Dogs + China = Complicated (Patreon)

Pets were actually banned during the dark days of China's communist revolutionary era (not that long ago) as they were seen as bourgeois.  

The growth of the middle class in China has seen an uptick in people accepting dogs as pets and it's really heartwarming to see the change of attitudes towards dogs (at least in the middle and upper classes of Chinese society).

I do however have a problem, a very, very big problem and that is compassion, I have compassion for people and animals, not an overly exaggerated amount, but I'd say on average a good dosage of compassion and that is why I've found it very difficult to separate the many, many individuals I've seen abusing animals in China from "Chinese people" as a whole, it's too easy to blanket an entire group of people based on the many, many barbaric actions of many unscrupulous and compassion devoid individuals I have personally seen in China.

#notall

I know how unfair and annoying it is to be labelled as XYZ based on the actions of other people that look similar to you or who come from the same place you do, but let's be honest here, if there's a stereotype or blanket label there's usually a reason for it, so when people find out that I'm a "white, South African" I can expect them to call me racist or think that I somehow benefited from the apartheid nonsense, I can jump up and down all day shouting that not all South Africans are racist, and there are huge class divides and even completely different cultures even within the white community (English, Afrikaans, Greek etc etc), high class, middle class, low class, rich, poor, etc etc, there are too many factors to be able to directly say "South Africans = racist" but you'd be correct saying that South Africans are racist because a lot of the time you would be right, there are a lot of racist South Africans (especially Julius Malema and the EFF).

So what does that have to do with Dogs and China? Simple, Chinese people eat dogs, not all of them and actually not even the majority, but it's common enough that you see dog meat restaurants in all Chinese cities, don't believe me? Go to Baidu maps and copy and paste “狗肉店” (dog meat restaurant) into the search bar, here are a few quick examples:

Beijing has a whole bunch of dog meat restaurants

Shanghai has a bunch too, but go out of those big international cities and the dog meat restaurants just suddenly jump, here's Changchun in Northern China (over 670 dog meat restaurants):

Then down South, a foreign favourite hangout city Xiamen:

Quite a lot of choice!

I could go on but it's pointless, you can find dog meat restaurants in every city in China, and the tired argument of "what's the difference between eating pigs, cows then?" can go to bed because pigs and cows are not deliberately tortured to death so that the meat is "more tender" and "tastes better", yes pigs and cows aren't treated in the most humane ways in the slaughterhouses, but if you've seen what I've seen people do to dogs in China you will literally shake the hands of the people who run the slaughter houses in the west and give them medals of humanity for using a bolt gun to the head rather than boiling and skinning the pigs and cows alive.... I know it sounds awful and it sounds like I'm exaggerating things here... but sadly I'm not... It's awful and something that any sort of sophisticated Chinese person is ashamed of, just as I am ashamed of my overly racist countrymen (they make me look bad) so are the middle and upper class Chinese people I know ashamed of the lower class people who eat dogs and condone the dog meat trade in China.

That's why I can understand when I get comments like the one above, I know how frustrating it is to be asked embarrassing questions like "do you eat dogs?" especially when you don't, it is infuriating and frustrating all at the same time, it's the same when Chinese people ask me why I'm not black because I'm South African or ask me if I can use chopsticks, but it's par for the course, rather than get upset I simply deflect and ask them if they can use a knife and fork or just laugh it off.... If I were a Chinese student being asked these stupid questions, I would simply say "yes, don't let me near your pet" or "no, do you?" some sort of nonsense or perhaps just ask them if they knew how ignorant they sounded asking such a stupidly stereotypical question.

I know I've been going on and on and been far too preachy in this patreon post, but please indulge me this one time as I have always been a dog person and this whole thing has been triggered by what's happening in Hangzhou right now, the city has banned walking your dog from 7pm to 7am and the middle class people are furious, rather than explain, Here's an article about it: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/11/16/world/asia/china-dog-hangzhou.html

Wow! Talk about Depressing! Sorry! I promise Wednesday's post will be a happy one as there are so many happy things happening in my life at the moment 

Love you all and can't wait to see you all in the next video!

- Stay Awesome!

SerpentZA