Pets or Meat?

[Glen Miyashiro]

I was tempted to put this in the Kaukau Korner, but that would just be naughty.

So now the Legislature wants to outlaw the eating of dog and cat meat (HB 866, SB 1026). The Advertiser and the Star-Bulletin are both all for it. So why does all this moralizing make me queasy?

I don't eat dogs or cats. I have pet dogs and wouldn't eat them. It's already against the law to be cruel to animals, but we still slaughter and eat fish, and chickens, and ducks, and cows, and pigs, and lots of other animals. If other people want to eat dog, I can't see why I should tell them no. Why is it necessary to make a law outlawing this practice just because some people find it icky?

[1stwahine]

Re: Pets or Meat?

Glen, I never thought of it that way...I love your question. I, on the other hand think their idiots (Legislators) to be discussing it in the first place. Frogs then now this. Auwe!

I never ate cat but unbeknonst by me growing-up, I ate "DOG MEAT". (cough,cough) My older siblings would start going "woof,woof" when I would pass them. I finally caught on what they ment.

[Miulang]

Re: Pets or Meat?

It is rather odd that this would crop up now. I have seen ordinances where it was illegal to traffic in stolen pets for resale to test labs, but not one in this country where it was illegal for humans to eat cats or dogs.

Maybe it's the Legislature's intent to state the obvious for the recent immigrants who might not realize that in this culture, eating domestic pets is frowned upon?

I know this culinary habit is practiced quite widely in Southeast Asia and lately there have been stories coming out of places like South Korea where animal activists are trying to get people to stop this practice.

Miulang

http://216.110.171.197/01/6/koreaShame0601.html

[pzarquon]

Re: Pets or Meat?

This is basically a solution in search of a problem, and a headline-hogging issue when there are many more important problems out there waiting to be tackled.

If you're worried about someone else stealing your dog or cat to eat it, then rest assured that existing laws covering theft will already provide all the legal backing you need to discourage and punish them.

If you're trying to prevent undue cruelty and abuse of these animals, then rest assired that, again, there are laws to this effect, laws that are still occasionally enforced.

If you're trying to protect dogs and cats as domesticated animals, thereby affording them a special class separate from, say, rabbits or iguanas or pigeons... then you've got a problem. What makes them so special? The fact that we think they're cute? We slaughter and grind up cows by the thousands and sell them at Costco, treating them as a commodity when some other cultures treat them as sacred. it's all relative.

Conceivably, you could go to a pet store, buy a fish, fry it up and eat it. (Whether you'd want to is a separate issue.) Presumably a purebred terrier would be too expensive for such a fate, but... if you paid for it...

Unless you're seriously advocating mandatory veganism, pushing this is ridiculous.

[Glen Miyashiro]

Re: Pets or Meat?

Considering the objections that the dog-meat critics have raised, I don't think this law is the right way to address them.

It's cruel. The only cruel parts are up to the point that the animal is DEAD. After that, it's "abusing a dead animal's carcass" or something like that. Once he is dead, I don't think Fido really cares whether or not you cut him up for filets. Sure, you don't want to kill the animal in an inhumane fashion (whatever that means). So use the same standards as for how we kill livestock.

It's inapppropriate for residential areas. Sure, I wouldn't want my neighbor killing his dog in the back yard, because it would be noisy and stinky, and there'd be blood all over the place, and it would really upset my dogs to boot. But then again, he isn't allowed to slaughter a cow in the back yard, either.

It's unhealthy. If there are concerns about unsanitary slaughtering conditions, or about unhealthy meat (parasites, etc.) then there should be Agriculture Department requirements, like they have for regular slaughterhouses.

It's abhorrent. Ahh, now we're getting to the real meat of the matter, aren't we? People just think it's gross and disgusting. Well, correct me if I 'm wrong but I don't think that it's illegal to kill and eat a cow in India, or a pig in Saudi Arabia, as much as most residents of those countries would retch at the thought. Why is it so important that we should be more restrictive than other countries in this area?

[Glen Miyashiro]

Re: Pets or Meat?

Heh. I usually don't read the Advertiser's discussion boards, so I didn't see that this was hashed out over there in detail last Friday already. Bungahead over there made another interesting point:

The proposed law is unconstitutional under the Hawaii State Constitution.

Article XII, Section 7 states as follows:

TRADITIONAL AND CUSTOMARY RIGHTS

Section 7. The State reaffirms and shall protect all rights, customarily and traditionally exercised for subsistence, cultural and religious purposes and possessed by ahupua'a tenants who are descendants of native Hawaiians who inhabited the Hawaiian Islands prior to 1778, subject to the right of the State to regulate such rights. [Add Const Con 1978 and election Nov 7, 1978]

Ancient Native Hawaiians regularly consumed dogs, along with pigs.

[Miulang]

Re: Pets or Meat?

That is true. The kanaka maoli did eat dog. So would this proposed law supercede the religious beliefs of the kanaka maoli? And if the 1978 law has priority, then wouldn't it be discriminating against the Koreans and Southeast Asians who also eat cat and dog?

Miulang