|
HOME>RESOURCES>Online Resources |
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
RESOURCES >Videos
>Online Resources
>Webmaster Resources
>Press Resources
 Email this Page...
|
|
Let Us Now Kill All The DogsChina slaughters tens of thousands of canines with giant clubs. How appalling is it?SFGate.com, Wednesday, 9 August 2006 http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/g/a/2... Chinese officials killed 50,000 dogs the other day. Just walked along the streets and lured them out of their homes and bushes and doghouses using whistles and firecrackers and then clubbed them to death with giant sticks, right there in the residential streets, tossed the bodies into big dump trucks and drove on. It was a particularly horrific scene, seemingly unimaginable in our "enlightened" age, a fully sanctioned slaughter ordered up by the local Chinese government in response to the recent deaths of three local people felled by rabies. Without some sort of action, more people could die, the government deduced. Solution: Kill all the dogs. Problem solved, right? Well, not quite. Now another Shanghai prefecture has ordered the slaughter of all its dogs, too, in response to the rabies-related deaths of 16 people in the past eight months. This particular region has an estimated 500,000 dogs. No word yet on how it plans to kill them all, but the strolling-and-clubbing thing might be the only way, given how even Chinese citizens tend to be slightly uncooperative when it comes to giving up their pets for random government massacre in front of their very eyes. Chinese authorities fear a rabies epidemic. Already in China, upward of 2,000 people die per year from rabies (only 3 percent of China's dogs are vaccinated). It's a worsening problem. It is not, by most estimates, as potentially lethal as the bird flu epidemic, but it's still highly dangerous. Given how they say it's far too late (and far too expensive) to vaccinate all the dogs, the clearest way to stop the epidemic is, well, to kill all the dogs. Isn't it? There is nowhere to look for the right answer. How do you process this? How can you file such an unspeakably brutal and seemingly heartless approach? Maybe you are shaking your head in disbelief. Maybe you can't process it at all, but you must admit, it brings a up number of powerful -- and deeply revealing -- notions of just who we think we are. Start with the birds. Recent bird flu outbreaks prompted the slaughter of chickens all over Asia. In 1997, Hong Kong slaughtered 1.2 million chickens to try and stop the first big outbreak, but it was only the tip of the bloody iceberg. Asia (and to a lesser degree, Africa and India) have since slit the throats of hundreds of millions of birds to stop what some scientists see as the most deadly potential epidemic of this age. So, the obvious question: Was the poultry slaughter any less horrible than what's now happening to the dogs? More justifiable due to the potential for human loss? Maybe so. Or maybe it's simply because we love fuzzy cute dogs more than ugly dumb chickens. It is difficult to parse. Obviously, dogs are much less valued in China as pets, as creatures with soul, than they are in the United States. It is an ugly cultural divide we cannot easily traverse. By most estimates, China has a decidedly ruthless perspective on the animal kingdom. For one thing, a billion people with an enormous underclass of poverty translates into perhaps one of the most truly bizarre and massive food marketplaces in the world, one that would certainly make most Americans quite sick. Or instantly vegetarian. As my knowledgeable travel friends tell me (and many food shows and travel documentaries obviously prove), there is nothing on this planet quite like a Chinese "wet market" for experiencing the full, glistening, slimy array of the animal kingdom, all manner of parts and organs and skins and droppings and other ghastly unmentionables -- not to mention insects and sea creatures and freakishly colored squishy things few people seem to be able to clearly identify -- that can be eaten by humans. They eat everything. No animal is off limits, no body part impossible to skewer or steam or peel or eat raw while still warm from the body. And there are plenty of tales of what constitutes a food delicacy in China that may seem terribly weird or cruel to us. But overall, you can also argue that it's a very efficient and thorough system. Nothing is wasted. But wait. Is America really that much more evolved? Do we not kill millions of ill-bred, hormone-injected, mistreated animals every single day in giant industrial slaughterhouses to feed our gluttonous and largely toxic fast-food cravings? You bet we do. As for dogs, well, we love them to death: Our nation's overrun animal shelters kill an estimated 3 to 4 million dogs and cats per year due to overbreeding and puppy mills and ignorance of spaying and neutering. They're not even rabid. They are no threat whatsoever. You have to ask: Are we much better at our treatment of animals simply because we've learned to hide it better? Because most of us will never come anywhere near one of those gruesome industrial feedlots in, say, rural Kansas or Oklahoma, where they cram tens of thousands of cattle into concrete-enclosed pens and the air is so thick with fetid gasses and feces and smokestack spewings you can smell the stench 100 miles away? But hey, at least we don't club our dogs in the streets in broad daylight. We're not, you know, monsters. To be fair, many in China were outraged by the initial dog slaughter. The brutality, the primitive approach is simply unspeakable, even for a country known for its dispassionate look at the animal world. Then again, many said the mass slaughter was entirely appropriate. After all, 2,000 people died in one year. Of course, 2,000 also die every single day from government-sanctioned smoking addictions. But, you know, oh well. The wise ones say you can measure the wisdom and spiritual consciousness of a culture by how it treats its animals. But it's a strange maxim. It is a guideline that is nearly impossible to properly navigate in the modern world, no matter what the culture, simply because there are so many gross contradictions, from respectful and tender to absolutely ruthless and abusive. And it's not just China. And it's not merely animals. It is nothing new, this mass-slaughter idea, emerging from somewhere deep within our darkest and most mindless souls: Got a bad case of something? Problem with some sort of unwanted infestation? Mad cows? Killer bees? Dogs? Chickens? Gays? Jews? Kurds? Tibetans? Rwandans? Sudanese? Pagans? Witches? Communists? Native Americans? Serbs? Palestinians? Terrorists? That's easy: Kill 'em all. The method is, apparently, in our blood. We do it all the time. We know this much: There appears to be a line somewhere. We all seem to sense it, though no one can quite put a finger on it. We know this line speaks to us as a supposedly enlightened species, as the creatures with the most advanced brains and (presumably) most nimble and sophisticated souls. But if we're honest, it makes us all a little uneasy, a little uncomfortable as the line often seems to demarcate not how enlightened we are but how far we truly seem to be from any sort of true evolution or advancement of spirit. Because so far, the best we as a species seem to have come up with is this: Do not kill innocent things in broad daylight with large sticks. The rest is, to say the least, still more than a little murky.
What Others are Saying8 Comments Post Comment 1. Re: Let Us Now Kill All The DogsThe views expressed in the comments above are that of the internet public and are not neccessarily reflected by the philosophy of AAQ. Please report any abusive activity to webmistress(AT)animalactivism.org News Headlines on your Website Keep informed! Get the latest local animal rights news headlines on your website with live AAQ news feeds. << Return to News Archives Related News Articles 26 Jul The RSPCA Veggie-states. Members’ Crucial Cruelty-free Vote12 Jul Victoria's animal experiments skyrocket04 Jul Regulate animal surgical procedures30 Jun Mice can feel empathy, McGill study reveals25 May Dairy Council slams McCartney wife milk health claims25 May The monkeys wearing glasses to improve children's eyesight24 May China pledges to stop cat and dog fur trade22 May 7:30 Report: Philosopher Peter Singer spoke with Kerry O'Brien21 May Council bans animal-tested items16 May My Adventure Presenting Animal Rights Philosophy to the FBI29 Apr Activists protest against meat28 Apr Animal activists occupy abattoir28 Apr Animal liberation protesters call police for help28 Apr Security tight for World Meat Congress26 Apr Animal activists plan nude protest23 Apr Egg farmers seek compo over cages08 Apr Fearless cries from the wilderness24 Mar Red meat, red herring22 Mar Factory farming: A moraI issue11 Mar What's for bloody dinner?18 Feb Aussie icons behind bars24 Oct Animals in a horror world of our making20 Oct Dining with compassion13 Oct Fur flies for Pam11 Oct China bear bile farmer eaten by own animals08 Oct Fur she's a jolly good fellow16 Sep Stein attacks 'cruel' hen farming13 Sep RSPCA campaign targets live export, egg and pork industries11 Sep Pets need rescuing too08 Sep NYSE backs down in animal rights fight26 Aug Human Zoo Exhibit at London Zoo.20 Aug Animal rights protesters made bankrupt18 Aug Dogs used as shark bait11 Aug Decapitated Kangaroos Found on Australia Golf Course04 Aug Some vegetarians are queer fish01 Aug Is Meat Sustainable?21 Jul Asian Elephants Do Not Belong In Australian Zoos19 Jul Elephants 'losing tusks'07 Jul Burgers from a Lab? US Study Says it's Possible05 Jul Protesters strip against bull run05 Jul The knives are out27 Jun As the G8 global poverty debate hots up...26 Jun Pupils taught to eat whales25 Jun Sacrificed for science23 Jun Feral camel cull targets NT-SA border20 Jun Drug to fight bird flu pandemic useless: WHO10 Jun Animals Are Skinned Alive in China for Fur Export10 Jun War games are no fun for animals 08 Jun War games no fun for animals08 Jun Dumped livestock lands on Ras Al Khaimah beaches06 Jun America's War on Speech and the SHAC 7 Trial23 May Fear Factories: The Case for Compassionate Conservatism - for Animals26 Apr Australia announces wild camel cull31 Mar Call for seal hunt boycott28 Mar Raw food vegans thin but healthy, study finds26 Mar Take the club to seal hunt18 Mar Emotions high at animal farm06 Mar Sheep might be dumb ... but they're not stupid28 Feb Horns of a dilemma: bovines can have a cow of a day too11 Feb Elephant deaths spur new debate over U.S. zoos08 Feb Worms on a Hook Don't Suffer, Norway Experts Find08 Feb It's Fur Without Fear on New York Fashion Runways06 Feb Worst year for animal cruelty31 Jan Cats: Friend or Foe?31 Jan UK widens crackdown on animal rights extremists28 Jan UK Foxhunters Vow to Fight on After Court Loss25 Jan All About Eggs24 Jan Zoo animals die from keepers' mistakes10 Jan Chickens Bred for Meat Have a Friend at the EU08 Jan Tortoise adopts baby hippo05 Jan Canada's cowardly face04 Jan Acoustic senses may have saved animals in tsunami21 Dec Sri Lanka Culls Chickens, Tests For Bird Flu07 Dec Hackers Inject Truth into Inghams Website30 Nov Birdflu Far More Deadly Than SARS, WHO Says29 Nov Weaving uses voice to put animal rights centre stage28 Oct
Scientists find new human species27 Sep Meateaters 'consuming more water'28 Jun Hunters want bullet-proof body-armour02 Jun Animal cruelty sentences appealed27 May Oz to Attract Tourists – With Dead Kangaroos27 May Austria Enacts Strict Animal Rights Laws13 May Petition to Permanently Ban Recreational Duck & Quail Shooting in Queensland13 May Townsville Court Sentences Sanction Cruelty to Animals12 Feb Avian Influenza - Death Toll: 50 Million and Rising19 May WE WILL TURN VEGGIE BY 204724 Oct AAQ - Animal Rights Footage - Goldfinger, Arena
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
 |
|
|||||
 |
||||||
|
|