Opinion Express View on South Korea’s dog-meat ban: Something about dogs

What’s the difference — from an objective moral lens — between pigs and goats and dogs? They all walk on four legs, they were domesticated by humans. As far as intelligence and emotion are concerned, the jury is out — pigs, especially, can be quite bright. The answer, perhaps, lies in what Jules Winnfield (Samuel Jackson) said to Vincent Vega (John Travolta) in Pulp Fiction: “… dogs got personality, personality goes a long way.” It may well be that the undeniable charm of the Canis Familiaris has led to centuries of culinary tradition being upended in South Korea. Earlier this month, the country passed a law banning the breeding, slaughter and sale of dog meat.

Over the years, there has been much international criticism of South Korea’s consumption of dogs. The culinary practice, though, has been on the decline, limited now largely to older people, nostalgic for a traditional meal. Activists have highlighted the cruelty dogs bred for meat are subjected to, from unhygienic living conditions and life in cages to disease and deprivation. There have also been high-profile supporters of the ban. President Yoon-suk Yeol and First Lady Kim Keon are family to many fur balls and made their opposition to the consumption of dogs well known.

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Yet, is there a germane difference between the cruelty that canines face in South Korea and other animals bred for food? The answer is important, especially in contexts where policing dietary choices is often a weapon against the weak. The difference between dogs and cows, pigs, goats and sheep, is that dogs were not domesticated — at least not widely — for food. In fact, there is research to show that humans as we know them — with language and emotion — evolved with and even through dogs, in a sort of emotional symbiosis. Or maybe that’s just what people tell themselves as they stare into puppy eyes while enjoying lamb chops.