conditions. Multiple dogs shared small, dirty cages as they waited to be turned into dog meat for consumption.
They were brought to San Francisco, California, where the Emergency Placement Partners with The Humane Society of the United States will be taking in the dogs and helping them be adopted into loving families.
While Korea is not alone in its dog eating practices (boshintang), it is the only country to raise dogs on farms for the dog eating market. Other dog eating countries, such as Vietnam and China, generally eat stray dogs from the streets.
Netizens have reacted strongly to the situation, many speaking out against the harsh, unsanitary conditions the dogs were raised under, while others spoke out against the dog eating practices in general.
Check out some of their comments below:
1. [+1,995, -735] The comments here are such a mess and clearly don’t understand the pathetic conditions these dogs are being slaughtered under. Dogs raised for dog meat cannot be compared to cows, pigs, and chicken because they live in way cleaner and better managed environments and are slaughtered in the most humane way possible. The animal humane society is not putting down the consumption of meat but the environment they are being raised and slaughtered under and the people who are still willing to eat the meat. They’re not just hating on the ‘boshintang culture’ for the sake of it.
2. [+1,764, -745] As someone who is raising a dog… they seem to be animals capable of all sorts of emotions similar to humans. He knows what I hate and like and I feel an emotional connection to him. To think that dogs capable of all those emotions are being killed like that makes me feel bad. Dogs seem to relate to humans on a level different from chicken, pigs, and cows.
3. [+1,422, -992] Stop comparing this to eating pigs and dogs. We should all be trying to cut down meat consumption in general instead.
4. [+131, -113] Are dogs the only animals? Why are they taking dogs raised for boshintang? It’s like saying they stole chicken from Kentucky Fried Chicken and are raising it as pets now. You can’t be against dog meat without being against all meats -_-
5. [+123, -70] I bet they were all so proud of saving the dogs that they went out to celebrate at a steak and pork restaurant. I personally am against boshintang but I think it’s laughable how there’s bias on certain animals.
6. [+108, -42] The blame can be put on the dog lovers. It’s better to make dog meat legal so that there can be standardized laws that improve the environment these dogs are raised and slaughtered under but dog lovers keep going against it so dogs continue to live in these unsanitary environments.
7. [+103, -90] Can we please just stop eating dogs already. There are plenty of other things to eat now, stop arguing that it’s tradition with all this debate… There’s nothing traditional about it, it was simply another food source when times were tough and food was scarce. We have plenty of food now so we don’t need dog meat.
8. [+76, -30] The first comment seems true. This is not an issue of whether we should eat dog meat or not but whether these dogs are being raised and slaughtered in a sanitary and humane environment.
Source: SBS and Wall Street Journal
