We are very proud to present to Abolitionist-Online readers our good friends from the International Aid for Korean Animals (IAKA) and Korean Animal Protection Society(KAPS), Kyenan and Sunnan Kum – sisters trying to abolish the industry in South Korea. Read their Interview here

Some background:  Every year, 3 million dogs and cats are slaughtered and consumed in South Korea. Slaughtering methods include hanging, electrocution and prolonged beatings with pipes and hammers.  Often cats are boiled alive, and dogs are routinely blow-torched alive to remove their fur and brown their skin.

This atrocious cruelty is encouraged by Korean dog-meat (boshintang) dealers who claim that the more the dog suffers on the way to her death, the tenderer her meat is. They claim dog meat has aphrodisiac properties and reduces sweating but research but ofcourse this is totally unfounded.  Dealers also perpetuate the myth that dog-meat stew is a thousand-old Korean “tradition”.  Yet the commercial trade of dogs for consumption began only around 1950, during the Korean war, when people faced starvation.  It expanded in the 1980’s, when a boom in the Korean economy made the once scarce “livestock” meats suddenly affordable.  At the time, the dog-meat trade involved only a handful of dealers who, fearing loss of business, quickly marketed dog-meat stew as a traditional “cure-all” health food.

Approximately 30 per cent of the dogs consumed every year are stolen companion animals, while the rest are bred by dog “farmers”, individuals who raise dogs as a side business.  Both the countries own breeds, the Jindogae and Sapsalgae dogs which are supposed to be preserved as national treasures, and foreign breeds such as Dalmatians, St Bernards and Collies are bred for the meat-market. Research has begun into crossbreeding horse genes with St Bernard genes to produce a 100kg “superdog” for the production of meat purposes.

Cat consumption is also relatively recent in South Korea.  Most of the cats consumed each year are trapped in crude wire cages.  Companion animals and strays alike are repeatedly bludgeoned with hammers or placed in sacks, which are then pounded on the ground.  Often, while still alive, the cats are thrown into large pots of boiling water and cooked with ginger, dates, and chestnuts until liquefied to a brown paste called Goyangi Soju, or “cat juice”, which dealers claim with cure rheumatism. 

Government Sponsored Cruelty:

Dog meat eating and cat juice drinking has encountered little impediment from the South Korean government.  A 1984 Ministry of Health law banning dog-meat stew as a “disgusting food” and Korea’s 1981 Animal Protection Law which bans cruelty to all animals have not been enforced to stop the trade.

Indeed, government officials play down the trade.  In a letter to us the Director of the Pharmaceutical and Food Policy Division of the Korean Health and Welfare Department claims that few Koreans do eat dog meat, and only usually during the summer-time. What is not mentioned is that dog meat is the fourth most popular meat in Korea.  The same official justifies the trade, claiming that “each country should not be judged by the norm of the other cultures but should be understood in the context of its own society”.

Given the horrific conditions in which western farmed cows, sheep, pigs and chickens live and die, and putting aside the horrific way South Korean dogs and cats meet their death, why is it that so many meat-eaters get upset at the thought of eating cats and dogs? 

Kyenan Kum, from the International Aid for Korean Animals (IAKA) offers this insight:

“While it may seem hypocritical for a meat-eater to denounce the practice of eating dog and cat meat, when we examine the history of the domestic cat and dog, we see that they have been kept as either working animals or human companions since being brought from the wild and domesticated.  Never in history have humans considered dogs and cats, or any other carnivorous animals for that matter, as livestock.  Historically, animals raised for consumption by humans have been primarily herbivores.  It may be a deep-rooted, instinctual aversion to eating our closest animal companions that drives carnivorous humans to find the notion of dog and cat consumption an anathema”.

 Claudette Vaughan, Australian IAKA representative had this to say:

“ The reason why certain animals such as cats and dogs are not consumed as food is not because, as commonly thought, they are companion animals and as such are held in great regard. It is because speciesistically the live animal provides a so-called “greater” service to humans than she would as a carcass in this scenario.”

PUBLIC CAMPAIGNS

Graphic undercover video documentation of widespread dog and cat torture has done much to incite animal advocacy organisations worldwide to demand an end to not only the torture and slaughter, but also the consumption of companion animals in South Korea.

Adverse world public opinion is needed. With this the Korean government will find it increasingly difficult to avoid dealing squarely with dog and cat consumption.

See:  www.koreananimals.org